On Re-Watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer

So guys, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." I've been re-watching the TV show from the beginning, because it's on Netflix instant and I'm bored and I really liked this show when it was initially on TV. And, well, since I can apparently only blog about things that are not at all new or relevant, I'm blogging about it.

The thing is, I watched this show pretty much religiously for the first two years of high school. And now, re-watching the early episodes, I have to say that a lot of the stuff with Angel and the boys-will-turn-evil-if-you-fuck-them thing is annoyingly heavy-handed, and Buffy's super powers are annoying in their lack of real world practicality and things are simplified and sometimes almost preachy.

But here's the thing...watching the early episodes of this remind me so clearly of what it was like being in an abusive relationship. Not so much the actual relationship part, as, well, to paraphrase what my lovely ex said, my ex wasn't possessed by a demon or put under a spell, he was just a dude who treated me like shit. No mystical, magical excuse needed. The stuff Buffy deals with after killing Angel, though, is like the writers looked into my head and wrote down exactly what it was like to get over my ex. Buffy's nightmares, the fear that Angel will come back mixed with wanting him to come back is like seeing myself on screen. I remember feeling that! Lonely and scared at the same time! My ex may not have actually been an evil demon-type vampire, but the nightmares I had about him for years afterwords turned him into one sometimes.

What's even weirder is that these episodes were on before this happened to me. I was, in fact, either not-yet-dating that guy or still with him when this stuff was on TV. How on earth was I so completely oblivious? At the time, I saw all these things and they just didn't connect at all. Now, I see these interactions, these moments where I can't trust Angel even when he really does get his soul back and it's deeply scary and awful. How could I not recognize then that the same thing was happening to me?

Also, I find it interesting that I can't deal at all with Angel anymore. The first time around, I watched this and I had no difficulty suspending my disbelief that Angel lost his soul, got his soul back, and so on and so forth. Now I see David Boreanaz on screen (I swear I don't actually have anything against David Boreanaz as a person or an actor, he just gets cast in some roles I find unfortunate) and my abuser-radar is pinged and I'm afraid of him. Like, I have an actual, visceral reaction to seeing him and it's all I can do not to yell "Don't trust him!" at the screen. I don't trust him, and I feel like he's making excuses with the whole soul/soulless thing, and it creeps me the fuck out.

I guess I'm still angry with myself sometimes. Actually, I'm angry with myself a lot of the time. I should be smarter than to get hurt, I should be cooler than to let things bother me. And I don't know why it should seem so bizarre that the 25-year-old me can see things the 15-year-old me couldn't while watching re-runs of a TV show about vampires. But it kind of does.