The Watcher's Guide : Volume 3

Rating:
Summary: Nice to own, most disappointing volume.
Review: After the first two Watcher's Guides were must-own volumes, I assumed that the author(s) and the publishers were looking to finish their BtVS guides with a bang.

Not really the case.

At best this book limps along, the main author's clear bias to certain relationships incredibly evident.

It lacks the things that made the first two volumes great -- the special features, if you will. There's no character guides, no quote sections, no extensive interviews with the cast and crew. Yes, it has critical(?) essays. But most of the time the writers come off as either self-important or childish.

Yes, I own this volume, but were the first volume this disappointing I wouldn't have purchased subsequent books.

Rating:
Summary: More of the same for the final Watcher's Guide but also less
Review: First, for those who were wondering, this is the third and final volume in "The Watcher's Guide," the official companion to the late and lamented television cult show "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." Whereas the first two volumes dealt with a pair of seasons of the series, Volume 3 covers the final three seasons of "BtVS." Again you will find each episode covered in terms of writer(s) and director, complete cast list of guest stars and co-stars, Plot Summary, Quote of the Week, Love in Vein (keeping track of the complicated and often disastrous love lives of the Scooby gang), Pop-Culture IQ (explaining the popular pop-culture references embedded in the episode), Continuity (covering the twists and turns in the Buffyverse), Dramatis Personae (tracking the key personality traits in the main characters), and From the Original Teleplay (dialogue and humorous stage directions cut from the episode). At the start of each season there are a page of freeze frames from all twenty-two episodes; a list of episode numbers, names and original U.S. airdates, and the stars listed in the opening credits. In between seasons six and seven you will find a section devoted to the "Pop Culture Explosion" in season six when the Trio worked in all those references to movies, television, comic books, "Star Wars," "Star Trek," and anything else that came into their warped little minds.

However, fans of the first two volumes of "The Watcher's Guide" are probably going to be disappointed by what else is in this volume. In comparison to what we have seen before, the information about "BtVS" is considerably less. There are neither character guides nor cast profiles, or sections by the writers or crew (and the spine is blue rather than black, as long as we are talking about differences). The rest is that by the standard established by the previous volumes of "The Watcher's Guide" this third one will suffer in comparison and long time fans are going to be disappointed. However, that does not stop "The Watcher's Guide, Volume 3" from being a necessary part of our "BtVS" library.

Volume 3 is put together by Paul Ruditis, who previously put together a "Star Trek: Voyager Companion" and has written novels for the television shows "Enterprise," "Charmed," and "Sabrina." Ruditis does the duty alone, which may explain why the second half of the book comes off in a new direction. The second half of the book consists of a series of essays devoted to the series as whole and not just on the final trio of seasons: Ginger Buchanan's "The Journey of Joanathan Levenson: From Scenery to Sacrifice" covers the interesting transformation of a recurring minor character into a "Superstar" and much more. Hank Wagner's The Family Hour" talks about how he shared watching "BtVS" with his children and finds deep thoughts in the series with regards to parenting.

Rob Francis' "London Calling: 'Buffy' from a British Perspective" explains the show's popularity in the U.K. despite having some American actors playing some of the Brits. Maryelizabeth Hart, who helped out on Volume 2, contributes "Slaying the Big Lies: Love Conquers All and Other Monstrous Myths," which looks at how love never seems to work out in the Buffyverse. Allie Costa's "A Part of Something: Or, 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer': My First Long-Term Relationship," is a fan's recollection of being a fan. Scott and Denise Ciencin, "I Know You Are, But Who Am I?" provides an analysis of how Dawn fit into the show over this period. In "Why I Like 'Buffy'" Charles de Lint provides a justification for liking a show with such a weird title, which is certainly something those of us in academia can relate to in terms of trying to foist the show off on students and colleagues. James Moore's "Monsters Made to Order" briefly looks at the similar themes behind key monsters in the show's history.

The chief attraction in the back of the book is "'Restless': A Path to Premonitions," which has Joss Whedon's teleplay for the finale episode of the fourth season with commentary by Ruditis focusing on how Whedon set the stage for some key developments in what followed. For those of us who have figured out most of the connections, Ruditis does a nice job of filling in the gaps in our deconstruction of the episode. The final offering is Micol Ostow's "'Chosen': A Postmodern Postmortem of 'Buffy' as Contemporary Icon" looks at how well Whedon fulfilled his purpose of establishing a pop culture icon by flipping the horror movie standard of the blonde girl being slain by the monster in the dark alley.

