Okay, here's the deal: I had NEVER watched Buffy before. It always looked juvenile and fluff-headed to me. Yet, I've had dozens of friends telling me that I HAD to watch the damn thing. So anyway, my birthday was 2 weeks ago and a friend bought me the first season on DVD, telling me that now I had no excuse not to watch it. After just leaving the still sealed box on top of my television for a few days, where it mocked me with it's silence, until I finally ripped the seal and put in the first disc. Over the next few days we watched the entire first series.
Surprise! It was actually pretty good.
Some of the episodes were pretty cheesy, but the first two and last two really stood out as being very well done. While I personally found Buffy herself to be pretty bland and I just thought Xander to be amongst the most annoying television characters ever, I found myself really liking Willow, Giles, and Cordelia.
I plan to eventually pick up the second season. Since the series has ended and I know there are going to be a finite number of DVD sets, I don't feel pressured to commit to a DVD library of Star Trekian proportions.