What age is BTVS and Angel aimed at ??

[Dyoll]

Hi. I trying to get my 9 year old brother in to Buffy but he cant seem to get in to it. Most the DVDs say 12 or 15. What age do you think is perfect to watch the episodes and appreciate them the most??

 

[Bluebird]

I was twelve years old when Buffy started on TV so I think that was a good age for me! Season 1 of Buffy seems like it was for a young teen audience but then got a lot more adult as the characters did. And I think Angel was always meant for an older audience, maybe in their 20s.

 

[palabravampiress]

I didn't discover Buffy and Angel until I was in my 20s, so it's really hard to say. I don't know if it was "aimed" at 20-somethings, but it definitely got that demographic (in me, at least).

 

[Joyce Summers]

I think it depends on the individual. It only aired when I was 16 so I can't say about how kids would respond to it, but I think some of it may be too scary for some of the more younger audience- like 6 or 7 years old.
Also a lot of themes, and sometimes even the humor may go over a child's head. I would presume, I'm not saying that's a fact, I'm just theorizing here, haha. So that might be why your brother just can't get into it.

I suppose the demographic is teens and above really.

 

[white avenger]

I have a friend who won't let her 16 year old son watch "Buffy," "Angel," or "Highlander" because she thinks that they ar too explicit in their portrayal of sex and violence.
All three shows are aimed at "young adults and older," but it's generally the parents who decide just when an adolescent becomes a young adult.

 

[palabravampiress]

^ Wow. Really? When I was 16 I worked at the movie theater and so therefore saw all of the R-rated sex and violence that I wanted to just by ducking into a theater on my break. Heck, I'd even stay out til 2:00am and stuff (not on school nights and usually working the closing shift, but sometimes staying to pre-screen movies and whatnot). I guess it is up to the parents. Different parents have vastly different standards.

My parents were never all that worried about what I watched. I mean, I've been watching soaps since, like, toddlerhood. Instead, my family had a "give us reason to trust you, and we will" policy, not strict, set-in-stone rules about ratings and curfews and acceptable vs. objectionable material and whatnot. We also only had one TV until I was 17 or so (when we got a TV for the basement), and therefore watched most TV together. The only TV they ever told me I couldn't watch was 90210, and that was only when it first aired and because of the late night time slot. When I was a young kid, I had a bedtime, so certain shows were past my bedtime. When I became an adolescent, though, bedtime was a thing of the past. Late night TV restrictions went along with it. I guess it's possible that my parents would have objected to my watching something had they ever felt a strong dislike for the subject matter or explicit content of anything that I wanted to watch, but I really don't think they ever felt that way. I guess they figured TV was fake and that there were a lot of bigger fish to fry in the real world.

Now I feel kind of bad that Buffy never appealed to me when I was a kid. I feel like I should have watched it in the name of all those poor deprived young 'uns who aren't/weren't allowed to watch it. lol.

All of that said, there isn't just one way to raise a child. I'm sure your friend has perfectly sound reasons for objecting to those shows. I like the idea of your friend raising her kids with the restrictions that she chooses, but not trying to have the shows taken off the air or something like some parents do.

 

[Lyri]

I was 12 or 13 when the show started airing over here and I started watching, so I pretty much grew up with the gang. Storylines and things got more mature as the characters got older, and as a result, as I got older. My sister is 14, she's a member of BB, but she doesn't post much because she doesn't 'get' the show. She's seen every episode of both Buffy and Angel, but she can't relate to it the way I can. She's not mature enough to see the subtext. Maybe when she's older, and she watches the show again on the DVD's she'll pick up stuff she missed the first time around and finally see what I love these damn shows so much...or, you know, the sky might turn green. lol

 

[Tueuse de Vampires]

Well all the Buffy DVDs over here are rated 16, so I guess that's about the age. Plus, here they air it around midnight anyway, so I don't think a lot of 12 year olds are able to watch it.
However, I first got into it when I was 13. Back then my parents forbade me to watch the show, though. (Luckily it was just at the end of s7 anyway, lol)
Well and Dyoll, I think 9 is definitely too young. Even more for Angel.

 

[wiccianslayer]

I started watching buffy when i was about 5 cause i caught it as it aired i watched it all through the years as i got older but eventully i stopped watching at 14 i started buying the Videos as i rewatched them i must admit i understood the episodes a lot more clearly.

 

[Superstar]

Well, I am 43 and male - and it appealed to me then and now.
So, I'm not sure an age limit is actually "aimed at" per se.
The writing was developed on multiple levels of appreciation.

Drama & at times melodrama, horror, camp, outright comedy... an eclectic mix.
It even has a musical.

 

[InsaneMystic]

Well all the Buffy DVDs over here are rated 16, so I guess that's about the age. Plus, here they air it around midnight anyway, so I don't think a lot of 12 year olds are able to watch it.

They only recently air in that horrendous timeslot. You're likely too young to remember :wink:, but Buffy started to air here in Germany on the slot Saturdays 5:00 PM (with bad editing cuts, then uncut in the late-night rerun), then from S4 onward Wednesdays 8:00 PM with Angel following at 9 (while they still managed to show them parallel, that is... German TV is such a sinkhole of incompetence).

