Taken from
http://forum.newsarama.comJOSS WHEDON TALKS BUFFY "SEASON 8"
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In speaking with Entertainment Weekly’s (and occasional comic writer) Jeff Jensen, Joss Whedon revealed more details on the March-debuting return of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to comics.
As revealed previously, the new series, to be published by Dark Horse and illustrated by Georges Jeanty (with covers by Jo Chen), will pick up after season seven of the television series, making the new series a canonical Season 8. Dark Horse Buffy editor Scott Allie announced at San Diego that Whedon, at that time, had roughly 20 issues mapped out.
“I don't know exactly why it or how it happened,” Whedon told Jensen. “I just thought, 'Oh, I could do that! It would be fun!' It happens to me every now and then, and causes me to commit to things I really don't have time for.''
In talking about the new series, Whedon confirmed that the project’s roots go back to a plan to continue Buffy on film. ''I had been thinking about doing some TV movies based on Buffy characters, but we could never get anything resembling financing together that was realistic, so it fell by the wayside,” Whedon said. “But that whole failed endeavor made me start thinking about what would happen next, and what the stories and mythology would be. I realized there was a lot to say, and it could make for a really fun comic book.''
Whedon will write the first four issues of the new series, and will then pull back to oversee other writers on the project, modeling it after television production. While the bulk of the writers coming on the series had not been named, it has been revelaed elsewhere that Jeph Loeb has signed on for an arc.
Other hints from Whedon about the new series:
- The thousands of girls who were empowered by Buffy at the end of Season 7 – still empowered. But that doesn’t mean there’re no more problems: “She may have closed the Hellmouth under Sunnydale and defeated The First. But evil? Still rampant!''
- The comic will deal with Buffy’s time aboard, as she was revealed to have been in Italy during Angel.
- Ideas that Whedon once held for a possible television spinoff unofficially entitled “Slayer School” will make it into the new series, especially now that there are thousands of new slayers the world over.
- The Scooby Gang will be back…but slowly, as time has passed and the audience will, according to Whedon, have to re-learn who these people are at this later point in their respective lives. Whedon said he wants to give everyone the entrance they deserve. “Over the course of my four-issue arc, you'll get a sense of where most of our major supporting characters are now.”
- Angel and Spike will be used, but sparingly, due to IDW holding the comic rights to the characters. Additionally, the new series will not resolve what happened at the cliffhanger ending of Angel.
Click the link above for the full article and additional images from the series.