Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Haunted # 3 [COMICS]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Haunted # 3 (Dark Horse) (Limited Series, 2001)

Creators: Jane Espenson (story), Cliff Richards (pencils), Julio Ferreira (inks), Jeromy Cox (colors), Clem Robins (letters)

Setting:  After Season Three

T.V./Movie Character Appearances:  Buffy, Giles, The Mayor (ghost), Willow, Oz, Xander, Adam (human), Maggie Walsh, Riley

Major Original Characters: None

Summary

Willow and Xander barely manage to get Oz locked up in a safe place before he transforms into a werewolf.  Xander shares his decision to go on the road for the summer.  The Mayor adopts the body of a new vampire and experiments with the form, surprising himself by drinking the body of one of his victims.  He even attacks Willow later that night, but she manages to cast a spell to escape.  Buffy is on patrol in a cemetery and tells a college student to take the long way around, but he doesn't listen to her and gets killed by a vampire (The Mayor) and, when Buffy discovers the body, she blames herself.  Agents of the Initiative, led by Adam (in his pre-cyborg human form), are also on patrol and they catch The Mayor's vampire body and take him to their underground complex.  Professor Walsh isn't particularly interested, however--to her, it's just another vampire.  Buffy continues to be tormented by Faith--and now, she's hallucinating even while awake!

Review

This was a really good issue.  I loved seeing the Initiative at work in the summer after Season Three and before Season Four, and everything ties in nicely.  Xander's decision to leave Sunnydale is handled in a poignant moment, as the reader can see Willow's disappointment that her best friend is leaving.  The Mayor continues to be a joy, even as a ghost.  I think I'd say this is one of the best short arcs or limited series of the Dark Horse run of Buffy.