Buffy the Vampire Slayer Omnibus volume 1


By Joss Whedon, Christopher Golden, Daniel Brereton, Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Paul Lee, Eric Powell, Joe Bennett, Cliff Richards, & various (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-784-6 (TPB)

I’m thoroughly enjoying a complete rescreening of Buffy at the moment and thus took a look at this premier compilation of her earliest comics outings. They’re still great too. You should track them down. They’re all available as eBooks these days…

Blood-drenched supernatural doomed love is a venerable, if not always creditable, sub-genre these days, so let’s take a look at one of the relatively ancient antecedents responsible for this state of affairs in the shape of Dark Horse Comics’ translation of cult TV show franchise Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Collected here in a big bad Omnibus edition is material from Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Spike & Dru #3 (December 2000), Buffy the Vampire Slayer: the Origin (January-March 1999) and Buffy the Vampire Slayer #51-59 (November 2002 to July 2003); nearly three hundred pages of full-colour, tongue-in-cheek mystical martial arts mayhem and merriment.

As explained in comicbook Editor Scott Allie’s Introduction, although the printed sagas and spin-offs were created in a meandering manner up and down the timeline, this series of Omnibus books re-presents them in strict chronological continuity order, beginning with a perilous period piece entitled ‘All’s Fair’ – by Christopher Golden with art from Eric Powell, Drew Geraci & Keith Barnett – originally seen in Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Spike & Dru #the 3 (from December 2000).

Although Buffy was a hot and hip teen cheerleader-turned-monster-killer, as the TV series developed it became clear that the bad-guys were increasingly the true fan-favourites. Cool vampire villain and über-predator Spike eventually became a love-interest and even a suitably tarnished white knight, but at the time of this collection he was still a jaded, blood-hungry, immortal, immoral psychopath… every girl’s dream date.

His eternal paramour was Drusilla: a demented precognitive vampire who killed him and made him an immortal bloodsucker. She thrived on a stream of fresh decadent thrills and revelled in baroque and outré bloodletting.

There has been an unbroken mystical progression of young women tasked with killing the undead through the centuries, and here we see the Chinese Boxer Rebellion of 1900, where Spike and Dru are making the most of the carnage after killing that era’s Slayer. The story then shifts to the Chicago World’s Fair of 1933 where the undying mad lovers are still on the murderous prowl. However, the scientific wonders of the modern world displayed in various exhibits are all eclipsed by one scientist who has tapped into the realm of Elder Gods as a cheap source of energy. To further complicate matters, Spike and Dru are being stalked by a clan of Chinese warriors trained from birth to destroy the predatory pair and avenge that Slayer killed back in Beijing…

Gods, Demons, Mad Scientists, Kung Fu killers, Tongs and terror all combine in a gory romp that will delight TV devotees and ordinary horrorists alike…

Next up is a smart reworking of the cult B-movie which launched the global mega-hit TV.

Starring Kristy Swanson, Donald Sutherland, Luke Perry and Rutger Hauer, the film was released in 1992 with a modicum of success and to the lasting dissatisfaction of writer/creator Joss Whedon. Five years later he got the chance to do it right and in the manner he’d originally intended. The ensemble action-horror-comedy series became a genuine phenomenon, inspiring a new generation of Goth gore-lovers as well as many, many “homages” in assorted media – including comics.

Dark Horse won the licensing rights in the USA, subsequently producing an enthralling regular comicbook series goosed up with a welter of impressive miniseries and specials. In 1999 the company – knowing how powerfully the inclusivity/continuity/completism gene dominates comics fan psychology – finally revisited that troublesome cinematic debut with miniseries Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Origin running from January to March.

Scrupulously returning to the author’s script and core-concept, restoring excised material, shifting the tone back towards what Whedon originally intended whilst reconfiguring events until they better jibed with the established and beloved TV mythology, adaptors Christopher Golden & Daniel Brereton (with artists Joe Bennett, Rick Ketcham, Randy Emberlin & J. Jadsen) produced a fresh 3-issue miniseries which canonically established just exactly what the formerly vapid Valley Girl did in her old hometown that got her transferred to scenic Sunnydale and a life on the Hellmouth…

It all kicks off in ‘Destiny Free’ as shallow yet popular teen queen/cheerleader Buffy Summers shrugs off recurring nightmares of young women battling and being killed by vampires throughout history to continue her perfect life of smug contentment. Even a chance meeting with grungy stoner bad-boys Pike and Benny can’t dent her aura of self-assured privilege and studied indolence…

The nightmares keep mounting in intensity, however, and all over town teenagers keep disappearing…

Things come to a head the week her parents leave town for a trip. In a dark park, a maniac attacks Pike and Benny and is only driven off by the intervention of a mysterious, formidable old man. Even so, the assailant manages to take the screaming Benny with him…

Next day the same old geezer is at school, annoying Buffy. She is blithely mocking until he tells her about her nightmares and explains that she has an inescapable destiny… as a slayer of monsters…

Meanwhile, deep in the bowels of the Earth a monster is marshalling his forces and making terrifying converts out of the spoiled, worthless – but tasty – children of California…

Buffy’s strange stalker is exceedingly persistent and that night, despite her disbelieving misgivings, she and Merrick – an agent of an ancient, monster-hunting secret society – lurk in a graveyard waiting for a recently murdered man to rise from his fresh grave…

When he does – along with unsuspected others – Buffy’s unsuspected powers and battle reflexes kick in and, against all odds, she spectacularly overcomes…

‘Defenseless Mechanisms’ finds the aggressively altered Buffy grudgingly dropping her fatuous after-school activities and friends to train with the increasingly strident and impatient Watcher Merrick. Even though her attitude is appalling and her attention easily diverted, the girl is serious about the job, and even has a few new ideas to add to The Slayer’s traditional arsenal…

Even as she starts her career by pretending to be a helpless lost girl to draw out vile vamps, across town Pike is in big trouble. He also knows what is happening: after all, every night Benny comes to his window, begging to be let in and offering to share his new life with his best bud…

At school, the change in Buffy is noticeable and all her old BFFs are pointedly snubbing her, even as every sundown Lothos‘ legion gets bolder and bigger. A fatal mistake occurs on the night when Slayer and Watcher save the finally-outmanoeuvred Pike from Benny and the Vampire Lord. Only two of the embattled humans survive and escape…

The tale escalates to a shocking climax when an undead army invades the long-awaited Hemery High School dance, looking for Buffy and fresh meat/recruits. With his bloodsuckers surrounding the petrified revellers and demanding a final reckoning, Lothos believes his victory assured, but in all his centuries of unlife he’s never encountered a Slayer quite like Buffy Summers…

As Allie’s Introduction already revealed, there are major hassles involved in producing a licensed comicbook whilst the primary property is still unfolding. Thus, as the print series was winding up the editors opted for in-filling some glaring gaps in the Slayer’s early career. Buffy the Vampire Slayer #51-59, spanning November 2002 through July 2003, addresses the period between the film’s end and her first days in Sunnydale, leading off with ‘Viva Las Buffy’ (Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Cliff Richards & Will Conrad) detailing what the Slayer did next: abandoning her disintegrating family as they prepared to leave LA and the reputation their daughter has garnered.

Buffy hooks up with sole survivor and wannabe monster-hunter Pike and they eventually fetch up in Nevada to investigate the apparently vampire-run Golden Touch Casino. The young warriors have no idea that a dark solitary stranger with a heavenly name is stalking them or that somewhere in England a Council of arrogant scholar-magicians are preparing a rather controversial candidate to join her as the new Watcher…

Sadly, Rupert Giles has a rival for the post who is prepared to do literally anything to secure the position…

Pike and the Slayer infiltrate the gambling palace as menial workers, whilst moodily formidable solo avenger Angelus goes straight to the top: hiring on as an enforcer for the management. When both independently operating factions are exposed, the Vamp with a Soul is tossed into a time-trap and despatched back to the 1930s as Buffy and Pike battle an army of horrors before confronting the ghastly family of monstrosities running the show across two eras.

The living and undead heroes endure heartbreak and sacrifice before this evil empire is ended forever…

Paul Lee then reveals the bizarre story of ‘Dawn & Hoopy the Bear’ wherein Buffy’s little sister accidentally intercepts a Faustian gift intended for the absent Slayer and finds herself befriended by a demonic Djinn who seems sweet but is pre-programmed for murder…

Through the narrative vehicle of Dawn reading her big sister’s diary, the last piece of the puzzle is revealed in ‘Slayer, Interrupted’ (Lobdell, Nicieza, Richards, Conrad, Lee & Horton) as Buffy’s own written words disclose her apparent delusional state. With no other choice, her parents have their clearly-troubled teen committed to a psychiatric institution.

Meanwhile in Ireland, Giles – having overcome his own opposition – completes his training preparations by undergoing a potentially lethal ritual and confronting his worst nightmare before heading to the USA, where Angelus and demonic attendant Whistler are still clandestinely watching over the Slayer.

That’s all to the good, as the asylum has been infiltrated by a sorcerous cult intent on gathering “brides” for infernal night-lord Rakagore…

As Buffy undergoes talk therapy with the peculiar Dr. Primrose, she comes to realise the nature of her own mission, her role as a “Creature of Destiny” in the universe and, most importantly, that the elderly therapist is not all she seems either…

With her head clear at last, all Buffy has to do is prove she’s sane, smash an invasion of devils, reconcile with her family and prepare for the new school year at Sunnydale High…

To Be Continued…

Supplementing a hoard of supernatural treasures is a copious photo, Title Page and Cover Gallery with contributions from Ryan Sook, Guy Major, Bennett, Gomez, Jadsen, René Micheletti, Paul Lee & Brian Horton.

