Techtite.com Editorial : My Two Bits, V2

As hard as it is to accept it, it's 99% confirmed by now: Buffy the Vampire Slayer will be shelving her wooden stakes for good, as of this May. As many tabloid sources confirmed in late February, Sarah Michelle "Buffy" Gellar has signed on the dotted line to film a romance comedy --called, quite simply, Romantic Comedy-- in August. This would be the time the TV series began shooting its next season. As one Sarah source put it to TV Guide's online web site, "You do the math..."

Let's just say that in times like these, even "bad news" is actually good news. At no time has series creator Joss Whedon even considered "another Buffy," meaning we will not be forced to accept some "new" actress in the role. There are any number of storylines that could have been written, where Buffy is cursed or otherwise coerced to take another look, and in the process, have another actress step in as Buffy Summers. This is not even a possibility to the crew behind Buffy, and that pleases this fan to no end. Sarah Michell Gellar is Buffy, period. If she goes, so does the character.

However, there's no denying that Buffy has created a whole "Buffy-verse" all its own, and many of the members of this storyline could keep the saga alive via a spin-off. Unfortunately, that won't be Faith, since Eliza Dushku has signed on for a different series next season (on a different network, no less). So, we're back at square one.

Which brings me (finally) to the editorial topic at hand: what would be the perfect Buffy spin-off? My first vote: Willow (Alyson Hannigan). She has developed into a character that not only equals the three-dimensionality of Buffy in the series; she often surpasses it, when given the chance. Last season (with the nerd trio) was a total bore, with the sole exception of Willow's becoming an evil, vengeful sorceress by the season finale. She's been as close to Buffy through the years as R2D2 was to Luke Skywalker. If there's to be a spin-off, it would almost have to be her.

Then there's Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg). The plus side of Dawn is, they could do a total reversal to the first, best years of Buffy. In the beginning, Buffy needed to be trained, she needed to go to high school, and most importantly, she needed a date for the prom. As of now in the series, Dawn is around the same age Buffy was when the whole saga began, so they could do everything that made the first seasons cool, all over again. What's even better is that Dawn is a different personality from Buffy so her approach to each dilemma would be equally different. That's option #2.

Option #3 is tricky. Could they introduce a "new" slayer...? Yes and no. For one thing, you would need a veteran teen actress, and these days, such pickings are slim. Sarah, you may recall, had already shown her acting muscle in "All My Children," long before Warner Bros. had even considered a "WB" network to begin with. Is there anyone out there who is cute as a button, would look believable as a teenaged "vampire slayer," and is a good actress to boot? That's a toughie. To me, this is too much of a hard sell to call a viable option.

Option #4 I more or less came up with at the 11th hour while typing this: make the "Vampire dimension" into a spin-off. One of the cooler episodes of season 3 was when a parallel universe was discovered, where Buffy never survived that fateful battle in season one, and in the process, Willow was now an evil vampire and the "Hellmouth" was opened for good. Call me a diehard fan of all those Marvel comics "alternate universe" tales, though this would make a fine cornerstone for a spin-off series. What's more; it could involve Willow or Dawn, entering this dimension by accident, trying to get back yet at the same time trying to put things right on this "other Earth." Willow-the-vampire would probably be the arch-nemesis in such a series, which after such rigid guidelines in acting as the prim-and-sweet Willow, might be a pleasant change for Alyson Hannigan.

Can choosing which-to-do be held off until early summer? No. Such a spin-off needs to be mentioned or alluded to, as of the "series finale" of Buffy this May, in order to have any hope of earning the show's fans. For one thing; they need to know what to look for, right? For another; they need faith. Okay, so they need Faith, though with Eliza Dushku out of the running, that's not happening. At the very least, we need to know what this spin-off will be, so we're not out the door by the time such a spin-off begins this fall. It's clear now that Buffy will retire in May; whether that applies to all other characters Whedon created is now up to him.

Agree? Disagree?

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Buffy, Faith, Willow, and Dawn...