Season 8 - Last Gleaming Part 2: Issue 37

[hitnrun017]

Beautiful cover. Dark and gritty. I quite like the emptiness. Guess this is going to be a pretty depressing issue based on the covers.

[AndrewCrossett]

Hmm. If possible, Buffy looks even more unhappy in Jo's cover than in Georges'.

[wenxina]

I'll go with tired and dejected in Chen's cover, and positively freaked in Jeanty's.

[The Girl In Question]

I like Chen's cover, too! I don't know what it is, but this cover seems to have more to it than some of her more "blah" covers. I usually hate or love her covers and I genuinely like this one. I most definitely prefer the Jeanty cover though. I'm pretty sure I'll get both.

[Wyndam]

Oh man that's a depressingly beautiful cover.

[Emmie]

The Girl in Question, I agree, there's something special to this cover. And I have to say, I disagree that this cover displays emptiness--the cover is full of emotion.

I've probably been one of Chen's harshest critics, mostly because I felt she was putting too much stock in likenesses and there's often a lack of dynamic action and emotion in her pieces. However, I think this cover really shows her talent.

It's not Chen's best likeness (the face is a bit too angular, the features a bit highset), but I think it's selling the most real emotion and mood. I look at this portrait and the details of likeness (very good, but not perfect) are rendered unimportant. This feels like Buffy. Remember how Joss instructed the artists to not draw SMG but to draw Buffy?

This is Buffy. Weary, defeated, letting the world crash over her without the energy to fight back, to protest, to even cry. The emotion of this piece is powerful, almost hypnotizing, and very, very Buffy.

Excellent. I feel as it I could stare at this all day and get lost in it. The way shadow is used, the brush strokes of shade that run atop Buffy's form, as if her picture was crumpled, as if the slashes of light and shadow are painting over her at the bottom, as if she's being swallowed by greater forces and she's submitting.

Understated and powerful. There's real heart in this piece where before in other covers I often saw poses and likenesses that felt a bit plastic. Even the detail of the hand speaks of this inward pain. Normally when Buffy's caught in an angst-ridden moment, she throws her hand out and says "Don't touch me!" But this reminds me more of grief, turning your hand inward to cover your heart, but the hand is limp and almost boneless (one single hand--Buffy is the Hand and has been rendered ineffectual, turned in on herself). There's weakness and pain, but a pain without the energy to grieve with loud tears and wails. All this pain is emanating from deep inside, silent and heartbreaking and quiet. All Buffy's energy has been used to silence the pain, to try to capture it inside her, to shoulder it alone and controlling her emotions has taken it's toll--she has no energy left to fight.

The earthy palette choice gives a feeling of the mundane (y'all remember how much I hate brown, right? This is brown done right and I love it). Makes me think how life has defeated Buffy, not the supernatural, but the pain of life, of love and connection. Her weakness and her strength are in how she's so very human.

I love this cover. I think it tells a story that leaves me feeling haunted and aching for Buffy.

Spike/Buffy aside:

SPOILER: Click to show

So far we've had two covers released for Joss' final arc Last Gleaming. The first was of Spike and now Buffy. Both are understated portraits where the subject is facing the same direction, though Buffy's is far more vulnerable and she's gazing out, while Spike is more standoffish and distant. Allie said we weren't getting a Spike/Buffy cover, but frankly I think we just did. The attraction of Spike and Buffy is that they are very much themselves while together where as Buffy and Angel become this romanticized ideal of lovers. So a Spike/Buffy cover truly is where we receive two covers where both Buffy and Spike are posing and expressing emotion in this way. Spike and Buffy are being presented as the same while still separate, independent individuals--that's most definitely what a Spuffy fan would love to see.

[Hellbound Hyperion]

So everyone who likes Chen's cover can pretty much agree that Em just put into words what we couldn't?

I do like that the first question I asked about the cover was, "What emotion is this and what does this represent?" There wasn't anything immediately off, like the Willow one-shot cover, and it was Buffy in a way that Chen's art could uniquely capture (as Jeanty does every single issue).

I have to guess that Joss is having some input here, too. Or he's just doing something knockout with these scripts that's made the artists work harder. Either way, I'm really amped (not vamped) to get into this final arc with Joss back at the wheel.

[loveisabird]

jo's cover is amazing. i wish i could make something that good! i cant tell if buffy is sad or just has a blank face but it looks from the cover that it may be a emotionally thought provoking issue. i havent bought any issues since issue 29 so i may buy this one solely from jo's cover.

[The Night Lord]

Wonder how the story is going to turn out, based on the cover...should be interesting

[wenxina]

Different strokes, I guess. Whereas Emmie could stare at that Chen cover all day, I took a look, went "Meh", and moved on with my day (I think our mind-meld is weakening... egads!). A short list of my issues with the Chen cover:

• It's brown. Again. Or more accurately, it's that muddy palette that Chen keeps using. And it's getting old. If I see an apple or banana that color, the last thing I wanna do is eat it.
  
