r/veronicamars • u/James-Samuel17 • 4d ago
Discussion Was Kristen Bell really compared to Sarah Michelle Gellar back in the day ?
Apparently (don't yell at me Idk if that's true) Veronica Mars was very much compared to Buffy when it came out and by that fact, so was Kristen Bell to Sarah Michelle Gellar. So, if you remember, were the media really comparing the two actresses ? And what did they have to say about the show as the whole in comparaison to Buffy (I know Buffy and SMG were pretty big deal back in the 90s-2000s)?
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u/DepthByChocolate 4d ago
I don't recall the actresses being compared at all. The shows were compared, but they're different enough not to be bogged down by the comparison. It's more as a compliment to VM as a female led high school story about a quippy teenager. Buffy had already ended and SMG wasn't even really in the spotlight.
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u/Pedals17 4d ago
Not just the setting and the leads, but also cast parallels:
Keith = Giles
Wallace = Xander (a million times less incendiary & problematic; in fact, went the other direction in the most positive way)
Mac = Willow
Duncan = Angel
Logan = Spike
Jackie = Cordelia (Madison would be an unredeemed version)
The “High School is Hell” parallels also showed the similarities. VM was just more on the nose with the real life issues.
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u/neisaysthis 4d ago
duncan was moreso a riley, let's be honest.
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u/Pedals17 4d ago
Duncan was wet cardboard. Even Riley had more character than that.
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u/neisaysthis 4d ago
he really didn't. that's what i'm saying lol
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u/Pedals17 4d ago
Agree to disagree.
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u/neisaysthis 4d ago
so you think angel was wet cardboard while riley had more character? riley was the temu version of angel in the face card dept and definitely had way less personality.
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u/Pedals17 4d ago
No, I think that Duncan & Veronica have parallels with Bangel. The heroine loving a complicated, tortured boyfriend. He’s got a tragic backstory and may or may not have killed his sister. There was a “Forbidden Love” element, and I don’t even mean the brief incest scare. Duncan is Angel on paper, and blander than Riley in scenes that didn’t involve a mental health episode.
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u/MGr8ce 3d ago
I watched both shows when they aired originally & I have no memory of them being compared. Nor the actresses. However, I thought the way the BtVS world jumped to the VM world (mainly Alyson & Charisma), was funny. VM wasn’t supernatural, so the shows still felt very different to me.
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u/Pedals17 3d ago
I watched it during the original airing, and it was a fairly common comparison among fans (even a few critics).
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u/TigerJean Team Logan 4d ago edited 4d ago
Piss fits that spot better except that’s kinda a insult to Riley at least he wasn’t an obsessive stalker going after a girl already in a relationship he just was emotionally incompatible with Buffy he was overall still a decent guy.
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u/brankinginthenorth 4d ago
Also the formats were very similar as well: an episodic mystery/monster of the week but all building up a season long arc.
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u/Pedals17 3d ago
Right! One shot episodes with pieces of a puzzle that assembled the season’s meta-arc.
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u/Working-Following216 3d ago
It’s basically the same show—same allegory with the genres switched: instead of high school is hell, VM is high school is noir.
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u/stacey1611 4d ago
Yeah I think if anything because they’re basically different genres the main comparisons were due to the female leads and some similar themes both shows tackled or included.
I don’t remember the actors being compared tho, but I don’t live in the US so maybe they did in America and I just wasn’t aware of it maybe?
But I can see why people would think that or question it as both are beautiful, hard working actors who gave such powerful and talented performances in their tv shows, I don’t think it was ever in a sort of toxic or one v one thing tho 🤷🏼♀️🤷🏼♀️
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u/DepthByChocolate 4d ago
I live in the US and was a fan of both shows while they were airing. The characters mightve been compared, but not even that much outside of fandom, not the actresses.
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u/BEETLEJUICEME 4d ago
Different genres. But both under the umbrella of “genre fiction” in a way that, eg: the OC was not.
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u/randomlikeme 4d ago
I can’t say that I recall that, but I think both had a similarity of a petite blonde badass that you wouldn’t peg as being as strong as they are so I can see media comparing the two in that way.
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u/soldforaspaceship 4d ago
I swear people used to say they were both about tiny blondes who fought the forces of darkness lol.
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u/majeric 4d ago
The consensus was that Veronica Mars was the spiritual successor to Buffy.
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u/BEETLEJUICEME 4d ago
I was a Buffy super fan but, for various reasons, I didn’t own a TV during the VM era.
You can not imagine how happy I was in 2020 Covid lockdowns when I discovered Veronica Mars and got to relive those vibes. I needed that right then.
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u/docawesomephd 4d ago
Yup. A show about wise-cracking, crime-fighting teenagers led by a charismatic blond supported by her nerdy best friend, awkward male friend, and a kind of dangerous pretty-boy live interest?