Given all the academic collections being published about "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" these essays are relatively light reading. Buchanan's essay connects all the dots with regards to Jonathan as do the Ciencins with Dawn, and Francis uses interviews with cast members to provide more of what we expect to find in the back of a "Watcher's Guide." So overall the essays occupy a sort of dead zone in between the musings of doctors of philosophy that are out there and the behind the scenes information we were used to in the previous pair of volumes. Again, the only complain here is that there is less here than what we expected. This is probably our payback for suggesting maybe there was too much in Volume 2. That would teach us except that the series and these guides are obviously both over.

Rating:
Summary: More of the same for the final Watcher's Guide but also less
Review: First, for those who were wondering, this is the third and final volume in "The Watcher's Guide," the official companion to the late and lamented television cult show "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." Whereas the first two volumes dealt with a pair of seasons of the series, Volume 3 covers the final three seasons of "BtVS." Again you will find each episode covered in terms of writer(s) and director, complete cast list of guest stars and co-stars, Plot Summary, Quote of the Week, Love in Vein (keeping track of the complicated and often disastrous love lives of the Scooby gang), Pop-Culture IQ (explaining the popular pop-culture references embedded in the episode), Continuity (covering the twists and turns in the Buffyverse), Dramatis Personae (tracking the key personality traits in the main characters), and From the Original Teleplay (dialogue and humorous stage directions cut from the episode). At the start of each season there are a page of freeze frames from all twenty-two episodes; a list of episode numbers, names and original U.S. airdates, and the stars listed in the opening credits. In between seasons six and seven you will find a section devoted to the "Pop Culture Explosion" in season six when the Trio worked in all those references to movies, television, comic books, "Star Wars," "Star Trek," and anything else that came into their warped little minds.

However, fans of the first two volumes of "The Watcher's Guide" are probably going to be disappointed by what else is in this volume. In comparison to what we have seen before, the information about "BtVS" is considerably less. There are neither character guides nor cast profiles, or sections by the writers or crew (and the spine is blue rather than black, as long as we are talking about differences). The rest is that by the standard established by the previous volumes of "The Watcher's Guide" this third one will suffer in comparison and long time fans are going to be disappointed. However, that does not stop "The Watcher's Guide, Volume 3" from being a necessary part of our "BtVS" library.

Volume 3 is put together by Paul Ruditis, who previously put together a "Star Trek: Voyager Companion" and has written novels for the television shows "Enterprise," "Charmed," and "Sabrina." Ruditis does the duty alone, which may explain why the second half of the book comes off in a new direction. The second half of the book consists of a series of essays devoted to the series as whole and not just on the final trio of seasons: Ginger Buchanan's "The Journey of Joanathan Levenson: From Scenery to Sacrifice" covers the interesting transformation of a recurring minor character into a "Superstar" and much more. Hank Wagner's The Family Hour" talks about how he shared watching "BtVS" with his children and finds deep thoughts in the series with regards to parenting.

Rob Francis' "London Calling: 'Buffy' from a British Perspective" explains the show's popularity in the U.K. despite having some American actors playing some of the Brits. Maryelizabeth Hart, who helped out on Volume 2, contributes "Slaying the Big Lies: Love Conquers All and Other Monstrous Myths," which looks at how love never seems to work out in the Buffyverse. Allie Costa's "A Part of Something: Or, 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer': My First Long-Term Relationship," is a fan's recollection of being a fan. Scott and Denise Ciencin, "I Know You Are, But Who Am I?" provides an analysis of how Dawn fit into the show over this period. In "Why I Like 'Buffy'" Charles de Lint provides a justification for liking a show with such a weird title, which is certainly something those of us in academia can relate to in terms of trying to foist the show off on students and colleagues. James Moore's "Monsters Made to Order" briefly looks at the similar themes behind key monsters in the show's history.

The chief attraction in the back of the book is "'Restless': A Path to Premonitions," which has Joss Whedon's teleplay for the finale episode of the fourth season with commentary by Ruditis focusing on how Whedon set the stage for some key developments in what followed. For those of us who have figured out most of the connections, Ruditis does a nice job of filling in the gaps in our deconstruction of the episode. The final offering is Micol Ostow's "'Chosen': A Postmodern Postmortem of 'Buffy' as Contemporary Icon" looks at how well Whedon fulfilled his purpose of establishing a pop culture icon by flipping the horror movie standard of the blonde girl being slain by the monster in the dark alley.

Given all the academic collections being published about "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" these essays are relatively light reading. Buchanan's essay connects all the dots with regards to Jonathan as do the Ciencins with Dawn, and Francis uses interviews with cast members to provide more of what we expect to find in the back of a "Watcher's Guide." So overall the essays occupy a sort of dead zone in between the musings of doctors of philosophy that are out there and the behind the scenes information we were used to in the previous pair of volumes. Again, the only complain here is that there is less here than what we expected. This is probably our payback for suggesting maybe there was too much in Volume 2. That would teach us except that the series and these guides are obviously both over.

