Buffy: New Sunnydale shelved by Hulu

[brightknightie]

How disappointed are we about Hulu shelving Chloé Zhao's Buffy the Vampire Slayer reboot/sequel series, Buffy: New Sunnydale, in which Gellar was to have returned to star alongside a new young slayer? Just a teeny-tiny bit wistful that maybe it could have been good, downright sad, quietly relieved, righteous that Whedon will get not one royalty penny?

(News article in the Hollywood Reporter.)

Comments

[havocthecat]

I wanted it so badly, and yet, I was so leery of it going horribly awry.

I guess we will never know. But I would kill for that pilot I've heard a rumor was filmed.

[celli]

Same to all that!

[brightknightie]

It's been confirmed that a pilot was indeed filmed. Maybe they'll make a one-shot special out of it someday.

[brightknightie]

The pilot having been filmed is now confirmed, according to People Magazine, which interviewed Gellar: "Gellar and Zhao filmed a pilot episode for what would have become a full series reboot, which would have brought back Gellar’s character and introduced a new slayer (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) to star alongside her." Article.

I was dismissive and purely skeptical until I heard that Zhao was on it with Gellar. Then I started to think that it could maybe be great, that a grown-up Buffy could maybe be just what we need. Maybe.

The People article reminded me that Disney now owns the IP, which exploded my head just a little.

[pj1228]

I didn't know there was a reboot planned. Maybe another channel will pick up. It seems a lot of work has already gone into it.

[brightknightie]

Disney owns the Buffyverse property. I suspect it's unlikely to allow any other company to license it from them.

This sounds to me a lot like the cancellation of the original Doctor Who in the '90s. One bureaucrat at the BBC had always hated the show, all his life, and gleefully, smugly canceled it at his first opportunity. An interview with Gellar revealed that one executive at Disney had always disliked Buffy the Vampire Slayer and was assigned to the project, constantly preening himself about how the show wasn't to his taste, as if that made him better than people who enjoyed it.

[annavere]

I am sorry for those involved and for everyone who was keen to watch the result, but I would say "quietly relieved" fits my mood.

Mostly, I have a philosophical objection to the idea that stories have to continue, and that we ought to know what happened after the show ended. Endings matter. A good ending is a remarkable feat of creativity (endings are hard!). And in the world of television, where most shows get cancelled, that both Buffy and Angel have a definite conclusion, and a pair of meaningful final scenes that summarize the mission statements of both shows, is incredible to me. And valuable.

I know the current trend is for endless interconnected stories and returning characters, and I don't share the fascination. I'd have been more invested in this series if Buffy wasn't in it, and it was entirely about some new slayers struggling and suffering in this universe (because drama does require suffering, and Buffy has had her share; let her have a happy ending, please, and let it be whatever each individual thinks best for Buffy after that gorgeous and final image of her slow smile - the whole point of that image was the field of possibilities, the "potential" of her future choices, and any official answer will by necessity close off most of them).

I didn't mean to write this much on the topic. The show is dear to me, and I feel more strongly about the idea of bringing Buffy back than I realized. I don't trust it would have been worth sacrificing the endings of 'Chosen' and 'Not Fade Away' to get a sequel.

[brightknightie]

Thank you for sharing! I am truly curious about the full range of feelings on the subject.

I do not personally love BtVS enough to be deeply emotional about a reboot or sequel attempt. But I am so about a number of other shows; I feel that I understand.

(To this day, I will not watch the new Battlestar Galactica. It failed to bring back any of the women characters from the original, not one, and in the early days when I was still considering watching it, I encountered fans of it who -- this is real -- mocked Dirk Benedict for having cancer, which convinced me that any show that attracted such people was probably very ... incompatible for me.)