What have we learned from Charmed, Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, The Twilight Zone, Heroes and Roswell? All together now: Reboots. Don’t. Work.
From the perversion of childhood classics to the destruction of otherwise perfect TV series with famously enduring cult followings, the list of failed adaptations, reboots and sequels which have fruitlessly attempted to capture the magic of the originals is disturbingly long. Meanwhile, brilliant new adaptations are getting cancelled left, right and centre despite largely positive reviews.
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different outcome, and you don’t have to be psychic to understand that it’s impossible to recreate the glory of something that was, and remains, so inherently of its time. How this isn’t overwhelmingly obvious to all those who sign on to such doomed projects is entirely beyond me.
According to Variety and Deadline, Sarah Michelle Gellar is said to be joining the rumoured Buffy The Vampire Slayer follow-up as an executive producer alongside Gail Berman. The 90s superstar all but confirmed her involvement yesterday when she shared a snap wearing Buffy’s famous “yummy sushi pyjamas”.
Fran Kuzui and Kaz Kuzui will executive produce via Suite B and Dolly Parton will do so via her production company Sandollar (bar Gellar, all of the aforementioned were EPs on the original show). Nora Zuckerman and Lila Zuckerman will write, show run and executive produce, while Oscar-winning Chloé Zhao (Nomadland, Eternals) is attached to direct.
Described as “the next chapter in the Buffyverse,” fans are reading between the lines to make the important distinction that the show isn’t going to be a re-vamp, if you’ll pardon the pun, but rather a follow-up to the original series.
Since it’s more than likely that Gellar will be the only returning OG, this means that the remainder of the all-star cast will probably be replaced; thus destroying any potential for nostalgic charm. They’d be better off starting fresh with a new, contemporary storyline with SMG on board solely as an executive producer to keep things in tip-top shape.
Indeed, the litany of beloved original cast members who won’t be able to join the project alongside SMG is so sizeable that any attempt to re-capture the lighting in a bottle that was the original Buffy series is futile.
Vampires don’t age – James Marsters (Spike) is 62 and David Boreanaz (Angel) is 55. While The Shanshu Prophecy uncovered in Angel’s spinoff dictates that vampires with souls can become mortal, would their characters have the same heart?
Nicholas Brendon (Xander) has ongoing health issues and has been involved in a myriad of scandals. Tara (played by Amber Benson) dies in season six, and we lose Anya (Emma Caulfield) in season seven. Charisma Carpenter’s character Cordelia dies in season five of the spin-off, Angel.
Perhaps most importantly, the original show’s creator, writer and producer Joss Whedon – once hailed as a paragon of Hollywood feminism – has come under fire in the last few years for misogynistic behaviour and for creating a toxic environment on the show during its six-year run. While many fans think Whedon should be cancelled, Buffy simply isn’t and cannot be Buffy without him.
One Redditor on a post discussing the reboot said, “I know it’s not exactly Kosher to say it, but Whedon's writing made the show what it is.” Another added, “His idiosyncratic style is such a huge part of the original show's DNA that I'm highly sceptical of anyone else being able to capture what made the show special.”
Giving Buffy a 2025 makeover will strip it of its marvellous late 1990s, early 2000s charm. Part of the joy in watching/ re-watching the show is enduring the horrifyingly bad special effects (cutting-edge at the time), obvious cuts to wig-wearing stunt doubles, and the hilariously obvious SFX vampire prosthetics. What’s more, how is an entire generation of Gen Z-ers expected to take the term ‘slay’ seriously in a modern setting?
Buffy was undeniably of its time. From showcasing the gradual shift toward the technological golden age (the show is credited with inventing the phrase “Google it”) to showcasing the height of new millennium fashion through the sartorially supreme protagonist – altering what is widely considered a perfect show with a satisfying ending runs the risk of retroactively ruining it for superfans like myself for the sake of a money grab.
I have endless questions regarding Buffy Take Two that I don’t necessarily want the answers to. Just one, really: when will money-hungry production executives with no value for historical, cultural zeitgeist learn to leave well enough alone?
As the notoriously misunderstood Cordelia once said in Season 2, episode 18, "Tact is just not saying true stuff. I'll pass.”
