Another really big comic book! This time collecting Buffy the Vampire Slayers 8th season volume 2. And it’s great fun. As with all collections this has it’s up and down moments. But overall this collection has some of the best Season 8 stories. The first story is Harmonic Divergence and deals with the creation of a new vampire reality TV show called Harmony bites. With Harmony being played by a real vampire. The we come to Swell. This story opens with Satsu taking on a huge monster with Kennedy dropping in on the proceeds. Only to have a cute fuzzy toy attack our heroes. Predators and Prey follows. It’s a story that emphasizes that the team aren’t just slayers they’re family. Nisha has been kidnapped and forced into this little energy ball and our heroes attempt to rescue her. Safe is next as Coco in this story confuses Faith with Buffy. Then she wants to become a slayer too after training. Living Doll is next as a puppet master type character creates dolls that talk. Harmony Bites revisits the main character from the first story and Clem tries to get in her business, there’s a number for you readers to get involved. Should Clem get in her business or not? But there’s a lot of great stories and I’m not going to give a synopsis on each one suffice to say that this is a great collection.
The Creative Team:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer continues under the watchful eye of Joss Whedon. There, as always, is a good mix of horror, comedy, gore and teen angst as the writers tackle stories that are off beat and provocative. The cool thing about the comic version is that it’s not limited to the confines and budget restraints of the Television series so the visuals can take us anywhere. Great stuff includes Harmony making appearances on Anderson Cooper and The Nation, leading Buffy to wonder if the real world knows who the good guys are. Also I loved the character of Simone and the fact that she gets Star Trek confused with Stargate (usually it’s Star Wars.) which adds a humorous moment. There’s something for everyone as the prerequisite monsters, demons, ghouls, zombies and of course vampires show up to torment our protagonists. I highly recommend this volume with only a couple of stories being kind of sub-par.
The art is fairly consistent with top notch depictions of our heroes and a lot of interesting monsters that make up this volume. the Swell was cool as a bunch of stuffed toys come together to pose a threat and highlights include the iron steel web spun to trap Nisha. I loved the man eating plant that threatens to eat up Courtney. It kind of reminded me of Little Shop of Horrors (the musical from the ’80’s, not the Corman quickie.) Plus the attack of the toys was great to see as their hasn’t been a Puppet Master movie in a while (that I know of anyway.) Great art to complement great writing.
In Conclusion:
Quirky off-beat horror is always fun if done right and Joss Whedon’s blend of teen comedies and vampire flicks shows no sign of slowing down. Thank God for the people at Dark Horse and, to an extent, IDW for bringing us tales within the Buffyverse. The comics continue to improve and Whedon shows just as much care in delivering quality product today as when the TV series first aired many moons ago. The climax of this volume is the five part Last Gleaming which should be made into a movie in it’s own right. This volume is a must have for any die hard Buffy fan. (***1/2)
[yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]
Writer – Jane Espenson, Steven S. DeKnight, Drew Z. Greenberg, Jim Krueger, Doug Peteri, Brad Meltzer. Scott Allen and Joss Whedon
Art – Georges Jeanty, Andy Owens, Cliff Richards, Karl Moline
Colors – Michelle Madsen
Letters – Richard Starkings and Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt
Publisher – Dark Horse
Author Profile
- Kevin Given has studied with “ Longridge Writers Group †and “ Writer’s Boot Camp †a speech/communications major from the University of Maine Presque-Isle/Orono sites. He has created the “ Karl Vincent Vampire Hunter †franchise which includes novels and comic books. They can be found on amazon, Indyplanet and Kindle. For a limited time you can get digital copies of “ Karl Vincent: Vampire hunter †# 1 and “ Files of Karl Vincent †# 1 for free on Indyplanet. Kevin is producing the third novel in the series “ Dracula Rising †(working title) and developing “ Foul Blood †into comic book form. Don't forget to check out the YouTube show " Comics: Let's Talk " hosted by Kevin Given
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