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"We'll try not to spoil
the new season" promises the editor of Titan's Buffy
mag in his usual 'show the punters how much I know about the show' spiel on
the contents page.
However, he doesn't seem to
appreciate that to the majority of Buffy viewers, the
"new" season is season five which, despite the editor's assertion
that he's seen "most of" it on BBC2, was still only getting
underway when #26 hit the newsstands.
Given that the magazine only
covers two series, I wouldn't expect them to confine news spoilers to a
sealed section à la SFX, but stupid
headlines like "no rest for the dead" accompanied by a picture of
Buffy do tend to give things away. Is it really too much to ask for
them to put a bit of thought into the news section?
The rest of the magazine
isn't really any better. The strapline on the cover implies a major
feature with David Boreanaz, which turns out to be the single page Random
Access feature - which is fine for a bit of fluff, but hardly a reason
to buy the magazine.
Interviews are definitely one
of the magazine's stocks in trade, and this month there's three if you
include the Writer's Block feature on Mere
Smith. However, neither the Christian Kane nor Andy Hallett ones are
particularly insightful. And with regard to the latter - haven't Titan
realised that Angel's second season still hasn't
materialised on Channel 4 yet? Or do they simply not care about these
things any more?
Titan's art director seems to
have got some new toys to play with recently, as demonstrated by the swirly
yellow background on the cover, which also doubles as the "free"
poster once more.
The magazine's features on
the show's "influences" always seem to suck, and given the
approach of the most of the magazine, it seems strange to find something
about film noir in there. Plenty of other SF/fantasy magazines do this
sort of thing, and most of them do it a lot better than this one. Of
course, it doesn't help when - as usual - you waste two pages on a
photographic intro instead of getting in there and tackling the subject.
The regular features are all
here as well - the reprinted comic strip, the reviews section which devotes
far too much space on photos and not enough on reviewing the actual products
and the letters page (complete with whopping great spoiler for The
Gift).
You guessed it - yet another
disappointing issue.
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