Buffy the Vapire Slayer Omnibus: Volume 2 by Various.
Title: Buffy the Vapire Slayer Omnibus: Volume 2.
Authors: Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Jen van Meter, Christopher Golden, Doug Petrie, James Marsters, and Dan Brereton.
Artists: Jeff Matsuda, Hakjoon Kang, Nolan Obena, Cliff Richards, Brian Horton,, Luke Ross, Ryan Sook, and Hector Gomez.
Genre: Fiction, short stories, adventure, romance, fantasy, vampire fiction.
Country: U.S.
Language: English.
Publication Date: 2002, 2003, 1998, 1999, 2000. (This compendium September 5th, 2007).
Summary: This compendium collects 7 graphic short stories that prequel and lead right into Season 2 continuity. In Angels We Have Seen on High (2002), Buffy is stuck dragging her little sister around the Santa Monica pier on a Friday night, and things take a further down-turn when vampires make an unwelcome appearance at the carnival. A Stake to the Heart (2003) is a story in four parts: In Act One: Deceit, while trying to ease the stress and grief that slayer duties and her parents' separation puts on Buffy, Angel accidentally frees Buffy's malignant emotions into the physical world, and she has to face Deceit, who puts doubts into her mind about her father's fidelity and love. In Act Two: Guilt, Buffy has to face the second malignancy demon - Guilt, who tries to defeat Buffy and consume her mother and sister by planting the feeling of responsibility for the separation into each one of them. Meanwhile, Giles arrives in Sunnydale and gets established as the highschool librarian. In Act Three: Abandonment, the third malignancy demon, Abandonment, tries to convince Buffy and Dawn that they are unloved and left behind by their mother, and thus consume them, while Angel tries to undo his summoning spell, and the Summers contemplate leaving L.A. for a fresh start. In Act Four: Trepidation, the last malignancy demon, Trepidation, affects Buffy and her family, as well as the citizens of Sunnydale, where the Summers family has recently relocated. In MacGuffins (1998), while Buffy is on summer vacation at her father's house in Los Angeles, two MacGuffins (small, leprechaun-looking creatures) make a bet with Giles that she could beat the 561 A.D. record of the Slayer, Garnhuld, by two days, in trying to get rid of them. In The Queen of Hearts (1999), as Spike and Drusilla travel to Sunnydale and decide to stop in St. Louis for some gambling, they encounter a casino owner who is much more than he appears, and isn't a fan of the couple's winning streak. The Ring of Fire (2000) is a story in three parts: In The Rising, Angelus and crew try to bring the demon Kelgor back to life by reuniting his body with his armour as Buffy tries to get to the tomb first, while Giles has a hard time coming to terms with Jenny's murder and yearns for retribution. In The Seven Samurai, as Kendra springs Buffy from a shady organization masquerading as the FBI, and Giles tracks them down, Dru resurrects Kelgor and reunites him with his armour, from which he draws his strength. In Kelgour Unbound, the Scoobies, as well as Angelus and Spike, team up to take on Kelgour and his giant evil eagle pet. In Paint the Town Red (1999), enraged by Drusilla's passion for Angelus and almost killing her, Spike travels to Turkey and takes over a town, which goes well until Dru catches up to him, and brings a necromancer in tow to punish Spike. In The Dust Waltz (1998), two of the Ancient vampires - Lilith and Lamia, arrive in Sunnydale to hold an ancient contest where two champions fight to the death, but things become even worse when Lilith takes a liking to Angel, and then summons an Ancient One, Azogg-Mon.
My rating: 8/10.
My Review:
♥ "You will run ands run but never reach that which you seek. Not in that direction. No whole to that hole. The mistake you make... all of you... is to seek the very cause of your abandonment as the means to fill the void. ... Emptiness is just a void waiting to be filled. By hope for the future.
~~A Stake to the Hearts: Act Three: Abandonment.
♥ Southern Illinois. Heading West. Heading, eventually, to a small California town with more than its share of darkness. But that's for later. This is now.
♥ "I know what you need. I always do. We'll drink, and we'll gamble, and we'll make love in the moonlight. We'll make lots of new friends... and then we'll kill them."
♥ "You know, I've never won anything in my life before tonight. Maybe my luck is improving."
"Undoubtedly. It's the river, I think. She has power and majesty unequalled on earth, and sometimes, she shares it with the rest of us."
♥ "It burns the world, it's so angry... It's a bad sun. Fights so hard, postures and roars its bravado. Listen to it roar, Spike. So angry, but filled with more despair than drowning lovers. It's whimpering now. Terribly sad, really. Day after day, it puffs its chest with power and pride. Yet night after night, the dark grapples with the poor sun, wrestling it down, suffocating it. It knows it'll lose, but every morning it has hope that the next time will be different."
"Gotta tell ya, pet... The sun sounds like a bloody moron to me."
~~The Queen of Hearts.
♥ "How come every time someone says 'Don't worry,' it triggers a panic attack?"
"Relax, Will. Guns don't kill people... Highly unstable Watchers kill people."
~~The Ring of Power: The Seven Samurai.