Buffy : Season 9

Buffy’s choice: Joss Whedon gets political

With Planned Parenthood controversy ’a hot button issue’, Vampire Slayer torn over pregnancy

Voices arguing for a woman’s right to choose in America’s anguished debate over abortion have discovered an unexpected ally: Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

The new issue of the Buffy comics, published on Thursday in the US, sees the Chosen One taking some time off from staking vampires through the heart to deal with what publisher Dark Horse called "a rather personal problem". Season nine continues, after issue five’s cliffhanger revelation that the Slayer was pregnant, with Buffy deciding what to do about the unwanted pregnancy – the result of a drunken night at a party. Eventually she decides to have an abortion.

"I want to do something. And I think it’s going to be hard. So I was hoping you could help me," Buffy tells the vampire Spike – a potential father of the baby (she isn’t sure what happened at the party). "I’m going to have an abortion," she continues. "I’m barely able to hold onto a job. I live with roommates who are about to kick me out. And I can’t even hold my alcohol well enough to remember who got me pregnant. I can handle the Slayer stuff … But everything else I’m not ready. At least not now."

The row over the breast cancer advocacy group Susan G Komen for the Cure’s decision to cut funding to the woman’s health care organisation Planned Parenthood has made abortion a "hot button issue", according to Joss Whedon, who created Buffy in 1992 and is now executive producer of the comic series.

"A woman’s right to choose is under attack as much as it’s ever been, and that’s a terrible and dangerous thing for this country. I don’t usually get soap box-y with this, but the thing about Buffy is all she’s going through is what women go through, and what nobody making a speech, holding up a placard, or making a movie is willing to say," Whedon told Entertainment Weekly

The cult creator criticised the celebration in the media of teen pregnancy and "young people having babies when they are not emotionally, financially, or otherwise equipped to take care of them", citing The Secret Life of an American Teenager television show, and the films Juno and Knocked Up.

"Even if they pretend to deal with abortion, the movies don’t even say the word ’abortion’," he said. "It’s something that over a third of American women are going to decide to have to do in their lives. But people are so terrified that no one will discuss the reality of it — not no one, but very few popular entertainments, even when they say they’re dealing with this issue, they don’t, and won’t. It’s frustrating to me. I don’t think Buffy should have a baby. I don’t think Buffy can take care of a baby. I agree with Buffy."

Early feedback has been mixed, with many comics fans welcoming the development. Comic Book Resources’ Kelly Thompson said that its authors "deserve huge credit for tackling the sensitive and controversial subject of abortion with unflinching honesty and realism" in her review, adding that Buffy’s decision "is handled smartly and respectfully and with exactly the right tone". "As a result, this is a comic that makes me proud to be a fan of the character and the Buffyverse at large," she said.

Others were less impressed. "Whedon’s talk of abortion being a ’painful’ decision for young women may be true as far as it goes, but such rhetoric is often code for pro-choicers who really mean it’s too painful a decision for any of us judgmental anti-choice yahoos to intrude on," wrote Calvin Freiburger in a post entitled "Buffy the Unborn Slayer" on Live Action, which describes itself as" a youth led movement dedicated to building a culture of life and ending abortion, the greatest human rights injustice of our time". Expressing the hope that Buffy won’t actually go through with the abortion, Freiburger added: "While I never watched Buffy myself, I did watch Whedon’s short-lived sci-fi series Firefly, a couple episodes of which indicate Whedon has a rather lax view of sexual mores."

Whedon insisted that the storyline was not a "sensationalist" move. "I did it as what seemed like a natural part of Buffy’s life," he said. "And obviously there will be complications to the whole storyline that could only happen in the Buffyverse. But it’s not about what happens, it’s about that moment of decision, and just articulating what so many people are not saying, but so many are thinking."