Thing is, all of the original shows in those equations were plenty dark in their own right.  If you know the names Donnie Pfaster or Jenny Calendar, then you know this is true … and the scariness of the monsters on Doctor Who has long been one of its major selling points.

With that in mind, I would say that not only is “Children of Earth,” the new micro-season of Torchwood, perfectly in keeping with Torchwood, it’s also perfectly in keeping with its grandpappy Doctor Who.

I mean that in both a good and a bad way.

Let’s face it, Doctor Who can be a bit cheesy from time to time.  It’s part of the appeal.  I mean, war machines with plungers and various toilet parts glued to them … robots whose shiny metal bodies are clearly people wrapped in aluminum foil … this is not a show for you if you don’t have a fairly high tolerance for goofiness.

And if you take a look at the poster I posted (ever so kindly and with great forethought) above, you might get a little whiff of cheese rolling off of it, too.  Everyone looks so serious, and there’s Gwen, holding two guns criss-crossed over his chest like she’s some sort of deceased postal worker buried in hororarium by her own homicidal kind.  Nobody holds guns like that; there’s no reason too.

Except that it does, admittedly, look kinda cool.

I’m making it sound like I hate Torchwood and Doctor Who, and nothing could be further from the truth.  Well, I’m sure something could be — if I said, “I’m a chocolate-covered Australian wearing gas cans for shoes and hosting a Patrick Swayze benefit concert,” or “I prefer Pepsi,” or “Damn you and your buffalo wings,” that’d be further from the truth — but there is a good distance between the truth and the implication that I hate those shows.  I don’t.  Kinda love ‘em, actually.

But, yes, there is more than a bit of cheese, even in the ultra-serious “Children of Earth.”

The story, for those of you who aren’t familiar, involves an alien threat to Earth in the form of the 4-5-6 (they’re named after the radio frequency they were first detected on), who have threatened to release a devastating plague into the atmosphere and destroy the entire species if the government(s) don’t give them what they want: 10% of the children on the planet.  If this reminds you a bit of Stephen King’s Storm of the Century, well, it does me too, a bit.

As with Storm of the Century (which I highly recommend), much of the best drama in the story is to be had in the conversations held between the people in charge, whose unfortunate task it is to now figure out how to cope with an unthinkable situation.  The British government has to figure out whether it is better to sacrifice the entire planet or a mere portion of its population, and once they’ve decided that there’s no decision at all, they have to decide who the children they take are going be.

That’s where it gets tricky, of course.  Do you make the decision to be impartial and “fair” and conduct some sort of random drawing, or do you try and separate the chaff from the wheat in the hopes of rendering the social impact as negligible as possible?

I’ve got my own philosophical thoughts on all that, but they’re tiresome and you don’t care, so let’s move on.

One of the ways in which “Children of Earth” truly shines is that the themes of family in general and children specifically is woven throughout the entire five-episode arc.  Let’s start at the top: for one thing, Torchwood itself is a sort of family, comprised of people who work in very close proximity and form exceptionally tight (if not always pleasant) bonds.  As you might recall, Torchwood suffered some terrible losses at the end of season two, so it’s already a wounded and scarred family.

Within that group, though, “Children of Earth” finds each of the remaining three members dealing with separate issues.  Jack, we learn, has a daughter and a grandson, both of whom age like normal humans.  Jack has been playing the role of uncle for the boy; neither Jack nor his daughter know how to explain the truth to Stephen.

Ianto, we discover, also has a family we didn’t know about: a sister, a brother-in-law, a niece, and a nephew.  Ianto is obviously a good uncle, and this is a nice little bit of characterization for him.

Then there’s Gwen, who during the course of the story discovers she’s pregnant; her husband, Rhys, is thrilled, but as the story progresses and things get darker and darker, Gwen seems to begin questioning whether or not she even wants to bring a child into such a world.

