Like many ’90s favorites, the Joss Whedon-created “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” is getting a small screen revival, we learned last week. Only, the show won’t be picking up where the previous series left off, but rather hitting “reboot” entirely for a fresh new take.
Fox 21 TV Studios is currently developing the series, with “Midnight, Texas” creator Monica Owusu-Breen tapped as writer, executive producer and showrunner. In a statement made on Twitter this week, Owusu-Breen has addressed the immediate backlash over the project, which will cast a black actress in the iconic role of Buffy Summers.
“For some genre writers it’s Star Wars. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is my Star Wars. Before I became a writer, I was a fan. For seven seasons, I watched Buffy Summers grow up, find love, kill that love. I watched her fight, and struggle and slay,” she wrote. “There is only one Buffy. One Xander, one Willow, Giles, Cordelia, Oz, Tara, Kendra, Faith, Spike, Angel … They can’t be replaced. Joss Whedon’s brilliant and beautiful series can’t be replicated. I wouldn’t try to.”
She continued, “But here we are, 20 years later … and the world seems a lot scarier. So maybe, it could be time to meet a new Slayer … And that’s all I can say.”
Created by Joss Whedon, the original series ran from 1997 to 2003.
Whedon is set to executive produce the new series alongside original series’ exec producers Gail Berman, Fran Kazui and Kaz Kazui as well as Joe Earley from Berman’s Jackal Group.