Visually impressive, winningly scripted and illustrated and – most importantly – proceeding at a breakneck rollercoaster pace, this supernatural action-fest is utterly engaging even if you’re not familiar with the vast backstory: a creepy chronicle as easily enjoyed by the most callow neophyte as by the dedicated devotee. Moreover, with the shows readily available, if you aren’t a follower yet you soon could – and should – be…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Omnibus volume 4


By Andi Watson, Christopher Golden, Daniel Brereton, Joe Bennett, Hector Gomez, Cliff Richards, Jason Minor & various (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-968-0

It’s the height of summer here and with “Seen-it Season” well under way and nothing but old movie blockbusters and sundry other reruns flooding the TV ether, I’ve decided to join in the lazy, short-sighted scheduling process with a few comics compilations starring venerable franchise stars. At least the entertainment quality of these golden oldies is guaranteed and there are no ads to fast forward through…

Buffy the Vampire Slayer debuted as a motion picture starlet, but found her home after migrating to the small screen. After securing her status as a certified media sensation, she won her own comicbook in 1998, with smart, suspenseful, action-packed yarns exploding out of a monthly series, graphic novels, spin-off miniseries and short stories in showcase anthology Dark Horse Presents – all complementing the sensational, groundbreaking and so culturally crucial TV show.

Buffy Summers resides in the California hamlet of Sunnydale, built over a paranormal portal to the Nether Realms dubbed The Hellmouth. Here, she and a small band of buddies battle devils, demons and all sorts of horrors inexorably drawn to the area: most of whom/what regard humanity as a succulent appetiser and Earth an irresistible eldritch “fixer-upper” opportunity.

With Rupert Giles, scholarly mentor, father-figure and Watcher of all things unnatural, Buffy and her “Scooby Gang” sought to make the after-dark streets of Sunnydale safe for the largely-oblivious human morsels, ably abetted and occasionally aided by an enigmatic undead stud-muffin called Angel…

Collected in this fourth of seven supremely scintillating Omnibus editions (and mirroring events on the show’s third season) are the pertinent contents of Dark Horse Presents #141, Buffy the Vampire Slayer #9-11, 13-15, 17-20 and 50, Buffy the Vampire Slayer Annual 1999, Buffy the Vampire Slayer Wizard #½, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Angel #1-3, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Lover’s Walk and Angel #1-3: collectively spanning 1999-2002 and all re-convened for your delectation as a chronological continuity rather than in original publishing order: well-nigh 400 pages of full-colour mystery, merriment and mystical martial arts mayhem.

As recapitulated in original series Editor Scott Allie’s Introduction, although stories were created in a meandering manner up and down the timeline, this Omnibus series offers them in strict chronological continuity order…

Launching the sundown action is an ambitious 10-issue epic which ran intermittently through the first two years of the monthly comic. ‘Bad Blood’ was written by Andi Watson and illustrated by Joe Bennett & Rick Ketcham and latterly Cliff Richard & Joe Pimentel, opening with a rare romantic moment. Buffy and recently-restored undead lover Angel are in the local cemetery where they are interrupted by a new type of threat. However this particular monster is too quick to be seen and apparently consumes corpses rather than living flesh…

Meanwhile, in a dingy alley formerly beautiful vampire Selke seethes. Even though her kind cast no reflections, she knows her previous clashes with the Slayer have destroyed not only her strength but also her sublime allure…

Even as Buffy’s mom idly considers cosmetic surgery to bolster her fading youth, Selke accosts plastic surgeon Dr. Flitter, offering the challenge of a lifetime and unchanging, undead eternal life in return. Obsession with appearances seems to be epidemic in Sunnydale and when Buffy is approached by talent scout Lana she seriously considers a proposal to become a model. If only it doesn’t cut into her Slaying schedule… oh, and school of course…

Whilst Giles was busy researching the elusive thing that eats cadavers, Ma Summers has regained her equilibrium and decides against going under the knife – which was lucky since Flitter has taken up Selke’s offer to restore her. However, as his normal procedures don’t work, he’s resorting to old books of magic for a solution, and is keeping the impatient nosferatu complacent by feeding her his other clients…

Buffy has prepared to battle what Giles calls “Ghouls” but faces a far worse, emotional, battering from the other models on her first day at work. Selke, meanwhile, fooling herself that Flitter’s efforts are working, has tried to recruit vampire allies from the town’s new undead overlord Rouleau and been utterly humiliated…

Later that night as Angel and the Slayer finally eradicate the ghoul gang, furious Selke puts her increasingly arcane cosmetologist on warning: succeed soon or die horribly… Issue #11 continued exploring themes of looks and sexual politics after sleazy musician Todd Dahl hits town with his band and starts looking for impressionable babes to bed.

After the Slayer forcefully turns him down, Todd brags that he has bagged Buffy and goes on to insult and rebuff more-than-willing teen witch Amy. All too soon, the repulsive love-rat is treated to a scary look at the other side of the bed when he suddenly transforms into ‘A Boy Named Sue’…

Flitter meanwhile has intercepted a grimoire intended for Giles’ lore library and deduced a way to heal Selke and even hype-up the strength of her own bite-created offspring. Unfortunately, it involves preying upon other vampires to get the raw ingredients…

The direly dangerous process succeeds and a fully restored, resplendent, deadlier than ever Selke triumphantly puts her plans into play. Soon everyone who ever crossed her will pay and pay and pay in blood and torment…

The wise-cracking action resumes with the formerly disfigured and depleted Selke paying a return visit to undead gang-boss Rouleau. The last time he saw – and spurned – her, she was a pathetic, mutilated bag of scars and bile, but now she is both beautiful and overwhelmingly powerful. She also bears a grudge…

Her pet plastic surgeon has discovered a passion for alchemy to supplement his total lack of morals. Flitter has completely taken up Selke’s cause, restoring and improving her but, since normal scientific procedures don’t work, is stuck with scouring books of magic for a solution. Although his researches turned up a way to turn vampire blood into a super-steroid for Selke and her “offspring”, now she and her newly-minted children of the night must hunt not only humans for food, but vampires for fuel…

Selke, though, is obsessed only with making the Slayer suffer…

Meanwhile, in a vain semblance of normal teen life, the Scooby Gangsters Cordelia, Oz, Xander and Buffy coach brainy, nervous Willow for an upcoming televised inter-school quiz show. Things start to come unglued when Selke incidentally consumes Sunnydale High’s resident nerd Lyle and Cordy, desperate to change her bimbo image, steals a magic charm from Giles and becomes a voracious consumer of facts. Sadly, there’s no off-switch and her brain quickly begins to overload…

Selke’s über-vamps are also making mischief with Buffy and Angel finding them almost impossible to destroy…

Now nocturnal civil war breaks out between Selke’s squad and the town’s regular fangers. Night patrols are crazily broken up by vampires constantly attempting to capture and drain each other, and things take a bleak turn when deadly demon lovers Spike and Drusilla return, keen on turning the mounting chaos to their own decadently amused advantage…

Soon, their unique talents for obtaining information have led them to the secret of the “bad blood”, with Selke and Flitter still oblivious to the new threat to their schemes. The cosmetic alchemist has now discovered a way of mystically cloning their own “Dark Slayer” to take care of Buffy, and Selke wants one right now!

Sadly Flitter’s first attempts are all woefully inadequate and promptly discarded… even the one which was still sort-of alive…

Buffy’s daylight problems are insane. Sleazy Todd spread very nasty rumours about her before he temporarily turned into a girl, but now he’s male again he’s fallen desperately in love with the girl he wronged. His misplaced passion and rekindled conscience cost him dearly…

Events reach crisis point as the war between leeches escalates. On a rare night off from slaying, Buffy hits one of Selke’s pack with her mom’s (stolen) car and is subsequently ambushed by the whole mob. Even as she impossibly stakes them all, in a hidden lab, Flitter decants his masterpiece – a Summers simulacrum physically identical to and apparently far superior to The Slayer. This sorcerous clone will relentlessly hunt down and slaughter the original…

Accursed by daylight lives approximating normality, Willow, Cordelia, Oz, Xander and Buffy are forced to join in school-type activities by building a float for an upcoming parade. Angel, meanwhile, has captured one of Selke’s new ‘Roid Rage Vamps and started obtaining answers in a manner most un-heroic…

On the midnight streets, Buffy is ambushed by her duplicate and, after a blistering battle, loses. Elsewhere Selke, unaware that a new faction has sabotaged her modified blood supply, gorges herself on the foul brew…

After disposing of Buffy’s body down a handy manhole, the doppelganger attempts to infiltrate the Scooby Gang, but although she has the Slayer’s memories, her attitudes are seriously skewed. For instance, her knowledge of fashion now rivals Cordie’s…

Tensions rise as the clone starts to degrade. Born of Bad Blood, she casts no reflection and can’t see her face, but once she notices the flesh of her shoulder coming off she heads straight back to Doc Flitter…

The cosmetic alchemist has already discovered that someone has adulterated his buckets of blood and Selke is completely out of control when the clone arrives, leaking from many lesions. None of them are aware that, deep below Sunnydale’s streets, Buffy is slowly recuperating, assisted by a shambling earlier prototype previously discarded by Flitter.

As Angel sneaks in and destroys the reservoir of augmented blood, the raging, oblivious Selke orders the duplicate to fetch Buffy’s body and prove she’s dead…

The gory carnival of chaos cataclysmically concludes when the clone confronts the Slayer and her earliest incarnation in the sewers, whilst above ground Willow and Giles examine “Buffy’s” blood on a discarded parade costume and uncover the awful truth…

When Selke sees the decimation wrought by Angel, she goes berserk; her form rapidly mutating into monstrosity, just as the long-awaited procession begins through Sunnydale. Her depredations are interrupted by the battered but victorious Buffy who spectacularly re-emerges to destroy Selke and end the Bad Blood menace forever. However, in the shadows, deadly demon lovers Spike and Drusilla fade from sight, taking new toy Dr. Flitter with them…

A selection of Short Stories comes next, beginning with ‘Bad Dog’ by Doug Petrie, Ryan Sook & Tim Goodyear from Buffy the Vampire Slayer Annual 1999. It depicts how the Slayer, whilst hunting for reluctant werewolf Oz on one of his “wild” nights, encounters a nasty young sorcerer determined to turn himself into a god at gal-pal Willow’s expense…

‘Hello Moon’ – written by Daniel Brereton & Christopher Golden, with art by Bennett & Jim Amash – was the first of three tales from Dark Horse Presents #141: a thoughtful vignette wherein Buffy instinctively attacks a monster on the beach only to realise she has much in common with her target.

