Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 # 5 - The Chain

As Spike would say "Bloody Brilliant" this is by far the best issue this series has offered. It's comes together so beautifully as we see the painful life the slayers still have to live. There is a lot of philosophy within this issue that actually help inspire me to write a certain thesis paper that impressed my professor. The best issue and it actually stands on its own. It does not need the past issues to explain what's going on. At first it had me confused especially with the demon declaring that Buffy Summers is once again dead. That part had me rolling my eyes and thinking "What? again? whatever" but realizing that it was in fact a decoy Buffy herself mentioned in the first issue of Season 8 then things started to fall into place. This unknown girl who just went into the slayerhood so willingly despite her fear and uncertainty was deeply moving. Her last sentence telling the readers how insignificant it is to her that she be recognized as someone other than Buffy's decoy was near tear jerking as a fellow clasmate simply said "Wow, that's a really sad story". Even as I write I know I can't write a good enough review that will capture how much I love this particular issue in the Buffy series.

I was tempted to edit the entry and remove "Buffy" from the list of characters appearing in this issue because Buffy Summers is not actually in this at all. Giles (I believe that's him) and many other unnamed slayers are in the book. The lead character is in fact, never named, because that's the point of the plot. She gives up her identity to go into an underworld as Buffy Summers the Vampire/Demon Slayer and she has no trace of herself visible. She acts like Buffy and looks like Buffy.

If you like giant slug monsters and little pixie things, pick up the book or at least borrow it. The artwork is right up my alley, very clear, nice color balances and good skin tones done by Dave Stewart. There are naturally a bunch of variant covers with this issue too. Just pick one, it really doesn't matter much, does it?

According to the article in the back, this filler story is the sort of thing to expect on occasion when they take planned breaks in the regular storyline.