There’s something about TV shows from the 1990s that makes them incredibly comforting. It might be the awkward hair and baggy clothing, the familiarity of having seen these episodes multiple times, or the sometimes cheesy dialogue. There are many shows that we think of as being the best of the ’90s, from teen dramas like Dawson’s Creek to popular sitcoms like Friends and Seinfeld.
There’s another beloved series from this time period that fans can’t stop watching today and that’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Airing from 1997 to 2003 for seven seasons, Sarah Michelle Gellar’s slayer protected Sunnyvale while living the life of a regular teenage girl. Here are 10 quotes from Buffy that are totally ’90s, from Buffy’s Valley Girl comments to dialogue between the rest of the characters.
“To make you a vampire they have to suck your blood. And then you have to suck their blood…”
“…It’s like a whole big sucking thing. Mostly they’re just gonna kill you. Why am I still talking to you?” Buffy says this to Giles in the pilot called “Welcome to the Hellmouth.” The second part of this quote – “It’s like a whole big sucking thing” – is the most ’90s part.
Generally, Buffy speaks like a ditzy California girl who would rather spend time lying by the pool or the beach than going to school or, you know, fighting off vampires. But Buffy is also smart and charming and she gets right to the point. She may sound a bit silly at times, but she’s going to be honest, too, and face the demons right away.
“I’m just saying when tragedy strikes, we have to look on the bright side. You know? Like how even used Mercedes still have leather seats.”
This gem of a quote is Cordelia Chase’s (Charisma Carpenter) and it’s from the first season episode “Teacher’s Pet.” For a quote to be totally and perfectly ’90s, it has to have that special combination of being a bit corny and yet still being logical.
While we know that Cordelia could have said something a lot wiser than this statement about used cars, she’s definitely onto something. Yes, even when something is used, it can still have some great qualities. And when your classmates and friends are fighting off vampires in your California town, you have to stay positive, too.
“I just don’t see why everyone’s always picking on Marie-Antoinette. I can so relate to her. She worked really hard to look that good, and people just don’t appreciate that kind of effort…”
Cordelia says this quote in season two, episode seven, “Lie To Me.”
This speech is like when Cher talks about “the more the merrier” being the motto of the day when she threw her dad a 50th birthday party in Clueless. In other words, it’s totally ’90s, and Cordelia and Cher have a lot in common. They’re both stylish popular girls who tend to sound pretty ditzy at times, but there’s something really likable about them at the same time.
“Harmony, when you tried to be head cheerleader, you were bad. When you tried to chair the Homecoming committee, you were really bad. But when you try to be bad… you suck.”
This quote comes from Buffy herself in the fifth season of the show. She’s speaking to Harmony (Mercedes McNab) who is part of the same group as Cordelia but ends up becoming a vampire.
The fact that Buffy ends her piece of dialogue with “you suck” is what really seals the deal and makes this a perfectly ’90s quote. Characters from this decade used to always say that people and things sucked.
“This is just too much. I mean, yesterday my life’s like, ‘Uh-oh, pop quiz.’ Today it’s ‘Rain of Toads.’”
It’s not always Buffy and Cordelia who get the best, most ’90s lines on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Yup, Xander Harris (Nicholas Brendon) has some pretty 1990s dialogue, too. In the second episode of season one called “The Harvest,” Xander is getting honest about the real teenage angst that he’s going through.
This is not only a great ’90s quote but also a classic Buffy one since it sums up the tone of the series. On the one hand, Xander is complaining about a quiz, which of course no one wants to deal with. On the other hand, he’s dealing with evil vampires and things that typical highschoolers don’t exactly see in their daily lives.
“I so don’t want to deal with Spike right now. The guy is really starting to bug me in that special ‘I want to shove something wooden through his heart’ kind of way.”
Buffy is known for telling it like it is, which is helpful since she’s dealing with a lot of weird things in Sunnydale and beating around the bush isn’t really going to help. This totally ’90s quote is from the season five episode “Out Of My Mind” and it’s also one of Buffy’s best lines.
Instead of simply saying that Spike was annoying her, which is what people would say today, she starts rambling a bit. It’s pretty adorable.
“No way! I wish us into bizarro-land and you two guys are still together?”
In the season three episode “The Wish,” a demon grants Cordelia’s dream: that Buffy didn’t move to Sunnydale. Well, it happens, and naturally, all hell breaks loose.
This quote is particularly ’90s because of Cordelia saying “no way!” and also calling it “bizarro-land.” These days, we would probably call it “an alternative universe” or say things looked weird. But the 1990s were all about hilarious, silly, and sometimes awkward slang. If you could call something by another name, you definitely would.
“Oh Pacey, you blind idiot. Can’t you see she doesn’t love you?”
Also from the season five episode “Out Of My Mind,” this quote from Spike (James Marsters) couldn’t possibly be any more ’90s.
Of course, he’s talking about Pacey Witter and Joey Potter’s romance on Dawson’s Creek. Thanks to the love triangle between those two characters and Dawson Leery, things got famously dramatic. Since everyone loved that show back in the day, Spike could make this pop culture reference and everyone got it ASAP. Sure, you could still say this today, but it had a lot more “oomph” back in the ’90s since this love triangle was fresh on everyone’s minds.
“Talk. All talk. Blah blah Gaia, blah blah moon, menstrual life-force power thingy.”
When discussing the group of witches that she met with, Willow Rosenberg (Alyson Hannigan) says this very ’90s quote in the fourth season episode “Hush.”
It’s hard to imagine anyone saying the word “thingy” today unless it was a joke, but back in the 1990s, this was a really common word.
“You can’t spend the rest of your life waiting for Xander to wake up and smell the hottie. Make a move. Do the talking thing.”
When Buffy and Willow are having a discussion about Willow’s crush on Xander in the second season episode “Surprise,” Buffy says this to her good friend. Willow’s response is, “Well, what if the talking thing becomes the awkward silence thing?”
This is another awesome, totally ’90s quote from Buffy, mostly because of Buffy’s use of the word “hottie.” While many people are nostalgic for this decade, it’s safe to say that everyone can agree that it’s a good thing that no one uses that word anymore.