The beleaguered fish-man also bears the weight of unwelcome responsibility for his endangered race. No sooner have these two champions made their peace, however, than a band of roving vamps attacks…

From the same source, ‘Cursed!’ by Golden, Hector Gomez & Sandu Florea then sees brooding Bad Boy Angel guiltily regaling Buffy with the horrific events he perpetrated following his rebirth as a bloodsucker in Ireland circa 1753…

Watson, David Perrin & Florea round out the DHP #141 appearances with a glimpse at Giles’ early career as a supernatural investigator tackling a nasty case of bodysnatching, resurrectionism, reanimation and ‘Dead Love’…

‘Stinger’ – by Golden, Gomez & Florea – comes from promo premium Wizard #½ – detailing how Xander’s attempts to save Willow from a bullying stalker lead to a clash with a fear-feeding scorpion-thing…

From Buffy #50, Andi Watson contributes hilarious change-of-pace gag strip ‘Mall Rats’ after which Golden & Eric Powell expose ‘Who Made Who’ (Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Lover’s Walk) with Spike and Dru’s notoriously “open” relationship going through one of those spiralling phases that always results in jealousy, spite and mass-slaughter…

Angel eventually spun off into his own TV series, but from the start was a big enough draw to earn his own comicbook title. Angel: The Hollower was a 3-issue miniseries (May-July 1999) and detailed how, even after reverting to exquisite evil before being redeemed again, his past would always haunt him…

It begins in present-day San Francisco where a pair of vampires is attacked by a monstrously tentacled horror. Veteran vamp Catherine barely escapes with her unlife and, having seen the horror before, knows there’s only one being she can turn to…

Back in Sunnydale, Buffy and Angel have resumed their after-dark partnership, even though Giles and the rest of her in-the-know friends are still wary of the recently re-redeemed night-stalker. However, once their monster-killing “date” ends, Angel is jumped by a band of fangers and sees once more a girl he slaughtered and “turned” over a century past…

Although their sworn enemy, his undead captors treat Angel with kid gloves. Catherine only wants to talk, and she wants to talk about ‘The Hollower’ …

A flashback turns to Vienna in 1892 where Angelus and his pack-mates Spike and Drusilla were amongst many vampires preying on the populace in complete security; oblivious of and immune to all threat or challenge.

However, soon after turning Catherine, Angelus was confronted by starving, terrified vampires fleeing some unimaginable horror that actually preyed on bloodsuckers…

Back in the now, Catherine reminds her sire of the cost the last time the creature manifested and warns him it has undoubtedly tracked her to Sunnydale…

Convinced, Angel agrees to a truce and prepares to battle the thing again. Typically he considers this something he cannot share with Buffy…

In end-of-the-century Austria the first fight against the Hollower unsatisfactorily stalled with only a few undead survivors, whilst now in Sunnydale Angel secretly consults eldritch expert Giles and learns the truth about the beast. He also discovers that, blithely unaware, Buffy is already hunting a huge, subterranean tentacle-horror that prefers vamps to human meals…

Watcher archives reveal a chilling scenario. Everybody knows vampires are actually human corpses with the departed soul replaced by a reanimating demon, using blood to fuel the composite creature. The Hollower, however, sucks out those demonic riders and ingests them. That wouldn’t be a bad thing, except once it’s full – about 3,000 demons is its limit – the horror explosively regurgitates them and the partially digested devils will infect the nearest LIVING body.

If the Hollower succeeds in satiating itself in vampire-infested Sunnydale and subsequently pops, most of the town’s mortal souls will suddenly become rabid, blood-crazed killers…

Despite being fully engaged in the hunt, Buffy can’t shift a nagging, tempting and unworthy notion: if the Hollower sucks out the vampiric part of Angel, will she be left with a normal human lover…?

Whatever the outcome, the Hollower has to be stopped at any and all costs…

The manic mystic mayhem then concludes with a comicbook postscript to the Season 3 TV finale as ‘Graduation Day’ (by Petrie, Jason Minor & Curtis Arnold, from Buffy #20) simultaneously follows Angel as he heads for his new mission in Los Angeles and stays in Sunnydale with Buffy when a demon who feeds on lost hope targets both monster-hunters at once, eager to destroy them both at their lowest emotional ebb…

Supplementing this compilation of mystic madness are Title Page and Cover Galleries with material from Jeff Matsuda, Jon Sibal, J. Scott Campbell, Alex Garner, Liquid! & Guy Major to complete the eerie excitement experience.

Visually compelling, winningly constructed and racing along at hell-for-leather pace, this arcane action fearfully funny fright-fest is utterly engaging even if you’re not familiar with the vast backstory: a creepy chronicle as easily enjoyed by the most callow neophyte as every dedicated devotee.

Moreover, in the era of TV binge-watching, with the shows readily available on TV and DVD, if you aren’t a follower yet you soon could – and should – be…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2008 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Omnibus volume 3


By Andi Watson, Christopher Golden, Tom Sniegoski, Joe Bennett, Hector Gomez, Christian Zanier, Cliff Richards, Jason Pearson & various (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-885-0

Although debuting as a motion picture starlet, Buffy the Vampire Slayer only really found her high-kicking feet after migrating to the small screen. Soon after securing her status as a certified media sensation, she won her own comicbook (in 1998), with smart, suspenseful, action-packed yarns exploding out of a monthly series, graphic novels, spin-off miniseries and short stories in showcase anthology Dark Horse Presents – all complementing the sensational, groundbreaking and so culturally crucial TV show.

Buffy Summers lives in small California hamlet Sunnydale, built over a paranormal portal to the Nether Realms dubbed The Hellmouth. Here, she and a small band of buddies battle devils, demons and all sorts of horrors inexorably drawn to the area and all regarding humanity as an appetiser and planet Earth an irresistible eldritch “fixer-upper” opportunity.

With Rupert Giles, scholarly mentor, father-figure and Watcher of all things unnatural, Buffy and her “Scooby Gang” sought to make the after-dark streets of Sunnydale safe for the largely-oblivious human morsels, ably abetted and occasionally aided by an enigmatic undead Himbo calling himself Angel…

Collected here in the third of seven supremely scintillating Omnibus editions (and mirroring events on the show’s third season) are the contents of Buffy the Vampire Slayer #1-8, 12, 16, Buffy the Vampire Slayer Annual 1999, Dark Horse Extra #12-16 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Play with Fire – collectively spanning 1998-2004 – all re-presented for your delectation as a chronological continuity rather than in original publishing order: well-nigh 300 pages of full-colour mystery, merriment and mystical martial arts mayhem.

As recapitulated in series Editor Scott Allie’s Introduction, although the stories were created in a meandering manner up and down the timeline, this Omnibus series offers them in strict chronological continuity order…

It all begins with the ‘Wu-Tang Fang’ (from Buffy the Vampire Slayer #1 by Andi Watson, Joe Bennett & Rick Ketcham) and starts following another tedious day at Sunnydale High School. Firm friends and comrades in adversity Willow, Xander and Buffy are blowing off steam at local club The Bronze when vampires attack.

The Slayer easily deals with the ill-conceived assault but afterwards is confronted by a mysterious oriental figure in a cloak and straw hat.

It disappears without incident but Xander, fed up with being saved by a girl and still reeling from an all-night kung fu movie marathon, enrols next day at a martial arts Dojo.

He soon painfully discovers his sensei is a bullying brute, even as Buffy and Giles are tracking a string of martial artists killed by vampires…

The standard searches of the Library’s lore-books turn up a name: San Sui of the Xiang River – an ancient wandering warrior who challenged fighters to duels and drank their blood when they lost…

Courtesy of the mysterious stranger, Xander’s brutal teacher soon meets just such a fate, but San Sui is totally unprepared for Buffy, who takes out the stored resentment over all the extra training she’s been forced to endure on his smug, undead ass…

‘Halloween’ (Watson, Bennett & Ketcham) then delightfully covers the annual arcane imbecility of Trick or Treating in Sunnydale; a night when vamps generally stay in, due to the hordes of happy people wandering about. This time, however, a pack of smart young dead things decide to stock up on tasty human titbits for their enforced staycation…

One of the abductees is scholarly stalwart Willow, snatched after storming out of an argument with her folks. Since, like most of the older high-schoolers, Buffy is stuck with chaperoning little kids on the night, nobody notices her BFF is missing until almost too late…

Of course the Slayer does her thing and rescues her gal-pal in time, but after a ferocious, vamp-eviscerating battle, Buffy’s concern for Willow causes her to miss one demon who manages to flee with severe – but not undeath-threatening – injuries. That will prove a costly oversight in months to come as grudge-bearing Selke slowly regains her power and feeds a burning hatred…

Jumping up a month, #3 goes ‘Cold Turkey’: continuing in sinister Seasonal fashion as Buffy is tasked by her mother with producing the traditional and daunting Thanksgivings Day fest. Stuck with necessarily late-night shopping in-between school and Slayer-ing, she and Giles are increasingly obsessing over that missing fourth Halloween human-hoarder…

Selke is hiding out and recuperating via the most degrading and disgusting means, but when she spots her hated enemy picking up turkey ‘n’ trimmings at the soul-destroying All-Nite-O-Mart, the damaged and depleted devil decides to surprise the Slayer and speed her own recovery with a hot meal.

Not her best idea ever, but despite a blistering graveyard confrontation, the irrepressible Queen of the Damned again escapes with most of her scurvy skin intact…

‘Dance with Me’ by Christopher Golden, Hector Gomez & Sandu Florea was produced for TV-Guide (November 21-27, 1998) and details The Slayer’s brief and final encounter with a boy who used to pester her at school functions. He’s a lot more forceful as a vampire, but still strikes out one last time…

Watson, Gomez & Florea reunited for Buffy #4 as ‘White Christmas’ sees the Slayer strapped for cash and forced to work at the local Mall to make money for gifts and a new party dress.

However, as Sunnydale is situated on The Hellmouth and Buffy is a certified weirdness magnet, her shifts at The Popsicle Parlor inevitably lead to demon-destroying overtime when she discovers creepy boss Mr. Richter spending all his idle moments in the Big Freezer, summoning infuriating ice imps and giant killer Frost Elementals…

Having survived that cataclysmic Yule duel relatively unscathed, the Scooby Gang – Willow, Cordelia, Oz, Xander and Buffy – look forward to a ‘Happy New Year’ complete with blood-free party, until dusty, crusty Lore Librarian Giles discovers a gigantic hell-hound raiding his book stacks and sets the crazy kids hot on its heels.