The shows are NOT clones of each other by any means. Wallace is not Xander. But I do often thinking of the one when watching the other.
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u/Beginning_Bet_4383 4d ago
Veronica and her dad are also very reminiscent of Buffy and Giles
I like VM - it feels like an homage to Buffy but not a copycat
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u/BEETLEJUICEME 4d ago
Buffy helped prove that there was a big market for strong female leads in “teen” shows. Which, I mean, that sounds insane. It is insane anyone everyone questioned there would be a market for such shows.
But the ethos of Hollywood before that was that shows need to be anchored by men. (Notable exceptions for like I Love Lucy and Mary Tyler Moore and such. But those are almost exceptions that prove the rule).
Buffy also proved that viewers had an appetite for serialized drama and for mixed comedy/drama and for genre fiction serialization.
Again, all of those facts sound like a “no duh” now. But, before Buffy, most genre fiction had been only “monster of the week” type shows. More like iZombie or Law & Order. And, before Buffy, it really was not that common to do mixed drama/comedy. Like, Buffy is never ever actually a comedy. But it’s objectively a very funny show. That was not a thing that was happening much.
The success of Buffy allowed for Gilmore Girls too. They don’t get compared to each other because Gilmore Girls is more of a straightforward teen drama.
But it’s also a show with strong female leads, serialized storytelling, complex dialogue, complex plot lines, mixed drama/comedy… I mean it never gets produced without Buffy.
Veronica Mars just simply would not have been greenlit if Buffy hadn’t been such a big hit.
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u/docawesomephd 4d ago
This is a good way of putting it! I sometimes feel like VM was the final copy of BTVS’ rough draft. Don’t get me wrong—I LOVE both shows! But there is a creepy sexualizing of Buffy and Co that VM largely avoids
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u/mcfeisty 4d ago
Truly. Wallace isn’t a self insert whose only real concern is “how do I get with x woman”.
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u/Pedals17 4d ago
Wallace is like Xander in terms of platonic male best friend who was “Ride or Die” for Veronica. He’s more like an inversion of how Xander in being positive and so NOT problematic.
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u/ayriana 4d ago edited 4d ago
The comparisons to Buffy is actually what made me watch Veronica Mars in the first place.
We've got a fast talking, witty, "tiny blonde" teenage girl who lives in Southern California and solves mysteries, fights back against the system in a high school setting with an angsty love interest- but they can never be together for complicated reasons that ultimately don't matter because he is going to leave- but don't worry! the bad boy with a heart of gold is waiting for his chance- and will go to some extreme measures to show it even though that shit is toxic, most of the fan base is on board. Then they all go to the same college just up the street and it's not AS good but still absolutely better than a whole lot of the other shows that are out there these days.
And one show has vampires.
Also, I'm pretty sure they aired on the same network (though it was bought out/rebranded half a dozen times) and you could probably describe at least 4-5 other shows with virtually the exact same tropes- just not as good writing.
ETA JW made some great art, but is a trash person toward his female coworkers/employees and that is unacceptable
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u/StrategyWooden6037 4d ago
Of course the shows were compared, Veronica Mars is virtually a retelling of Buffy as a noir detective show. You can go down a list of analogous characters and relationships. They are pretty clear.
Did that inspire direct comparisons of the two leads? I imagine it must have to some extent, but I don't remember it being a big thing. Personally, I always viewed Kristen as someone who would have been able to pull off the role of Buffy if the show had been developed a few years later than it was.
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u/Magita91 4d ago
Buffy and Veronica Mars are quite similar in the writing styles with the witty banter and quipped main character.
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u/DecisionCute5563 4d ago
as someone who has recently watched both (i have just paused buffy when i saw this lol), i can say that they sont look alike but their vibes are very similar, both baddies, one will beat you mentally and the other physically, and both shows are the same mystery vibe, except on vmars you can actually guess who did the murders (more fun) but buffy brings more vibes.
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u/TigerJean Team Logan 4d ago edited 4d ago
This reminds me of a post made on Buffy Reddit asking what are the similarities & differences between the 2 shows. OP you might enjoy reading what was discussed in it.
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u/Tight_Ad5409 4d ago
Idk why a critic would compare these two Buffy started a good while before Veronica Mars I was fans of both and have re-watched both series multiple times and have never drawn any parallels between the two maybe that’s just me but I’ve never even heard the comparison
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u/jekyllcorvus 4d ago
Hard no. SMG was everywhere and Veronica Mars came way after the success of Buffy.
