Buffy animated series

[Skittles]

Taken from Buffy mag. Issue 14

©Eric Wight

The latest rumor from the Buffyverse is that plans for Buffy: Animated could be coming to the fore again, after various Buffy alumni have been heard discussing the cartoon series. Speaking at a recent US convention, Xander actor Nicholas Brendon told attendees that, "Alyson, Tony, and I just voiced our characters for Buffy: Animated. They are doing test episodes for a new presentation so they can shop it around to new networks. It's going to happen." The official word from Mutant Enemy is that a short animated piece, lasting for 5 minutes, is being put together as a test, alhough there is no official commitment from a network as of yet. Previous plans for the animated series were shelved early in 2003 when no US networks or children's channels would pick up. At the time, Joss Whedon told TV Guide that, "We just couldn't find a home for it - which will baffle me to the grave." As well as having scripts ready to go, initial animated characters had also been designed by artist Eric Wight, who is now involved with the project once again. Eric Wight's designs can be seen at www.ericwight.com. In an exclusive interview with the UK Buffy Magazine, Jeph Loeb, former executive producer on the project, comfirmed that work on the animated series had started once afain. "All great Buffy stories involve resurrection and the same holds true for this one," he said. "We just waited until the time was right and for the magic to come back. It did." While he was unable to indicate a timescale for it, or confirm whether the series would definatly be picked up, he did reveal that as well as the original cast members Nick Brendon, Anthony Stewart Head, and Alyson Hannigan, they also have "a bunch of other surprise voices that we can't talk about right now." Meanwhile, former Buffy/Angel writer, David Fury, has been talking about other spin-off possibilities for the Buffyverse. "Eliza Dushku is starring in Tru Calling so a Faith series is not happening, " he revealed during an exclusive interview with Dreamwatch Magazine. "As much as everybody loves Spike, I'm not sure anyone feels he can carry his own show. I know a lot of fans feel differently, but he makes a great supporting character or co-lead. Is it possible? Absolutly, but Joss has a lot of other ideas too. There is the possiblility of making the animated Buffy show because they are putting together a presentation again. There has always been an interest in doing Fray [Joss's future Slayer graphic novel] as a movie. Joss is hoping for a Firefly movie francise and if it does well, he may do more Firefly films."

Like the article said, you can see more pictures of the animated series a www.ericwight.com. I will continue trying to get more info on this series and other spin-off news. But it's gonna be quite hard with me not getting my subscrition for the mag. Oh, how I hate mail orders...

[Skittles]

Buffy-Animated.com

"The Pilot Episode". Surprisingly little is known about this, but it's probably not too bad a guess to say that Joss Whedon probably wrote it. Interviewed at the BBC, Jane Espenson mentioned:

"The pilot episode introduces you to Sunnydale and introduces you to the entire cast in kind of a unique way"

credit: BBC

"Teeny" was Jane Espenson's first completed script. Described by Whedon as "Basically it's The Incredible Shrinking Buffy, which is something we could never have done [in the live-action show]."

Again, it involved a common metaphor of high school: feeling small, but in this case, Buffy shrinks to Barbie Doll size with it. As Jane mentioned in an interview:

"It allowed us to accomplish visuals that would've been impossible with live action. The episode was about feelings of insecurity and obscurity that most of us faced in high school -- a return to the very metaphorical story-telling of seasons one and two of Buffy."

credit: Ain't It Cool News

It was in this episode that Buffy would face the "scottie dog" sized Roika Demon designed by Eric Wight.


"Food Fight", another script by Espenson where school lunch (demon meat) turns on the students.

"This had a cool series of scenes in which spaghetti coalesced itself into a big wiggly demon."

"The Back Room". This is the last of the Animated scripts Jane Espenson wrote, and she's mentioned it just a couple of times. They always wanted to do a story about Buffy stealing, and accomplished this in the cartoon, but with Dawn. Or maybe Buffy after all. It's not apparent which as two interviews contradict each other...

"[the episode] involved Buffy being stopped by a security guard for shoplifting and being taken to the store's back room, which was actually a passage to a scary netherworld of judgment and punishment."

[Skittles]

Buffy-Animated.com

Essentially the show would be Year One. Hence the show would retain the core members of the Scooby Gang; Buffy, Willow, Xander and Giles.

Supporting characters would, of course, include Joyce Summers and, due to Season 5 events, Dawn would be retrofitted into continuity.

Although other characters, such as Principal Snyder and Angel would appear, in an SFX Magazine interview, Joss Whedon stated:

"We actually didn't find Angel that much in the early stories. The fact of the matter is, Angel is a cool character, but this is really about high school and so Angel is someone who would have been recurring, but not necessarily in every episode. Which was actually the case in the first season of the live show. There are some stories where he doesn't have a place."

credit: SFX Magazine July 2003

Additionally, The Master was not set to appear as a recurring villain. Due to the nature of animation, the episodes would air out of order, so any season length plot lines would be difficult to maintain, but Jeph Loeb has stated in a BBC interview that "We have talked about the idea of creating what we refer to as our 'arch nemesis' who would be a recurring villain that was unique to the animated series, but so far I can't actually comment on that part."

