$10.95 from Dark Horse Comics
Written by Andi Watson
Penciller Hector Gomez
Inker Sandu Florea
Picking up a comic adaptation of a popular franchise like a TV series is a hit or miss endeavor. I've seen some adaptations over the past couple of years of reviewing that really blew me away. The absolute tops is still, and may go down in history as such, Stefan Petrucha's brilliant, nearly two-year run as writer on the *X-Files* comic. Petrucha took the characters of the television show and, even when he couldn't use *any* of the show's mythology arcs or minor characters, managed to craft one chilling, thought-provoking story after another, truly creating an alternate *X-Files* on the comic page that took advantage of the opportunities of the written word to offer stories that TV couldn't. It was a landmark use of the comic medium.
All of which is to introduce my comments on Andi Watson's Dark Horse adaptation of *Buffy, the Vampire Slayer*, issues of which are reprinted in the new trade paperback *Uninvited Guests*. What can I say other than, why would you spend eleven dollars on a middling adaptation of television?
It's a good question. Why do we read adaptations? Because we want more of a fix on our favorite characters, perhaps, in which case I suppose any old thing will do. *Uninvited Guests* gathers several stories all of which take place roughly during Buffy's second TV season. If you're yearning to reflect on those thrilling days of yesteryear, there you have it: Buffy, Willow, Cordelia, Oz, and Xander all in high school, Giles still a dweeb. The humor is perfectly adequate although Watson, not a fan of the show, makes no attempt to replicate the oddly unique vocal rhythm of the show, nor does he attempt any sort of allegory in his plots the way the show does. In one story, a demon invites all the girls to a slumber party; on the show this would be a sly commentary on slumber parties, or communism, or *something*; in Watson's comic it's just a plot.
But there *is* humor. The first story, "White Christmas," tries one trick I don't recall the TV show ever attempting, that of giving Buffy a real job. Here, strapped for cash, the Slayer defies Watcher Giles' orders and takes a gig at the food court of Sunnydale's variant on the Galleria. It's Christmas time and there are ice demons involved, but the best part is the everyday teenage interaction among the characters. Buffy's handful of friends descend on the food court to visit her, which of course would horrify anyone in a silly paper hat.
In "New Kid on the Block," the aforementioned slumber party tale, Buffy and her friends waste some time at a mall arcade. Very cool is the background touch that Buffy can carry on a conversation while absolutely cleaning up on a first-person shooter.
Maybe it's too much to ask that an adaptation replicate faithfully the feel of a TV show-- all I ask, really, is that the creators of the comic adaptation devise some way to make us thankful for reading the comic version. To succeed, the comic must do more than provide illustrations of the characters in lesser stories that feel lesser because certain crucial elements are off-limits. Those limits must be invisible; somehow the comic adaptation must provide something that the TV version cannot: a clever angle, perhaps, or, as Petrucha managed so brilliantly with *X-Files*, the simple opportunity to spend lots of time with narration in the heads of the characters.
In a side note, I wonder where the Dark Horse/Warner deal stands as far as actor licenses. Although some issues of the *Buffy* comic feature renderings that resemble the show characters very much, all the characters in *Uninvited Guests* seem to be mid-season replacements for their TV counterparts. You know that's supposed to be Oz because his hair is reddish, and that's Cordelia because she acts like it and she's not Willow. It's like that strange season of *The Dukes of Hazzard* when suddenly their were new Duke Boys, except that these characters have the same names. But I grant you, this is nit-picking. It's hard to capture someone's likeness.
So what's my grade on *Uninvited Guests*? About 70%. It's enjoyable, but there's got to be a way to make your ten bucks get you more than just a fix.