Exclusive Interview with Amber Benson Part 2

Here it is: part two of our amazing interview with Amber where we talk Buffy, Drones, and everything in between.

Don't forget that Amber's book is out now. If you're extra fancy you can even read it on one of those crazy Kindle gizmos. Thanks again to Amber for sitting down with us. We all had a great time.

Exclusive Interview with Amber Benson Part 1

We've been eagerly anticipating releasing the interview we did with Amber Benson at NYCC and now, at long last, here it is! Who is Calliope Reaper-Jones? Where did the idea for her new book - on sale today - Death's Daughter come from? Why don't more women go on the heroes journey? Watch the first part video of our exclusive interview to find out!

Amber will be touring all around California promoting the book, signing, and just being generally awesome. You can see a list of the events she'll be attending here and, oh look, a handy dandy map!

Stay tuned because this Thursday, 2/26, we'll be posting part 2 of our interview with Amber where we talk about Buffy, her movies "Strictly Sexual" and "Drones", working with her boyfriend Adam Busch and much, much more!

Click on the link below to purchase Death's Daughter:
link

**UPDATE PART 2 OF THIS INTERVIEW IS NOW UP:

http://buffyfest.blogspot.com/2009/02/amber-benson-part-ii.html

Amber Benson at NYCC Writer's Panel

On Sunday I had the pleasure of sitting in on a panel called Writers on Writing where a number of excellent genre authors talked about their craft, where their ideas come from, and the different ways one can try to break into the business. For the purposes of this post, I've focused on all of Amber's responses to the questions but the whole panel was really fantastic. Enjoy!

Exclusive Interview with Buffy comic book artist Georges Jeanty

Whilst dashing about on Saturday, we had the fantastic opportunity to catch up with none other than Georges Jeanty, the man responsible for the art of Buffy Season 8. We did the whole thing right on the convention room floor and the feeling was electric and fun. We opened up the Q&A to our affiliates at Slay Alive, who conjured up a few additional questions to give you insight into the artist's mind. What makes the man tick? Watch the video to find out!

And visit here for all Georges Jeanty all the time at his site:

http://kabalounge.com/

Exclusive Interview with Brian Lynch Part 2: Angel: ATF Finale *Major Spoilers*

The final issue of Angel comes out today, but Brian was kind enough to give us an advanced copy on Friday. Here's the 2nd part of our interview from NYCC and as you'll see from this discussion, Brian has a great understanding and love for these characters. Please be aware that there are major spoilers in this interview, not only for Angel #17 but for the Spike comic and all that comes next. You have been warned.

Full Video of NYCC Dollhouse Panel and Day 3 recap

We started our day at the enormous line for Dollhouse. We suddenly weren't able to use our press passes to set up the cameras early like every other panel. Apparently what changed is Fox told all press that no one would get to set up early or even be able to enter the room except Fox executives. Luckily, Michelle and I, along with our camera guy Ivan, got there 2 hours early just in case something like this happened and took our place as probably 600 and 601 in line. Joss's panel was clearly the big ticket event of NYCC. This was all while Bitsy went to Amber Benson's "Writers on Writing" panel along with our unofficial 4th blogger Ryan to film it. The schedule forced us to split up, which was sad.

The crowd was obviously full of hard-core fans: Dr. Horrible

 costumes, Jayne Hats, full Browncoat regalia, a serious Vamp Willow, the whole nine yards. We met some really cool people. Oh speaking of, we met SlayAliver darthrosenberg9 once we went in the panel! The doors finally opened about an hour before the scheduled time and we sat right in front of "Darth". I guess he got a glimpse of our Buffyfest shirts and we ended up chilling during the panel. What a nice guy. In the end, our camera ended up in the best spot in the house and we have great footage of the entire panel (sans screener, of course.)

[While saying that, please take note that even though we cleared the aisle so that people could walk around the camera, the unprecedented event occurred of a blind woman with a large seeing eye dog needing to walk down that particular aisle to exit the theater about half way through the panel. So please ignore what happens in part 2 below at around the 12 minute mark. We needed to accommodate her the best we could and move the camera around for a minute.]

