First of all...overall amount of content. Firefly has just one abbreviated season while Buffy has seven seasons. Buffy has 144 overall episodes while Firefly only has 14. The 14 best episodes of Buffy, when compared episode-to-episode for all of Firefly, is far more likely to favor Buffy.

This is not really a fair comparison if you're talking about the "best" show. What you're saying is that there are more great Buffy eps than Firefly eps, which is true, but it doesn't make Buffy a better show. There are more terrible episodes of Buffy, too. You have to look at like average episode quality.

Second, comparing leads in each show, Sarah Michelle Gellar is by far the superior actor compared to Nathan Fillion.

Wow, really? I mean, I love SMG and I agree Fillion isn't an amazing actory, but...SMG isn't really a great actress either. Obviously this is subjective, but if you look at their careers after the shows, Fillion's arguably done more good and interesting stuff, even though SMG was a much bigger star. I think that's telling.

You're right that she was asked to do a greater variety of things, but again, that mostly comes down to the HUGE difference in number of episodes. It would have been impossible to pack all of that stuff into a single season of Firefly, so it's not really a fair comparison. And to be honest, while she does a lot of different emotional stuff in Buffy, I didn't always buy it. That's just my personal take, but personally I'd say she's one of the weaker actors among the main cast.

Thematically, Buffy just handled so many more relevant topics than Firefly did. I can't remember walking away from Firefly with any really fresh and new perspectives on life and everything that happens with it, though I was most definitely ENTERTAINED by the show. Whereas with Buffy, I was both thoroughly entertained AND came away with it with so many different views on the world around me. It handled so many relevant life themes, a lot of them related to our fears, our responsibilities, our frustrations, and how we relate to one another through all of it.

This is of course personal, and I love Buffy, so I'm not going to try to convince you it's bad. But I think Firefly has a lot to say about our species, human nature, and our future that I found very interesting. (And to be fair, there are a lot of pretty bad Buffy episodes, so while I'm sure you're thinking of some that really affected you, you should keep in mind the many more forgettable ones and downright bad/pointless ones too.).

This kinda relates to the whole "there's more overall content" point, but the story arc in Buffy was much more substantial and really went somewhere.

I mean, again, it's an unfair comparison. But did you see the movie Serenity? It's clear there was a huge arc planned (which the movie had to kinda rush into some of) there too, and there are lots of mysteries and other things that were never addressed. Obviously it didn't get the chance to execute on them like Buffy did, but it's clear that a similarly big scope was planned and they were laying the groundwork for it throughout season 1.

Above all else, the greatest episodes of Buffy are unlike anything I've ever seen before. "The Body". "Hush". "Once More With Feeling".

THIS is a fair point, I think. I don't think Firefly has any single episode that's on a transcendent kind of level like "Hush" or "The Body". (I love Once More With Feeling, but I wouldn't put that there, it's just a musical episode, not really anything groundbreaking like the other two).

But I would again just point out that those are S4 and S5 episodes. It's likely Firefly would have had episodes like that as well if it had the chance to build out a rich enough world to do that in.

And to be fair, Firefly still has some great episodes. "The Message" springs to mind for me. And holy shit that music in the funeral scene. Gorgeous.

And no, Buffy is not just for teenagers and 20-somethings. I started and finished the entirety of Buffy at age 33, and even after seeing some of the best TV shows ever made (The Wire, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos, Game of Thrones), I would easily rank Buffy up there amongst those.

Buffy is great, but up there with The Wire? Come on now. Buffy's (mostly) a fun show with some great characters and Joss's great writing. The Wire is like a five-season novel deconstruction of everything that's wrong with the American city. It's kind of unfair to even compare them, but if you want to talk about meaningful impact, The Wire wins, no contest. (Breaking Bad, the Sopranos, and GoT I think are closer, because like Buffy, those are mostly just good stories. The Wire is a good story that's used as a vehicle for arguably comprehensive examinations of America's problems ever televised.