Perhaps some of you have noticed a large influx of comic books based on cancelled television properties.  Once upon a time, this would be akin to fan fiction.  Laughed at (or nerd raged at) and quicky forgotten.

And then Joss Whedon went and wrote the first story arch of  “Season 8” of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, single-handedly legitimizing the comic book sequel.  I’ve been reading all of the follow up comic books of the Whedonverse.  (Wow, I really do call it that).  Not just Buffy, but also the Dollhouse “Epitaths”.

And all the Firefly stories.

The Spike mini-series.

And Angel & Faith, which quickly became my favorite of all the Buffyverse sequel comics.  Seriously, I have a future article solely about “Season 9” of Angel & Faith.

Probably due, in part, to the success of Buffy comic books, other television shows have taken a shot at continuing the story in comic book format.  Smallville even gave it a shot, launching “Season 11.”

The biggest news was that The X-Files was going to have a “Season 10” comic book, fully blessed by Chris Carter.  Of course, I heard “blessed,” not “written by,” so I’m hesitant to get too hopeful for this comic.

Have I been sounding overly optimistic about these “Continued Adventures of” comic books?  Well, I have been let down in the past.  In point of fact, the Angel “Season 6” comic book (also known as the “After The Fall” story arch) was disappointing.

To clarify, I liked David Lynch’s writing, but the art got more and more muddy.  Hell, the first issue left me scratching my head as to who was who.  And it only went downhill from there.  I actually stopped buying this comic by the 5th issue.

Fortunately, the other Whedonverse comics haven’t really let me down.  Let’s see what “Season 10” of the Buffy comics have in store for us.

Thanks for reading!  See you next Thursday with an in-depth look at “Angel & Faith”!