It's only now in the full rerun of Buffy that they slotted it Wednesdays around 11 PM to midnight, and Angel Mondays around the same time. I don't get why anyone would choose such a bad timeslot for the German first run of A S4/S5!? Almost as if they want to say "Yeah, we finally bought the rights to air the rest of it, but we know no one's gonna be watchin' that stoopid vampire show anyways." :confused3

 

[Jenny]

I wouldn't let my 9-year old daughter watch it (well she's only 2 1/2 now but you get what I mean). I just feel it would be too scary for her at that age.

 

[Washburne]

but Buffy started to air here in Germany on the slot Saturdays 5:00 PM (with bad editing cuts, then uncut in the late-night rerun)

The same here, with the difference that we got it so late we´re a coulpe of season behind, so it was shown monday - thursday if I remeber correctly.

There is no way I´d let a 9 year old watch the show, but I don´t have much problem with a 12 year old in general. But at that age it really depends on the person. I don´t think all 12 year old ar fit to watch the show. And let´s be honest. Even if they´d like the show at that age they probably won´t see it the same way as us with a few more years to our resume.

 

[Tueuse de Vampires]

The same here, with the difference that we got it so late we´re a coulpe of season behind, so it was shown monday - thursday if I remeber correctly.

There is no way I´d let a 9 year old watch the show, but I don´t have much problem with a 12 year old in general. But at that age it really depends on the person. I don´t think all 12 year old ar fit to watch the show. And let´s be honest. Even if they´d like the show at that age they probably won´t see it the same way as us with a few more years to our resume.

Exactly. I think it was originally intended to deal with certain teenage problems the viewership also encountered. And as the viewership grew up, the themes became more adult-oriented as well (btw that's also the same in other shows/medias...like in Harry Potter...everything gets darker and darker from book to book, which is good. I'm part of this HP generation, and when the 4th volume was first published, I was only 12, and for the 7th I was 18 already...so it's nice how the book changed with me). And imo that's part of what makes the show so powerful, everyday problems wrapped up in mythology. I'm not so sure kids can get that, when they haven't gone through anything like it before.

 

[Angels baby101]

Honestly maybe your brother just doesn't like the show?.... Some people just dont like it and no matter how many times you get them to watch it they never will.... I mean they aim it for a young adult audience but i think people of all ages enjoy it...... It just depends on their taste in t.v shows and the like... Some people just cant get into it.

My Boyfriend tolerates it because he knows i love it and he likes me to be happy but he would be perfectly fine to never watch them again lol i guess it doesn't help i drool over DB 😛

I honestly saw like two episodes when it first came out and hated it... my brother loved it but i had no liking for it at all... but in the like 2nd season or beginning of the 3rd i fell in love with it.....

My mom has never tried to stop me from watching things really I mean i was like 2 the first time i watched like Nightmare on Elm Street lol it freaked me out at first but then my mom showed me a video of the guy being put into makeup and i was fine after that... I've been watching scary stuff ever since and honestly i'm glad she had me get into it at an early age... it helps out in the long run i think....

 

[InsaneMystic]

Exactly. I think it was originally intended to deal with certain teenage problems the viewership also encountered. And as the viewership grew up, the themes became more adult-oriented as well (btw that's also the same in other shows/medias...like in Harry Potter...everything gets darker and darker from book to book, which is good. I'm part of this HP generation, and when the 4th volume was first published, I was only 12, and for the 7th I was 18 already...so it's nice how the book changed with me).

I fully agree on that, including the HP analogy. However, for someone like me whose emotional maturation comes slow-if-ever, that "growing up with the characters" unfortunately doesn't work as intended... I mean, I was 25 when I started watching Buffy, and I still prefer the highschool years of the series as that's closer to my emotional maturity. (Nonetheless, S6 hit home with its portrayal of addiction, so I clearly rated that as my favorite of the later seasons.)

I don't have any problem with kids around 11-13 watching the early seasons, but especially talking about S6 of Buffy or the later seasons of Angel, I don't think that's overly appropriate viewing for anyone below 15-16, at least.

 

[November]

It started on TV here when I was about 12 and the theme song used to freak me out! I think I was far too young and naive to understand the show at that age but I watched a few episodes over the years and then got back into it when I was about 18. I think most of the storyline would have gone over my head in my early teens but I could still enjoy it for the action scenes and funny dialogue.

 

[Bangelxx]

I started watching buffy when I was 12, (last year) and I was totally into it, so I'd probably agree with 12-15

 

[Lindsey McDonald]

See, SS nailed the problem, the early episodes are great for people in their early teens, like 12-13 (it's pronounced twelveteen, so stop sniggering), but later on it gets more and more adult. It was fine for people growing up watching it, but if somebody of the age of 12(teen) bought all the dvds, they probably wouldn't appreciate the later seasons. If they bought one season a year though, it would probably be better. Not that I think the later seasons are particularly inapropriate, but I just don't think they would apreciate them as much.

 

[Bangelxx]

See, SS nailed the problem, the early episodes are great for people in their early teens, like 12-13 (it's pronounced twelveteen, so stop sniggering), but later on it gets more and more adult. It was fine for people growing up watching it, but if somebody of the age of 12(teen) bought all the dvds, they probably wouldn't appreciate the later seasons. If they bought one season a year though, it would probably be better. Not that I think the later seasons are particularly inapropriate, but I just don't think they would apreciate them as much.

I understand what you mean. though maybe I'm just weird then.... I am 13, and I LOVED the later seasons way more then the earlier seasons. season 1 was way too boring, you know...not much of a story. Thats just coming from a "twelveteen" as you like to say it.