Once every generation, a Slayer is born… If you've never seen Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you should. Here's our take on the best of.

With 145 episodes to choose from, it's difficult to compile a top ten list. If you have time, settle down with an entire season (see our picks for the most worthy candidates below). If you don't, here's our stab at a top ten. We have left out some of our favorites (such as season four's "Restless") in favor of episodes that can stand more or less on their own.

1. Ted (Season 2)
   Buffy's mom, Joyce, takes up with a computer salesman, who insinuates himself into the Summers family and the Scooby gang with home-made mini-pizza, cookies and miniature golf. But Ted is more and less than he seems. Buffy's violent clash with him nets her an interview with the police and conflict with her mother. Guest starring John Ritter as Ted.

2. Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered (Season 2)
   Buffy sidekick Zander tries to win back (or exact revenge from) his girlfriend Cordelia with a magic spell. The plan backfires of course, and every woman in Sunnydale except his intended falls for him.

3. Band Candy (Season 3)
   Buffy and friends are aghast as Sunnydale's adults start behaving like high schoolers.

4. Hush (Season 4)
   Silence reigns as Buffy and the gang try to stop a macabre group of grinning demons known as "The Gentlemen" who have stolen the entire town's voices. The gang is forced to communicate via pantomime and overheads.

5. A New Man (Season 4)
   Giles former pal Ethan Rayne doctors Giles's beer, transforming him into a Fyarl demon. Giles hires Spike to help.

6. Superstar (Season 4)
   Any comment about the plot of this one will ruin it. Just watch it, but not before you've seen several other episodes to get a feel for the show. Best if preceded by Earshot (Season 3).

7. I Was Made to Love You (Season 5)
   Nerd genius and season über bad guy Warren designs a robot to be the perfect girlfriend, but finds that he doesn't love her. This episode spawned Spike's beloved "Buffybot," who plays a humorous role in several subsequent episodes.

8. Once More with Feeling (Season 6)
   This musical episode could also be titled "The Sound of Buffy" or "My Fair Buffy." Some of the cast is lacking in vocal talent, but the overall effect is both funny and affecting.

9. Tabula Rasa (Season 6)
   One of Willow's magic spells goes awry, causing temporary amnesia in the entire Scooby gang. Group conflicts disappear as the gang comically tries to figure out what's going on. The episode ends with Michelle Branch performing her song "Goodbye to You" at the Bronze as unhappiness and discord return with restored memories. This is the all-time favorite episode of several Buffy fans we know.

10. Storyteller (Season 7)
    A là PBS's Masterpiece Theater, Andrew records the goings-on in the Summers household. Buffy herself has grown quite insufferable by this point in the series; Andrew lends much needed humor to the heavy-handedness sadly prevailing in season seven.

Season Three: Mayor and Faith

What makes this season great:

• The Mayor
  In season three, the bad guy directing the season's evil is the mayor of Sunnydale, brilliantly played by Richard Wilkins as an obsessive-compulsive bureaucrat and almost kindly father figure to slayer-gone-bad Faith (Eliza Dushku). His plans for an "ascention" to another being culminates in a two-part finale in which he transforms into a large reptile a là early Japanese Godzilla; the weasely high school principal perfectly played by Armin Shimmerman becomes his first meal.
• Faith
  We love Faith as the bad girl counterpoint to the oh-so-perfect and self-pitying Buffy. The conflict between the two slayers drives many of the season's best scenes.
• Harmony
  In the season's finale, Buffy classmate and Cordelia sidekick/nemesis Harmony becomes Sunnydale's first bimbo vampire. She is hilarious in later seasons.
• Angel
  The mopey monster finally leaves town.

Season Five: Glory Hallelujah

What makes this season great:

• Glory / Ben
  The season bad guy is an out-of-her-dimension god named Glory. She's an indestructible, destructive, demanding and high-maintenance glamour girl (Clare Kramer) whose headaches are relieved by brain-sucking the nearest human. She's also a kindly hospital intern named Ben. And she's in search of a mystical key. She knows Buffy's got it; but she's not sure what it looks like. Neither are the Scooby gang. Neither are we. It takes a few episodes to sort it all out and the entire season to run Glory out of town.
• Glory's Minions
  They look like they dropped by the set from a community theater's version of "Lord of the Rings." They excel in Glory endearments.
• Spike
  While living with Harmony, Spike discovers that he's in love with Buffy. Hilariousness ensues.

Season Six: Buffy and Spike

Season six is the darkest of the Buffy series. It follows the trajectories of Buffy and Spike's relationship, Zander and Anya's engagement and Willow and Tara's romance. All end badly. But in the process, the show covers some serious topics from love and friendship to date rape and addiction. The trademark humor is still there, but is often overshadowed by the drama of these difficult relationships. On the negative side (and perhaps fittingly), the season's human bad guy Warren is despicable and repulsive and lacks the evil charm of Glory and the Mayor. Warren aside, this is some compelling television.

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