Fast forward to the future and we find a 50-year-old Buffy Summers’ living in a world ravaged by climate change, with the vampire regime frolicking in dystopian harmony with their human cattle. With vampires capable of walking around by day unhindered thanks to a polluted sky, it’s Buffy who is hunted now. But rebellion is brewing, with hope found in a young girl who believes herself to be the last Slayer.
With the fourth and final part of their series out this week, writer Casey Gilly (Star Wars, My Little Pony) and artist Joe Jaro (Firefly), along with colorist Joana LaFuente (Fence) and letterer Ed Dukeshire (Mighty Morphin Power Rangers), bring some familiar faces and new heroes and villains to this dystopian future in Buffy the Last Vampire Slayer from BOOM Studios.
For Gilly and Jaro, Buffy was part of their lives from the moment the series aired in the ’90s. “I was in my teens,” says Gilly, “the same age as the characters, so even though my life was very different, I still found them relatable.” She has proudly watched the series more than 10 times all the way through, though she says she hasn’t spent time with it over recent years. Just as big a fan, Jaro loves the original movie, and watched the series as often as possible, binging it when it became streamable. “It was constantly on as I was drawing, at least the first two issues,” he says.
Stepping into the Buffy universe has been fun and exciting for Gilly, “but honestly, I’m even more excited to be collaborating with Elizabeth, Gavin, Joe, Joana, and Ed — they are all immensely talented.” When he was first approached about working on a Buffy story, he was totally boosted, Jaro says. “Then they hit me with, oh it’s an older Buffy in her 50s. I said to myself, yeah this is going to be pretty dope.”
There have been other stories told in the future of Buffy’s world, such as Fray, but none of them were referenced for Buffy the Last Vampire Slayer. “Our Buffy-world is pretty small and I think it feels intimate — it’s not so foreign from the series or movies that fans won’t recognize it, and the differences are fairly subtle… until they aren’t.” Design-wise, Jaro says that his references were the main sources, including the series, as he mentions earlier. “I think this helped me in a way, to keep my focus on who Buffy is.”
Although Gilly’s work on My Little Pony might seem like a far cry from the bloody, filthy, vampire dystopia in Buffy the Last Vampire Slayer, Gilly notes that her MLP is actually quite dark. “There are witches, possession, monsters, Evil Dead references, and lots of bizarre humor. My amazing editor, Megan Brown, and the folks at Hasbro were both incredibly supportive of everything I wanted to put in there, so I went for it.” In contrast, she doesn’t think her Buffy story is what one might truly consider dark and gritty. “There are elements of darkness and there are certainly some moments of horror, but to me, it feels witchy, funny, and a bit like a Giallo, thanks to Joana’s gorgeous colors. I certainly didn’t feel dark and gritty while I was writing it — honestly, what I thought most about was making Joe, Elizabeth, and Gavin laugh. I wanted to keep the apocalyptic tones subtle, which I find even more unsettling than a full-blown barrel fire/street gangs wearing human rib cages as armor/drinking gasoline to stay alive sort of apocalypse. Both are cool, but the core of Buffy is in the contrast of evil invading the familiar and I wanted to retain some of that.”
And of course, there’s Buffy’s sense of humor, which Gilly still has her holding on to even and especially after all she’s seen and as her aging body fails to respond as it used to. “It’s definitely her coping mechanism,” says Jaro. “More so, I think it’s just her telling it as it is rather than sarcastic humour. She really doesn’t give a crap anymore.”
How would Gilly and Jaro handle living in this future they have created? “I’d probably still be drawing. It’s my coping mechanism,” says Jaro, but Gilly is more pragmatic. “You mean if we were living in a hellscape where we had to mourn things we’ve lost every single day thanks to a global crisis, while being confronted by the fresh horrors of government ineptitude, dismissal of science, and predatory capitalism? Uhg, no idea. My imagination isn’t that good.”
Oh. Right.
But at least there are no vampires, I guess?
Grab Buffy the Last Vampire Slayer #4, out this week!
