Joss Whedon, in the midst of publicity for both The Cabin in the Woods and The Avengers and everything else in between, has said that a planned spinoff of Buffy the Vampire Slayer about Giles (Anthony Stewart Head) is not entirely out of the question. Though there is a chance that it’ll be a character played by Head who isn’t Giles, and maybe it’ll be on the BBC. But Whedon’s on it. Trust him.

According to Blastr, Whedon has been talking about this spinoff since 2001. It even has a title: Ripper, after what is said to be Giles’ nickname from his days as a young occultist. It would also take place in England and center on Giles getting into supernatural mischief, independent of his young vampire-slaying friends in America. And while the project has morphed into every form of entertainment imaginable short of an iPad app — DVD release, TV series, mini-series, etc. — Whedon has never seemed to be able to let it go.

And he was asked about it just recently by the AV Club:

“[T]he thing about Ripper — the essence of it — is that the BBC came to me at one point like, ‘It doesn’t have to be Ripper. It can just be [Anthony Stewart Head], and there’s magic, and he’s Tony, cuz he’s awesome.’ And that’s the thing: For some reason, he keeps getting sexier every year. That’s not happening to me! I’m like, ‘What are you doing?’ And that story was always about a mature guy who’s lived, and about the choices he’s made. So you could make that now, or you could make it 10 years from now. And I’ve tortured Tony more than any other living human with, ‘We’re definitely gonna do this!’ Because I thought we were. …”

Um, clearly this is red meat for die-hard Whedon fans. Maybe even on the level of a Firefly reunion, because obviously, there would be a reunion with Sarah Michelle Gellar on such a show. And he still seems intent on making this happen, somehow. We’re guessing with magic? Let’s remember that Cabin in the Woods was made and still ended up sitting on the shelf for about three years, only to be one of the most highly-anticipated horror releases of the year. (And then completely living up to the hype.) Whedon makes things happen in some shape or form … but maybe we won’t hold our breath for this. We’ll just wait and see.

(via Blastr)

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