When news of Joss Whedon and Monica Owusu-Breen’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” reboot broke last month, there were pretty much two responses from a very divided fanbase.
The first was an outraged “how dare you?” and the second was an optimistic “let’s wait and see.”
And while Marti Noxon was initially a member of the former group, the prolific TV producer — who served as showrunner on Season 6 of Whedon’s cult series starring Sarah Michelle Gellar — has since joined up with the latter.
“I’ll be honest, initially I was like, ‘Nooo! Don’t touch the sacred text!’” Noxon told TheWrap. “But the more I learned about it, the more excited I got.”
Last month, the plans for a “Buffy” reboot were revealed, with Whedon on board and Owusu-Breen set as showrunner for the in-the-works series, which will feature a black lead character. There is currently no network or streamer attached to the 20th Century Fox-produced project.
The “don’t touch ‘Buffy’” backlash was so strong it prompted Owusu-Breen to take to Twitter to reassure fans “there is only one Buffy” and that Whedon’s “brilliant and beautiful series can’t be replicated.”
“I wouldn’t try to,” she wrote. “But here we are, 20 years later … and the world seems a lot scarier. So maybe, it could be time to meet a new Slayer … And that’s all I can say.”
Noxon, for one, thinks it’s “a great concept.”
“I’m excited that there is a female showrunner and that she’s a woman of color writing about a woman of color,” Noxon told TheWrap. “So I’m actually really pumped for it.”
As for whether or not Noxon would sign on for the reboot, she says she’s been “kind of busy” doing her own thing (see: HBO’s “Sharp Objects” and AMC’s “Dietland.”)
“So if they ask — I don’t know what I’d say,” Noxon said. “It depends on what I was doing. But I think they’ve got it covered (laughs).”