Sarah Michelle Gellar Declined Chloé Zhao’s ‘Buffy’ Revival Multiple Times

Sarah Michelle Gellar had quite the journey to returning to her vampire-slaying roots in the Buffy revival series, New Sunnydale. Before ultimately signing on to the project, she spent years turning down the opportunity to reprise her iconic role, sharing in a recent interview that she had initially thought she would never return to the Buffy universe.

Gellar explained that she was in a different place in her life and hadn’t heard a compelling reason to come back to the world of Buffy until Chloé Zhao presented her vision for the revival. It took four years of back and forth before Gellar finally committed to the project, with a lot of “Yes” and “No” calls along the way.

Despite the revival ultimately being scrapped by Hulu, Gellar expressed gratitude to Zhao for reigniting her love for Buffy and giving her the opportunity to consider returning to the role. She shared how the project had taken six years to come to fruition, emphasizing the importance of taking the time to do things right.

While the Buffy revival may not be moving forward at the moment, there’s still hope for the future of the franchise. Hulu remains interested in exploring new ways to keep the spirit of Buffy alive in another form. So, while fans may not see Gellar back in Buffy’s boots just yet, there may still be new stories to come in the future.