Gwen is wrestling with some mildly (if mostly academic) difficult decisions, but the entire story culminates in a scene in which Jack has to make a truly monstrous choice.  I’m not going to give it away here, in case someone is reading who hasn’t seen it yet; and if you have seen it, you surely know what I’m talking about.  This scene is a Battlestar Galactica-worthy moment of pitch black darkness, and it shares with that show a sense of there being no other way to resolve things.  It’s one of the most powerful moments in the history of the Whoniverse, that’s for damn sure.

There are numerous other such moments, many of them in the last episode, and it’s these scenes which makes me give a thumbs-up to these episodes.

They are, however, far from being free of problems.  Here are a few:

*     I hate the vocal effects they used for the sound of all the children simultaneously saying the same things.  It sounds nothing like hordes of children speaking simultaneously.  Now, granted, I don’t actually know what hordes of children simultaneously saying the same thing sounds like, but I bet this ain’t it, and if it doesn’t feel right, it feels wrong.  This feels wrong.  I’d have preferred to actually hear all of those kids speaking; that might’ve been creepy.  Although I’m sure the production logistics of accomplishing that sort of thing would be considerable, so maybe crappy vocal effects was the best they could do.

*     As a plot device, Clem — the old man who was almost a viction of the 4-5-6 — is a bit clunky.  He feels pretty significant during the first few episodes, but his story comes to a weak conclusion, in my opinion.

*    I’m not a big fan of the way the 4-5-6 are depicted.  Which is to say, how they aren’t depicted, because basically, they are never shown.  My first inclination was to think it was cool, because that way, they didn’t have to go through hours of buildup to show goofy rubber-masked aliens.  But then I began to feel like that was a bit of a cop-out, and also not in keeping with Doctor Who tradition.  It was an even worse decision to havee the aliens be some sort of weirdly vomitous creatures who were constantly spewing some sort of pea-soup-looking flith against the windows.  I suspect that this would have been okay if they’d shown it only once or twice, but it seems like it must’ve happened at least ninety-three times.  And did you notice that every time, those windows looked spotless, as if the 4-5-6 hadn’t just yarked on ‘em ten seconds earlier?  Methinks some shots were recycled.  Bad execution of a decent idea.

*     I’ve got a boner for Gwen, don’t get me wrong, but I think they tried to play her up as too big of a bad-ass at times.

*     Can America please hire a different newscaster?  Apparently, we’ve only got the one, and she looks a bit too much like Skeletor for my tastes.

*     I don’t believe for one second that if all the children of the world began chanting “We Are Coming,” and then stopped, society would continue to operate just like normal.  I get that this is a convention of storytelling, but I’m just saying, that’s silly.

*     The Prime Minister is obviously even a bigger douche than Saxon was, but it feels totally unbelievable that he would order Frobisher to sacrifice his own children to the 4-5-6.  This scene plays because the two actors are pretty great, but it seems patently false on a storytelling level, and custom designed only to give us the scene which follows.  Which, again, is a great scene; but it feels a bit like it came out of a factory that customizes in stock scenes of Darkness and Despair.

*     Ianto and Jack’s big scene was a failure on the part of the director.  Here is a very emotional scene, played in too close-up a shot from a too-awkward angle.  Back the hell up and give us a better look at these two good-looking gentlemen; otherwise, you ruin it.

Mostly, though, this was a gripping, excellent series of episodes.  I’ve seen some complaints that it’s too dark, and that that darkness makes it feel too separate from the Doctor Who canon of which it is technically a part.  I disagree.  At one point, Gwen basically asks where the Doctor is, and it’s a valid concern.  To me, though, this strengthens the Doctor as a character.  After all, he’s always finding himself stuck in nasty situations, trying to find the right metaphorical medicine to fix the problem at hand; his absence here just makes him seem like that much more of a savior all the other times.

This issue was written by Jane Espenson, who somehow — between her gigs on Dollhouse and Caprica – managed to squeeze in some time to return to her old Slayerverse stomping grounds.  Espenson, of course, is an excellent writer, and she doesn’t disappoint in this issue, which is crisp and epic and all the good things we tend to hope for from the Buffy comics.

In other words, after several slightly disappointing issues, #26 is a return to form for the series.

