Speculation- which Buffy character could best carry a spinoff.

Cafe Society
1

I caught last week’s Angel: the Spinoff episode, and annoying rearrangement of Las Vegas aside, guess what? The other vampire with a soul is just as boring as he was on BtVS. If it weren’t for the great supporting cast, I don’t think that show would have lasted beyond the first season. Love that Fred, she is adorable. Now Fred, there’s a chick who needs her own show.

OK, now to the real subject of this thread. Assuming that this is the very last season of Buffy: the Vampire Slayer, and they spin off a new show instead of trying to go on with a Buffyless Buffy, which character gets center-stage?

The nominees are:

Dawn. I like Dawn. Even during her whiny phase, I felt for her, and she is emerging as a much stronger character this season. I was once among the crowed that pictured her as the next Slayer, with a re-ensouled Spike as her Watcher. (hey, if Giles pulled a few strings…) I don’t see this as a likely proposition anymore. She’d definitely have to be in the new show, but I see her in more of a computer-research-detective role, kind of like the job Willow filled during the first two seasons. Also, I think she needs to develop her Key powers. That is a potential story arc that seems to have fallen by the wayside, and needs to be picked up again at some point. I mean, she’s the Key, she should be able to do interdimensional stuff, right?

Faith- Yeah, she was cool before she went over to the Dark Side of the Force, and she seems to be trying to redeem herself, but, shouldn’t she still be in prison? I’ve heard she’s due to do a few more Buffy episodes this season, but I don’t think at this point the character was developed enough to carry her own show. I’d definitely want her in a recurring role, though.

Willow- Ahh, yes, our favorite witch. With all those badass witchy powers. And that sweet demeanor. Basically a sweet gentle girl, but when push comes to shove, she can show amazing strength. But on the whole, I don’t think she’s forceful enough to carry a show. Definitely want her on the team, though. She’d be a major asset.

Xander- Um, no. Xander’s a dweeb. Granted the last couple of seasons the character’s matured, shown some real strength, but he’s still a dweeb. I’d still want him around, though. His sarcasm would lend some great humor, and his carpentry skills could definitely come in handy- I picture an episode in which a bunch of demons is holed up in a brick or stone building with a wall, and, since canons aren’t easily available, the gang decides to build a trebouchet… Also, his antagonistic nature would help keep things in perspective, when a particularly sympathetic MOTW shows up.

Spike- currently the strongest supporting character on the show, he occasionally even overshadows Buffy. He’s strong, he’s freaking gorgeous (drool) he’s intelligent, resourceful, he’s freaking gorgeous- oh, wait, I said that already. Drool. He’s also got that re-ensouled vampire angst thing going, though Joss has promised no brooding. And the chip would provide just that touch of physical vulnerability, say, in the face of a human enemy who thought it would be neat to conjure up something… I think that for a spinoff, Spike would have to be the one to take center stage. We need a love interest for him. Maybe if Willow isn’t willing to try driving stick again, if anything were to happen to Gunn, and the new show ended up on WB, or the two networks manage to resolve their differences and drop the silly no-crossover rule, maybe Fred. Fred is so cute. I love Fred. Sped, anyone? (I am, of course, assuming that BtVS ends up with Buffy finally dead. Permanently, no resurrection spells, just a nice warm dirt blanket. God knows, she’s earned the rest.)

Anyhoo, them’s my views on the subject.

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Oooh, my vision for BTVS crossover:
Buffy somehow disappears in the final scene of this season. She doesn’t die. (I’m thinking through a dimensional portal or the Hellmouth or something) Anyway, before she left she finally declared that she loved Spike. Spike, being Spike, is not going to let her go without a fight. So he decides that he’s going to ifnd her. He needs Dawn to come along with him because of her key powers so he basically kidnaps her and pulls her out of school. Xander doesn’t have anything better to do (Let’s say Willow is in England with Giles and Anya is dead) so he comes with. Wackiness ensues.
So basically they’d be traveling all over the world and into other dimensions looking for Buffy. I like Xander when he’s not being a big ass, and in my world, there will beSpike/Xander bonding in S7 so they get along pretty OK in the new spinoff.

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pepperlandgirl, that sounds like an interesting premise but doesn’t it sound like that worlds travelling series “Sliders”, starring Jerry O’Connell? Great idea though, I know I’d watch it.

4

As much as I hated Riley, when he and his wife showed up last season, I was kind of intrigued. When the left at the end in the helicopter, I was thinking, “Hey, can’t I go with them? They’re gonna go to cool places and hunt monsters with all kinds of neat gadgets, while I’m gonna stay here and watch a girl flip burgers.”

Riley himself is pretty cardboard and uninteresting, but a globetrotting band of high tech monster hunters would be kind of cool, I think.

5

My vote would have to go with Anya or Spike. Both could carry a series on their own shoulders, IMHO.

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I think Emma Caulfield could do anything. That last episode really drove home the fact that Anya is a horribly under-written one-dimensional character (she’s a capitalist and is afraid of rabbits and… well, that’s it) but she still manages to make her interesting, and even sympathetic. So I’d watch “Tales of the Former Vengeance Demons” without a doubt, but I’ve heard that she’s the other one (along with Sarah Michelle Gellar) who’s ridding herself of the whole Buffy thing, so I guess that’s a no-go.

How about Jonathan?

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The Adventures of the Mustard Guy and the Parking Ticket Lady.

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One the one hand i get the feeling Faith will be the one to die sealing the hell mouth,thus bringing her redemption storyline full circle.

But then i think that the only way to end it will be buffy entering the hell mouth,we won’t see her die though.

Thus leaving it open if SMG decides to do a few guest shots later.

9

I’m surprised nobody mentioned him yet, but what about good ol’ Giles? I mean, he is already doing his own spin-offy type thing in the UK, isn’t he? (Which is probably why nobody mentioned him, but still…)

Other than Rupert, I think Willow is the one who would be able to spinoff most successfully. Send her off to MIT, or whatever school it was that was trying to recruit her way back when, give her a few sidekicks, good white magic, and the black magic monkey off her back, and it should be fun.

It may take some better-than-average writing to make her assertive enough to be a title character, but it shouldn’t be that difficult.

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I second this, but I always wanted as her partner and co-lead…Tara. Yes, there wouldn’t be much sexual tension in the will-they-or-won’t-they sense, as they already have… However, there are series that were successful with married/committed couples (e.g. McMillan & Wife, Hart to Hart). Unfortunately, Joss the Great and Terrible bolluxed that up, in the name of artistic…something or other.:rolleyes:

11

Some interesting stuff from Mr. Whedon here, as regards post-Buffy Buffy. I’d watch Faith the Slayer if it were on TV. Of course, I’d watch a show that consisted of nothing more than a buck-nekkid Joss Whedon reading from the phone book. He’d make it work somehow.

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I seriously doubt that there will be a Faith the Vampire Slayer. I mean, it would be cool, but Eliza Dushku isn’t doing too badly for herself with a movie career. (Much better than Scooby Doo and its 2 sequels.) I doubt she’d want to give that up to work on a TV Show on a network that doesn’t even have affiliates in major markets with a (probably) substansial pay cut.