By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Recently, Deadline broke what is already the most surprising news of the year: Sarah Michelle Gellar will be returning to headline a reboot of her insanely popular ‘90s genre cult classic Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Details about this are still sparse, though the description of this as “the next chapter in the Buffyverse” implies that it will be set in the same world as the original show. And that’s a big part of why this Buffy reboot is destined to succeed: because it will build off a series that left the door wide open for a continuation.
The Buffy Reboot Plot After Season 7
Some Buffy fans don’t love Season 7, but the show-stopper of a finale is a big part of why this reboot is likely going to be a smash hit. The whole schtick of this universe’s lore was that only one Slayer was active at a time and blessed with all the power that comes with it. In the series finale, Buffy managed to fully unleash this power, giving “potentials” all around the world the same set of low-level superpowers that she had used to defend Sunnydale from evil throughout the years.
While we don’t know exactly what direction the new show will take, it’s a pretty safe bet that Buffy herself not be the lead character. In fact, she’ll almost certainly be a Watcher-like figure to one or more Slayers who need guidance. Thanks to the original Buffy finale, this aspect of the reboot would make sense because we know for a fact that this fictional world was suddenly filled with young girls who, overnight, suddenly gained powers that could transform them into either heroes or villains. Either way, that world will need the veteran presence of Buffy, the one Slayer with more experience than any of the rest.
Don’t Make The Picard Mistake
Assuming the Buffy reboot goes this way, it seems like it will be off to a better start than its closest analog: Star Trek: Picard. That Paramount+ show was also a revival of a beloved ensemble genre show everyone loved in the ‘90s, and it similarly situated its title character as an older mentor figure to a new generation of heroes. However, many Trek fans hated that first season because it changed everything we love about Picard (including his hatred of turning androids into slaves) in order to make him into this aloof figure who suddenly needs to return to action to save the day.
Narratively speaking, that’s a great way to get a returning character back into the action, which is why it’s a safe bet that the Buffy reboot will do just that for our favorite Slayer. However, Buffy doesn’t have to lose her ideals and status like Picard did. Instead, she simply needs to be what she was at the end of the series: just one Slayer in a world where hundreds or even thousands of others now share her powers.
It would be absolutely perfect if Buffy’s personality and morals remained the same but she had to ride herd on a new crop of Slayers who, in the parlance of Silicon Valley, just want to move fast and break things. At any rate, the writers for the Buffy reboot have plenty of material to draw on, including some killer comics that are (for now, at least) canonical. And if the show manages to snag some other returning actors (none have yet been confirmed), we can finally learn whether Buffy ended up with Angel, Spike, or someone else altogether (although if it’s Riley, the fandom may riot).
This Buffy Fan Has Hope
As a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan from my teens (I joined mailing lists to receive VHS recordings before my town finally got WB!), I have high hopes for this reboot. That’s significant because I’ve watched other revivals like Frasier fail, and I’ve watched Picard nearly destroy its title character’s legacy before sticking the landing with its final season. The world of TV reboots is, frankly, something of an apocalypse right now, but who better than Buffy Summers to navigate it and save the world yet again?
Source: Deadline
