she’s the only chosen one

Comic If you’re a Buffy: The Vampire Slayer fan of old but haven’t been following the season eight comic books, I’d strongly recommend you at least find a copy of this month’s issue, #20. A continuity light number, it sends Buffy into what seems like a dream world were she’s back in Sunnydale, it’s season one again, her mum’s alive and she’s the only chosen one.

The metafictional twist is that these earlier times are actually a homage to the much muted animated series and in particular this pilot, with a simpler story and characterisation, more slapstick and well, some of the same jokes. Eric Wight's character designs are used as contrast to the more "realistic" work from Ethen Beavers and Adam Van Wyk.

On a couple of occasion, Buffy almost seems to be aware that she’s in a cartoon (or a comic book recreations of one) and writer Jeph Loeb gets loads of comic mileage and poignancy out of the disconnect between the older slayer in her teenage body, to demonstrate how, even though some things change, some things often stay the same.