The issue opens with Willow transporting Buffy the the secret slayer stronghold by having them both in animal guise: Willow as a seagull carrying Buffy as a fish.  It’s a humorous image, but it also gets at what promises to be a key point of this story arc: Willow’s dangerous relapse into the overuse of magic.  The image of Willow clutching Buffy in her talons is funny, yes … but it’s also ominous.

One of the happier story developments is the reunion of the whole team, including Faith and Giles rejoining the main slayer group (for the first time in season eight, if my memory serves me).  This leads to Buffy confiding in Giles her fears over Willow’s impending fall back to the dark side, and that’s a good, welcome scene; the Buffy/Giles relationship is one of the most important in the series, and it’s never quite the same without it being present.

There is a cool battle sequence involving, amongst other things, tanks, and it culminates in the slayers having to abandon their hideout and go on the run … which they do via sumbarine.

The comic ends with the submarine being magically transported to a Buddhist temple, where we meet — wait for it! — Oz.

Yep, that’s right, Especnson has the good sense to bring Oz back into the story.  Of course, I wouldn’t know it was Oz if the letters column didn’t clue me in; that’s one problem with comics, they sometimes think that artwork which only sorta looks like the original character will be immediately recognizeable.  Me, I wouldn’t put too much stock in that assumption.

I would describe this episode as being one of moments in which our characters all take the time to try and figure out how best to survive in the new situations they’ve found themselves in.  Lafayette is doing his best to merely stay alive as a captive in Eric’s basement; Jessica is trying to figure out how to cope with her new “life” as a vampire; Sookie is trying to figure out how her relationship with Bill has been altered by Jessica’s presence; Tara is trying to figure out the extent of her relationship with Eggs, and also (less directly) of her relationship with Maryann; Sam is worrying over Maryann’s re-entrance into his life and what it might mean for his livelihood; and Jason is simply basking in his new existence as the Light of Day camp’s favorite student.

Of these, I’d say I’m probably the most interested in Lafayette’s story.  Nelsan Ellis, of course, was probably the best character of season one (although Jason was close in my opinion), and it looks like that streak may continue.  Ellis is getting an opportunity to play all kinds of interesting new sides to Lafayette, including a ruthless determination to survive no matter what the cost, and no matter what the terms of that survival.  And yet, it seems totally consistent with the more brash and in-control Lafayette we remember from the first season; the character hasn’t changed, we’re seeing the same guy in wildly different circumstances.  As usual, he gets some of the best dialogue.  For example, upon being called a prostitute by Pam: “I’m a survivor first, a capitalist second, and a whole bunch of other shit after that, but a hooker dead last.  So if I got even a Jew-at-a-Al-Quaeda-pep-rally’s chance of gettin’ up outta this motherfucker, I’m taking it.  Now, what you want to know?”

Lafayette also has a great scene with Ginger, an incredibly skanky-looking woman who work sat the bar where Lafayette is being held captive.  (I’m still not quite sure if that’s Fangtasia or not.)  She freaks out, shoots Lafayette in the leg, and then starts screaming at every little thing.  The best moment is in which she grabs some towels to stop the bleeding, looks at them, screams, and then hollers, “These are dirty!”  True Blood is great at that sort of broad comedy, but it never feels cheap.  Michael Bay, please pay attention: this is how you integrate humor into a non-comedy.

This all leads to some terrific involvement from Eric, who is finally getting some, uh, juicy scenes after being mostly wasted during the first season.  He gets Lafayette to tell him that Jason Stackhouse might have been responsible for the disappearance of the vampire character Stephen Root played last season, and later confronts Bill, telling him that he’s going to be taking Sookie to Texas to help find Godric, another missing vampire.  Eric — and actor Alexander Skarsgård — makes a cool sheriff, and while I’ve never seen a sheriff wear a running suit while on duty, Eric seems to be able to get away with it.

