Buffy Season 8 Motion Comic (Issues 1-19)   Starring (voice): Kelly Albanese, Natalie Lander, J. Anthony McCarthy, Daniel Taylor and Whitney Thompson Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment RRP: £15.99 5117501000 Certificate: 15 Available 03 October 2011

Animated comics have always struck me as a strange idea as they end up neither representing the original comic, nor are they able to demonstrate the same level of visual dynamism that even the most basic animation can achieve. But for many people they remain popular, especially the animated comic produced for Watchmen.

Buffy: Season 8 originally started life as a normal comic book series from Dark Horse comics, which had the canonical joy of being overseen by the series creator Joss Whedon, who produced the whole season and wrote the first story arc.

The Motion Comic, presented here on a two DVD set represents the first nineteen comics, although, sadly the voices are not that of the original actors. Each comic lasts for around twelve to thirteen minutes.

For fans of the show waiting to get another Buffy fix, they you can take the Buffy Trivia Experience. Under Buffy’s Spell (5 min, 19 sec) has many differing fans talking about what they like about the show, including some of the people who made the original comic. You also have a gallery of Season 8’s comic book covers and the option to create your own comic.

This is a difficult one, who is going to buy this? Whilst there is nothing intrinsically wrong with the concept or realisation, I do have to question whether there is enough of a fan base still in existence for such an old show, who would want to buy a product which is essentially a lazy way of reading comics.

6

Charles Packer