Vampire Time

At 33 seconds into the above video of BBC Two continuity from the 29th October 1999, we get a trailer for something rather interesting: the first late-night showing of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, airing at 11.10pm on Sunday, which was a repeat of the episode premiered the day before at 6.45pm (season 2, episode 6 "Halloween", original US TX almost exactly two years beforehand on 27/10/97).The early-evening showings had been subject to heavy censorship, whereas obviously these post-watershed airings would be completely intact. Although the trailer starts with the words "after dark" and offers an opportunity to "see [Buffy] in a completely new light", with the announcer also branding it as "late-night Buffy", the trailer has a slight air of skirting around what it actually is. It feels a little euphemistic, as if the BBC did not want to admit that the earlier showings were being heavily cut; even the Radio Times listing for the premiere refers to the late-night airing as an "extended…