I do remember hearing somewhere that the folks who made the movie didn't want to gamble on a serious movie about someone called Buffy who killed vampires for a living. So the movie became cute fluff. It was fun, but the series was a lot more engaging.
Mostly, what worked for Buffy was the group dynamic. They found the right kind of people, and ran with it. The fact that they had this light humor running through it, with the characters often coming up with horrible puns or one-liners (often Willow or Buffy saying something apparently without thinking about it, then having to backtrack quickly at the implied innuendo).
The musical, as an aside, was a lot of fun, but what struck me the most there was Alyson Hannigan portraying horror when she realizes where she pulled Buffy from. Horror is really hard to portray on screen. You can do shock, and fear. But horror? that's a subjective emotion, and it's really hard to make the audience feel it empathically with the character. They did a wonderful job there, and it really showed.
Mostly, what worked for Buffy was the group dynamic. They found the right kind of people, and ran with it. The fact that they had this light humor running through it, with the characters often coming up with horrible puns or one-liners (often Willow or Buffy saying something apparently without thinking about it, then having to backtrack quickly at the implied innuendo).
The musical, as an aside, was a lot of fun, but what struck me the most there was Alyson Hannigan portraying horror when she realizes where she pulled Buffy from. Horror is really hard to portray on screen. You can do shock, and fear. But horror? that's a subjective emotion, and it's really hard to make the audience feel it empathically with the character. They did a wonderful job there, and it really showed.