World Famous Comics: The Long Way Home (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 1)
The Long Way Home (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 1)
By: Joss Whedon Publisher: Dark Horse Comics Average Rating: Binding: Paperback Label: Dark Horse Comics Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 136 Publication Date: October 31, 2007 Reading Level: Young Adult
Product Description: Since the destruction of the Hellmouth, the Slayers - newly legion - have gotten organized and are kicking some serious undead butt. But not everything's fun and firearms, as an old enemy reappears and Dawn experiences some serious growing pains. Meanwhile, one of the "Buffy" decoy slayers is going through major pain of her own. Buffy creator Joss Whedon brings Buffy back to Dark Horse in this direct follow-up to season seven of the smash-hit TV series. The bestselling and critically acclaimed issues #1-5 are collected here for the first time, as are their covers by Jo Chen and Georges Jeanty.
Where Do I Begin? I'm a die-hard Buffy fan. After that very last episode it was so hard to let those characters go because I was so attached to them and to the show. The show is truly, hands-down one of the best television shows ever created. Period.
Then the comics came out. I'd heard of them a long time ago, but I had never picked them up. So recently I bought myself a copy of this very first volume of stories. In my head I was thinking "Ok this is going to be cool. What an innovative way to keep the show running!" So I read through it in a couple of days. And then I read through it again. Something just didn't feel right. In a lot of ways I liken these season eight comics to the season five episode of BTVS where Dawn attempts to bring their mother, Joyce, back to life. Dawn wanted it so bad, like we fans so want there to be another chapter in BTVS. It's selfish so to speak but the need is there. So we push hard enough and long enough until something like these comic books come out. The pieces are all there: Buffy, Willow, Xander, Giles and various other characters from the Buffyverse. But something is definitely amiss. I really dislike the way the characters are portrayed, especially the women. The page of comic art with Willow standing there in the red pants, I mean come on!! You can totally see how over-enhanced her breasts and butt are!! Did anyone ever wear clothes so melted on like that on the show? NO! How about the image where it shows the potential slayers at the slumber party playing games in scantily clad lingerie? Seriously? Even poor Xander had a double take sequence when he began to hint at his own handling of his manly needs, if you catch my drift. Dawn bathing in a pond with nothing to cover her up but a few bubbles? Why did they have to portray that sequence in that situation? I honestly can't think of a single good reason. It's gross to me and it really slaps the show and it's history across the proverbial face.
Overall, the story has a nice quality to it. Some of these ideas I would have loved to have seen played out on my TV screen. But sometimes the writing just didn't seem to be very coherent. Like the writers were pulling a page from the "Lost TV show handbook" about how to confuse their readers. I found myself having to go back and forth a lot and do a lot of rereading, but often times I just could not make sense of certain lines of dialogue or events that played out.
I want more Buffy badly. But these comic books just are not it. They feel very indulgent, almost like they were written not by Joss Whedon but by some oversexed, overzealous comic book nerd who writes those crappy Buffy fan-fics that are all over the net. I can't justify paying any more money in the vain hope that the rest of the book series will be any better, because frankly this first volume is just that bad!
Buy it one at a time, or five at a time, either way, it's fun The last season of BUFFY was strictly for die-hards, so I wasn't expecting too much when Joss announced that Dark Horse would print his scripts for Season Eight. And yet there have been some good stories nevertheless, even with all the new slayers that basically I could care less about. They are better than the Potentials of Season Eight, maybe because they're only pen on paper instead of terrible actresses saying stupid lines.
Making Dawn into a giant humanizes her ironically enough. Whiny and bratty when played by Michelle Trachtenberg, the new Dawn is still whiny but her dilemma leads to some great double page panels, and finally she gives in and tells Xander how she came to be in this fix, though I can't give away the spoilers. Xander makes a great commander, though it is not clear to me how he has come to forget all about Anya and has given his heart to a new slayer. Still, the producers of Season Eight have not forgotten that we value Xander insofar as his first priority is to Buffy, and they have given us several good X-saves-B sequences. Willow too.
The sinister menace of Twilight is clearly limned, but the best stroke is the storyline in which Buffy is branded a terrorist. What a refreshing change for comic books, in which terrorism is supposed to equal evil (like THE DARK NIGHT RETURNS) and anything alien is demonic. This storyline is certainly taking its time, though, isn't it? Has the monumental popularity of the TWILIGHT vampire series derailed Joss' plans to develop his own version of Twilight?
Buffy Season 8 Volume 1 If you are a fan of the "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" series then you should definitely pick this up. I just got it and I'm almost done with it. It's great. It has the same quality writing that you expect from the Buffy series. The art work is also very good. This is a must for any true Buffy fan.
The long and mostly boring way home... It took me a while to find out that there were comics based on a "Season 8" of my beloved buffy, and i was so excited and couldnt wait to give them a read.
Needless to say i've enjoyed them so far but the long way home is not one of the ones that i have enjoyed. Joss' writing in this book is (for the most part) horrible, i can honestly say that i have no idea what he was thinking. Giant dawn, bringing a certain dead character back. Just because he doesn't have a budget to work with anymore doesnt mean it shouldnt lose the feel of the show.
The thing that saved this TPB for me was #5 entitled "the chain" which is a fantastic issue and if the others were even half as good it could have been a classic.
A comic book is not a TV show on paper. I am an old Buffy fan, but I am new to comic books. So I have a mixed review to offer.
The comic book format is difficult for me to fully appreciate. The artist renderings of the characters is, perhaps, too artistic. I know the characters well from the TV show, but I have trouble recognizing them in the comic book. Until they are identified by name, I am not sure who is who. It's sort of like having new actors play the parts. To make it worse, artists change from issue to issue, so you get used to how a character is drawn and then it changes.
Some of the wit and drama of the TV series is here, and that is why I will probably end up buying all the volumes. But, it's comic book pacing, which is not TV show pacing. It sometimes takes me a couple of read throughs to begin to understand what is happening.
I am new to comic books, and so I will admit that I may not have a proper appreciation for what we have here. I am bit disappointed, in that I don't feel this series captures the "magic" of the TV show. A novel might have been better. Still, this is the only season 8 we've got. So, I'll keep watching/reading with the hope that it will grow on me.
Anything Goes Trivia
Last Kiss
Megaton Man
Tony's Online Tips
Trevor
