Brand Whedon, Feminism, and the damage done


My latest vlog in which I tackle the problems for Brand Whedon in the aftermath of allegations that seriously undermine his public persona;

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Buffy Draft: End Of Days 7.21

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Here is the next set of drafts from Jane Espenson (this one co-written with Doug Petrie). This one is 'End of Days', the brilliant nail-biting lead in to the final ever televisual Buffy. Faith and the girls are blown up, Buffy meets a very old woman who tells her about a scythe, Spike and Buffy get close; Angel and Buffy get seemingly closer... It's a great episode.

Only two drafts, but also a snippet from the email correspondence between myself and Espenson, some of which will be in my forthcoming book, Joss Whedon.

The drafts remain the property of FOX television, and the email snippet is copyright to Manchester University Press.


Draft 1

Draft 2

"Attached is ‘End of Days’, another co-write with Doug.  He wrote all the big actiony bits, I wrote all the funny Andrew/Anya, Willow/Giles, Xander/Dawn stuff."

Go here for a little snippet about one of her insights into "The Replacement"

And try out for drafts for Band Candy, and more Espenson insight!
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Celebrity Culture, Brand Whedon and the post-Romantic fallacy

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Over the last couple of weeks there have been a number of responses to the allegations made by Kai Cole against her former husband, television producer and self-declared feminist Joss Whedon. The accusations of serial infidelity against her with numerous female co-workers have produced, on the one hand, maliciously joyful expressions of schadenfreude (‘see, I always knew he was no feminist’ / ‘ha – all icons get what’s coming in the end’); and on the other such out-pourings of grief and anger one might think he had murdered all newborns. Whatever the truth of the claims, and whatever the justification of the responses (some of which have been eye-wateringly splenetic), what is clear is that Brand Whedon has taken a hit.
I do not know, and do not care about Joss Whedon as a person (I don’t mean I wish him harm; simply that I am not interested in him). I am however interested in Brand Whedon. I have spent nearly 20 years writing about it, so it makes sense that I have a view. Brand Whedo…
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Jane Espenson drafts for Whedon shows #2 'The Replacement' (with correct links...)

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During the Writers' strike of 2006, I was fortunate to strike up a correspondence with Buffy, Angel and Firefly writer Jane Espenson. The email exchange will be published in my forthcoming Joss Whedon book. But in addition, she sent me drafts to all the episodes she wrote while at Mutant Enemy (the production company that made the shows mentioned).

These are the Outline and the four draft versions before the shooting script. You will all find your own nuggets but a couple of things worth noting. First, the episode's title in the Outline is different from Draft 1, and D54raft 1 is different from 2, 3 and 4 all of which have the title as we know it, 'The Replacement'. Jane Espenson said in an email to me, 'Note the title changes and the change in the way ‘Xander’ is identified in the script - this was an attempt to help with the mislead that Xander had been copied rather than split in two'. [An edited version of the email correspondence will be an appendix in th…
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