Article Leaked Buffy reboot script is painful? (the axing of "New Sunnydale" style)

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Albeit in actor rather than director context, it's reminiscent of originally choosing Geneviève Bujold to play Janeway in Voyager, who had zero experience with television productions.

Inside Chloé Zhao’s failed ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ reboot: A close reading of the script, directed by Chloé Zhao, may give clues to why Hulu passed on the show, which has caused an ongoing uproar online from the “Buffy” faithful eager to see their favorite character return to television. ... Buffy has but one line in that original script.

[...] Why the absence of Buffy in the “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” reboot wasn’t flagged as a potential problem from the beginning is a mystery. Sources say, though, that Hulu is still hopeful that a new creative team can revive the revival sometime in the future. But one well-placed source close to the show said the pilot process wasn’t more difficult than launching any other television show — yet it was made “all the more difficult” by Hulu, which ultimately had “no idea what they really wanted.”

[...] On paper, there’s never been more of a slam dunk than “Buffy the Vampire Slayer: New Sunnydale.” [...] Somehow, the stakeholders figured out how do it without Whedon, who’s considered too toxic to hire after allegations of abuse have sidelined his career. And most significantly of all, Gellar had finally — finally! — agreed to return as Buffy, after being convinced to do it by Oscar-winning director Zhao, who helmed the pilot. With Gellar and Zhao — who’s professed her love of “Buffy,” and has said she “watched religiously” — serving as stewards, what could go wrong?

[...] The issues with the pilot seem to be manifold. [...] despite her love of the original series, Zhao proved to be a mismatch for “Buffy the Vampire Slayer: New Sunnydale.” ... Those sources say that Zhao’s prodigious skills as a director didn’t lend themselves to a television pilot that requires a lot of exposition. It was undershot ... The performances from the actors playing the new characters, who need to make a strong impression as they’re introduced, were under-directed, the sources said. That Armstrong, the new Slayer, has a very young appearance — she turned 16 on March 10 — contributed to the whole enterprise playing too young.

Nerdrotic Daily
https://youtu.be/byAu3EwbNYw

VIDEO EXCERPTS: [...] So Sarah Michelle Geller is out there blaming the Hulu executive right now and they're naming this guy, which is just unbelievable....

[...] People are trying to protect Chloé Zhao. Hulu wanted to go forward with a season. They were paying up out the ass to keep the pre-production going cuz the contract stated that people in pre-production would still get paid.

They couldn't nail Chloé Zhao down to commit to a time frame to film this and then decided to ultimately just cut the neck off it. Maybe the release of the script is an effort to protect Chloé cuz maybe nobody ever believed in this script, and after you read it, you can sort of see why.

[...] Yeah, that script was something. It's making the rounds now and people understand why it was cancelled, but there might be a lot more to this story.

[...] Behind her, a second wraithlike figure crawls from the sand. Its skin is dead and stretched like a corpse with stringy hair and dirty clothes that might identify it as female. ... and Nova says, "Oh my god, a girl died."

And someone else says, "Well, we shouldn't assume her gender."

Leaked Buffy reboot script is painful ... https://youtu.be/byAu3EwbNYw

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/byAu3EwbNYw

[confused2]

Get Whedon? Tell everyone in advance what he's like (?) .. if you want the job and the money .. you have to work for Whedon.

[confused2]

Xander has died

BBC reports:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer actor Nicholas Brendon dies aged 54
...
Following news of her co-star's death, Gellar, quoting a famous monologue by his character in the series, wrote: "They'll never know how tough it is to be the one who isn't chosen. To live so near to the spotlight, and never step in it. But I know. I see more than anybody realizes, because nobody's watching me."

"I saw you Nicky," she added. "I know you are at peace, in that big rocking chair in the sky."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckg9wgj9y5no

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Xander has died

BBC reports:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer actor Nicholas Brendon dies aged 54
...
Following news of her co-star's death, Gellar, quoting a famous monologue by his character in the series, wrote: "They'll never know how tough it is to be the one who isn't chosen. To live so near to the spotlight, and never step in it. But I know. I see more than anybody realizes, because nobody's watching me."

"I saw you Nicky," she added. "I know you are at peace, in that big rocking chair in the sky."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckg9wgj9y5no

Almost borders on coincidence, given the new Slayer pilot just being decapitated. The effects and consequent injuries of substance abuse finally caught up with him. Whereas in contrast the benchmark of Keith Richards (82) remains impervious to such (depression probably made the speedier difference for Brendon).

Brendon was only a year younger than Charisma Carpenter (55), so that was really two cast members who were way old to be teenagers. Although Hannigan (51) is three years older than Gellar (48), she still didn't quite qualify for the grade of "elderly schoolgirl" like Carpenter. Michelle Trachtenberg was the youngest of the lot (as Buffy's magically created sister), but she tragically died before any of them, last year at age 39.