The trail leads to doomed, damned lovers, a guiltily romantic triangle and an ancient curse from witch-haunted Salem before the savage crescendo almost ends Willow’s life…

In ‘New Kid on the Block Part 1’ (co-written with Dan Brereton) Watson, Gomez & Florea depict Xander obsessing over pretty transfer student Cynthia with his pathetic, fawning, drooling attentions cruelly mocked by his best friends – and rightly so….

His infantile ardour is hardly halted when the girls decide to have a slumber party. Resolved not to miss out even though he’s not invited (and certainly not creepy at all), the hapless idiot sneaks into the night of nail varnish, romcoms and pink pyjamas and is horrified to discover that he’s not the only unwelcome intruder…

Buffy, exhausted from staking a new band of bloodsuckers plaguing the town, is almost too late to save the day in ‘New Kid on the Block Part 2’. However, after driving off the monster party-crashers, she confers with noble vampire boyfriend Angel and realises that even though able to move around in daylight, sweet little Cyn might not be all she seems…

‘Food Chain Part I’ by Golden, Gomez & Florea originated in Buffy #12 – where it was originally seen under the title ‘A Nice Girl Like You’ and revealed how new student Sandy inexplicably got involved with bad boy Brad Caulfield and his gang.

No one in the Scooby-Gang can understand what she sees in the local louts… until Buffy uncovers Sandy’s true nature and her nasty habit of feeding on the energy of young folk…

The same creative team produced ‘Play with Fire’ – a serialised saga gathered from promotional periodical Dark Horse Extra – in which Willow’s growing facility with and dependency on witchcraft draws the gang into a clash with an earthbound ghost and his demonic abusers…

‘Food Chain Part II’ (from Buffy #16 by Golden, Christian Zanier, Marvin Mariano, Draxhall Jump, Curtis P. Arnold, Jason Minor & Andy Owens) then concludes the sorry saga, revealing how poor Brad is still connected to the demonic Sandy’s monstrous master and is now killing in his name…

‘The Final Cut’ by Watson, Jason Pearson, Cliff Richards & Joe Pimentel originated in Buffy #8, and details how a student horror movie being made in town masks a demonic entity dwelling in the celluloid and feeding off the young stars. It should never have put Buffy in the spotlight…

Golden, Tom Sniegoski, Richards & Pimentel then wrap up the monster-mashing madness by reporting ‘The Latest Craze’ (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Annual 1999) wherein an avaricious old enemy introduces demonically-addictive toy “pets” to the impressionable Sunnydale kids. However, the wickedly adorable “Hooligans” are not only magical moonlight kleptomaniacs but also have a sinister agenda all their own…

Supplementing this compilation of mystic madness are copious photo, Title Page and Cover Galleries with material from Arthur Adams & Dave Stewart, Chris Bachalo, Tim Townsend & Guy Major, Joe Bennett, Chynna Clugston, Gomez, Randy Green, Ketcham, Joyce Chin, Owens, Zanier and Fabio Laguna to complete the eerie excitement experience.

Visually impressive, winningly constructed and proceeding at a hell-for-leather pace, this arcane action fearfully funny fright-fest is utterly engaging even if you’re not familiar with the vast backstory: a creepy chronicle as easily enjoyed by the most callow neophyte as every dedicated devotee.

Moreover in this era of TV binge-watching, with the shows readily available on TV and DVD, if you aren’t a follower yet you soon could – and should – be…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Omnibus volume 2


By Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Jen Van Meter, Christopher Golden, James Marsters, Doug Petrie, Daniel Brereton, Jeff Matsuda, Cliff Richards, Luke Ross, Ryan Sook, Hector Gomez, & various (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-826-3

A hunger to be frightened is imprinted inn our genes and courses through our surging blood. Psycho-killers, ravening monsters, unsuspected epidemics, funfair rides, overdue bills, undeleted search-histories and a host of other things – daft and not – all trigger our visceral, paralysed fright, fight or flight response and thus always feature highly in our mass entertainments.

These days however the slow-building tension and cerebral suspense of the printed genre has been largely overtaken and superseded by the shock-values and sudden kinetic action of both small and big screens, with the entire oeuvre also liberally doused in a hot sauce of teen alienation, unrequited love and uncontrollable hormones – all making for a heady (if often predictable and flavourless) brew.

The transition was very much the result of a landmark American TV show and assorted media spin-offs which refocused the zeitgeist. However, even decades later, Dark Horse Comics’ clever, witty graphic interpretation of the cult global mega-hit TV franchise Buffy the Vampire Slayer remains a superbly enjoyable fear-feast, so here’s another look at that comics landmark via the publisher’s economical and engaging Omnibus Editions series.

Once the company secured the strip licensing rights, they began producing a regular series, a welter of impressive original Graphic Novels, numerous miniseries, spin-offs and specials. They even featured assorted cast and characters in their own anthology titles such as Dark Horse Presents. Long after the beloved TV show died, from 2007 onward comics delivered creator Joss Whedon’s never-broadcast, continuity-canonical Season Eight and beyond to the delight faithful fans and followers.

Buffy Summers lived in small California hamlet Sunnydale, built over a paranormal portal to the Nether Realms dubbed The Hellmouth. Here, she and a small band of buddies battled devils, demons and all sorts of horror inexorably drawn to the area and whom/what/which all considered humanity an appetiser and planet Earth an irresistible eldritch “fixer-upper” opportunity.

With Rupert Giles, scholarly mentor, father-figure and Watcher of all things unnatural, Buffy and her “Scooby Gang” sought to make the after-dark streets of Sunnydale safe for the largely-oblivious human morsels, ably abetted and occasionally aided by an enigmatic stud-muffin calling himself Angel…

Collected here in the second of seven big bad Omnibus editions are the contents of Buffy the Vampire Slayer #60-63, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Spike & Dru #1-2, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Ring of Fire and Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Dust Waltz plus pertinent material from anthologies Reveal and Dark Horse Presents Annual 1998, (collectively spanning 1998 to 2003), presented for your delectation as a chronological continuity rather than in original publishing order: well-nigh 300 pages of full-colour mystery, merriment and mystical martial arts mayhem.

As explained in series Editor Scott Allie’s Introduction, although printed sagas and spin-offs were created in a meandering manner up and down the timeline, this series of books re-presents them in strict chronological continuity order, before apologising for the fact that back then an initial lack of up-to-date information often led to a few hairy moments and false starts.

This collection begins with outrageously experimental and enticing strip ‘Angels We Have Seen on High’ (by Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Jeff Matsuda, Hakjoon Kang, Nolan Obena & colourist Dave McCaig from Reveal, November 2002) wherein Buffy – still not settled into her new home – reluctantly takes little sister Dawn to a funfair. When the Slayer is distracted by a pack of feeders, she leaves the brat with a responsible adult who proves to be anything but…

Happily a mysterious leather-clad figure proves to be her guardian angel…

Next up is ‘A Stake to the Heart’ (Buffy the Vampire Slayer #60-63, August-November 2003 by Nicieza, Cliff Richards, Brian Horton, Will Conrad & Michelle Madsen) wherein the family is sundered after Buffy’s dad leaves for a new, less complicated life. Taking out her feelings on Sunnydales’s undead legions, the Slayer is unaware that she is being observed by Angel and his demonic sponsor Whistler as well as malignancy spirits ‘Deceit’, ‘Guilt’, ‘Abandonment’ and ‘Trepidation’ which feed on misery and negative emotions.

Meanwhile in another part of town, a dowdy British scholar arrives and begins his new day job as the librarian at Sunnydale High School…

Despite their cruellest efforts the malignancies have never contended with someone like Buffy before, nor her still-hidden future allies…

Whimsically concocted by Jan Van Meter, Luke Ross, Rick Ketcham & Guy Major, ‘MacGuffins’ originated in Dark Horse Presents Annual 1998, and focuses on fun as Buffy gets a unique educational gift from new Watcher Giles: dutiful agent of the venerable cult tasked with training and assisting Slayers in their anti-arcane endeavours.….

All she has to do is catch the damned things before they wreck her house and life…

Although Buffy was a hot, hip teen monster-killer, as the TV series developed it became increasingly apparent that the bad guys were the true fan-favourites. Cool vampire villain and über-predator Spike eventually became a love-interest and even a suitably tarnished white knight, but at the time of this collection he was still a jaded, immortal, immoral psychopath… every girl’s dream date.

His eternal paramour was Drusilla: a demented, faithless libertine precognitive vampire who killed and turned him. Dru thrived on a constant stream of fresh decadent thrills and revelled in baroque and outré bloodletting.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Spike & Dru #2 – from October 1999 – saw the twisted lovers gradually making their way to Sunnydale, roaming the American South in ‘Queen of Hearts’ (by Christopher Golden, Ryan Sook & Major). Arriving in St Louis they board a gambling palace on a paddle-steamer, just wanting to waste some time and test their fortunes. Unfortunately the enterprise is being operated by a sinister luck-demon with as little concept of fair play as Dru and Spike…

When they finally realise the real stakes, all the forces of elemental supernature can’t prevent the river running red – and sundry other colours – with demon blood…

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Ring of Fire was scripted by screenwriter/producer Doug Petrie (in his time a writer, director and co-executive producer on the TV show). The art comes from Sook, Tim Goodyear & colourist Dave Stewart. It was originally released as a slim, full-colour, all-new graphic novel which established the artist as a major comics talent.

