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What we have here is the original pilot for the series, shot somewhere around 1996, which was made to present to the studio. The idea behind it was that the studio had ordered Whedon to produce a half hour pilot for them to see what he would do with the show. This pilot is ultimately what got the show picked up, and it was never meant to be seen by the public, just by executives.
The availability of this is pretty low, although it is considered to be one of the most widely pirated television pilots in history. Whedon is on record as saying that it will never see the light of day, because it's terrible and he doesn't want it out there. After seeing it, I can understand where he's coming from.
First, most of the cast is here. Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy, Nick Brenden as Xander, Tony Head as Giles, Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia, etc., and we even get appearances by Harmony and Jonathan. What is different is that instead of Alyson Hanigan, we have Riff Regan as Willow. My, what a different show this would have been with her as Willow. Now, I know that I'm saying this after living the last 12 years having known Alyson as Willow, but this just doesn't feel right. I've included the above picture of Riff in the role so that you can see how different she is. First off, to my eyes, she looks to be at least mid 20s, maybe older. Second, she doesn't have the shy awkwardness that Alyson did, and thirdly...there's no hint of inner sexiness waiting to be revealed. If Riff Regan had remained Willow, we'd never have gotten sexy vampire Willow or the hot first Halloween episode Willow. Who knows if they could have played up romantic tension between Xander and her, either. It's certainly not in this pilot.
It starts off like the televised Pilot, with Darla breaking into school with a boy, but then it's different. There's not a lot of moody atmosphere, and it takes place on a play stage. In fact, several scenes take place on the auditorium stage, including the finale. You get the impression that they didn't have much money and were just using what was available, which HAS to be the case. I like that aspect. If you can separate yourself from this being Buffy, it's kind of neat to see how much like an amateur student film this is. There's no music in it other than a few grunge songs, so it feels very raw.
Much is the same in the plot, with Buffy meeting Flutie and Giles, then having to go rescue Willow, but the way it is all played out is at about 1/10 of the level that it played in the final televised pilot. It's just so raw and cheap that it feels like it was shot for no money at all. I wonder what the principal actors got paid for this. We even get to see the first dusting, which is not a CG effect, but instead seems to be a stop motion shot of a man being replaced by salt, which progressively piles higher and higher as he "decomposes."
There is no Angel. There is no Master. There is no interior for the Bronze. We see the same school, an auditorium, and an exterior shot of a building that says the Bronze. Instead of the actor we know who played Flutie, we have Stephen Tobolowsky, who was in Groundhog Day and who is now recognizable for his role in Heroes. I actually preferred this Flutie, and wonder why he didn't return. Maybe he had something else going on by the time this was picked up a year later.
All in all, it's not really fair to judge this too harshly, as it was never meant to be seen by people like me, and was intended just to show executives what Whedon wanted to do with this show. But having seen it, if I was one of those executives, I can't say that I would have let this go on to be a series, because there's just not enough good stuff here. It feels VERY much like an ultra low budget version of the movie from the early 90s, but without the polish that the movie had. Crazy, right? But clearly Joss saw the things that needed to be changed and did what he had to do, because when the pilot made it to television, it was a vastly different show. The skeletal frame was the same, but the meat was so different.
I'm not going to grade this, as it wouldn't be fair. This exists as a curiosity for fans like myself, and is worth watching if you can find it, just to see what could have been different. If you can bear seeing your beloved Buffy in a not so great light, it's worth seeking out.