Rating:
Summary: Must NOT Have, I wouldn't have given the one star to it!
Review: Here's my reasons:

a) claims that Buffy doesn't love Spike

b) claims that Buffy said "I love you" to Spike out of pity

c) two pics of tongueless B/A kiss

d) no pic or mention of B/S' burning handclasp

e) essay on how B/A is true love and Spike could never get Buffy to love him


Rating:
Summary: Where was the Slayer when this book was made?
Review: I had looked forward to the third installment of the series Watcher's Guides for quite sometime and when it came out I ordered it right away...BIG MISTAKE!

Quite on the contrary to the first 2 Watcher's Guide Volumes, this book has NO CHARACTER GUIDE or Bio Guide, my 2 favorite parts! The "Restless" episode teleplay is interesting but, i would have given that up in a second for the character giude.

The Episode Guide is done well but I expect a well done episode guide, that's why i'm buying this book. I could easily live without the essays wich are basically there to take up room, and speaking of room, the Watcher's Guide Volume 2 (containing two seasons) is thicker than The Watcher's Guide Volume 3 (containing THREE SEASONS! ~what's up with that?)

A big let-down for all Buffy Fans and the end of the series. I just hope that the new Angel Casefiles will be better, which is sadly also going to be done by Paul Ruditis who I am ashamed of.

Rating:
Summary: Put A Stake Through Volume III
Review: I should have known...Volume III of the television series companion for Buffy The Vampire Slayer, was written by Paul Ruditis, who also wrote the rather bland Star Trek: Voyager episode guide.

The book covers seasons 5 through 7 of the show. First, I don't know why the publisher decided to change the format of the book. Volumes 1 and 2 were clearly written with the fan in mind. Packed with fun, the previous installments had a zippy text that covered, not only what happened in front of the camera, but also gave readers a peek behind the scenes. Ruditis, just as he did in the Voyager book, keeps that to a minimum. Sure, we get excerpts of dialogue cut from every episode and a diconstruction of the script for season 4's "Restless", which forshadowed events that occured throughout the rest of the series--but most of this comes across as filler. The songs section is totally excised in favor of a series of essays written as tributes to the show by various contributors. While the essays work in theory, they still seem out of place, like they belong elsewhere in another book. Christopher Golden, Nancy Holder, and the other contributors for the other guides, matched the show's hip style easily. Here though, volume III is a lot like how Buffy was when she came back from the dead. Comming off the paradise of the other guides, this book is cold, distant, and removed.

The 359 page book has dozens of black and white photos as well as 12 pages of color photos. I wish Ruditis had given readers, at least a glimse of what it was like on the set as the final episode took shape. I will put the book on my shelf for complete-ness sake. But what a letdown...

Rating:
Summary: Where was the Slayer when this book was made?
Review: I strongly recommend that you buy Keith Topping's unofficial guide instead of this. "Slayer: The Last Days of Sunnydale" is much more accurate because Mr. Topping bases his opinions on interviews from Joss Whedon and other writers of the show.

"The Watcher's Guide" is just the opinion of the author and is completely inconsistent with what Joss Whedon has stated in multiple interviews.

The sloppiness of this book is shocking.

Rating:
Summary: Very Poor
Review: I strongly recommend that you buy Keith Topping's unofficial guide instead of this. "Slayer: The Last Days of Sunnydale" is much more accurate because Mr. Topping bases his opinions on interviews from Joss Whedon and other writers of the show.

"The Watcher's Guide" is just the opinion of the author and is completely inconsistent with what Joss Whedon has stated in multiple interviews.

The sloppiness of this book is shocking.

Rating:
Summary: Nice wrap up to a great series
Review: No, it's not the Bible of Buffydom, but it's a nice wrap up to a most excellent series.

As a discerning reader and fan, I look for satisfaction in show guides and I got it with the WG3. Not only do we get to relive the episodes, but also see some fun insights from longtime fans/writers via the essays.

Did I want more? Yeah, probably, but I'll always want more.

Did it suck, like other reviewers have stated? Not in the least. Maybe it wasn't to their taste, but everyone has their own opinion.

For the record, I've been a professional reviewer, though no longer, and the WG3 is exactly what it's meant to be: an official guide to the last 3 seasons of the show with a few fun extras.

IMHO, the authors and contributors did an excellent job.

Rating:
Summary: Wasted paper
Review: This book is horrificly inaccurate. The author clearly never watched the later seasons of Buffy because if he did he would know that Buffy was in love with Spike. He contridicts just about everything Joss Whendon had said about the Buffy/Spike relationship. I agree that if you are a Spike and/or a Spuffy fan then do not buy this book.