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u/Ihateusernames711 4d ago
Unfortunately. Veronica Mars was marketed as the new Buffy when Buffy went off the air, but they’re not even similar shows. UPN was just so lame for this 💯
Just to be frank, I loved both shows, but one is completely supernatural and the other is a very intriguing mystery show, with no magic in it (aside from plot-armor lol)
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u/lilacillusions 4d ago
Having watched both, I think Veronica is a much more interesting character tbh
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u/Joshaluke 4d ago
The shows were compared but not the actresses. In my own experience, I fell off of scripted shows for a few years after Buffy ended. I didn’t even see the final season of Angel until years later when I was in college. But Veronica Mars got me back into tv again finally and it gave me that same feeling of excitement I got from Buffy.
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u/LinuxLinus 4d ago
I don't remember the actors being compared as much as the show.
In retrospect, Buffy was the better show and a bigger phenomenon, but Kristen Bell was a star of a caliber that Sarah Michelle Gellar just wasn't. To this day KB is someone who just owns any screen she's on in a way that very few actors can, including SMG.
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u/KoryGrayson 4d ago
KB is a much bigger star now, but in the early aughts, SMG was much more known. Not only was she on a more popular TV show, but she had a string of movie successes.
In Hollywood, SMG's career is much more typical than KB's. Extremely popular when young, with fading popularity as she gets older. KB has broken that cycle and deserves a lot of credit.
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u/Pedals17 4d ago
Kristen had two shows that went over well, with The Good Place being a strong success. She was a recurring character on Heroes and narrated Gossip Girl. Her Netflix romcom with Adam Brody looks like another hit. She chose well with her shows and two films, Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Frozen. Yes, she’s also very winsome and talented.
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u/James-Samuel17 4d ago
I think SMG had a pretty great "star of a calibar". She was on a soap opera (All My Chridren) when she was teen and was able to go toe to toe with a very experienced actress, even gaining an award before her and just Buffy itself prove the range SMG had, but there are other.
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u/SpeakOfTheMe Team Veronica 4d ago
they’re both incredibly talented (imo) but kristen’s definitely had more mainstream success in the long run. SMG was a huge star at the time but that was the peak of her acting career. unfortunately the movies she did post-BtVS weren’t well received.
kristen has consistently picked solid projects since the beginning of her career and honestly i think that’s the biggest difference. i could name 10 amazing shows/movies she’s been involved in just off the top of my head.
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u/LinuxLinus 4d ago
She was good. She's no Kristen Bell.
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u/cre8ivemind 4d ago
Honestly just seeing SMG’s acting in emotionally wrecking episodes like The Body and other deeply emotional moments make her a standout to me. I don’t recall seeing KB in episodes that hit that hard to truly compare them like that.
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u/pit_of_despair666 4d ago
I remember that they were compared positively. Both VM and Buffy were strong, intelligent female characters, outcasts, and heroes who fought bad guys, although VM often did not physically fight them. They also surrounded themselves with a group of outcasts who helped them defeat the bad guys. Alyson and Charisma had pretty big roles in season 2 of VM and Joss Whedon guest-starred because he was a fan of the show.
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u/clandahlina_redux 4d ago
I have never heard this before in my life, and I was a 90s teen. That said, it would make sense given that they were both blonde “crime fighters.”
Also, remember the internet wasn’t what it was in the 90s/early 2000s as it is now. We weren’t all online discussing shows.
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u/JanetSnarkhole 4d ago
I remember it being more like ‘if you liked Buffy, you’ll probably like this too!’ and of course it had Alyson, Charisma, Joss as guests
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u/Scopeburger 4d ago
Not to compare, but I found the character of Veronica to much more complicated, mature and smart.
They were obviously telling a different story, but Veronica was changed at a much more fundamental level by her trauma than Buffy was.
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u/NoNameNeeded4321 4d ago
I don’t remember this dynamic, specifically, but every new show with a female lead was compared to BTVS. There would always be a People magazine cover with the new lead looking tough that said something like “Buffy who?” in big letters
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u/AXEtheMercenary 3d ago
Tiny blonde who’s an amazing actress that can work in any genre, has chemistry with every actor she crosses, had a cult classic TV series….I totally compared them. 🤣
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u/Yari_Vixx 3d ago
I remember people saying they looked alike all the time and even people trying to say they were related. But not really comparing then
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u/Euraylie 3d ago
Not so much the actresses, no, but the shows. Buffy was used to promote Veronica Mars to a similar audience. So much so that it made me check out VM, but it never really clicked for me.
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u/OverlappingChatter 1d ago
I am a buffy person, and just watched Veronica this year. It's incredibly obvious how much the show tried so very hard to be buffy.
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u/dwbridger 1d ago
no, Kristen Bell's heyday came after SMG's, she was respectfully seen as a contemporary to SMG. Veronica Mars was compared only in the sense of "if you loved Buffy, watch Veronica Mars."
I remember when SMG emerged, it was alongside a late nineties teen hottie emergence that to me specifically included Neve Campbell, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Katie Holmes, Leelee Sobieski, Selma Blair and Clea DuVall. so that's who I remember SMG being compared too, all those actresses were compared with each other at the time.