The tale is set during TV Season 2 (which ran from Autumn 1997 to Spring 1998) when Buffy’s enigmatic vampire boyfriend Angel had reverted to a soulless slaughterer of innocents. His latest victim was High School computer teacher Jenny Calendar, who moonlighted as a gypsy witch and practising technopagan. She was also the one true love of Buffy’s mentor Giles…

One dark and stormy night twelve miles off the coast in ‘The Rising’ a Japanese cargo ship transporting ancient Samurai armour weathers staggering waves and a visit from a ghastly horror calling himself “Angelus”…

The 500-year-old war suit once belonged to warrior demon Kelgor, whose power was tied to it and enabled him to raise an army of undead killers in 16th century Japan. Angelus and his unwilling allies Spike and Drusilla intend sparking the necromantic apocalypse designated “The Ring of Fire” and all they lack is Kelgor’s corpse (hidden by Watchers half a millennium ago). They’re expecting the Slayer to find that for them…

Cool vampire villain Spike was severely wounded and confined to a wheelchair at this time and Dru exulted in tormenting him by playing up to Angelus …

With Giles all but paralysed by grief, “Scooby-Gang” stalwarts, Willow, Xander and Oz are left to search copious reference files for information, but as their painstaking study bears dark fruit Giles is ambushed by Angel and Dru at Jenny’s grave. Buffy is there to rescue him, but that just gives Spike the opportunity to follow the merely human vampire hunters and activate the dead Samurai’s blazing revival spell…

Rushing to their side Buffy manages to (mostly) destroy freshly resurrected Kelgor, but as the Slayer pursues she is arrested by Federal spooks who know exactly what she is…

Frustrated but not thwarted, the terrible trio are at each others throats until Dru realises there is still some life in Kelgor’s remains. Moreover, the demon wants to share his centuries-old back-up plan with them. Hidden with the remains of ‘The Seven Samurai’ graves scattered throughout the state is the secret of true resurrection, and if the vampires gather the contents of those hidden tombs, all their wicked wishes can still come true…

Meanwhile, locked in a covert detention centre, Buffy faces exposure to the world and worst yet her mother. Giles is gone: fallen far off the deep end and reverted to his old, manic persona of “Ripper”, but that’s not a bad thing since he knows the people who arrested Buffy aren’t government agents… or even people. Yet even before he can get to her, back-up Slayer Kendra busts her imprisoned predecessor out.

(Long Story Short: when Buffy briefly died the next Slayer was activated, and even though the Blonde Bombshell was subsequently revived, Kendra, once here, wasn’t going away…)

The action goes into overload as the Japanese hell-lord is finally fully reconstituted to form an alliance with Dru, leaving Angel and Spike twisting in the wind. The “Feds” are then exposed as opportunistic demons trying to secure the resurrection spell for themselves in ‘Kelgor Unbound’. They are ultimately frustrated in that diabolical dream as Ripper has taken off with it, madly determined on bringing back his Jenny…

Across town Buffy, Kendra and the gang are too late to stop the final ritual. Dru and Kelgor exultantly awaken a colossal flame-breathing devil-bird to expedite their conquest of humanity and, forced into a tempestuous alliance with bad boys Angel and Spike, the vastly overmatched Buffy and Co need more magic than young witch Willow can conjure.

They need Giles back or the world is lost…

That cataclysmic clash is followed by the first issue of the miniseries Buffy the Vampire Slayer Spike & Dru: ‘Paint the Town Red’ from April 1999. It was co-written by James Marsters, who played the laconic Spike, with Christopher Golden. Illustrated by Sook & Stewart, the tale is set just after the undead couple split following a terrific love-spat, and follows the heart-sore Cockney Devil to an isolated Turkish village where he establishes a private harem and hunting preserve. Everything is perfect until Dru comes looking for him with her latest conquest, a recently-resurrected necromancer.

Koines is her love-slave, a wizard capable of controlling corpses with but a thought. Until she set her death-monger against Spike it hadn’t occurred to anybody that vampires are just another kind of cadaver, but once the mage realises he decides to renegotiate the terms of his rather one-sided relationship with the inventively psychotic vampire virago, and Spike discovers that he is not quite over Dru yet…

The story portion of this immense collection concludes with Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Dust Waltz from October 1998

Scripted by Dan Brereton and illustrated by Hector Gomez, Sandu Florea & Major, it was the very first Buffy comics offering; released as a full-colour, all-original graphic novel which set the tone and timbre for the forthcoming series.

It all begins in ‘Promenade’ as twin ancient vampiric horrors slowly cruise towards California and a showdown in Sunnydale. At school Buffy is still insolently resisting the stern admonitions of Giles to keep training, but a merciful interlude is offered when the Watcher invites Buffy and her gang – Willow, Xander and former mean girl Cordelia – to accompany him to Baytown Port and meet his niece Jane, imminently due to disembark from a world cruise.

It also inadvertently affords the squad their first, albeit unsuspected, glimpse of Vampire “Old Ones” Lilith and Lamia, who have made a pilgrimage to the Hellmouth with their bloodsucking Champions to indulge in savage ritualistic combat.

That night Buffy, on monster patrol with (once more reformed and benevolent) vampire boyfriend Angel, encounters and destroys one of the Champions. Deprived of her tool for the ritual, Lilith decides Angel will be his replacement – whatever it takes…

Tension intensifies in ‘Moondance’ as Buffy hunts for the vanished Angel, with Jane tagging along in defiance of Giles’ wishes. The Bloody Sisters have an army of infernal beasts and creatures with them, however, and the gang is captured and dragged to the Hellmouth even as the Watcher frantically seeks the true purpose of the dark combat ceremony…

Buffy, however, is far more direct and simply marches straight into the monsters’ midst to deal with the threat and save her friends “Slayer-style” in blistering, action-packed eponymous conclusion ‘The Dust Waltz’.

Of course even after trashing the vampire hordes there’s the small problem of un-summoning the colossal elder god the battle was designed to awaken…

Supplementing this compilation of chthonic confabulations are copious photo, Title Page and Cover Galleries with material from Matsuda & McCaig, Horton, Ross, Ketcham & Major and Sook, to complete the eerie excitement experience

Visually impressive, winningly constructed and proceeding at a hell-for-leather pace, this arcane action-fest is utterly engaging even if you’re not familiar with the vast backstory: a creepy chronicle as easily enjoyed by the most callow neophyte as every dedicated devotee.

Moreover in this era of TV binge-watching, with the shows readily available on TV and DVD, if you aren’t a follower yet you soon could – and should – be…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer volume 1


By Joss Whedon, Christopher Golden, Daniel Brereton, Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Paul Lee, Eric Powell, Joe Bennett, Cliff Richards, & various (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-784-6

Blood-drenched supernatural doomed love is a venerable if not always creditable sub-genre these days, so let’s take another look at one of the ancient antecedents responsible for this state of affairs in the shape of Dark Horse Comics’ translation of the cult TV show franchise Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Collected here in the first of seven big bad Omnibus editions is material from Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Spike & Dru #3 (December 2000), Buffy the Vampire Slayer: the Origin (January-March 1999) and Buffy the Vampire Slayer #51-59 (November 2002 to July 2003); nearly three hundred pages of full-colour mystical martial arts mayhem and merriment.

As explained in comicbook Editor Scott Allie’s Introduction, although the printed sagas and spin-offs were created in a meandering manner up and down the timeline, this series of books re-presents them in strict chronological continuity order, beginning with a perilous period piece entitled ‘All’s Fair’ (by Christopher Golden with art Eric Powell, Drew Geraci & Keith Barnett) from Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Spike & Dru #3 originally from December 2000.

Although Buffy was a hot and hip teen cheerleader-turned-monster-killer, as the TV series developed it became clear that the bad-guys were increasingly the real fan-favourites. Cool vampire villain and über-predator Spike eventually became a love-interest and even a suitably tarnished white knight, but at the time of this collection he was still a jaded, blood-hungry, immortal, immoral psychopath… every girl’s dream date.

His eternal paramour was Drusilla: a demented precognitive vampire who killed him and made him an immortal bloodsucker. She thrived on a stream of fresh decadent thrills and revelled in baroque and outré bloodletting.

There has been an unbroken mystical progression of young women tasked with killing the undead through the centuries, and here we see the Chinese Boxer Rebellion of 1900, where Spike and Dru are making the most of the carnage after killing that era’s Slayer. The story then shifts to the Chicago World’s Fair of 1933 where the undying mad lovers are still on the murderous prowl. However, the scientific wonders of the modern world displayed in the various exhibits are all eclipsed by one scientist who has tapped into the realm of Elder Gods as a cheap source of energy.

To further complicate matters Spike and Dru are being stalked by a clan of Chinese warriors trained from birth to destroy the predatory pair and avenge that Slayer killed in Beijing…

Gods, Demons, Mad Scientists, Kung Fu killers, Tongs and terror all combine in a gory romp that will delight TV devotees and ordinary horrorists alike.

Next up is a smart reworking of the cult B-movie which launched the global mega-hit TV.

Starring Kristy Swanson, Donald Sutherland, Luke Perry and Rutger Hauer, the film was released in 1992 with a modicum of success and to the lasting dissatisfaction of writer/creator Joss Whedon. Five years later he got to do it right and in the manner he’d originally intended. The ensemble action horror comedy series became something of a phenomenon and inspired a new generation of Goth gore-lovers as well as many, many “homages” in assorted media – including comics.

Dark Horse won the licensing rights in the USA, subsequently producing an enthralling regular comicbook series plus a welter of impressive miniseries and specials. In 1999 the company – knowing how powerfully the inclusivity/continuity/completism gene dominates comics fan psychology – finally revisited that troublesome cinematic debut with miniseries Buffy the Vampire Slayer: the Origin running from January to March.

Scrupulously returning to the author’s script and core-concept, restoring excised material, shifting the tone back towards what Whedon originally intended, whilst reconfiguring events until they better jibed with the established and beloved TV mythology, adaptors Christopher Golden & Daniel Brereton with artists Joe Bennett, Rick Ketcham, Randy Emberlin & J. Jadsen produced a new 3-issue miniseries which canonically established exactly what the formerly vapid Valley Girl did in her old hometown that got her transferred to scenic Sunnydale and a life on the Hellmouth…

It all kicks off in ‘Destiny Free’ as shallow yet popular teen queen/cheerleader Buffy Summers shrugs off recurring nightmares of young women battling and being killed by vampires throughout history to continue her perfect life of smug contentment. Even a chance meeting with grungy stoner bad-boys Pike and Benny can’t dent her aura of self-assured privilege and studied indolence.