So the panel itself opened up with Matt Roush, Joss, and Tahmoh Penikett and, as you probably know by now, a teaser screener of Dollhouse. Buffyfest has been spoiler central this weekend, so I think it's best to keep it spoiler-free. I mean, there was a Dark Angel type motorcycle chase, Lady Gaga, and a Geisha girl...but if you want to know exactly what happened there is a lot out there right now detailing the screener scene-for-scene. Overall, I personally really liked it. Michelle wasn't so convinced about Eliza's acting AT ALL but was very intrigued by the character of Boyd. I kind of agree with Michelle regarding Eliza. She totally "Faithed" it in the first scene and the rest of it I kind of tuned her out, which didn't hurt the episode for me...but it can't be good either. The set of the Dollhouse looks beautiful, though, and reminded us both of Wolfram & Hart if it was a spa. Overall, I got a feeling of the first scene of Serenity (when River is in the school) mixed with a little Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It was a vibe I didn't expect and was refreshing.

Anyway, during the panel look out for Joss's awesome answer to an aspiring writer, how big his smile gets during the extended Dr. Horrible applause, and his comments about a Dr. Horrible sequel. One very telling moment was when Joss was asked, "When are we going to see Angel in season 8 of Buffy?" Joss replied "Probably when it's the most painful" but then he said something to the effect of when Georges figures out how to draw him, he's been having some trouble. Michelle is surmising that Angel is obviously making an appearance then since what the hell else is Georges trying to perfect him for?? Hmmm. Anyway, on to the videos:

oh yeah, and that's me yelling "Buffy Movie!!" to Joss at the end. What can I say? I was under Michelle's influence.

NYCC Dollhouse panel quote

When are we going to see Angel in season 8 of Buffy? Joss Whedon
"Probably when it's the most painful" - Joss Whedon

Exclusive Interview with Dark Horse Editor Scott Allie

We interviewed Dark Horse (Buffy Season 8) editor Scott Allie on the Comic Con floor yesterday. He's such a nice guy and he gave us a lot of insight into the industry of the Buffy comics. Oh and he has great hair.

Sorry about the poor audio quality, the convention was packed at this point and Michelle's questions are a little low. The first 2 questions were about bringing new readers to comics through Buffy and if he seeing more women in the comic world both as readers and professionals.

*Update*
From the desk of Scott Allie:
Apologies to Jo Duffy, Ann Nocenti, Marie Severin, Tatjana Wood, and the other women whose comics I grew up on! In trying to make my point on the fly, I grabbed the first name to come to mind—not to mention that Louise Simonson was at NYCC. But of course she was by no means the only woman in comics 20 years ago. —Scott Allie

Line to the Dollhouse Panel at NYCC

Mentalness...it's not for another hour and I'd say there's 1500 people
in line. (Note the plethora of Jayne hats!)

NYCC Day 2 Recap and video Interview with Brian Lynch *Spoilers*

Day 2 at Comic Con was amazing! There were a lot more people which made it harder to navigate, but we have some great news to report.

The day started out with a fantastic interview with Brian Lynch. Brian sat with us for quite some time and gave us the scoop on Spike, Gunn, Drusilla and Angel. Also, some great insight into his feelings for the characters he spent time with for so long. Oh, and chock-full-o spoilers! To make matter even better, yesterday Brian passed us a copy of the final issue of Angel:After the Fall #17 (it practically glowed when he gave it to us).We read it, it's fantastic, and part 2 of our interview with Brian where we discuss the issue will be up on Wednesday, it's release day.

Before our next interview with Scott Allie, we headed over to the packed Robot Chicken Panel where Seth Green struck a sexy pose and made everyone laugh a bunch of times.

Scott Allie talked Buffy: Season 8 and more with us. It was a great interview amongst the chaos of the con around us. Scott is such a seasoned professional and he was very nice to take the time out of his packed Comic Con schedule. We'll be posting the full video of that tomorrow.

Lastly, the one who makes Buffy look and feel like Buffy, Georges Jeanty. Our interview with Georges was so fun and really showed us what passion he has for the characters of Buffy. We took some questions from Slayalivers wenxina, iloveromy, and Trey for Georges as well. Expect the video of that soon.

Here's the first part of the interview with Brian Lynch. Please be warned there are spoilers galore in here. Again, look out for the second part of the interview on Wednesday, which is all about Angel:ATF issue #17.

Holy NY Comic Con day 2 chaos, Batman.

Q&A with Georges Jeanty

One of our interviews tomorrow at NYCC is with Buffy Season 8 Comic Artist & Illustrator Georges Jeanty. If you'd like to submit any questions for him, put it in the comments section of this post and we'll pass some along.

Dark Horse, Dark Horse, Dark Horse, They're Dark!

Ok, here's the scoop from the NYCC Dark Horse panel:

There will be no Buffy comic in June, The Tales of the Vampire one shot will be replacing it instead. The covers done by Jo Chen and will be about a boy in high school.

