"The Chain" is the fifth issue of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight is a comic book series published by Dark Horse Comics. The series serves as a canonical continuation of the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and follows the events of that show's final televised season. It is produced by Joss Whedon, who wrote the...

series of comic books, a continuation of the television series of the same name. It is written by creator Joss Whedon

Joss Whedon

Joseph Hill "Joss" Whedon is an American screenwriter, executive producer, director, comic book writer, occasional composer and actor, founder of Mutant Enemy Productions and co-creator of Bellwether Pictures...

. It is dedicated to the late Janie Kleinman, a network executive whom Whedon worked with and admired.

Plot

"The Chain" focuses on one of the Slayers

Slayer (Buffyverse)

A Slayer, in the fictional Buffyverse established by Buffy and Angel, is a young female bestowed with mystical powers that originate from the essence of a pure-demon, which gives her superhuman senses, strength, agility, resilience and speed in the fight against forces of darkness...

 used by Buffy Summers

Buffy Summers

Buffy Summers is a fictional character from Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer franchise. She first appeared in the 1992 film Buffy the Vampire Slayer before going on to appear in the television series and subsequent comic book of the same name...

 as a decoy to fool her enemies. The comic is a standalone

Serial (literature)

In literature, a serial is a publishing format by which a single large work, most often a work of narrative fiction, is presented in contiguous installments—also known as numbers, parts, or fascicles—either issued as separate publications or appearing in sequential issues of a single periodical...

 issue, and features no appearances from Buffy herself, although season seven characters Andrew Wells

Andrew Wells

Andrew Wells is a fictional character in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, played by Tom Lenk. The character also appears in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, the canonical continuation of the series....

, Rupert Giles

Rupert Giles

Rupert Giles is a fictional character created by Joss Whedon for the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The character is portrayed by Anthony Stewart Head. He serves as Buffy Summers' mentor and surrogate father figure...

, Vi, and Rona play small roles. The story is told through parallel narratives, showing the Slayer's calling, assignment as a Buffy decoy, and death.

The story itself is largely narrated by the Buffy decoy. An unnamed Potential Slayer, she is activated during the events of "Chosen

Chosen (Buffy episode)

"Chosen" is the series finale of the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It serves as the 22nd episode of the seventh season, and the 144th episode overall. The episode was written and directed by series creator Joss Whedon and originally aired on UPN on May 20, 2003...

". She is violently thrown on her back by the calling but then saves the lives of her schoolmates with her newfound powers. After seeing a commercial on local television starring Andrew and Vi, the girl finds the Slayer organization and "the chain" to which all Slayers are connected. While fighting vampires with a squad of Slayers, the narrator intervenes to save a fellow Slayer and is bitten by a vampire. Squad leader Rona identifies the Slayer as a candidate to serve as a Buffy decoy in an underground society of demons, monsters, and faeries. The girl is ultimately killed by the demon she was sent to deter, Yamanh, who is proud to have slain Buffy Summers. Following her demise, other Slayers drop in to dispose of Yamanh and his followers, who are engaged in battle with the underground clans of faeries, slugs, raven-like demons, and a "leafblower" type looking mystical creature that the decoy had united against Yamanh. The narrator's final thoughts suggest she is happy to have saved the world and been part of "the chain", even if her own name will never be known.

Production

Editor Scott Allie describes "The Chain" as an important story: "Joss put a lot into this one. If it were an episode of the show, he would have directed it."

Paul Lee penciled the issue, proceeding Georges Jeanty, who returns the following issue. In one panel, Lee depicted past Slayers such as the First Slayer, the Righteous Slayer, Naayéé'neizgháni the Navajo Slayer, Nikki Wood

Nikki Wood

Nikki Wood is a fictional character created by Joss Whedon in the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, portrayed originally by April Weeden-Washington and later by K.D. Aubert.-Biography:...

, Elizabeth "Edward" Weston, Anni Sonnenblume, and the Chinese Slayer. In the same panel, season one villain The Master

Master (Buffyverse)

The Master is a fictional character on the fantasy television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer . He is a centuries-old vampire portrayed by Mark Metcalf, determined to open the portal to hell below Sunnydale High School in the fictional town of Sunnydale where the main character Buffy Summers lives...

 appears in the background along with a Turok-Han

Turok-Han

The Turok-Han vampires are fictional characters from Joss Whedon's TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. They appear in the 7th and final season of the series, making their first appearance in the episode "Never Leave Me", when the Seal of Danzalthar is opened under the basement of Sunnydale High,...

.

Reception

In a Harvard Independent review, "The Chain" received particular praise in a review which was particularly critical of the Season Eight series as a whole. Reviewer Truc Doan notes that "the one-issue story of a nameless slayer's death after she takes on the responsibility of being Buffy’s decoy, was Whedon’s writing and comic format at its best, creating webs of complex and intellectually stimulating meaning out of a few pages of little dialogue and a few snapshot images", elaborating to say ""The Chain" takes the personal and places it in a multi-structural universal, one where the metaphor is not only one of feminism but of war, of social duty, and of internal values pitched against an unmoving external reality as well. It’s the story of an ordinary girl, one you may have passed on the street without thinking twice about, and how she grew up, how she established an identity, accepted the responsibility that came with power, and saved the world along the way. That is what Buffy the Vampire Slayer is about."

Canonical issues

This series has been described as 'canon' by both Whedon and various commentators. As the creator of Buffy, Joss Whedon's association with Buffyverse story is often linked to how canonical the various stories are. Since Whedon is writing this story, it will be seen as a continuation of the official continuity established by Buffy and Angel.

Season Eight contradicts and supersedes information given in the paperback novels set after Season Seven, such as Queen of the Slayers

Queen of the Slayers

Queen of the Slayers is an original novel based on the American television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer.-Plot summary:Following the Hellmouth's closure, hundreds of potential slayers have been awakened. Buffy Summers hoped that overturning the Slayer's self-sacrifice would result in her earning...

and Dark Congress

Dark Congress (Buffy novel)

Dark Congress is an original novel based on the American television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and is written by Christopher Golden.-Plot summary:Golden has revealed some things about the plotline in an interview with Slayerlit:...

, which are described as being set in an unofficial "parallel" continuity.

Timing

• Intended to be set after Buffy's seventh season. The timing is uncertain. It is possibly set sometime after "The Long Way Home", part 1 as Buffy refers to her decoy as alive, although Rona intimates that her existence is somewhat secretive and therefore the fact that she is dead may not have ever reached Buffy.