The nightmares keep mounting in intensity, however, and all over town teenagers are disappearing…

Things come to a head the week her parents leave town for a trip. In a dark park, a maniac attacks Pike and Benny and is only driven off by the intervention of a mysterious, formidable old man. Even so the assailant manages to take the screaming Benny with him…

Next day the same old geezer is at school, annoying Buffy. She is blithely mocking until he tells her about her nightmares and explains that she has an inescapable destiny… as a slayer of monsters…

Meanwhile, deep in the bowels of the Earth a monster is marshalling his forces and making terrifying converts out of the spoiled worthless children of California…

Buffy’s strange stalker is exceedingly persistent and that night, despite her disbelieving misgivings, she and Merrick – an agent of an ancient, monster-hunting secret society – lurk in a graveyard waiting for a recently murdered man to rise from his fresh grave…

When he does – along with unsuspected others – Buffy’s unsuspected powers and battle reflexes kick in and, against all odds, she spectacularly overcomes…

‘Defenseless Mechanisms’ finds the aggressively altered Buffy grudgingly dropping her fatuous after-school activities and friends to train with the increasingly strident and impatient Watcher Merrick. Even though her attitude is appalling and her attention easily diverted, the girl is serious about the job, and even has a few new ideas to add to The Slayer’s traditional arsenal…

Even as she starts her career by pretending to be a helpless lost girl to draw out vile vamps, across town Pike is in big trouble. He also knows what is happening: after all every night Benny comes to his window, begging to be let in and offering to share his new life with his best buddy…

At school the change in Buffy is noticeable and all her old BFFs are pointedly snubbing her, even as every sundown Lothos‘ legion gets bolder and bigger. A fatal mistake occurs on the night when Slayer and Watcher save the finally outmanoeuvred Pike from Benny and the Vampire Lord. Only two of the embattled humans survive and escape…

The tales escalates to a shocking climax when the undead army invades the long-awaited Hemery High School dance looking for Buffy and fresh meat/recruits. With his bloodsuckers surrounding the petrified revellers and demanding a final reckoning, Lothos believes his victory assured, but in all his centuries of unlife he’s never encountered a Slayer quite like Buffy Summers…

As Allie’s Introduction already revealed, there are major hassles involved in producing a licensed comicbook whilst the primary property is still unfolding. Thus, as the print series was winding up the editors opted for in-filling some glaring gaps in the Slayer’s early career. Buffy the Vampire Slayer #51-59, spanning November 2002 through July 2003, addresses the period between the film’s end and her first days in Sunnydale, leading off with ‘Viva Las Buffy’ (Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Cliff Richards & Will Conrad) which details what the Slayer did next: abandoning her disintegrating family as they prepared to leave LA and the reputation their daughter has garnered.

Buffy hooks with sole survivor and wannabe monster-hunter Pike and they eventually fetch up in Nevada to investigate the apparently vampire-run Golden Touch Casino. The young warriors have no idea that a dark solitary stranger with a heavenly name is stalking them or that somewhere in England a Council of arrogant scholar-magicians are preparing a rather controversial candidate to join her as the new Watcher…

Sadly Rupert Giles has a rival for the post who is prepared to do literally anything to secure the position…

Whilst Pike and the Slayer infiltrate the gambling palace as menial workers, moodily formidable solo avenger Angelus has gone straight to the top and been hired as an enforcer for the management. When both independently operating factions are exposed, the Vamp with a Soul is tossed into a time-trap and despatched back to the 1930s whilst Buffy and Pike battle an army of monsters before confronting the ghastly family of monstrosities running the show in two eras.

The living and undead heroes endure heartbreak and sacrifice before this evil empire is ended forever…

Paul Lee then reveals the bizarre story of ‘Dawn & Hoopy the Bear’ wherein Buffy’s little sister accidentally intercepts a Faustian gift intended for the absent Slayer and finds herself befriended by a demonic Djinn who seems sweet but is pre-programmed for murder…

Through the narrative vehicle of Dawn reading her big sister’s diary, the last piece of the puzzle is revealed in ‘Slayer, Interrupted’ (Lobdell, Nicieza, Richards, Conrad, Lee & Horton) as Buffy’s own written words disclose her apparent delusional state. With no other choice her parents have their clearly troubled teen committed to a psychiatric institution.

Meanwhile in Ireland, Giles – having overcome his own opposition – completes his training preparations by undergoing a potentially lethal ritual and confronting his worst nightmare before heading to the USA, where Angelus and demonic attendant Whistler are still clandestinely watching over the Slayer.

That’s all to the good, as the asylum has been infiltrated by a sorcerous cult intent on gathering “brides” for infernal night-lord Rakagore…

As Buffy undergoes talk therapy with the peculiar Dr. Primrose, she comes to realise the nature of her own mission, her role as a “Creature of Destiny” in the universe and, most importantly, that the elderly therapist is not all she seems either…

With her head clear at last, all Buffy has to do is prove she’s sane, smash an invasion of devils, reconcile with her family and get ready for the new school year at Sunnydale High…

To Be Continued…

Supplementing the hoard of supernatural treasures is a copious photo, Title Page and Cover Gallery with material from Ryan Sook, Guy Major, Bennett, Gomez, Jadsen, René Micheletti, Paul Lee & Brian Horton.

Visually impressive, winningly scripted and illustrated and most importantly proceeding at a breakneck rollercoaster pace, this supernatural action-fest is utterly engaging even if you’re not familiar with the vast backstory: a creepy chronicle as easily enjoyed by the most callow neophyte as by the dedicated devotee.

Moreover in this era of TV binge-watching, with the shows readily available on TV and DVD, if you aren’t a follower yet you soon could – and should – be…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Tales of the Vampires

New expanded review

By Joss Whedon, various (Dark Horse Books)
ISBN: 978-1-56971-749-3

Although debuting as a motion picture starlet, Buffy the Vampire Slayer only really found her high-kicking feet after migrating to the small screen. Soon after securing her status as a certified media sensation, she won her own comicbook in 1998, with smart, suspenseful, action-packed yarns (in a monthly series and graphic novels, fully supplemented by spin-off miniseries and short stories in showcase anthology Dark Horse Presents) which perfectly complemented the sensational, groundbreaking and so culturally crucial TV show.

And just like in the TV arena, many of those spin-offs had plenty going for them in their own right: not just character-driven vehicles like Angel or Spike and Drusilla, but also more anthological and tangential fare such as this intriguing, cleverly-themed collection of bloodsucking short tales notionally scattered throughout the “Buffyverse”. Interweaving vignettes with an overarching in-continuity story these episodes – which originally appeared as part of one-shot Drawing on Your Nightmares Halloween Special and 5-issue miniseries Tales of the Vampires from September 2003 to April 2004 – are mostly coloured by Michelle Madsen with lettering primarily by Annie Parkhouse.

It all eerily opens with eponymous introduction ‘Tales of the Vampires’ by Joss Whedon, Alex Sanchez & Derek Fridolfs as a rather select school party visits some most peculiar historical sights…

Deep underground, four precocious children are brought to interview a long captive vampire. The aspiring Watchers – who will one day witness and war against all the forces of supernatural horror – are smugly conscious of their abilities, but have never truly imagined a vampire like Roche. The enchained Nosferatu is pleased: he can share stories of his kin and wait for his moment…

‘Father’ begins a triptych of tales written by Jane Espenson. Illustrated by J. Alexander it starts in Hollywood, circa 1922 and ends in 2003, tracing the strange relationship of boy grown old beside his evergreen last blood-kin whilst ‘Spot the Vampire’ (lavishly limned by Scott Morse) playfully and poetically offers some sage advice to monster-hunters at Christmas before ‘Dust Bowl’ (Jeff Parker) settles in 1933 Kansas; a land sucked dry and desolate, but where one family has found an inexhaustible supply of something refreshing, thanks to a wandering stranger…

A strange relationship is developing between raconteur and his deceptively dangerous listeners as Roche recounts the story of ‘Jack’ – by Brett Matthews & Vatche Mavlian – which sheds new light on events in Whitechapel in 1888, whilst ‘Stacy’ (Whedon & Cameron Stewart with colours by Chip Zdarsky) reveals the innermost thoughts of an imaginative lass who believed in magic and so wanted to be different. Then ‘Some Like it Hot’ (Sam Loeb & Tim Sale, with letters from Richard Starkings and Comicraft) comedically considers the outcomes when a mad doctor meets a vampire fed up of living in the dark…

Of much darker mien is ‘The Problem with Vampires’ (Drew Goddard & Paul Lee) as Spike returns to Prague to rescue his insane inamorata Drusilla from a human determined to torture her to second death after which ‘Taking Care of Business’ by Ben Edlund & the Nick of Time Crew (with Fridolfs inks and colours by David Nestelle), offers a moment of devotion as a centuries old-vamp who specialises in eating clergymen has a gas station “road to Damascus” moment after meeting a little man who says he’s God…

As little Edna slowly comes to the conclusion that Roche has more in mind than mere storytelling, the vampire relates how a bloodsucking gambling addict met his match thanks to ‘Dames’ (Brett Matthews & Sean Phillips) in Depression-era Las Vegas and before the monstrous Roche makes his move against those sweet little kids (sarcasm alert!) he tells them of when puissant Vlad Dracula clashed with Buffy Summers, Kira, Xander and other newly activated Slayers in ‘Antique’ (Goddard & Ben Stenbeck) whilst redeemed vamp Angel was feeling ‘Numb’ (Matthews & Cliff Richards) from recollections of the evil acts he had so recently committed…

And then Roche makes that move… and Edna makes hers…

If you’re a Buffy fan this collection featuring the kinds of beasties that she so adroitly despatched is for you. If you’re a devotee of kick-ass action/horror comics you’ll love this too. And if you’ve just been a fan of the television show this is your chance to get addicted to comics ’cause this one’s so terribly hard to put down.
Tales of the Vampires ™ & © 2004 Twentieth Century Fox. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel: Past Lives


By Christopher Golden, Tom Sniegoski, Cliff Richards, Christian Zanier, Joe Pimentel & Digital Jump (Dark Horse/Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-1-84023-366-7

These days an ingenuous ingénue loving an undead bloodsucker is so worn out and overused it is mostly a subject of parody and jest, but not too long ago the concept was relatively fresh and enticing, with longed-for trysts generating lots of sparks and oodles of blood…

For an entire generation, their first brush with the idea came courtesy of landmark TV show Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Her charismatic career began after a clueless cheerleaderValley Girl teenager suddenly turned into an indomitable monster-killer: latest winner of an arcane mystic/genetic lottery which transformed unsuspecting mortal maids into martial arts killing machines…

The cult series and its assorted media spin-offs refocused the zeitgeist and, since comics’ clever, witty graphic interpretation of the show is what interests me most, here’s a look at one of the first team-up projects.

