Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans have had a rough few days after Hulu officially pulled the plug on a revival of the series, which would have brought star Sarah Michelle Gellar back as the titular heroine. Described as a continuation of the original story rather than a reboot or revival, Gellar was gearing up to bring Buffy Summers back alongside a new crop of heroes, although reports had been unclear about whether any other supporting characters from the original show would have joined her. Unfortunately, Gellar shared that Hulu executives decided not to release the series, disappointing countless fans. This is far from the only reboot series to go through this kind of trouble, similarly to what happened with Hilary Duff’s Lizzie McGuire reboot that was set to debut on Disney+. However, as chatter increases about what happened with the Buffy reboot (officially titled Buffy: New Sunnydale) and why it was canceled, fans saw a new wrinkle in the story. Speaking with The Wrap, Gellar addressed the news about scripts from the recently canceled Buffy reboot series being leaked online. Calling it “unfortunate,” she told fans who saw the leaked scripts (which come from the show’s pilot episode) to not look at it, considering that fans are “not getting [their] visions and all of that.”

Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers for ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’20th Century Fox Television

She also compared the situation to the one surrounding 2022’s Batgirl, which was almost completely finished before Warner Bros. canceled its release on HBO Max. Noting that it was not finished before it was shelved, she explained that she and the team “made a pilot on purpose” to introduce new characters, setting the stage for where the series went from there:
“I actually hope it doesn’t [leak], because then everyone’s going to have an opinion on this and that. And pilots are not finished. It wasn’t done, right? It’s not like we did a season and finished it and then they shelved it. [‘Batgirl’] was finished. I want to clarify this, we made a pilot on purpose, because there’s some new characters…and you want to see how it goes…you learn from it and there’s things you fix.”
In the days after the Buffy reboot was canceled, director Chloé Zhao held nothing back in saying that she had “an incredible time” working on the show with Gellar and the crew. Viewing themselves as “guardians of the original show” and wanting to be truthful to Buffy’s original run, she made it clear that she and everybody involved wanted to do everything they could to give the fans something they wanted to see. She also admitted to having no idea whether the show could be picked up elsewhere but remained hopeful that the story can continue.

Considering the recent success reboots like Scrubs have seen, and with other reboots like Baywatch and Scooby-Doo going full speed ahead, Buffy feels like a property that should have a shot at seeing another day in the spotlight. However, with no signs pointing to which production team could pick up Buffy for another chapter, its status remains in flux.

Release Date

1997 – 2003

Network

The WB