I’m also having a lot of fun with Jason’s plotline, involving his newfound entrance into the Light of Day camp.  There he is, riding on a bus, blithely saying “shit” after a group singalong, kicking ass at flag football, totally throwing himself into the role when asked to take part in an acting exercise in which Sarah Newlin pretends to be a vampire sympathizer … Ryan Kwanten plays the hell out of all of these scenes, injecting Jason with a wide-eyed innocence and enthusiasm for his surroundings.  But Jason, an occasionally foolish character, is no fool; Kwanten has a moment, when the words “vampire sympathizers” get roudly booed by his fellow campers, in which he allows a subtle amount of uncertainty and maybe even disdain to play across his face.  This is what’s so great about Jason as a character: to a certain extent, he gets blown by the wind and goes wherever it takes him, but he’s also never entirely closed off from seeing the wider world.

Jason gets good dialogue this episode, too, and most of it comes in tandem with a new character, a fellow camper named Luke (played by Wes Brown) who is obviously jealous of Jason’s immediate favorite-son status.  “Luke McDonald,” he introduces himself to Jason on the bus; “no relation to the restaurant.”  Jason’s reply: “Any relation to the farm?”  “What farm,” comes the answer; and Jason looks at him with a sort of blank disbelief before changing subjects.  Later, after Jason wows the crowd during the vampire-sympathizer playact session with Sarah (after a bizarre and hilariously apt moment in which Sarah dons astoundingly fake fangs and reveals her character to be not just a vampire sympathizer but an actual vampire!, Jason freaks out, snaps a flagpole in half, and only-sorta pretends to prepare to stake her with it), Luke confronts Jason.  “You think you walk on water, don’t you?”

Kwanten has an awesome moment in which he cockily snaps off a piece of dental floss before delivering what must, in his head, seem like the ultimate rebuke: “I’m pretty sure that was Moses.”  Luke replies, disgustedly, “No, it was Jesus; Moses parted the Read Sea.  And what the hell was with you snapping the American flag in half like you was some Muslim Buffy with a dick?!?  That was all kinds of messed up.”

I’d have to say I’m also enjoying Sam’s story, which involves Maryann showing up at Merlotte’s to fuck with him, her intent unknown.  She orders plate after plate of food (I’m reminded of seeing that ginormous table of food in her house when young Sam broke in); it’s not clear if she’s eating it or not, which is probably something the episode should have taken a moment to show one way or another.  Later, she does something to make the entire bar full of people lose their inhibitions and sart dancing; even Andy, who describes his softshoe abilities as being akin to an epileptic on meth, and he’s not kidding.  Michelle Forbes is awesome in this episode; I always thought her younger self was hotter than balls playing Ensign Ro on star Trek: The Next Generation, but she’s even hotter here in her more mature guise.  It’s that danger in her eyes, which is almost palpable.  Some of the vampire cast could learn a thing or two about being menacing by paying attention to this lady.  I don’t know where this storyline is heading, but I suspect it will end in Maryann’s death, and I miss her already.

The Sookie/Bill plotline has long been one of my least favorite elements of True Blood, but the addition of Jessica into the mix seems to be perking it up a bit.  I continue to enjoy how fussy Bill can be; the hilarious scene in the clothing store when the saleslady, upon seeing how Bill behaves toward Eric, makes the assumption that the two are a gay couple is one of the best moments of the seris to date.  Also, Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer seem to have a bit more chemistry together lately than they did last season.  Their relationship has never exactly been a weak link for the show, but it hasn’t been a highlight, either, at least not for me; but it seems to be improving.

As for Jessica, well, she’s played by a hot redhead (Deborah Ann Woll), so I’d be interested in her even if I wasn’t interested in her.  But she continues to be a promising character, capable of playing humor and pathos at the same time.  She also does pretty well with the anger she feels, both at Sookie and Bill for causing her to become a vampire, and at her parents for making her former life such a miserable and sheltered one.  This is an interesting dynamic; Jessica is caught between one set of parents in her previous life, and a new set in her current one.

Sookie gets at least one great moment during her scenes with Jessica, after the new vampire has broken her promise and gone into her old parents’ home.  “I don’t normally cuss,” says Sookie, “but you have completely fucked me here!”  That made me chuckle.