Once the company secured the strip licensing rights, they began generating a Buffy regular series, a welter of original graphic novels, specials, numerous miniseries and eventually a full spin-off.

Buffy Summers lived in the small California hamlet of Sunnydale, unfortunately situated on a paranormal portal to the Nether Realms dubbed The Hellmouth. Here she and a small band of friends battled devils, demons and every sort of horror inexorably drawn to the area and whom/what/which all considered humanity an appetiser and planet Earth an irresistible eldritch “fixer-upper” opportunity.

With Rupert Giles, scholarly mentor, father-figure and Watcher of all things unnatural, Buffy and her “Scooby Gang” began making the after-dark streets of Sunnydale safe for the oblivious human morsels, aided by an enigmatic stud-muffin calling himself Angel…

He was a good vampire – one who possessed a soul – and he and the Summers girl fell in love. Sadly that broke the spell which made him a tragic hero and instead unleashed the diabolical vampire he had been – the red-handed Angelus who had turned Europe into his personal charnel house for nearly two centuries.

When Angel was finally restored to the ranks of the valiant – thanks to the loving efforts of the Slayer – the paralysing guilt and threat of a relapse compelled the vampire to leave Sunnydale and set up monster-killing shop in Los Angeles: a city packed with its own plague of supernatural horrors (in actuality the separation was prompted by Angel winning his own TV series and naturally that meant a solo comicbook too)…

This British Titan Books edition – collecting the story originally and alternately seen in Angel #15-16 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer #29-30 (January and February 2001) – combines the talents of scripters Christopher Golden & Tom Sniegoski with illustrators Cliff Richards, Christian Zanier, Joe Pimentel & Digital Jump and commences with an Introduction by Golden, detailing the genesis of this ambitious crossover before the drama commences in LA, where Angel is enduring heightened demonic assaults.

The monsters are furiously out of control, claiming Angel’s deadly new female ally is responsible for ramping up the ongoing Cold War. Unfortunately, the undead crusader has absolutely no idea what the assembled horrors are talking about but realises things are getting desperate when higher level demons attack him in his own sanctuary…

Meanwhile in London, the Council of Watchers convene a special meeting. The normally passive supernatural society are all in a tizzy over Mr. Travers‘ pet project. It seems his disciple Alexa Landry has absconded with a number of arcane artefacts and is now creating a public spectacle, acting more like a Slayer than a coolly dispassionate occult observer…

In Sunnydale, recent College Freshman Buffy Summers has also noticed a sharp jump in monster mayhem. Night predators are streaming in, having escaped from LA and all claiming – in the brief moments before the Slayer ends them – that they are being relentlessly stalked and savagely destroyed by another human female…

Back in Los Angeles, Angel barely survives a nigh-overwhelming monster ambush only to discover on returning home that his mortal allies Cordelia and Wesley have been brutally beaten by an apparently rogue female Watcher…

Buffy #29 then resumes the tale as Giles gets a call from the hospitalised Wesley and rallies the gang to Angel’s assistance. Soon he, Buffy, witches-in-training Willow and Tara, former-demon Anya and plucky human sidekick Xander are on the road – but not the Slayer’s current boyfriend.

Left behind and sulking is Riley Finn – a military spook-buster trained by the government as part of a covert Federal anti-demon task force. Apparently Buffy isn’t too keen on her past and present beaus trading stories…

In a flashback, the scene switches to the 19th century where Sir Andrew Landry and his faithful band of vampire hunters spectacularly fail to destroy the diabolical Angelus. Moreover the deeply insulted and chimeric vampire determines to visit his particular brand of generationally extended retribution upon the nobleman and his family…

Back in the now, Angel has his first painful encounter with Alexa, last of the Landrys, even as Watcher Travers reintroduces himself to Buffy and Giles. The perturbed patriarch wants the Slayer’s help in stopping his off-the-rails acolyte, but before he can ask, the trio are attacked by a posse of demons out for payback…

Elsewhere, as Alexa thrashes Angel, the story emerges: Travers had clandestinely supplied Landry with mystic weaponry in the hopes she would prove a more loyal tool than Buffy, utterly unaware that his scholarly protégé had a personal agenda to address wrongs dating back centuries…

Now she is seemingly unstoppable and even combining all their various monster hunting forces isn’t enough to stop the magically augmented, vengeance-crazed psycho…

Luckily Buffy and Giles have a cunning plan…

With covers by Keith Wood, Zanier & Dave Stewart, this is a splendidly straightforward, fast and furious action romp blending supernatural thrills, beastly chills and sharp wit: a total tonic prescribed for anybody suffering a surfeit of lovestruck face-suckers and kissypoo predators – which last really should know better at their age…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer™/Angel ™ & © 2001 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Food Chain


By Christopher Golden, Tom Sniegoski, Doug Petrie, Jamie S. Rich, Tom Fassbender, Jim Pascoe, Christian Zanier, Cliff Richards Ryan Sook & others (Dark Horse Books)
ISBN: 978-1-84023-315-5

Having conquered television, Buffy the Vampire Slayer began a similar crusade with the far harder-to-please comicbook audiences. Launched in 1998 and offering smart, sassy tales to accompany the funny, action-packed and mega-cool onscreen entertainment, the saga began in an original graphic novel (Buffy the Vampire Slayer: the Dust Waltz) before debuting as a monthly series.

She quickly became a major draw for publisher Dark Horse – whose line of licensed comicbook successes included Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Aliens and Predator – and her exploits were regularly supplemented by short stories in company showcase anthology Dark Horse Presents and other venues.

This commodious UK Titan Books compilation features stories spanning 1999 and 2000 – set during Seasons 3 and 4 of the TV show – including issues #12, 16 and 20 of the regular title, a couple of yarns from Buffy the Vampire Slayer Annual 1999 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Lovers’ Walk plus the Dark Horse/Wizard co- published Buffy/Angel #½: a period which saw Buffy’s noble vampire lover Angel set up shop in his own spin-off series –both small screen and printed…

What You Need to Know: Buffy Summers was a hapless Californian cheerleader Valley Girl until the night she inexplicably turned into a hyper-strong, impossibly durable monster-killer. Accosted by a creepy old coot from a secret society of Watchers she discovered that she had become a “Slayer” – the most recent recipient of an ancient geas which transformed selected mortal maids into living slaughter-machines of all things undead, arcane or uncanny.

After little trouble in Los Angeles she moved with her mom to the deceptively quiet hamlet of Sunnydale, but Buffy quickly and painfully discovered that her new hometown was situated on the edge of an eldritch gateway known to all the unhallowed as The Hellmouth…

Enrolling at Sunnydale High, Buffy made some friends and, tutored by new Watcher Rupert Giles, conducted a never-ending war on devils, demons and every shade of predatory supernatural species inexorably drawn to the area…

The stories re-presented here span Buffy’s horrific Graduation Day and eventual transition to the local college (complete with a new boyfriend – federal/military spook-buster Riley Finn) but open with a few High School escapades such as ‘Food Chain Part 1’ (by Christopher Golden, Christian Zanier & Andy Owens from Buffy #12 where it was originally seen under the title ‘A Nice Girl Like You’) as new student Sandy inexplicably gets involved with bad boy Brad Caulfield and his gang.

No one in the “Scooby-Gang” (Willow, Xander, Cordelia and werewolf Oz) can understand what she sees in the local louts… until Buffy uncovers Sandy’s true nature and her nasty habit of feeding on the energy of young folk…

Golden, Tom Sniegoski, Cliff Richards & Joe Pimentel then detail ‘The Latest Craze’ (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Annual 1999) wherein an avaricious old enemy introduces demonically addictive toy “pets” to the impressionable Sunnydale kids. However, the wickedly adorable “Hooligans” are not only moonlight kleptomaniacs but have a sinister agenda all their own…

From the same source, by Doug Petrie, Ryan Sook & Tim Goodyear comes ‘Bad Dog’ wherein the Slayer, whilst hunting for Oz on one of his bad (i.e. full moon) nights, encounters a nasty young sorcerer determined to turn himself into a god at Willow’s expense, after which ‘Food Chain Part 2‘ (Buffy #16 by Golden, Zanier, Marvin Mariano, Draxhall Jump, Curtis P. Arnold, Jason Minor & Owens) reveals how Brad is still connected to the demonic Sandy’s monstrous master and killing in his name…

Set in the aftermath of the pivotal Graduation Day episode, ‘Double Cross’ (#20, by Petrie, Minor & Arnold) follows Angel as he heads for his new mission in LA and stay-at-home Buffy when  a demon who feeds on lost hope targets both monster-hunters simultaneously, eager to destroy them both at their lowest ebb…

A bright change of pace follows as trainee witch Willow and new partner Tara go hunting for a rare magical flower and stay in a haunted Bed-&-Breakfast. ‘Punish Me with Kisses’ (Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Lovers’ Walk by Jamie S. Rich & China Clugston-Major) sees the young lovers futilely trying to placate and exorcise a married couple who had been quarrelling for most of the century since their deaths…

The special also provided ‘One Small Promise’ by Tom Fassbender & Jim Pascoe, with art by Richards & P. Craig Russell, in which Buffy and Riley have a thoroughly entertaining spat which a band of roving vampires mistakenly assume might put them off their staking game…

Wrapping things up is ‘City of Despair’ from Buffy/Angel #½ (Fassbender, Pascoe, Richards & Owens) wherein Angel and Buffy – although separated by hundreds of miles – are united in an extra-dimensional arena after their souls are stolen to take part in a demon’s gladiatorial game…

This is one more splendidly accessible assemblage of arcane action and furious phantasm fighting, even for those unfamiliar with the extensive back history: another self-contained chronicle of creepy carnage and witty wonderments as easily enjoyed by the newest neophyte as any confirmed connoisseur.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 2001 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Pale Reflections


By Andi Watson, Doug Petrie, Cliff Richards & Joe Pimentel (Dark Horse/Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-1-84023-236-6

Having conquered television, Buffy the Vampire Slayer began a similar crusade with the far harder to please comicbook audiences. Launched in 1998 and offering smart, sassy tales to accompany the funny, action-packed and mega-cool onscreen entertainment, the series began in an original graphic novel (Buffy the Vampire Slayer: the Dust Waltz) before debuting in a monthly series.

