By Chris Snellgrove
| Printed 27 seconds in the past
The runaway success of Buffy the Vampire Slayer led to the event of an Angel spinoff that centered on the titular vampire with a soul performed so memorably by David Boreanaz. That present admittedly fell in need of the unique present’s general high quality, however Angel is rightly remembered as being the most effective spinoffs in tv historical past. What many Buffy followers don’t notice, although, is that we almost acquired one thing probably even higher than Angel: a Religion spinoff specializing in Eliza Dushku’s fashionable vampire Slayer.
The Buffy Religion Spinoff

This concept was the brainchild of Tim Minear, an Angel author who later went on to change into the Emmy-nominated government producer of American Horror Story. After Buffy the Vampire Slayer resulted in 2003, Minear needed to observe up on that present with a separate Religion spinoff that will observe up on this Slayer’s adventures after she got here again in season 7 to assist Buffy save the world. Initially, Minear envisioned his present as a “Religion meets Kung Fu.”
That is, in fact, a reference to the superb ‘70s TV present starring David Carradine by which the principle character wanders the Outdated West, righting wrongs wherever he encounters them. Whereas Buffy had principally centered on the fastened location of Sunnydale, Minear needed the Fath spinoff to have its title character “most likely on a motorbike, crossing the earth, looking for her place on this planet.” He conceded that that present “would get an arc in some unspecified time in the future,” however he felt “the concept of her rooted someplace appeared mistaken to me” and that “the concept of her continuously on the transfer appeared proper to me.”

Whereas she initially appeared in Buffy, holding Religion on the transfer on this spinoff would really repay one of many greatest storylines in Angel. As Minear factors out, Religion broke out of jail in that present with a view to assist cease Angelus (the amoral and sadistic monster Angel turns into when he loses his soul). She later went to Sunnydale to assist Buffy cease the First Evil, however “there would have been some individuals after her” following her jailbreak, which could clarify Religion continuously transferring from place to position in her personal spinoff.
Why It Didn’t Occur

After Buffy, followers have been hungry for extra, and a Religion spinoff would seemingly have been successful resulting from Eliza Dushku’s recognition, so why did this present by no means get made? The first cause is that Dushku felt Sarah Michelle Gellar left some “actually massive boots to fill,” and that “typically it’s important to go together with your intestine, and my intestine was telling me that I perhaps wanted to attempt one thing else that was simply totally different.” Briefly, she needed to do some non-Buffyverse work, which is why she ended up because the lead character within the supernatural drama Tru Calling.
As hardcore Buffy followers know, this Religion spinoff is only one of many canceled initiatives in Whedon’s universe. There have been additionally concepts for a Giles spinoff, a Spike film, an animated spinoff, and even a Slayer College present that includes among the newly minted Slayers from Buffy’s seventh season. Whereas all of those may have been enjoyable (particularly the Giles present), none had the sheer potential of a by-product that includes Religion. That’s as a result of, as this rogue Slayer as soon as joked, followers are all the time able to “thank God” for “sizzling chicks with superpowers.”