Jeph Loeb also mentions that "One of the things that Joss pointed out was that one of the downsides of the Master's story was that he never got out, and because he never got out, there wasn't actually much mayhem that he could cause. So, why not focus on other activities that went on at that time?"

Voices

The initial character designs were based on the fact that it was not known whether or not the voice actors would be the same as those in the live action show. Although it was stated that it would be preferable in an ideal world:

"What I would say at this point is that we would love to have everyone. That is our first choice and we would hope to make that happen. Everyone has expressed interest. It's going to come down to the two biggest things in these cases, which are time and money, so we can't say yet.

"Joss hopes to be able to make an announcement within the next two or three weeks in order to tell everyone what hopefully will be good news. In any event, people should rest assured that whoever is cast in the roles will be cast by Joss, and the idea is to make the characters sound and act like they do on the show.

"It's not as though animated Willow is going to be written different from live action Willow. if she's not going to be Alyson, she is going to sound as much like Alyson as we can find."

credit: BBC interview with Jeph Loeb

Sarah Michelle Gellar made it clear that she was not involved:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Sarah Michelle Gellar told SCI FI Wire that she has chosen not voice her character in Joss Whedon's proposed Buffy: The Animated Series. "I don't know anything about the animated series," Gellar said in an interview. "I'm not part of that. It says that I am [on the Internet], but the first I heard of it was last week."

credit: SCI FI Wire

And similarly David Boreanaz mentioned additional commitments at the time in an interview with Teen Hollywood:

"No. Joss came to me and said "We’re doing this Buffy animated thing and you’re more than welcomed to come down." I’ve been so tied up with work that it just hasn’t happened."

Additionally Danny Strong (Jonathan from Buffy) mentions that he was under consideration for a major part in the series.

"You know, thinking about animated stuff, they were talking to me about doing Xander for the animated show."

[Skittles]

Buffy-Animated.com

Joss Whedon
Creator/Executive Producer/Writer

Currently Joss Whedon is involved in the fifth season of Angel and the recently confirmed Firefly movie. He's also expected to follow up his successful Dark Horse comic about a future Slayer, Fray.

Jeph Loeb
Executive Producer

After a successful run on Batman with Jim Lee, Jeph Loeb is returning to Smallville to write and perform as Consulting Producer.

Eric Wight
Art Director

Following his first published work in Hellboy: Weird Tales #2, Eric Wight has gone on to design several covers for the Justice League Adventures comic book.

Steven S. DeKnight, Jane Espenson, Drew Z. Greenberg, David Fury, Rebecca Rand Kirshner, Marti Noxon
Writers

Steve DeKnight is currently working on Angel.

Jane Espenson has joined the writing staff of Gilmore Girls.

Drew Greenberg begins writing duties on Smallville season 3.

David Fury is also now writing for the fifth season of Angel.

Rebecca Kirshner is writing for Las Vegas, a show about surveillance experts at a Las Vegas casino.

Marti Noxen is the showrunner for Fox's midseason drama Still Life.

After being recruited to "run" the show (Joss Whedon being a fan of Loeb's comic writing, and Loeb understanding that the show should be like the live-action show rather than 'Buffy Babies' or 'Buffy the Vampire’s Friend'), Jeph Loeb worked with Joss on the pilot and the series bible.

Ironically it was just as Loeb left because of production delays that the series was given a green light.

"The process took so long to put the package together, it just came together on Friday [June 14], and he got an offer, a big deal over at Warner Brothers, and he had to move on," Whedon said in an interview. "He'd been shepherding it for over a year. We'd put together a bunch of great scripts. He's done an amazing job, but there was no light at the end of the tunnel. It was a really difficult process, and Chris Buchanan, the president of my company, finally got it through, but Jeph had to move on."


In an interview with smgfan.com, Eric Wight revealed how he got to work on the show.

Eric Wight: Once at Warner Bros, I began work on Superman and Batman Beyond as a character designer. After about a year, I decided I wanted to try something new. I heard through the grapevine that Film Roman (the company famous for making the Simpsons) was producing an Austin Powers cartoon. Eric Radomski (one of the original Batman producers) was producing the cartoon, so I sent him some Austin Powers drawings, he like what I did, and hired me to be one of the character designers of the show.

The production was killed before we even finished the first episode, but Radomski and I clicked very well together, so he kept me onboard to develop "DOOMSDAY," an original cartoon by the creator of Sliders and produced by Howard Stern. That show also died an early death (a common practice in Hollywood). As I had begun to clean out my office, Radomski informed me stop packing, that he had been approached by Joss to develop a Buffy cartoon and wanted me to be the guy to draw the presentation art to help sell it to the networks. Joss really dug what I did, and the rest is history.

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Cinescape Television

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER creator Joss Whedon has revealed that current continuity on the live-action BUFFY series will have a definite effect on the events of the coming animated TV series.


While talking to CINESCAPE's Anthony C. Ferrante, Whedon addressed rumors that Buffy's kid sister, Dawn, would be a part of the series, saying, "Yes, she's going to be involved, because the Monks changed history. We've decided the history they've changed is now history and so we thoguht it would be fun having year 1 [of the animated] series to have Dawn is in the mix. Now we have a ten year old in that mix. That amused us and gave us differnet ideas for stories too -- and sibling stuff."


