Buffy the Vampire Slayer Is Being Revived, And It Has the Perfect Roadmap

Buffy the Vampire Slayer ran for a staggering 144 episodes that covered a variety of plots and characters. While it might seem like the show truly covered everything that this universe had to offer, especially with the ending, the new revival has a pretty good road map to follow. While the show went off-air years ago, the in-continuity comic books have continued on.

While watching Buffy, every season the next villain always seems bigger and badder. Buffy and the Scooby Gang go from battling an ancient vampire that wants to take over the town of Sunnydale to fighting the literal first evil in existence. It's hard to see how the revival will be able to continue the plot after all that, at least at first glance.

But even though the TV show ended with season seven, the Buffy revival needs to follow the comics, which provided more and more plot lines that this new revival can definitely use as a road map.

The Buffy the Vampire Slayer Comics Featured So Many Major Events

Beginning with Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight #1 by Joss Whedon, Georges Jeanty, Andy Owens, Dave Stewart, Richard Starkings, and Jimmy

After the events of the season seven finale "Chosen," every potential slayer on Earth is activated by a magical spell cast by Willow Rosenberg. Buffy and Faith aren't the only two slayers anymore; there are now hundreds across the world. The awakening of these slayers completely changed the world's balance, and with the destruction of the Watcher's Council at the hands of Caleb, these new slayers needed somewhere to go. And so Buffy came in and created a new slayer organization that she crafted into a worldwide evil-fighting force. No matter where demons or vampires appeared, Buffy's new army could face them.

With Buffy already having taken on some of the most powerful vampires in history, as well as defeating the First Evil itself, it wasn't easy coming up with new villains that could match Buffy and her new army, but the comic creators managed. The first set of villains that Buffy faced were the surprise duo of Amy and Warren Mears, two antagonists from the original show and major enemies of Willow Rosenberg. While these two were certainly dangerous, they were nothing compared to what Buffy would face in the coming days.

The New Villain Twilight Was Buffy's Biggest Challenge in the Comics

This Threat Was Far More Familiar Than She Thought

The main threat that Buffy had to contend with through "season eight" of the comics was the mysterious Twilight. The character was inhumanly fast, remarkably strong, and led an organization that nearly brought down Buffy's entire Slayer organization. Due to Twilight's continual attacks, over two hundred slayers were brutally killed. Twilight's rampage was made all the more concerning by the fact that Twilight seemed to personally know Buffy. It was later revealed that Twilight was none other than Angel, one of Buffy's greatest love interests.

Angel had been manipulated by the elder God known as Twilight, who sought to enter the universe and recreate it in its image. While Buffy tried to fight Twilight, she eventually ended up giving into its manipulations, having sex with Angel and giving birth to the Twilight dimension. Thankfully, Buffy was able to banish Twilight by destroying the Seed of Wonder, which was the source of all magic on Earth. Destroying this seed had grave consequences for the world, and it'd be more than enough material for an entire season of the revival.

With the Seed of Wonder destroyed, all magic on Earth was destroyed as well, which had devastating effects on the entire world. No more slayers could be created, all witches lost their powers, and though vampires and current slayers were unaffected, no new vampires could be made. Instead, they transformed into "zompires." Even more concerning was that suicide rates began spiking all over the world and no good songs, movies, or books could be made after the seed was destroyed, as the "magic" of inspiration and creativity was gone as well. A new TV season following this fallout, especially with Willow, would be incredible.

In the Canon Buffy Comics, the End of Magic Was Disastrous for Dawn

Buffy's Own Sister Nearly Died

Another major aspect of the End of Magic arc was that nearly all spells that were cast either lost their power or were outright broken. While the spell that had cursed Angel with a soul went unbroken, the same couldn't be said for Dawn. While Dawn looks human and is remembered fondly by the rest of her family, she isn't human. Dawn is a mystical energy known as the Key; she's simply given human form due to powerful magic - which is no longer working due to the End of Magic, resulting in Dawn growing weaker and weaker, nearly dying.

Any one of those plots would be enough to carry an entire season, and they're just from Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight. There are still four more comic-book seasons after this series that include plots like a half-vampire half-slayer from the future attempting to absorb the power of the entire Slayer line or even Spike getting a literal alien spaceship. There are many directions that the Buffy the Vampire Slayer revival could go in, and almost all of them have already been mapped out by the comics. Even if the show ignores all of this canon, the premise of the revival sounds like something that has already been done in the comics.

Buffy Fans, Get Reading: There's Already a Comic Similar to the Revival

Starring an Older, More Grizzled Buffy

Right now, information on the Buffy revival is very scarce. All fans know is that it will feature a much older Buffy in a mentor position to a much younger slayer. Interestingly enough, there was already a comic that had a similar premise: Buffy the Last Vampire Slayer by Casey Gilly and Joe Jaro. This comic followed a world overrun by vampires, and it starred Buffy as the final slayer, entirely alone due to the death of all her friends.

She eventually finds hope for a better world in the form of a prophecy and a young girl who is related to it, which is very similar to the basic idea of the Buffy revival: an older version of Buffy looking after a younger girl. While the revival certainly won't adapt the full scope of the world being overrun by vampires, there may very well be other parts of the Last Slayer comic worth adapting. No matter what direction the new Buffy TV show takes, it's very likely that the comics have already done something similar, meaning that Buffy the Vampire Slayer's revival has a perfect road map to follow.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight is available now from Dark Horse Comics, and Buffy the Last Vampire Slayer is available now from BOOM! Studios.