‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer' revival is moving forward on Hulu — and I really wish it wasn't
Don't get me wrong — my "Buffy" obsession runs deep. I even spent my 21st birthday meeting David Boreanaz and James Marsters at a convention instead of gambling in Atlantic City.
Every year, I queue up season 2's 'Surprise' exactly 17 minutes and 50 seconds before midnight on my birthday, just so Willow's 'It's happy birthday, Buffy!' hits right on time. "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" defined my childhood (and let's be real, my adulthood) as much as it did the '90s.
But to paraphrase a certain angsty, bottle-blonde vamp: Let it rest in peace.
"Buffy the Vampire Slayer" gave us a beautiful ending (spoiler alert for anyone over 20 years late to the party). Both Buffy and fans bid farewell to Sunnydale and the Hellmouth after the Scooby Gang took on their most insidious and oldest adversary yet. 'Chosen' marks the end of Buffy's coming-of-age arc, and frankly, we don't need to see what she's up to decades later.
Our Slayer doesn't get a happy ending with either of her fanged suitors, Angel and Spike, but both receive powerful goodbyes honoring the part they played in making Buffy who she is. Ultimately, she departs with the weight of the world no longer solely on her shoulders as she enters the next era of her life off-screen.
Yet it wasn't Buffy who closed out the show. Love Dawn or hate her, the final line comes from Buffy's sister asking, 'What are we going to do now?'
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Well, apparently, we're going to revive the show two decades later.
Though the reboot was in the works long before the tragic death of Michelle Trachtenberg, sullying that ending feels even more wrong now. Gellar just confirmed that the show will pay homage to Trachtenberg, but the best way to honor her legacy is to leave that ending be. I'm no Dawn fan, but Buffy died for her sister, and the inevitability of killing Dawn off-screen leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
Yes, life went on after the credits rolled, but we don't need to see it. The awful Buffy comic books make that abundantly clear (did anyone ask for Troll Dawn and Xander to hook up?). Activating the potential slayers was a powerful story arc, but it also offered a natural conclusion to Buffy's Chosen One journey.
I don't want to know if Buffy is married, divorced, widowed or has kids. We don't need to know that — because that's not the story we tuned into every week for seven years. Those details are better left to the imagination and AO3.
At this point, most "Buffy" fans are probably as sick of love triangles as I am. Yet Spike and Angel helped define the original series.
James Marsters and David Boreanaz certainly made the most of the vampiric elixir of youth that Hollywood hides from the rest of us mere mortals, but they're not 20 anymore. Even if they wanted to return, they couldn't — not convincingly — which is one of the biggest reasons a reboot never seemed feasible.
With key characters dead, others unavailable and the vampire-aging thing being what it is, the revival already feels like a hollow version of the original. And yeah, I know — 'What's dead doesn't have to stay dead.' But maybe it should. Especially if it's just for the sake of a cash grab.
I trust Sarah Michelle Gellar. She's always been fiercely protective of Buffy as a character, and the fact that she's turned down so many revival pitches before makes me think she sees something here. But without most of the core cast, it's hard to imagine this feeling like anything other than a shadow.
The original show resonated because of who stood next to Buffy when the world ended, not just the monsters she slayed.
Look, Hulu isn't the problem. If "Buffy" has to come back, it's the best place for it. Hulu's track record with smart, emotionally rich genre shows ("The Handmaid's Tale") and even its approach to camp ("The Great") actually lines up with "Buffy's" tone. The platform could support a revival ... but that doesn't mean it should.
"Buffy the Vampire Slayer" was lightning in a bottle: sharp writing, iconic one-liners ('I may be dead, but I'm still pretty'), flawed but lovable characters, and emotional stakes that often hit harder than the supernatural ones. At its core, "Buffy" was about found family, love and choosing to fight through darkness together. You can't recreate that with a couple of callbacks. You can't reboot the soul of a show without the people who gave it one.
"Buffy" was a product of its time and that's part of what made it work. Set it in the 2020s and you lose the charm, the cheese, the campy magic. We've already lost the Hellmouth; now we're losing the plot.
Sure, there may be merit to the new story. And yes, I'll stream it the second it drops and probably hate myself for it. I did it with the "Teen Wolf" movie. I'll do it for "Clueless." And I'll definitely do it for "Buffy." But reviving these quintessential '90s titles — especially when the original ended on such a strong note — risks sullying the legacy for what? One or two seasons of mid content?
Nostalgia runs pop culture now, sure. But the hardest thing in this world is to love and let go. The Powers That Be need to be brave and allow Buffy stay in the '90s, where she belongs.
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