1x01 Welcome to the Hellmouth (1)

[5.9/10] Mrs. Bloom and I rewatched the pilot to Buffy the Vampire Slayer in honor of the 20th anniversary of the show’s debut, and boy do you feel the fact that it’s 1997 when revisiting “Welcome to Helmouth.” BtVS is one of those foundational shows for me. I didn’t really grow up with it, but it still made such an impact on me when I first watched the series that it’s colored almost every show I’ve watched since. Serialization, maturity, dialogue, character arcs, balancing drama and comedy – there’s nothing this show couldn’t and didn’t pull off. But the pilot is a reminder that even an all-timer like Buffy took a little while to find its voice.

Though, oddly enough, that’s one of the few things in “Hellmouth” that feels pretty well-formed right from the beginning. Joss Whedon’s trademark patter is out in full force and though the cast hasn’t quite acclimated to spitting it out yet, the lines themselves are as recognizable in Season 1 as they are in Season 7. Sure, there’s some awkward bits, like the two random girls in the lockerroom exchanging stilted slang, but for the most part, it’s clear that in the show’s early-going, the playful back-and-forth between all the characters is what set the show apart.

Particular kudos are owed to Anthony Stewart Head, the actor who plays Giles, who has probably the most thankless task and yet who pulls it off with seeming ease. More than anyone else in “Hellmouth,” Giles has to deliver the exposition, the premise, the infodumps that set all of this slaying up, and he does it with a sense of urgency, concern, and a hint of creepiness that helps the medicine go down.

Sarah Michelle Gellar and the rest of the young cast does an admirable job for a first outing, but they seem much more clunky and mannered rattling off the teenspeak. Gellar in particular doesn’t quite seem comfortable yet, leaning a bit too far into the valley girl patois and not really nailing the emotions from moment to moment. Still, she’s serviceable at worst, which is more than can be said for the likes of David Boreanaz’s Angel in his opening frame.

While the show would gain notoriety for the way it took the heightened reality of a genre show and played the consequences of it straight, here BtVS pretty well embraces the camp of it all. The Master has the tone of a B-movie villain to begin with (in keeping with series’s cinematic roots), and the candles and blood and nightmares all point in the same Saturday afternoon movie feel of this episode.

The same goes for the teens, who replicate the usual dynamic of popular kids and nerds and less-than-smooth dudes trying to get the girl. Cordelia is a total archetype in the early going. Xander gets some good lines, but also fills a typical role (one essentially duplicated by Jesse, which should have been a clue). Really only Willow jumps the gun by seeming like more than the sum of her clichés. Sure, she’s still clearly the nerd, but the exchanges with Buffy give her an earnest flavor all her own, and the fact that she rolls with Buffy’s “seize the moment” speech already gives her a malleability and room for growth missing in most of her compatriots in the show’s first hour.

Still, there are signs of things to come. Whedon opens the show with a subversion. The nervous little blonde girl asks the dark-clad bad boy if what they’re doing is okay, and seems scared at the shadows around every corner, only to reveal that she’s the thing that goes bump in the night. It’s not the best-acted scene ever put on film, but it’s a sign right from the jump that this was going to be a show that defies your expectations.

By the same token, “Hellmouth” introduces a theme that will be with BtVS until the very end – the burden of being the chosen one. Whedon wisely chooses to dispense with an origin story, instead giving of just enough detail of the broad strokes backstory from the movie to let us know that this isn’t Buffy’s first rodeo but that she’s trying to put the whole vampire slaying thing behind her.

Of course, if she managed that, there wouldn’t really be a show, so naturally there’s rumblings of a big danger coming, and ominous warning, and foreboding dreams to suggest that she can’t just put away her stakes and focus on making friends just yet. Still, the fact that she wants to, that she’s feeling pressure from her mother and the awkwardness of being new and just wants to try to have a life immediately gives the show a bit of depth despite its “office Halloween party” soundtrack and mood lighting.

It also introduces the show’s early central conceit – the notion of teenage fears and anxieties manifested as supernatural threats. It’s not quite as one-to-one as later plots like a girl who feels invisible turning invisible, but there’s the sense that Buffy is feeling the nudge from her mother on the one hand, urging her to straighten up and fly right, and the nudge from her surrogate father on the other, urging her to fulfill her mystical responsibilities. All the while, she just wants to try to live her life and make friends and be normal.

It mirrors the sense in which teenager feel overwhelmed, pulled in different directions by the adults in their life, and want to set aside responsibilities to just try to fit in. Sure, most of us don’t have to go stalking in the night to try to slay vampires at the same time we’re trying to meet up with new pals at a very 90s club, but it’s representative of the sorts of pressures that almost all young adults face.

That’s what recommends this show and helps cut through the eye-roll-worthy cheese that permeates this opening salvo. It’s easier to look back on this pilot having watched the full run of the show and see it laying the foundation for where the series would eventually go. Seeing this episode for the first time, I understand my original reaction to it, one of bewilderment that this was the beginning of something so hallowed when it was mired in teen tropes and generic figures. But watching it now, I notice all the little ways it laid the groundwork for who Buffy was, for where everyone fit into her world, and for the unique challenges she faced, challenges that would be with her from the beginning to the end.

I was born in 1996. So, pretty much since I was able to sit up and watch TV I've been watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And 25 years later this is still a phenomenal TV Series worth every bit of the praise it gets.

This first episode not only sets up the background for who Buffy is, why she's at a new school, and what she's destined for in the future of the series, but it also gives an authentic and hilarious introduction to all of the characters.

It does heavily portray the characters based on typical high school stereotypes - the 'popular girl' acts entitled and rude to anyone 'below her,' the 'nerdy smart kid' gets picked on constantly, etc. - and Buffy is stuck in the middle of it, trying to figure out who everyone is while also trying to keep her life on track (and away from the undead.) And that makes her relatable.

I'm really looking forward to this rewatch of the series. The last time I watched Buffy I was in middle school, so it's been many many years since then. All of the nostalgia has already come rushing in, but in many ways I'm also watching with new eyes and a completely different perspective and I'm looking forward to what that will bring me.