Compiled for students and fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the book is an exhaustive listing of the pop-culture references that pop up throughout the show, peppered with trivia, music, episode cross-references, and much more. It provides hours of trivia-obsession for fans of Buffy, Willow, Xander, Spike, Angel, and the rest of the Sunnydale residents.
The second edition adds a section on the unaired “Pitch Pilot,” episode arcs for character relationships, and about 30% more pop-culture references. Inside this book are 314 pages of:
- Episode arcs – 13 pages of episode arcs, showing viewing maps of the minimum episodes to watch to get the stories for Buffy, Xander, Willow, Giles, Angel, Spike, Anya, and various relationships.
- Overviews – One-page overviews of each season plus brief overviews of each episode.
- Pop-culture references – Per-episode documentation of the show’s more than 1000 pop-culture references: who said it, what they said, and what the heck they were referring to.
- Cross references – 190 cross-references to other episodes, including references to “Angel.”
- Music – 140 listings of the music heard in the episodes and performed in The Bronze (Here are some links to Buffy Music MP3s).
- Trivia – 70 trivia items listed with their respective episodes.
- Character tables (1 for each season) – Tables listing the characters in each season, showing in which episodes the characters are introduced, appear, or leave the series.
- Writers and directors – Tables listing the writers and directors and the episodes they worked on.
- Characters and actors – Alphabetized table of all the characters and actors, with over 200 entries.
- Huge index – Topping off this guide is a robust, academic-quality 43-page index with more than 2,500 entries on episodes, bands, cultural references, episode cross references, and more.
This book gives you all the answers to questions like:
- In which episode is Xander’s reference to the film Cannibal: the Musical (Shpadoinkle!)?
- In which episode does Spike first come to Sunnydale?
- In which episode does Buffy finally tells the Watcher’s Council that without her, they might as well be watching Masterpiece Theater?
New in the second edition is a listing of the music heard in the show — the music performed in the Bronze and the background music. There were a few attempts at soundtracks for the show, but there’s no single source for all the music. Visit the next best thing to a soundtrack: my page of links to Buffy Music MP3s available from Amazon and iTunes.
There be spoilers ahead!
The Gentleviewer’s Obsessive Guide to Buffy the Vampire Slayer should provide hours of fun for Trivial Pursuit enthusiasts as well as fans of Buffy, the other residents of Sunnydale, and the genius of Joss Whedon. But be warned that this book is basically comprised entirely of spoilers.
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Published by Paisley Publications, March 2014, 314 pages, Paperback binding, US$18.00, ISBN: 978-0-9851600-1-2
The first edition of this book included these color illustrations. These are not included in later editions.