On the second season of Dollhouse (which is currently two weeks into the planning phase in the writers’ room): “We don’t have the onus of trying to be a big hit sitting on our shoulders.  We can just be ourselves.  And so the stories we’re breaking are pure, and exciting, and everybody’s on-board in the room, and it’s never flowed better.”

On the in-development feature film reboot of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: “I think that’s something better left untouched by me.”

Since November 2008, girls every where have been freaking out over vampires, Robert Pattinson, and the next installment of the saga: New Moon.  Although I never saw it in theaters, I finally got around to watching Twilight on DVD.  I love most vampire flicks, but I had my doubts about this one.  The DVD case actually reads “The most epic romance since Titanic”. Yikes!

But since I felt like the only female in the world who had not seen it, I decided to give it a try.  I will say right away that it was better than I expected.  Not a whole lot better, but better.  The one thing I could not help thinking after the movie was over, though – are these really vampires?  So now I’m sitting down to look at just how far from the path of classic lore these vampires stray, and to ask the question, “can they really call themselves vampires?”

The “vampires” of Twilight have their own set of rules.  They are in fact immortals, but they otherwise defy almost every rule that vampires have been working with since they first set undead foot onto the silver screen.  I’ll begin with sunlight.

Vampires have always been unable to go out in sunlight.  It kills them. Kills them dead.  The decision to depart from this fundamental trait is a questionable move.  Being unable to go out in sunlight is a pretty defining thing for vampires.  In Twilight, the vampires “sparkle” in direct sunlight, exposing the fact that they are not human.  You could reason out that “myth” has confused the fact that they should not be in sunlight, with they could not be in sunlight.  Although it is really not the same thing, this line of thinking at least makes it a more forgivable transgression.

Sure, Joss Whedon took liberties with direct sunlight in “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”, but he didn’t change the principle.  Spike and Angel could dart around under blankets and sit in shadows, but the sun could still kill them.  The finale of “Trueblood” took its own liberties when their lead character Bill was able to ”come back” from being toasted to a crisp.  But the fact still remained that too much sunlight and he lit up like a marshmallow in a camping fire.  These other series are playing with the rules, but not throwing them out all together.

The fact that most vampires can’t go out in sunlight directly relates to their sleeping habits.  They cannot go out in the sun and this in turn sends them to their coffins to sleep the day away.  Then they emerge well rested and ready to prowl.  While I really don’t even want to get started on this whole sleeping thing, I feel like I must.

Yes, there are several animals in the world that get extremely little sleep.  Dolphins that only rest one half of their brain at a time while sleeping.  But these are characteristics found in nature, and we are dealing with mythological creatures.  Creatures of the night, that are established as sleeping during the day.  Sleep is, in part, a period of rest and relaxation, which hunters would need.  Sleep is also a time of repair and growth, which a vampire would probably need to digest blood.  There is really no logical reason for vampires not to sleep.

Vampires are powerful, both physically and mentally.  The Twilight vampires are super strong, just like in most vampire tales (like in the Whedon-verse, where it takes a slayer matched with equal strength to kill them).  So vampires with more strength and speed than humans are widely accepted.  But what about mental powers unique to each vampire?

Vampires have always had hypnotic powers.  This makes sense for a vampire.  It’s a power that comes with the territory.  They need to draw people in and bring them closer.  This is used to attract prey, or seduce a potential new vampire to carry on the line.  It is necessary for survival in every way.  But the Cullens introduce a smorgasbord of mental powers from mind-reading to seeing the future.  And that’s just in the movies.  Jasper Cullen can push feelings on to people, making them feel whatever he wants.  This is definitely outside the realm of necessity and I really don’t see the need to change things up (again).

Let’s focus on one thing Twilight got right: body temp.  In the movie, Edward is described as being cold to the touch.  This is classic vampire.  Vampires are cold to the touch because they are dead.  They would have the temperature, or lack there of, of a corpse.  So congrats to Twilight for getting one of a hundred things right.  I also enjoyed a 2 second clip of the “bad guys” as they walked to the baseball field.  There is a split second were they are “gliding”, which is very reminiscent of the old Christopher Lee days of black and white vampire films, where they “glided” more often than not.  So that was pretty cool.

