Abstract
Patricia Pender announces at the start of her monograph that the majority of her academic career has been dedicated to thinking, arguing, and writing about the American television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003). She has not only studied the show for the past twenty years, the length of its existence, but also its earlier 1992 film incarnation (directed by Fran Rubel Kuzui). Thus, Pender presents herself as an expert on Buffy from the outset.
A senior lecturer in English at the University of Newcastle, Australia, Pender’s areas of specialization are feminist theory and history. She is also on the editorial board of Slayage, an academic journal dedicated to scholarly investigations of Buffy as well as creator Joss Whedon’s other works. Pender’s other two books are Early Modern Women’s Writing and the Rhetoric of Modesty (2012) and Material Cultures of Early Modern Women’s Writing (2014), coauthored with Ros Smith.
In June 2012, Slate magazine declared Buffy the most written-about popular culture text of all time, and with copious amounts of academic journal articles, conference presentations and books dedicated to the show, one may wonder if there remains anything new to say about it. Pender aims to “produce a more sustained, nuanced and critical gender analysis of the series than is yet available.” Not only are there abundant writings on Buffy, but several are also from I.B. Tauris, including Reading the “Vampire Slayer”: The New, Updated, Unofficial Guide to “Buffy” and “Angel” (2003) edited by Roz Kaveney and Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Rhonda V. Wilcox (2005), who is especially regarded as a leading scholar on the show. However, Pender does indeed advance the study of Buffy, particularly with her chapters on the show’s masculinity.
With plentiful studies covering Angel and Spike, Pender focuses instead on less popular and lesser known characters Riley Finn and Andrew Wells. Interestingly, she argues that Riley is “designed to be deliberately and provocatively underwhelming,” which is how he was viewed by fans and by his fellow characters. She suggests that this was, in part, due to the actorly skills of Marc Blucas and his portrayal of Riley’s hegemonic masculinity. Her contrasting discussion of Andrew’s obviously closeted homosexuality, never explicitly stated in the show, and his attempts at appearing heteronormative also works extremely well. Chapter 7, perhaps the most accessible chapter, concerns Buffy’s fandom and the afterlife of the show via DVD and the Internet, allowing it to be accessed and consumed when desired. This chapter also touches on concept of scholars as both academics and fans, and the precarious place occupied when combining these roles.
The book’s structure results in its flowing very well and, as each chapter focuses on a different aspect of contemporary feminist theory, together they have a clear agenda which is successfully executed by Pender. Although this is a book about a television series, there is very little textual analysis of the show itself; instead broader themes are investigated throughout, including placing the study of Buffy within the wider feminist fields of girl studies, television studies, and postfeminism. In addition, there is a strong focus on third-wave and transnational feminism, masculinity, fan studies, and queer theory. Thus, while the author suggests that her monograph is suitable for both scholars and more general fans, it is doubtful that a lay audience would understand much of the book’s content without some prior academic knowledge, and it seems predominantly aimed at scholars or, at the very least, undergraduate students of popular culture studies and gender theory. Perhaps some of the later chapters could be understood and enjoyed by a more general audience; but there remain numerous popular writings on the show that would cater much better to the needs of fans wishing more information.
The first chapter deals with binaries arising within the show, mainly the overarching theme of good versus evil, but also its consistent play with seriousness and silliness. Pender analyses this through the lens of the show’s gender dynamics and its parodying of these binaries. Chapter 2 then discusses Buffy within its historical context of late 1990s America, when “adolescent girls were achieving new social, political and cultural visibility,” placing it within the many sociological studies on girlhood that emerged at this time. There then follows a focus on third-wave feminism, a movement wishing to “reconcile the political agenda of second-wave feminism with the critique of White racial privilege by women of colour,” before looking at the show in relation to Whiteness and female emancipation. Indeed, for the most part Buffy’s is a White-centric world, with its main characters all markedly White. One exception is the brief appearance of Black Slayer Kendra, but this character only survives for three episodes.
The author backs up her claims throughout with an ample amount of accompanying notes, as well as a weighty bibliography showing her dedication and the extent of her research. As Pender suggests at the end of Chapter 2, “we should not dismiss popular culture forms too readily because they often contain liberating or emancipatory messages that are not immediately apparent,” a key message we can take away from studying Buffy the Vampire Slayer.