Blog 8

"High School is Hell"

This piece of writing analyzes how the writers and the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Joss Whedon, infuse a multitude of metaphors into the show to have the ability for a greater connection with the audience. It’s important to do this within a show because it keeps the audience hooked. Just like a movie where you get attached to the characters. Maybe it’s more for girls, but when you get hooked to a character in a chick flick and something bad happens to them, it’s hard not to cry…there’s a sense of feeling their pain. Like what if that happened to me?

I think Tracy Little’s points are very interesting in her metaphor analysis. “By contrast, in the Buffyverse the writers begin with the idea that teens struggle with social pressures, violence, and other social horrors. They then take those metaphors, used to speak about the realities of
life, and make them real. Finally the viewers are left with a show where the characters' worst horrors are not just the monsters they are fighting but the grim reality of such ultimate highschool horrors as parent-teacher night, not having a date for the prom, being made fun of in class, and not getting a spot on the cheerleading team.” This creates for a sense of humor because the characters find these school-related horrors are greater than their struggle with demons.

In the “Evolution of Metaphor” part of the analysis, we get to see how metaphor is used and developed throughout the seasons. In season one, we see that the metaphor is based around finding identities and places within a new school. Season two is all about relationships and how your significant other is the opposite of what you thought them to be. Season three is about how “graduation is like the end of the world.” Graduation is the end to the life of a senior in high school. This makes sense because at that point, we don’t know anything that lies beyond high school. It’s like a point of being pushed out into the real world.