She quickly became a major draw for publisher Dark Horse – whose line of licensed comicbook successes included Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Aliens and Predator – and her exploits were substantially supplemented by a profusion of short stories in the company’s showcase anthology Dark Horse Presents and other venues.

Scripted primarily by Andi Watson, this particular UK Titan Books edition – with depiction and delineation from Cliff Richards & Joe Pimentel – features stories set during TV Season 3 and re-presents issues #17-19 (January through March 2000), as well as a delicious and timely morsel first seen in Dark Horse Presents #141, March 1999.

Check your facts here: Buffy Summers was a gormless charm-free cheerleaderValley Girl until the night when she inexplicably turned into a hyper-strong, impossibly durable monster-killer.

After being stalked by a creepy old coot from a secret society of Watchers she discovered that she was the most recent recipient of a millennial mystic curse which transformed mortal maids into living death-machines to all things undead arcane or uncanny: a Slayer.

Moving with her mom to typical California hamlet Sunnydale, Buffy then learned her new hometown was located on the edge of an eldritch gateway known to the unhallowed as The Hellmouth.

Enrolling at Sunnydale High Buffy made some friends and, schooled by new Watcher Rupert Giles, conducted a never-ending war on devils, demons and every shade of predatory supernatural species inexorably drawn to the area…

This slim supernal compilation at last concludes ‘Bad Blood’ – an extended storyline which pitted the daring, darling “Scooby Gang” against ambitious, narcissistic psycho-killer vampire Selke and her new breed of modified demonic thralls.

When vain Selke’s face was ruined in battle she naturally sought out a plastic surgeon. Dr. Flitter took up her cause, restoring and improving the vampire with the promise of immortality as his oft-postponed reward.

However, since scientific procedures didn’t work, he resorted to magic and his researches found a way to turn vampire blood into a super-steroid for Selke and her chosen brood. Now she and her newly-minted children of the night hunt not only humans for food, but other vampires to provide the raw ingredients of the Bad Blood serum…

Despite a rather full dance card, however, Selke cannot forget what Buffy did and is increasingly obsessed with making the Slayer suffer…

Selke’s über-vamps are also making much mischief, and Buffy and recently restored undead lover Angel are finding them almost impossible to destroy…

As a nocturnal civil war breaks out between Selke’s squad and the town’s “normal” vampires, Selke urges Flitter to use the blood to make a Slayer antipersonnel weapon – a sorcerous clone designed to hunt down and slaughter the original…

The saga picks up in ‘Your Cheatin’ Heart’ as Willow, Cordelia, Oz, Xander and Buffy are forced to join in school-type activities by building a float for an upcoming parade. Angel, meanwhile, has captured one of Selke’s new ‘Roid Rage Vamps and started obtaining answers in a manner most un-heroic…

On the midnight streets, Buffy is ambushed by her mystic clone and, after a blistering battle, loses. Elsewhere Selke, unaware that a new faction has sabotaged her modified blood supply, gorges herself on the foul brew…

After disposing of Buffy’s body down a handy manhole, the doppelganger attempts to infiltrate the Scooby Gang, but although she has the Slayer’s memories, her attitudes are seriously skewed. For instance, her knowledge of fashion rivals Cordie’s…

Tensions rise in ‘She’s No Lady’ as the clone starts to degrade. Born of Bad Blood, she casts no reflection and can’t see her face, but once she notices the flesh of her shoulder coming off she heads straight back to Doc Flitter…

The cosmetic alchemist has already discovered that someone has adulterated his buckets of blood and Selke is completely out of control when the clone arrives, leaking from many lesions.

None of them are aware that under Sunnydale Buffy is slowly recuperating, assisted by a shambling earlier prototype previously discarded by Flitter.

As Angel sneaks in and destroys the reservoir of augmented blood, the raging, oblivious Selke orders the duplicate to fetch Buffy’s body and prove she’s dead…

The gory carnival of chaos concludes in ‘Old Friend’ as the clone confronts the Slayer and her earlier incarnation in the sewers, whilst above ground Willow and Giles examine “Buffy’s” blood on a discarded parade costume and uncover the awful truth…

When Selke sees the decimation wrought by Angel, she goes berserk, body rapidly mutating into monstrosity, just as the long-awaited procession begins through Sunnydale. Her depredations are interrupted by the battered but victorious Buffy who spectacularly destroys Selke and ends the Bad Blood menace forever.

However in the shadows, deadly demon lovers Spike and Drusilla fade from sight, taking their new toy Dr. Flitter with them…

Supplemented by the usual wealth of photos and covers by Jeff Matsuda, John Sibal, Randy Green & Andy Owens, this chronicle also includes ‘Killing Time’ – a short adventure by Doug Petrie, Richards and Pimentel wherein three sulky Goth girls manifest chronal ravager Ragginor and the Slayer has to defeat the demon before all time ends…

Here is another superbly accessible magical fight-fest – even for those unfamiliar with the vast backstory: a creepy chronicle of short stirring sagas as easily enjoyed by the most callow neophyte as by any dedicated devotee.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer ™ & © 2000 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.

Angel: The Hollower


By Christopher Golden, Hector Gomez & Sandu Florea (Dark Horse/Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-1-84023-163-7

These days a ingenuous girl loving an undead bloodsucker is so trite and overused it is a subject of parody and jest, but not so long ago the concept was relatively fresh and enticing…

For an entire generation, their first brush with the idea came courtesy of a landmark TV show. Buffy the Vampire Slayer began her charismatic career after a clueless cheerleaderValley Girl teen suddenly turned into an indomitable monster-killer: latest winner of an unpredictable mystic/genetic lottery which transformed unsuspecting mortal maids into human killing machines and martial arts masters…

The cult series and its assorted media spin-offs refocused the zeitgeist and, since Dark Horse Comics’ clever, witty graphic interpretation is what interests me most, here’s a look at one of their earliest sidebar projects.

Once the company secured the strip licensing rights, they began generating an engaging regular series, a welter of original graphic novels, spin-offs, specials and numerous miniseries.

Buffy Summers lived in the small California hamlet of Sunnydale on the edge of a paranormal portal to the Nether Realms dubbed The Hellmouth, where she and a small band of friends battled devils, demons and every sort of horror inexorably drawn to the area and whom/what/which all considered humanity an appetiser and planet Earth an irresistible eldritch “fixer-upper” opportunity.

With Rupert Giles, scholarly mentor, father-figure and Watcher of all things unnatural, Buffy and her “Scooby Gang” began making the after-dark streets of Sunnydale safe for the oblivious human morsels, aided by an enigmatic stud-muffin referring to himself as Angel…

Eventually he was revealed as a good vampire – one who possessed a soul – and he and the Summers girl fell in love. Sadly that broke the spell which made a tragic hero and instead unleashed the diabolical vampire he had been – the red-handed Angelus who had turned Europe into his personal charnel house for nearly two centuries.

Although Angel was eventually restored thanks to the intervention of Buffy and Co, he had briefly carved a savage swathe through town – ghastly even by Sunnydale’s standards – and was left burdened with a double dose of paralysing guilt and faced every night the vigilant, fearful suspicions of his human allies…

Angel eventually won his own TV franchise, but long before that he had graduated from romantic interest/arch enemy into his own 3-issue tryout miniseries. Angel: The Hollower was released from May to July 1999 and detailed how, even after reverting to exquisite evil before being redeemed again, his past would always be there to haunt him…

This British Titan Books edition commences with an Introduction by scripter Christopher Golden (and ends with a light-hearted interview with original series cover-artist Jeff Matsuda) before the action opens with ‘Cursed!’ by Golden, Hector Gomez & Sandu Florea (originally seen in anthology Dark Horse Presents #141, March 1999) wherein the Brooding Bad Boy regales Buffy with the horrific events that followed his rebirth as a bloodsucker in Ireland circa 1753.

That handy origin recap concluded, the main event – set during the TV show’s third season – kicks off in present-day San Francisco where a pair of vampires is attacked by a monstrous tentacled horror. Veteran vamp Catherine barely escapes with her unlife and, having seen the horror before, knows there’s only one being she can turn to…

In Sunnydale, Buffy and Angel have resumed their after-dark partnership, even though Giles and the rest of her in-the-know friends are still wary of the recently re-redeemed night-stalker. However once their monster-killing “date” ends Angel is jumped by a band of fangers and sees a girl he slaughtered and “turned” over a century past…

Although their sworn enemy, his undead captors treat Angel with kid gloves. Catherine only wants to talk and she wants to talk about The Hollower…

In a flashback, the scene turns to Vienna in 1892 where Angelus and his pack-mates Spike and Drusilla were amongst many vampires preying on the populace in complete security, oblivious and immune to all threat or challenge.

However, soon after turning Catherine, Angelus was confronted by starving, terrified vampires fleeing from some unimaginable horror that actually preyed on bloodsuckers…

Back in the now, Catherine reminds her sire of the cost the last time the creature manifested and warns him the thing has undoubtedly tracked her to Sunnydale…

At last convinced, Angel agrees to a truce and prepares to battle the thing again. Unfortunately this is something he cannot share with Buffy…

In end-of-the-century Austria the first fight against the Hollower unsatisfactorily stalled with only a few undead survivors, whilst now in Sunnydale Angel secretly consults eldritch expert Giles and learns the truth about the beast. He also discovers that, blithely unaware, Buffy is already hunting a huge, subterranean tentacled horror that prefers vamps to human meals…

Watcher archives reveal a chilling scenario. Vampires are actually human corpses with the departed soul replaced by a reanimating demon, using blood to fuel the composite creature. The Hollower however, sucks out those demonic riders and ingests them. That wouldn’t be a bad thing, except once it’s full – about 3,000 demons is its limit – the horror explosively regurgitates them and the partially digested devils will infect the nearest LIVING body.

If the Hollower succeeds in satiating itself in vampire-infested Sunnydale and subsequently pops, most of the town’s mortal souls will suddenly become rabid, blood-crazed killers…

Engaged in the hunt, Buffy however can’t shift a nagging and unworthy notion: if the Hollower sucks out the vampire part of Angel, will she be left with a normal human lover…?

Fast and furious, this tale of two cities and times is a solid supernatural thriller big on action and intriguingly presented. Definitely prescribed for anybody suffering a surfeit of lovestruck face-suckers and kissypoo predators – which last really should know better at their age…
Angel ™ & © 2000 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved.