buffy the vampire slayer

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Predators and Prey

ISBN: 9781595823427
BtVS Season 8 Volume 5
I purchased this book.

This volume of BtVS season eight is for fans, not newcomers. It’s not really a book that pushes forward the drama of Twilight, the secret anti-Slayer group that’s trying to destroy every Slayer on the streets. This collection of comics serves as housekeeping, as well as character and world building asides.

Perhaps channeling the modern day popularity of shows like True Blood and the urban fantasy genre (and irony since Buffy was an establishing factor in UF’s popularity) this graphic novel starts off with a frivolous-feeling tale of the vapid vampire Harmony getting a reality TV show. (Not that the story arc is vapid or frivolous, it merely reflects the qualities of Harmony herself.) While the reality show is almost on its death bed Harmony is attacked by a Slayer and all of a sudden it becomes a hit, Harmony a star and Slayers the bad guys. It fits in the greater scale of the story arc, but this wasn’t how I pictured vamps coming out in the Buffy-verse. Through Harmony everything seems shallow and empty, but that is the point.

Continuing, readers will find; a story about the Asian sect of Slayers that hints at, but doesn’t come close to the hilarious third book of season eight; a story of Andrew, Buffy and the growing sect of bad Slayers that reads like it’s seeding all kind of future things for the series, but just barely brushes against them; a story from Faith and Giles, which is absolutely fabulous, dark disturbing and wonderful; a resolution of sorts of the magical mess up Dawn got herself into; as well as bonus snippets of Harmony’s reality show and an ad for a fictional product featured in this volume.

Each of the stories are stand alone, provided you already know the characters, which is the major factor leading to this book feeling more like a themed anthology than the next book in a series. It is almost impossible to pick up Predators and Prey without knowing the previous story lines. So readers should be forewarned that this book will probably not be a satisfying read if read out of order.

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May 29

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Long Way Home by Joss Whedon

Season Eight: Part One
Graphic Novel: 9781593078225, $15.95

The Long Way Home doesn’t start exactly where the last television season of Buffy left off, instead it starts a little past that, after Buffy and her crew have restarted their lives. In some ways, things are very different, but in others, they’re exactly the same. Each character seems to have taken a level of bad ass as they push forward in the fight against evil in their own ways.

Training the new slayers for a fight that’s longer and more eventful than the epic big bad battle season seven kissed viewers goodbye with, Buffy still has issues, and still has a ton of problems, including; Andrew, Willow’s sometimes tenuous hold on her personal darkness, Dawn’s feelings of uselessness and need for attention, Xander’s everlasting support that might just be more than friendly and a cadre of teen girls to wrangle, train and keep alive.

On a part-training mission, Buffy and some of her trainees interrupt a demon ritual and discover the human prey all have the same strange symbol carved into their chest. More than just a casual encounter, the crew get to work trying to unravel the larger plot only to be distracted by a series of villains, who like good antagonists, never seem to go away completely. So between high school rivals, still bent on revenge, the military declaring Buffy’s operation a terrorist sect, giant sized little sisters and a mass zombie attack The Long Way Home doesn’t skip a beat, thrusting beloved characters right back where fans love to see them, with the same humor and mix of horror and fantasy that Buffy is famous for.

There couldn’t be a better continuation of the Buffy-verse and with such a There couldn’t be a better continuation of the Buffy-verse and with such a die-hard audience we can hope this new, more affordable, and in some ways more flexible, series will continue for a long time to come.

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