This week , Identity Crisis and Justice League author Brad Meltzer takes over theBuffy The Vampire Slayercomic , bringing a more superheroic whole tone . Why does it make the book the best it ’s been in years ? Here ’s our spoiler - free take .
Maybe it ’s just me , but the Buffy comedian has seemed to be drifting ever since … the Fray arc , perhaps ? But that ’s a year of issues that have seemed disjointed and lack ever since , with plots seeming to run too long , or come out of nowhere before disappearing again ( That whole “ vampires are now rosehip ” thing , for example ) ; even Jane Espenson ’s last few issues have disappoint , despite the reappearance of Oz for the first time in years . The magic , it seemed , was gone .
Meltzer ’s first issue – # 32 , the first chapter of “ Twilight ” and subtitled “ Buffy Has F#@$ing Superpowers ” – very cursorily bring that magic back by being something that the comedian has n’t been for too long : Fun . fishy , too , and mirthful in a way that stretches beyond Andrew being a nerd , although this is also the nerdiest subject of Buffy to particular date , with very specific call - out in dialog ( rooter of older - school Marvel / DC crossover will get a bang at one breaker point ) , caption ( Meltzer has clearly been take Matt Fraction ’s Uncanny X - Men ) and even art ; the background joke on the last page is both random and logical at once , and also screaming . It ’s this violation to the Big Bad and Sense of Danger that Meltzer brings to the book that refreshes it so quickly , and also cause you more cognizant of what ’s been lacking for so long as foreshadowing and the construction of tension got overtaken with selfimportance and leaden storytelling .
That ’s not to say that there ’s nothing here beyond the humor ; we get an explanation for Buffy ’s superpower far quicker than I ’d expect , and it ’s a major status quo change that validate the entire “ Retreat ” spark in a way I did n’t expect , and as Twilight begins to make his move , certain allegiances shift again in unexpected ways . Things start to take place again , in other row , and there ’s a sense of an endgame being near – or even existing – that has n’t been here in a long fourth dimension .
Buffy#32is a coming back to form for the series , and from the most unexpected of germ ; I was n’t that much a devotee of Meltzer ’s previous comic work at DC but here , he ’s find a upper and weightlessness that I had n’t seen from him before , one that suits the Whedonverse and helot , hopefully , to remind all the other author remaining on the serial that Buffy and friends work well when the melodrama is mollify with humor and comedy .
Buffy The Vampire Slayer#32is relinquish on Wednesday .
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