The creation of vampires is a feature that has stayed fairly constant in stories.  As legend goes, a vampire can feed off of your blood until you are dead.  Vamps can also feed off you enough to leave you weak, keeping you as docile nourishment before eventually finishing you off.  There are several different takes on whether or not you can go back about a normal life afterwords. (And by the way, vampires bite you with fangs.  Something that these guys have none of.  Not permanent fangs, not retractable fangs, nothing.)  Lastly, a vampire can drain you mostly of your blood and let you drink from their blood, altering you from a human to a vampire.  Tadah!

A few different but similar variations have emerged here (kudos to “Trueblood” for keeping it classic).  Once again Twilight deviates from vampire canon here.  In Twilight, vampirism is passed more like a virus or poison.  Once bitten, nothing else has to happen for the transformation to take place (unless you are sucked dry).  The only way to avoid the change is to have the toxin sucked back out.  The whole virus/poison take on this is an approach normally reserved for zombies and werewolves.  This difference really bothers me.  However it works for the Twilight saga and not for me for the same reason.

Vampires are sexy, enticing creatures.  The act of making someone a vampire is a huge metaphor for sex.  The biting of the neck, the swapping of fluids and blood is all very sexual in nature.  Instead these vampires have reduced the whole thing down to little more than being bit by a rabid dog.  The reason this works for the movie is because there are a lot of themes about chastity and abstinence.  Edward doesn’t even want to kiss Bella because he’s afraid he will lose control.  The author of the book is Mormon and so the whole waiting-until-you’re-married-thing is part of the deal, even in a book about vampires.  From this perspective, the lack of sexuality in the process of turning someone into a vampire makes sense.  However, I really don’t like a sexless take on vampires.  What’s the point?!  Instead of neutering your vampires, why not pick another genre.

Lastly, how do you kill a vampire?  Why what an easy question!  You drive a stake threw their heart.  Sometimes the stake is silver, sometimes the vampire collapses into dust once staked.  But how do you kill a vampire from the Cullen family?  You tear them apart and burn them…. what!?  So the only way to kill them is to do something that only another vampire has the strength to do.  How convenient.  The movie also doesn’t mention classic vampire repellents such as garlic and holy water.  There was also no mention of having to be invited into someones home to enter it.

So to wrap up the comparison, here’s what the Twilight vampires have in common with the classics:

• Immortality
• Drink blood
• Cold / dead skin

And here’s what they don’t:

• No fangs
• Shine in the sunlight
• Excessive mental powers
• No sleeping
• Zombie/werewolf rules on transmission
• Can only be killed by being torn apart and burned

These new vampires do stray pretty far from accepted vampire lore.  Perhaps it is better to think of them as a new species of vampires.  But like it or not they do retain enough of the most basic vampire framework, that I would have to say that they still count as vampires.

Overall the movie itself was entertaining.  The love story lacked any real foundation (though I am told that the books flesh this part out).  Some of the special effects were laughable but the fight scenes were cool.  Edward Cullen is a self-loathing vampire, seemingly directly inspired by Angel of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and the eponymous spin-off.  Neither like feeding off humans or gettin’ busy with their girls.

The family dynamics were interesting and my favorite part of the movie.  It was also well directed and very well acted.  Will I watch it again? Sure.  Is it a good vampire movie? not really.  Is it a tear-jerking hart-pounding romance? No.  Will I see the sequel? Of course – Micheal Sheen is in it.

It is very, very tempting to say that it is not a vampire movie at all.  But like most things in the world of sci-fi and fantasy, different interpretations are part of the territory, if not a time honored tradition at this point.  I would say this is a perfectly enjoyable little film for any open-minded sci-fi/fantasy fan.

The Whedon-produced comic finally gets around to dealing with the whole Dawn thing, and it’s an entertaining conclusion, though after a 25-issue run, it can’t help but feel anticlimactic.

