Buffy Summers is coming back from the dead. Again. Entertainment Weekly reports that Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, in association with 20th Century Consumer Products, has acquired a new middle-grade book series that centers on everyone’s favorite vampire slayer. Cartoonist Carolyn Nowak will pen the stories, which fuse together comics, journal entries, text messages, and class notes.
While the books are aimed at a younger audience than the original series, they’ll maintain “themes of empowerment and independence,” the source writes. So, if you were counting down the days until you could introduce your favorite kid to the joys of “Buffy” without traumatizing them with the death of beloved characters, sexual innuendos, and/or gore, you’re in luck.
Created by “Avengers” writer-director Joss Whedon, “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” aired on the The WB from 1997- 2001 and UPN from 2001–03. Sarah Michelle Gellar played the title role, a highschooler who is tasked with fighting vampires, demons, and other forms of evil brewing in Sunnydale, California. The heroine was first introduced in a 1992 film starring Kristy Swanson. Whedon penned the script and Fran Rubel Kuzu directed the feature.
Whedon famously conceived the character after seeing so many horror movies kill off blond girls who walked into alleys. “Literally, I just had that image, that scene, in my mind, like the trailer for a movie — what if the girl goes into the dark alley. And the monster follows her. And she destroys him,” he’s explained.
Widely considered one of the most influential series of all time, “Buffy” celebrated its 20th anniversary this year. “As an actor, you wish for that one role where you can leave your mark and forever be remembered, with ‘Buffy’ I got so much more,” Gellar posted on Instagram in honor of the occasion. “She’s a feminist challenge to gender hierarchy. Buffy may have been the Chosen One, but I was the lucky one.”
Head over to EW to check out the first book in the new “Buffy” series, “New School Nightmare.”