When Buffy The Vampire Slayer left the airwaves back in 2003, many were left heartbroken as many geeks are when a beloved tv show gets cancelled or runs it's course. In the case of Buffy, the story seemed somewhat complete with the complete destruction of Sunnydale. This wasn't of course the end of the story of these characters and for one more year we got a few glimpses into the new world order of the Slayer line with the continuation of the spin off series Angel.
It wasn't long of course until Buffy returned in full canonical glory. albeit in a new format, with the 2007 release of the Season 8 comic book with Joss Whedon himself back at the helm. Having ventured into the Comic Book format during the run of the TV show with many non-canon stories, The Buffyverse did briefly have a canonical stint in this format with the futuristic spin off mini series Fray about a Slayer in a less than perfect future version of earth. It was in the Fray mini series that the Slayer Scythe featured in Season 7 of the TV show first made it's appearance. How do we know the world of Fray is canonical? Well that's easy because midway through Season 8 fans of the mini series are treated to a Buffy/Fray crossover story arc which does not disappoint.
Season 8 took us on a wild overtly fantastical ride where the extent of the writers imagination was no longer limited to what the television show's budget could stretch to producing believably. This of course got many fans excited about the new possibilities for storylines but did admittedly aim a little too big on occasion such as giant mystical deities and let's not forget the giant Mecha Godzilla/Dawn hybrid - whilst the latter was an amusing homage to the Japanese Kaiju/Mecha cinematic culture the giant deities were perhaps a step too far! Season 8's 40 issue run (plus 3 one shot releases) ended in 2011 with Season 9 following shortly after and this time everything came back to basics after the writers also felt Season 8 had gotten a little far from the core Buffy style and had taken the opportunity granted by the destructive climax of the Season 8 Finale to shake things up rather dramatically once again.
Season 9 separated the gang and had everyone off solving their own problems, including the introduction of the Angel & Faith comic book into the mix as well as 2 mini series runs for both Spike and Willow. These were all written with the intent that the fans could read as many or as little as they liked of the books released under the Season 9 banner and not lose out if they chose to focus on only one release as key elements that were relevant to the overall story line were always summarised where necessary when something had happened in another book that you may not have been following.
Overall both Season 8 and 9 were both fantastically enjoyable reads for the fans of the show who wanted to continue with the characters storylines and don't detract from the TV show at all, however that said, both 8 and 9 always felt like a seperate entity being in a new format and had having just re-watched the tv series yet again from the beginning in it's entirety it's clear some aspects of the show didn't always translate to the new format quite so well.
This last week saw the long awaited release of Season 10 and without giving anything away, the first issue had me laughing out loud many times as I read it and was very pleased to discover it had truly captured the missing spark of the TV series that was occasionally lacking since the format change.
With pop culture references, jokes and characteristic snarkyness being totally on point throughout the issue as well as a few surprise returns of familiar faces, I had a smile on my face from start to finish of issue one and was left excited and very optimistic for the future of the Comic Book Buffyverse. Season 10 looks like it's going to be a fun ride!
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If you haven't yet read any of the comic book continuation of the Buffyverse you can find trade paperback collections of both Season 8 and 9 at your local Comic Book store, large chain book stores and online retailers and you should be able to catch up by the time the first trade paperback of Season 10 becomes available if not sooner!
New to the comic book format? not sure if you'll like the change in style? well there's even a solution to help ease you across to the new format. The first 19 issues of Season 8 were also made into what is known as Motion Comics, artwork from the comic books is taken and converted into a video format, occasionally animating some elements and adding an audio track with voice actors performing the roles of the characters. Sadly no more than the first 19 have been produced at this time but the ones that have been made are available to purchase on DVD, Blu-ray and digital download and are a great way to get through the first half of Season 8 very quickly!
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