We’re still in shock that Chloé Zhao‘s “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” series revival with star Sarah Michelle Gellar dusting off her stakes was given the axe after they shot a pilot episode. There are now some new details surfacing about how and why the horror comedy show didn’t get a full season order, with Ryan Kiera Armstrong playing a new slayer in “Buffy: New Sunnydale,” hailing from showrunners Nora Zuckerman and Lilla Zuckerman.
As Gellar told People Magazine (via Variety), everyone was shocked, saying, “Nobody saw this coming,” including the head of Searchlight (producer of the show on Hulu alongside “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” and Zhao’s “Nomadland“). However, without naming names, pointing to an executive working on the show would make it clear they were not a fan of the source material, which could have been a reason the show did not get past the pilot stage.
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“No one saw this coming, including the head of Searchlight. I got the call as we were stepping onto the stage for the premiere of their own movie. And it’s also the weekend of Chloé [Zhao] going to the Oscars as a best director nominee for ‘Hamnet.’ For them to call us on the Friday of what should have been Chloé’s victory lap for an incredible film, and my world premiere of something that I worked very hard for is…That says something…We had an executive on our show who was not only not a fan of the original but also proud to constantly remind us that he had never seen the entire series and that it wasn’t for him…That’s very hard when you’re taking a property that is as beloved as Buffy, not just to the world, but to me and Chloé. So that tells you the uphill battle that we had been fighting since day one, when your executive is literally proud to tell you that he didn’t watch it.”
Deadline is adding their own reporting of events, suggesting from sources with knowledge that after pilot rewrites, there was an expectation that “Buffy” would be given a season order, only for “Disney Television Group President Craig Erwich, who oversees Hulu Originals, called auspices to inform them that the project was not moving forward.” There is a strong possibility that Erwich is the non-fan executive Gellar was referring to in her quotes above (notably, this is just our assumption).
What adds to the infuriating aspect here is that Zhao is coming off Oscar night, where her latest feature, “Hamnet,” had an impressive eight nominations, including for Best Director and Best Picture, with her actress Jessie Buckley walking away with the Best Actress Oscar statue. Previously, her Searchlight Pictures film “Nomadland” landed Oscar wins for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actress for Frances McDormand back in 2021.
Meanwhile, Zhao shared her own comments on the Oscars’ red carpet on Sunday night, “I had an incredible, incredible time with Sarah [Michelle Gellar], with all the cast and crew doing this. And we, first and foremost, see ourselves as the guardians of the original show,” Zhao said to CNN/Variety about the show ending before audiences got a chance to see it. “Our priority for Sarah and for us has always been to be truthful to the show, to be truthful to our fans. So, things happen for a reason, and we keep our hearts open, and we welcome the mystery. And what this might lead us to.”
Created by Joss Whedon, “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” first started life as a Fran Rubel Kuzui-directed feature film from 1992 starring Kristy Swanson, Luke Perry, Paul Reubens, Rutger Hauer, David Arquette, Hilary Swank, and Donald Sutherland (also featuretted a young Ben Affleck, who had his line redubbed by another actor), which was given a series reboot in 1997 that is much more synonymous with the property.
Having a show with Zhao’s name attached to it felt similar to what Ryan Coogler was doing with his own “X-Files” revival series, so killing the project before the public got a chance to see it feels a tad anticlimactic.
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