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| In the roughly two
years since Dark Horse began creating a line of comic books based on the cult television
hit Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a lot of great stories have been added to the mythos of the
irrepressible teenage slayer and the loyal friends who help her keep a foot up on the
forces of evil. With the help of one of the show's main writers, Dark Horse is pushing the
envelope even further this August with the release of an original graphic novel that sends
Giles to the brink of insanity and pits Buffy against the love of her life in one of the
most vicious battles imaginable. Plus there's a big samurai demon thing. Doug Petrie may not be a household name to
Buffy fans, but if you look closely at the credits of some of your favorite episodes,
you're likely to find his name under the words "written by." "The very first episode of Buffy I wrote was called Revelations," said Petrie, "and that's where the group finds out that Angel is still alive and that Buffy has been hiding that. There is a scene where Giles just destroys Buffy--he brings up that Angel tortured him, killed his girlfriend, and he tears her apart for hiding the fact that Angel is still alive." Petrie has written and contributed to numerous other episodes of both Buffy and the recent BTVS spin-off, Angel, but he says his initial handling of Rupert Giles established a deep respect and fascination for the Watcher-cum-librarian who is responsible for training and guiding the Slayer through her struggles against evil. At the end of season two on the television show, the once-repentant vampire Angel once again becomes possessed by his demon soul, and in a horrific rage he brutally murders Giles' girlfriend, Jenny Calendar, and nearly kills the Watcher as well. "Ring of Fire is an epic that takes place squeezed between episodes of season two. So Jenny Calendar has recently been killed, and Giles has not yet fully realized how devastated he is," explained Petrie. "On the show, he takes a bat--I think it's a flaming baseball bat--and beats Angel with it, and Angel very nearly kills Giles until Buffy steps in and rescues him. This is all squeezed in around that time period. "With that in mind, I thought it would be fun to have Giles really lose it, so in the book he sinks into despair and becomes kind of self-destructive. I liked thinking of Giles being self destructive and not taking care of himself." Giles' downward spiral is fueled not only by his own rage and despair, but also by the evil plot Angelus has concocted to resurrect the ancient Japanese demon warrior, Kelgor. The potential resurrection of the supernatural samurai is not only loaded with deadly possibilities for the residents of Sunnydale--it also inspires a dark curiosity in the mournful Watcher. After all, Giles has spent the majority of his life working on behalf of the forces of good, and by last measure, all it's earned him is a murdered girlfriend and a broken heart. That's what makes it easy to see how even someone as responsible and respectable as Giles could consider compromising everything he's come to stand for in order to regain what was taken from him. "I tend to think of Giles as being sort of a referee for the universe. He is the one always keeping the rules straight and making people obey the rules," said Petrie. "I thought, what would happen if this guy gave up--not only stopped caring about the rules but actually became resentful for having been a good person all this time only to have such a terrible thing happen. "Essentially, he begins to really misbehave, and his only goal is to get everything he wants, and what he wants is his girlfriend not to be dead. The scary thing is that he's knowledgeable and he might just be able to gain dark powers and resurrect Jenny." The story behind Ring of Fire is harrowing and intense, and editor Scott Allie knew immediately which of his stable of Buffy artists would be asked to draw the book. "We really wanted Ryan Sook for this story--not only because he's Joss Whedon's favorite Buffy artist, but also because his artwork is a perfect complement to the dark and emotional nature of the book." Sook first garnered the attention of Buffy fans as the artist on the original Spike and Dru one-shot, and since then the young artist's heavy chiaroscuro inks have softened and become more graceful, which is sure to please those Buffy fans who might've felt his style was too dark for depicting their teen television heroes. "I have to say one of my very favorite things about the graphic novel is Ryan's art," Petrie confessed. "It's just awesome, and it looks just the way I pictured it from the start." Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Ring of Fire is an 80-page, full-color original graphic novel on sale August 30 for $9.95. |
