Free Joss Whedon: The Genius Behind Buffy by Candace Havens

going to go,” Whedon tells. “A scene that starts out very dramatically could end up quite funny, or something truly horrible could happen in it. So it’s not sort of, oh, here’s the funny part, here’s the scary part; we really never know what’s going to be highlighted.”
    Whedon was more surprised than anyone that the WB let him get away with his style of storytelling. From the beginning, the network let Joss do what he felt was needed. There were a few arguments with Standards and Practices about certain jokes and some of the sexuality, but for the most part he was able to get away with, well, murder.
    “We have had a long and good relationship with the network,” says Whedon, “and they believed in what we were trying to do. We really couldn’t have asked for more support in the beginning. This was a tough show to support and there really wasn’t anything like it. Fox was doing the scary thing with The X-Files , but our show is more of a reach in a lot of ways. It wasn’t easy to promote or market . . . It’s an edgy show and unconventional.
    “It’s strange how all the pieces fall together for some shows and not others. I can’t explain why, but sometimes it just works.”
    It certainly does work, and Whedon and his team have managed to integrate these seven elements to create a fan base whose size and enthusiasm haven’t been matched since the early days of Star Trek .

5
     
    Seven Seasons of Buffy
     
    “My girlfriend’s been dead for like six episodes and she keeps coming back. I dont think dying means a whole lot on this show. Maybe on ER.”
    —Adam Busch
     
     
    F or seven seasons, Buffy the Vampire Slayer has enthralled, delighted and infuriated fans. For all the variety of Joss Whedon’s projects, the seven seasons of Buffy remain Joss’ most influential and important body of work to date. This chapter explores, season by season, the process by which Joss developed his masterwork over the years. Focus is on the overall story arcs developed by Whedon and on the specific episodes that he wrote and directed.

S eason one
     
    As a midseason replacement show, Buffy was given the go ahead to create twelve episodes in the first season (as opposed to the usual 22 for a full season). Its renewal far from assured, Joss created a self-contained story arc twelve episodes long, beginning with Buffy’s arrival in a new school and concluding with Buffy’s final confrontation with the Master in episode twelve.
    The opening two-parter, Welcome to the Hellmouth and The Harvest , was written by Whedon, who painstakingly oversaw every aspect of its production. Combined, these episodes make up almost ninety minutes of television and were an opportunity, in a sense, to remake the Buffy movie and do it right. Whedon, who had become accustomed to writing for big-budget movies, had to adjust to the limitations of his budget. On the Buffy season one DVD, Whedon talks the listener through the making of these first two episodes. What comes across most powerfully is Joss’s continual realization that his big budget ideas would have to give way to the reality of his limited means.
    But he didn’t chafe under these restrictions; he almost seemed to welcome them. He quickly found that a small budget he could control was far better than an enormous budget that he couldn’t. And Joss’s focus on story and character made the budget limitations less important. He made the best of it, even declaring the small budget to be an asset to the show. “There’s this thing called a budget you have to work and I think it makes you much more creative when you have a small one to work with. It forces you to concentrate on the story. I say this all the time but usually one or two vampires will work just as well as 100 if the story is good.”
    These two episodes embody almost everything Whedon was trying to accomplish with Buffy. These episodes succeed at what he calls his “genre-busting mission,” successfully integrating