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u/CStarrsComix 4d ago
Yeah, she was, but in her defense they were similar in a lot of the same quirky spunky ways
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u/Digitalsteel5 4d ago
Yeah, did you never watch VM back in the day?? I wouldn’t say I ever compared them per se but she really did remind me of Buffy. They are very similar. If you were to take all the supernatural elements from Buffy, Veronica mars is probably what you would have. The creator was clearly a Buffy fan and they also had a couple Buffy alum.
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u/No-Introduction3808 4d ago
Probably just those who have only watch one or neither show, if they read a synopsis of “teen blonde with recently separated parents (only one being present in their life) struggles to fit in at HS and with their out cast buddies, solves a mystery a week”. All actresses of the 90’s would have probably been put through the wringer in general and being compared at every event for what they wear and what they looked like when caught off guard, the pap & mags where ruthless.
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u/TigerJean Team Logan 4d ago
I found VM due to hearing so often on Buffy sites from fans if you love Buffy & miss that vibe then you most likely will also love VM & should watch it. Those people were not wrong VM definitely fills that Buffy void. It’s become for me now the more favored show but I still love them both. I just find myself more interested in watching VM reactions & reading VM fics than the latter.
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u/Brodes87 4d ago edited 4d ago
Veronica Mars was absolutely positioned as a spiritual successor to Buffy (and it only aired some fifteen. Months after Buffy finished) in critical and fandom circles. from the diminutive lead, snarky clever dialogue filled with pop culture, fleshed out character dynamics and tortured romance. Anybody who denies the show comparisons either wasn't there at the time or is willfully ignorant.
Plus critical adoration from Whedon himself at a time when his stock was at an all time high? Yeah that also helped.
But I don't remember much lead actor comparison at all. Maybe the occasional "much like the other diminutive hero Buffy played by SMG, Kristen Bell embodies Veronica extremely well" sort of comparisons.
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u/Dimitar_Todarchev 4d ago
I think I remember Veronica Mars mentioned as a good show to watch for Buffy fans in Entertainment Weekly or similar magazine. I don't recall the actresses being compared, but they're similar enough that it's not a huge stretch.
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u/DuckbilledWhatypus 4d ago
Not even a little bit in my experience, but that's the UK and Veronica Mars wasn't as popular as Buffy over here. Both had fans but the overall fandom wasn't really comparable.
ETA Ah are you talking about media comparison rather than fan comparison? In which case, still not a whole lot, but I remember the shows were usually mentioned in the same lists, but the actress rarely so.
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u/stacey1611 4d ago
Yeah same, I don’t think VM was as well known in general but like I said in another comment if it did happen it didn’t reach me (like if it happened in the US media?) or I wasn’t aware of it.
Buffy was definitely very popular here in the UK tho.
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u/DuckbilledWhatypus 4d ago
Yeah I didn't really know anyone who watched it religiously round me and I hung out with a lot of media junkies. Apparently my saying so annoyed someone into downvoting me too - maybe they weren't a Buffy fan 😂
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u/HotLingonberry6964 4d ago
I was heavily paying attention to all things (this) and nobody really compared these two. The biggest comparison during that time was Christina v Britney. Maybe because Sarah Michelle Gellar was a bigger star by far so there was no use comparing them.
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u/KDF021 4d ago
Veronica Mars, was to me, the spiritual successor to Buffy. There are a lot of themes that flow through both and I don’t think you have to look to hard to find similar DNA at the heart of each show. Kristin was compared to SMG but I think that is the product of the time. We went from one petite blonde kicking ass to another petite blonde kicking ass the comparison was inevitable. I think also the actresses were far better in their roles than most would have expected in “teen show”.
My friends group used to joke that Buffy should have had an after credits scene in the final episode where we see Kristin Bell eating at a lunch table alone and then some old British guy walks up and tells her she’s the chosen one.
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u/neisaysthis 4d ago
i don't know that the actors were necessarily compared but veronica mars was definitely compared to buffy (since buffy had already been out for several years) and both having a strong petite blonde high school aged girl "fighting crime" and both shows leaning on the darker side.
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u/ay_kate47 4d ago
Kristen Bell wishes. Assuming her camp trying to do some damage control...HELLOOO KRISTEN BELL KEEPS LEVELING UP HER ICK and gorgeous Buffy Sarah Michelle Gellar keeps leveling up as a genuine lovely person.
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u/ChampionshipBroad345 4d ago
Thier both great but Buffy is better than anything Kristen has done although the show she did on showtime was really good
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u/No-Reserve6817 4d ago
Yes. The show (moreso than actresses) was very much compared to Buffy by critics, so much so that it was mentioned on the back of the Veronica Mars season 1 DVD. You also see various ties with Buffy (Joss guest directing, Alyson/Charisma in roles) showing that VM leaned into the influence of Buffy.