In every generation there is a chosen one. She alone will stand against the vampires the demons and the forces of darkness. She is the slayer. And now she’s gonna do it all again. The new BOOM! Studios comic series has returned to the story of Buffy, Willow, Xander, Giles, and all the residents of Sunnydale, starting from the very beginning. They’re telling the story again once more, with feeling. Welcome to the Hellmouth. Welcome to Buffyversity.
We at Buffyversity are pretty excited for this new Buffy series. How will magically starting again in 2019 change things for the Scooby Gang? We couldn’t wait to find out, so we sat down with series writer Jordie Bellaire and series editor Jeanine Schaefer to find out how they were approaching the material. We find out how they were introduced to Buffy, why they think the story endures, and whether or not we can expect to meet Jenny Calendar and the Technopagans (hint: Ms. Calendar is a definite yes!).
If you still feel like you need to get your slay on after that, we’ve got a special surprise for you- a preview of issue two! Enjoy our conversation with the team, and some exclusive pages from series artist Dan Mora. And keep an eye on this space- there’s more Buffyversity goodness to come!
Jordie, what’s your history with the character Buffy? I notice from your profile on the Image Comics website it very prominently says that your cat’s name is Buffy.
Jordie Bellaire: I love Buffy. My cat and also the character. When I first got the pitch from Jeanine I was real excited, but I couldn’t help but feel like a bit of an impostor, because I was not a big teenage fan, I did not sign on until I was closer to 18 which for me was really nice because I was so close. But I’m 30 now, I don’t know if that’s much of an excuse. But I fell into it really hard in college. It wasn’t a thing I shared with other people because the ship had already sailed for everybody else. So I was watching it late in the game back when Netflix was still sending DVDs. I was rushing to the mailbox, you could only watch three episodes, and I was rushing to get it sent back. In that way it was an experience… she meant a lot to me in college. I think Jeanine was just talking about the importance of Buffy to me at one point, she had never seen a woman on TV like Buffy before. And I gotta say, I can’t remember seeing someone like Buffy either, before or since.
I liked her friends, that was what made me like the show. It was so character driven. Everyone had their flaws and they were so lovable, or else you liked them in spite of horrible flaws. That was what always related to me. No one was perfect, no one was the best, everyone was going through life as best they could and kind of mucking it up along the way.
Jeanine Schaefer: I think Jordie, finding it at 18, 19, 20, even well into your 20s, you’re still really right in that: who am I? What do I want out of life? What are the pressures that are on me to make the right decisions, especially as a woman? Am I allowed to make bad decisions? What that judgement looks like. That’s all what Buffy dealt with and why she was so important to so many people. To see someone able to make a mistake and carry on with their life.
I started watching it when I was in my 20s but that was because I was in college when it came out!
JB: Not to knock anyone who got into later! I had this roommate who finally watched the last season with me and she never stopped getting at me that I hadn’t watched it when I was a kid. She went hard, always placing second in those Buffy trivia contests. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’m always thinking of her.
Continued belowThat’s eerie! Jordie, you and I are the exact same age and we had the exact same entry into Buffy at the exact same time. College, my friends had seen it, Netflix, the whole deal.
JB: Maybe you and I were rushing out to the same mailbox under the same moon!
When you put it like that, it sounds like an episode of Buffy.
JB: It does!
The thing that makes this new series so excited besides the creative team- Dan Mora is a legend and the two of you teaming up is so exciting to me- is that you’re transplanting the story from 1997 to 2019. In the first issue, you can start to see the ways that asserts itself. Like Willow: from the beginning she’s just out because it’s 2019 and things are different from they were in 1997. How’s the new setting affecting your approach?
JB: Me and Jeanine talk about how teenagers today are having a different experience from back in the 90s. When people hear the word reboot they worry we’re gonna do all the cringe-worthy things that a reboot could entail, but it’s such a different experience being a teenager today. We’re trying to stress that, how everyone is connected, everyone is on social media, how everyone can have a friend even if they are the most bookish quiet person in school, they can have a very enriching online life, and that’s amazing! I think there are a lot of new ways teenagers are able to get through each day now from when I was in high school. We’re definitely approaching that in a big way. Jeanine is always reminding we about the whole online thing, always nudging me. Maybe it’s because she’s got kids, and she’s seen it more for what it is. I know they’re not teenagers yet, but I think Jeanine is really plugged in as a mom today. Teenagers now: they’re connected!
Well then really importantly: are there still techno-pagans?
JB: To be honest, me and Jeanine haven’t talked about that but I guess, it’s the future. It’s 2019!
Yeah, what’s Jenny Calendar in 2019?
JB: Oh, I love Jenny. I will say that Jenny is in there from the word go. I love Jenny.
JS: That was a non-starter. Jordie said “It’s Ms. Calendar or nothing!”
JB: It’s not even a joke. I love that woman so much.
And the show did her so dirty in the original run! Now she gets another shot.
JB: Exactly!
That’s what excites me about the whole venture. You don’t have to worry about how actors work together or VFX budgets or giant CGI snakes that look kinda crappy now.
JB: No budgets here. Dan is such a great artist. I just wrote a really weird creature for something and I can’t wait for Dan to draw it because I know he’s gonna take his imagination and make something insane that we would never see in the show. He’s definitely amazing and we get to explore all these new monsters!
Here’s a question for everyone. Even though there have been lots of Buffy comics, Buffy really belongs to Joss Whedon: those are two names you just can’t untangle. I feel like now people look at Whedon really differently from when he was just a young guy making a weird TV show in 1997. How are you guys in conversation with Joss Whedon’s legacy?
JS: Joss has been really generous in that he’s giving us the room to stretch our legs and tell the story we want to tell. He read our initial outline, and he read our scripts so far, and he looked at the big character beats. That was his biggest concern. That we take care of these characters that are so important to him and that are now so important to millions of people. We walked him through all these huge character moments and even the tiny character changes we wanted to make to talk about how they would inform the larger character arcs. He was really excited by what we wanted to do! I think for a couple of things, he might have thought we were a little crazy, but he was like, “yeah, I’m on board!” I think he understands how important this is to us. He did give us a couple of parameters and asked us some tough questions we had to answer before we could move forward and we were able to do that in a way he was very happy about. You will see at least one of those hinted in the first issue and more of that as we go on. He’s been very generous but he’s also been holding us to the high standard of taking care of these characters that are so important to so many people.
Continued belowI imagine the answers to those questions are probably spoilers, but would you be able to share what the questions were? What his concerns were?
JS: I sure can’t. I sure cannot!
What I will say is that we used those questions as a real road map and they are the same questions we’ve seen fans asking. I thought it was funny. The more feedback I saw from concerned fans, the more I noticed that they were the same questions that Joss asked us. What I can say is that every question that a concerned fan has, we did everything we are doing in service to answering those questions.
Written by Jordie BellaireCover by Matt Taylor
Illustrated by Dan Mora
Colored by Raul Angulo
Lettered by Ed DukeshireThe reimagining of Joss Whedon’s groundbreaking series continues as Drusilla, the self-proclaimed Mistress and her pet, Spike, make their debut with their sights set on Buffy! Meanwhile, Giles is determined to teach Buffy about her destiny, responsibility, blah blah…can someone tell him to chill? How bad can it get?
