There is an entire generation who have never seen the episode of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer†when Willow rips the skin off the man who inadvertently killed her lover. That was some riveting drama, so unexpected and extremely daring for network television. Then there’s the episode in “Angel†where the vampire who becomes evil when he finds happiness believes his son to be lost to him forever. Angel has skills after living at least 100 years and what does he do to the man who he thinks has killed his son? He attempts to strangle him with a pillow.
That kind of rage, where you forget every way you’ve learned to kill was as surprising as Willow making someone skinless. Writer Christos Gage alongside the artwork of Rebekah Isaacs recaptures the spirit of these iconic moments from the television series in issue 17 of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s†tenth season.
Buffy and Spike are a couple, Angel has returned to help them and the rest of the Scooby gang defeat Archaeus, a big bad evil who Buffy can’t defeat on her own. Old wounds are buried, but not without a lot of witty banter that only old frenemies and lovers can have. The intimate knowledge these people have of each other makes every panel riddled with tension. Then there are the moments of private conversations where characters come to the realization that in the mortal world supernatural beings and humans just can’t sustain a healthy relationship. These epiphanies lead to quite a few laugh out loud moments.
Essentially Gage captures the essence of the series and continues the drama by focusing on the emotions and behaviors of the characters. There will always be some super-baddie to fight, but the core of shows produced by Joss Whedon are always the people and their conflicts. That above all drives the narrative and makes everything that surrounds it extremely compelling.
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