The Buffy the Vampire Slayer reboot with a Black lead has been put on pause.
According to The Hollywood Reporter’s TV’s Top 5 podcast (as reported by TVLine) the reboot, which was set to star a Black actress in the title role is now “on pause.” The series did have disgraced creator Joss Whedon as an executive producer with Monica Owusu-Breen as writer/showrunner. Owusu-Breen and Whedon have also worked together on Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
The Buffy reboot was billed as a "contemporary building on the mythology of the original," but people began wondering if it was just going to be a rehash of the original, but just with a Black lead.
Buffy fans and TV lovers in general were seemingly skeptical of the idea, with some believing simply changing Buffy from white to Black was lazy. Owusu-Breen released a statement regarding the controversy, saying that for her, Buffy the Vampire Slayer is her Star Wars and that she would never replace the characters.
“Before I became a writer, I was a fan. For seven seasons. I watched Buffy Summers grow up, find love, kill that love. I watched her fight, and struggle and slay,” she wrote. “There is only one Buffy. One Xander, one Willow, Giles, Cordelia, Oz, Tara, Kendra, Faith, Spike, Angel…They can’t be replaced. Joss Whedon’s brilliant and beautiful series can’t be replicated. I wouldn’t try to.”
"But here we are, twenty years later…And the world seems a lot scarier," she continued. "So maybe, it could be time to meet a new Slayer….And that's all I can say."
The original Buffy stars, however, have since come out in support of actor Ray Fisher, backing up his abuse allegations against Whedon. Charisma Carpenter, Sarah Michelle Gellar and others revealed the various levels of verbal and emotional abuse they experienced while working with Whedon on Buffy.