• It really doesn't tell me anything... other than Buffy may be sad/tired/depressed/downtrodden/etc. Everyone has their own spin on what Buffy may be feeling, but the cover doesn't tell me why. A cover should draw you in, and while I guess it's working for some, I personally find it pretty but empty.
  
• When compared to Chen's superb #5 cover, this one just pales in comparison. Both are portraits of Buffy (well, one's a decoy, but wearing a mask), but while the #5 cover has emotion and something interesting to look at, this one stops at giving me sad Buffy. The #5 cover made me go, "Ack! Her face is a mask! Why is it a mask?! Wait, decoy Buffy? Is this like Mission Impossible?!" Also, Buffy's sad face was better there.
  
• When compared to the variant cover, this one really wouldn't generate that much discussion by itself at all. Had this cover been released a while back instead of the variant, we wouldn't be on page 4 of discussion now. I mean, we arrived at "baby bump" with Jeanty's cover (don't know how, but we did), and all I've seen so far in terms of Chen's cover is, "Buffy is tired..." which is kinda old news, IMHO.

So yeah... not feeling the love for it. Which is cool... having a variant to choose from is always aces! Unless both covers don't rock your happy (*cough*#36*cough*).

[buffyfan21]

I love Chen's portrait of Buffy this issue. It could easily become one of my faves of her covers so far. Are we to assume that this is Chen's version of a "younger" Buffy meant to mirror Jeanty's cover? If so, then Chen did a wonderful job. Buffy was perhaps more healthy looking back in those days (i.e. not super skinny), but still, Chen's portrayal of Buffy is so hauntingly beautiful and yet so sad at the same time. She really does a great job of conveying that here. And while some of her features may be slightly off, as others have pointed out, she definitely has the nose down pat and you still get the essence that is "Buffy" for sure. Definitely one of Chen's most beautiful covers. Something about is so captivating and inspires an air of sadness and possible fear? Feelings of regret perhaps?...

Ok, I'm done rambling now. I will resume my ode to the beauty that is this cover at a later time.

[Emmie]

No, I definitely don't think this is a younger Buffy. Rather, Chen has captured the way Buffy looks in face, spirit and body in the later seasons. More like Season 6/7 with Season 5 hair. (Yes, I just did that, I'm a huge nerd.)



Xi, I think the difference is simply this--if you don't look at the portrait and find the emotional heart of it to touch you (if I stare at it long enough it makes me want to cry), then all the other things you list matter very much. If you're carried away by the emotion, the natural portrayal and symbolism reflected, then it doesn't matter.

And haha, I've got more street cred for hating brown, but I still say this is brown done right. (Lord knows I effing hate brown!) ;-)

[wenxina]

What can I say, Em... I'm not a portrait kinda guy. Very few portraits actually touch something in me... and the rare ones that do are more often than not, photos (think Afghan Girl on the National Geographic cover).

I dunno if brown can ever be done right. I mean, it's nowhere as bad as the craptacular browness of the middle of "AtF", but seriously... brown = ACK! It's just a depressingly overused color. Can I petition for Chen to do a Warhol-esque cover instead?

[BlueJay]

That's one amazing cover right there. Jo Chen done me proud.

[Emmie]

Jun 30, 2010 21:19:36 GMT -5 wenxina said:

Can I petition for Chen to do a Warhol-esque cover instead?

I think they used up all their Warhol pastels to color the Goddesses in Retreat. Give me dark mood over psychedelic--this is BtVS, not Austin Powers. ;D

[The Girl In Question]

^^Aw, I like bright colors

[wenxina]

Jul 1, 2010 0:33:48 GMT -5 Emmie said:

Jun 30, 2010 21:19:36 GMT -5 wenxina said:

Can I petition for Chen to do a Warhol-esque cover instead?

I think they used up all their Warhol pastels to color the Goddesses in Retreat. Give me dark mood over psychedelic--this is BtVS, not Austin Powers. ;D

If there's going to be trippy time travel involved, Austin Powers may be a good reference point.

[The Night Lord]

^ Yeah, baby

Sorry, I just had to do that

[shslibrarian55]

Thank you, Emmie. I'm glad that bothered somebody else.

[Emmie]

Jul 1, 2010 1:12:47 GMT -5 The Girl In Question said:

^^Aw, I like bright colors

I like them, too, but Retreat had some serious storytelling issues, not least of which was the battle looked like it was produced on Power Rangers. It's a battlefield--they needed dark mood to actually get across the gravity of the moment.

Instead, it looked cartoonish. And people were dying. It just didn't fly right. The color palette made the mood laughable instead of dire. Compare this to the coloring in the later issues of After the Fall and you'll see how powerfully different a battle can be when there's a colorist like Mantovani bringing the story to life.

The bright colors work for Scooby daytime stuff, but there needs to be more dark contrast here. Whatever happened to the horror of BtVS?