The coming BUFFY animated TV series will be set in the vampire slayer's high school years. -FRANK KURTZ

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Sci-fi Wire

Gellar Talks Buffy Toon

Sarah Michelle Gellar told SCI FI Wire that she turned down a chance to voice her most famous role in a proposed animated version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer because she couldn't devote the necessary time to the show. "Literally the joke is I'm a commitment-phobe actor right now," she said in an interview while promoting her latest film, The Grudge. "I am a commitment-phobe because I was nothing but contractually bound for years."

Gellar added, "I was contractually bound to Buffy, to the Scooby movies, to whatever it was. I don't do something unless I can commit 110 percent, and I just can't say that three times a month or this week I could actually, absolutely do an animated show."

Gellar said that she's not even sure the Buffy fan base would go for an animated series. "What's the term everyone uses?" she asked. "Jumping the shark. You never want to inundate, in my opinion. I think Buffy went out when it was still on top. I felt like we came back in that last season, did the show we wanted to do. I was really happy. I don't know why, then, you go back. What can Buffy do?

"I remember the pitch to me about the cartoon was like, 'She can turn into things and have magical powers,'" Gellar said. "To me, that wasn't what Buffy was about. To me, Buffy was a real girl. These were metaphors for real demons. This was about how, in high school, the demons of high school literally become these monsters. So I'm not sure why you'd make an animated show. And no one showed me a script."

[BuffyAnne5763]

I can't really quote this, cause I can't really remember where it came from, but last I heard on the subject, Sarah and David both turned down the animated series, however Aly, Nick and Tony all have done recordings for it already. And Buffy's character would be voice by the girl (the name escapes me, sorry) who did the voice on the games. Which, frankly doesn't bother me, she sounds almost exactly like Sarah anyway.

Oh, and here's something fun that I wanted to add, but however, it doesn't really need it's own thread: Kristine Sutherland (Joyce) is now in an Advil commercial that airs during EVERY SINGLE Lost episode! It's weird seeing Buffy's mom trying to sell pain killers when her character died of a brain hemmorage! ;D (I'm not making fun, just an observation)

BA

[irol]

^ARE you serious? i wanna see

[Skittles]

BuffyAnne5763 said:

I can't really quote this, cause I can't really remember where it came from, but last I heard on the subject, Sarah and David both turned down the animated series, however Aly, Nick and Tony all have done recordings for it already. And Buffy's character would be voice by the girl (the name escapes me, sorry) who did the voice on the games. Which, frankly doesn't bother me, she sounds almost exactly like Sarah anyway.

Oh, and here's something fun that I wanted to add, but however, it doesn't really need it's own thread: Kristine Sutherland (Joyce) is now in an Advil commercial that airs during EVERY SINGLE Lost episode! It's weird seeing Buffy's mom trying to sell pain killers when her character died of a brain hemmorage! ;D (I'm not making fun, just an observation)

BA

;D I saw that commmercial!

[BuffyAnne5763]

I may be able to DL, I'd have to see. Highly doubtful. Like I said, they've aired it during all the lost episodes so far. Gives you a little incentive to watch Lost!

[BuffyAnne5763]

according to BTVS mag #17 feb/mar

(bear with me, I'm NOT going to type out the entire article cause it's the longest one to date...)

Okay, first of all the official word on when Buffy: Animated is going to become reality is SOON. We must be patient.

According to Jeph Loeb, exec producer, they have completed a 4 minute "Animation Test" with full color, voices, and music. The animation returned from overseas late this past summer and was scored. The score, as of now, will have the same feel and sound as the live action series.

According to Eric Wight, he hasn't seen the presentation, but from what he understands, it's turned out great, it is mainly 2-D animation with a little 3-D animation involved as well.

The presentation video features the voicework of Gisele Loren (Buffy, she did the voice of Buffy on the video games as well), Tony Head, Nick Brendan, and Alson Hannigan. Pending schedules, they will most likely work on the final project.

David Boreanaz stated, "I've never been approached by anyone (for Buffy: Animated), as far as getting involved, but I love doing voiceover and animation stuff. I'll never say that it won't happen, it just depends on where I am."

It is hoped that Buffy: Animated will finally find a home sometime early this year.

[Skittles]

yay! I really hope it finds a place soon 'cause I'm really excited about it.

[Skittles]

I finally got my new issue of Buffy magazine, so I have lots of news to post.

Joss is currently still looking for a network that will accept the series, but writer Janes Espenson and illustrator Eric Wight gave us a bit of information. Their biggest problem was that Buffy couldn't look too mcuh like Sarah Michelle Gellar because Sarah wouldn't be doing the voice. Some other challenges include wondering whether characters can make pop culture references that post-date Season One or not, a 'new' car would have to be a '97, etc. Jonathan (Danny Strong) is to be brought back for a few episodes. Atleast eight episodes have been written and approved by Joss.

[Skinwalker]

such a long delayed project, i hope it finally happens.