[confused2]

From what I find on the 'net Whedon doesn't seem to be all that bad .. a toxic workplace maybe .. but presumably they were paid .. so ..

The most damning allegation is that Charisma Carpenter was fired for getting pregnant, and that Cordelia’s storyline in season four of Angel was not merely bad writing but was in part retaliation for the pregnancy.

https://www.reddit.com/r/buffy/comments/...20violated.

Obvious discrimination - would he have fired a bloke for getting pregnant? - I don't think so. Tricky. If you're hired to look like Cordelia and you don't .. ??

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From what I find on the 'net Whedon doesn't seem to be all that bad .. a toxic workplace maybe .. but presumably they were paid .. so ..

The most damning allegation is that Charisma Carpenter was fired for getting pregnant, and that Cordelia’s storyline in season four of Angel was not merely bad writing but was in part retaliation for the pregnancy.

https://www.reddit.com/r/buffy/comments/...20violated.

Obvious discrimination - would he have fired a bloke for getting pregnant? - I don't think so. Tricky. If you're hired to look like Cordelia and you don't .. ??

The other story that surfaced was that they had to let her go to pay Spike -- to bring James Marsters on the set of Angel for that final season.

#Cancellation: "Marsters made a similar statement, saying cancellation took the cast and production staff 'completely by surprise'. He said in 2021 that Spike's addition to the show prevented cancellation after four seasons, although his request for a salary equal to what he was paid on Buffy caused Whedon to remove Carpenter from the main cast."

The irony regarding Spike is that Whedon never wanted to incrementally turn a murderous villain into a rehabilitated champion (especially one who eventually had an affair with Buffy). The studio forced him to do that because of Spike's surprising popularity with fans. Coincidentally, though, extreme anti-heroes as protagonists became the new wave of shows in the 2000s -- from The Sopranos to The Shield to Dexter to Breaking Bad.

[stryder]

All that Buffy gossip and no one threw Kristy Swanson into conversation topic.

I guess the original was eclipsed by the reboot of a bootstrapped series, from the film. (which apparently Dolly Partons film company made)

[confused2]

All that Buffy gossip and no one threw Kristy Swanson into conversation topic.

I guess the original was eclipsed by the reboot of a bootstrapped series, from the film. (which apparently Dolly Partons film company made)

I'm not sure Kristy Swanson would have had (as an actress) the same 'emotional range' as SMG - Whedon brought out a chemistry (acted or real) in the cast ..?

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The movie, of course, was later de-throned as canon because it strayed heavily from Whedon's screenplay. And the 3-part 1999 comic book series called The Origin provided the authentic story prior to the first episode of the television show. The Origin was derived from the unaltered film script, and Whedon gave his 90% blessing to it as the legitimate "before".

https://reviewsfrommycouch.com/2017/11/b...igin-1999/

INTRO: Dark Horse’s “Buffy” comics have been canonical for the past decade, but the first story that is officially part of the canon came out much earlier: “The Origin” (January-March 1999) takes Joss Whedon’s script for the 1992 movie, translates it into a three-issue comic series and gives it the necessary tweaks to fit with the universe and timeline of the TV show.

Whedon was in a difficult position with the movie: He wanted to distance himself from it, because he didn’t like the comedic direction and some of the performances (particularly Donald Sutherland’s). On the other hand – aside from specifics such as Buffy’s year in school and what happens to vampires when they are staked – the movie is the backstory to the TV series.

In Buffy’s first meeting with Principal Flutie in “Welcome to the Hellmouth” (Season 1, episode 1), he is concerned that she burned down the gym of her Los Angeles school (something that doesn’t happen in the movie, but does in “The Origin”). In “Becoming, Part 1” (2.21), we see a remake of the scene of a candy-sucking Buffy being discovered by Merrick, her first Watcher – of course with Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy and Richard Riehle as Merrick, replacing Kristy Swanson and Sutherland.

Although adapted by novel writer Christopher Golden and Dan Brereton rather than Whedon himself, “Buffy’s” inventor mostly praised “The Origin”: “The origin comic, though I have issues with it, CAN pretty much be accepted as canonical. They did a cool job of combining the movie script (the SCRIPT) with the series; that was nice, and using the series Merrick and not a certain OTHER thespian [Sutherland] who shall remain hated.”

A look through the 1st issue of "The Origin" ... https://youtu.be/Zv7ue8AFcQo

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/Zv7ue8AFcQo

Marsters on why Whedon should have killed Spike off as planned ... https://youtu.be/hynZ2j9M9IE

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/hynZ2j9M9IE