In fact, the whole series is feeling rather anticlimactic to me these days.  Maybe it’s just the fact that we’ve gotten a long string of stand-alone stories, I dunno, but this title is starting to feel like it’s got no direction.  That’s a shame, as for a while there, this really did feel like a genuine Season Eight of the show.  I’m certainly not ready to give up on it yet, though; as long as the individual issues can manage to be as entertaining as this one, I’m okay with the overall series feeling a bit aimless.

Written by Doug Petrie, this issue has, if absolutely nothing else, some of the sharpest dialogue the comic has seen in many a month.  This might be due to the fact that Petrie worked in the Buffy writers room from seasons three through seven; this guy knows his way around a Hellmouth.  Which is not to say that there’s a Hellmouth in this issue; there isn’t.  There is a lot of Xander, and a decent amount of Andrew, though, so score.

There is some weird, creepy stuff involving dolls, and the relationship the painting at the end of this review references is strangely touching in that way only a show comic like Buffy can provide.

Oh, and a plot point revolves around Veronica Mars.  Gotta love that.

Spoilery.

When they cross from one medium to another, continuation stories (official or not, canon or not) tend to feel a bit unsatisfying and hollow even in the best of circumstances.  The Whedon-produced Buffy comics have not only avoided that curse, they have refuted it.  Over the past, oh, dozen or so issues, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight has been good enough that it actually feels like a legitimate season of the gone-but-not-forgotten television series.

That’s a long winning streak; you had to figure it would end sooner or later, and here is that issue.

It’s not bad, per se, but it is a bit of a dud.  The title has been bringing in a nice run of comics (and television) hotshots of late, including Jeph Loeb, Jane Espenson, Steven S. DeKnight, and Drew Z. Greenberg.  This month is no exception, with Jim Krueger of Earth X fame scripting the one-shot issue.  He’s joined by penciller Cliff Richards, who served in the same capactity for over four years on Dark Horse’s original Buffy the Vampire Slayer series.

Richards’ artwork is predictably reliable, but Krueger’s script is merely so-so.  As previously mentioned, “Safe” is a one-shot, so it takes that opportunity to drop in on Faith the Vampire Slayer and her slightly grumpy watcher Rupert Giles.  It’s always fun to see these two, and it’s been a while, so they’re especially welcome here.  Krueger writes some good dialogue for Faith (“This really obvious trap feels like a trap”), and he has a firm grasp on how to write Giles, but the story Krueger tells in “Safe” leaves a lot to be desired.

We are introduced to Courtney, a Slayer who has abandoned her squad and is (thanks to her lack of training) on the verge of being turned into a juice box by a vamp when she is saved by Faith and Giles.  Courtney tells them that she has left her squad because its other members decided to join something called a “Slayer Sanctuary,” where they and other Slayers have gone because they don’t want to, you know, actually be Slayers.

From there, we are served up a substandard plot involving a rogue Watcher, a demon who preys upon regret, and a town that has made a bargain to keep all vampires outside city limits.  None of this is bad, but it’s not involving, and the plot comes to a weak resolution.  (How did Faith recover enough to kill the demon?)

On the plus side, I like Courtney the Vampire Slayer.  She’s a little ditzy, a little snarky, a little incompetent.  Somewhat reminiscent of season-one Buffy, she even has divorced parents to make the parallel more concrete.  On the minus side, Krueger makes almost nothing of these appealing qualities after the first handful of pages.

Final thoughts on “Safe”: this issue feels less like Buffy than it feels like a Buffy cover band.  It’s not bad, but it’s obviously just filler.  Which is okay; a series can do that.  Nice to see Faith and Giles, though, and I’d be happy to see Courtney return.

Check out Comic Book Resources for an interview with Krueger about “Safe.”

You can also check out Buffy the Vampire: Season Eight at its Wikipedia page.

Previous issues of Season Eight have been collected in trade paperback form:

The Long Way Home

No Future For You

Wolves at the Gate

Time of Your Life