Weeks 10 and 11 – Buffy.

1) Q. Wilcox and Lavery (2002) identify 9 defining characteristics of 'quality TV' - can you apply any of these to other television series that you have viewed recently? Are there any other characteristics that you could add to their list?

2) What role does Hills (2004) suggest the fans play in the construction of cult TV? How is new media central to this?

3) Hills (2004) lists a number of defining characteristics of cult TV that contain similarities to the defining characteristics of pop genres (e.g. fantasy, science fiction) discussed earlier in the Pop Genres paper. Can you identify these and discuss why you think that these characteristics are repeatedly viewed as underpinning popular genres?

4) Buffy The Vampire Slayer (Cult TV Show) - How does Buffy deconstruct traditional literary notions of good and evil?

 

5) In what way is Buffy influenced by the romantic gothic tradition? Yet how does Buffy also provide a contemporary critique of this tradition?