We asked Scott Allie the following in respose to that:

Buffyfest: "We already know that the "tales of the vampire" you story just announced won't feature characters from Buffy (CBR announced that earlier), but since it will be in the present timeline of the buffyverse, will our usual characters play a part somehow? Does Joss Whedon approve a side project like this story-wise?"

Scott Allie: "Yes, because we wanted to make this part of season 8 and because Tales of the Vampire was something he came up with first, he's not co-writing it to the extent that he does with season 8 but everything is going through him, the craetive team got approved by him, and he gives feedback. It will have his finger prints on it more than the old [pre-season 8] comics did [and has final approval]."

We then asked about the idenity of season 8's Twilight and when we'll be finding out who he is. Scott's funny dramatic pause was punctuated by a vague "Eventually."

Oh, and Twilight's identity? We later found out he's George Washington. You heard it hear first, folks.

In response to a Serenity comic question someone asked - Scott explained that "Joss is so busy with the stupid Dollhouse thing" (in jest, of course) "it's kind of taking up a lot of his time". Allie went on to say, "Buffy is so demanding for Joss. He edits every script, every page of atwork goes through him, every cover concept...cover concepts often come from him. He has a Shepard Book outline in his head but he has to wait until there is time to work with Joss properly. He just agreed to write something that he probably should've said no to, but that's the kind of stuff that pushes Serenity back."

They also revealed a few other details: Expect another Myspace presents Dark Horse Buffy mini comic that we're going to love (but nothing they're ready to discuss). They (meaning Joss and Scott) have talked more potential Sugar Shock, potential Cabin in the woods, potential Dollhouse, potential Serenity, and potential Fray. It's all very potential because but they want to be able to do it right.

That's pretty much it. These guys are cool, seasoned professionals and it was great being at the panel.

Check out all the Buffy related video from this panel below:

IDW Follow up

Wow, you look away for 2 seconds, more news for the IDW panel, currently underway here at NY Comic Con.

The character of Illyria will be crossing over to another title called "Fallen Angel: Reborn". Apparently, this is the first time anything has been done this way and they had to get special permission from Joss Whedon to make this happen. The story will take place during season 5 after Illyria had lost her powers. She goes on a journey to get those powers back.

**Update - Video of this panel below and clarification from earlier - it seems as though Gunn will be getting his own one-shot written by Brian Lynch.

Sorry, apparently I'm not as good a camera handler as Michelle was at the DH panel. Good thing we'll have great people with us the next 2 days who know how to handle their professional equipment properly!

These guys seem like they have a really great time working together. They are putting out so many Whedonverse stories next year, it's like spin-off city over there! Angel, Spike, Dru, Illyria and even Gunn! I only wish Kelley Armstrong was there with the boys as well to bask in her new fandom.

IDW Panel Bombshell - Major Spoilers

MAJOR COMIC SPOILERS - Don't read below if you don't want to know

the IDW panel opened up with Brian Lynch and Chris Ryall announcing the following:

Brian Lynch and Juliet Landau spoke over Facebook about how she was intrigued by what's going on in the story and Spike's story. From that conversation they are now going to be co-writing a 2-shot for IDW about Drusilla.

They also spoke about some sort of Gunn story (apparently Gunn's alive in Kelley Armstrong's Angel: Aftermath....or something).

Finally, the announced that they are doing a Spike Comic written by Lynch and it has an indefinite issue amount as of now. I think Lynch's words were "we'll keep doing it until people get sick of it".

Check back for full video later (along with video of the Dark Horse panel.)

NYCC Dark Horse Panel

If you haven't heard the news by now, Dark Horse announced earlier today that they are doing a one-shot of another "Tales of the Vampire" story. We're sitting at the panel, if you have a question, twitter us now.

It's dark, it's dark, it's really really dark....horse

Dark Horse has prime real estate right when you walk in, but for some
reason no Buffy #22. Huh?

Smells like geek spirit

We're here!

NY Comic Con starts today along with our live coverage!

And we're off! Buffyfest's live blogging weekend coverage of the NY Comic Con begins now. Check back for updates and breaking news throughout the weekend. We have a bunch of cool gifty giveaways too so if you see us, come say hi. 

We will be arriving in minutes. Today's plan is to attend the Dark Horse panel with Buffy Season 8 editor Scott Allie and then hit up the IDW crew complete with Angel: After the fall writer Brian Lynch. Will Nathan Fillion show up for the Wonder Woman screening tonight? We don't know, but we sure will soon. Stay tuned!

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