#slayer fest

[smokebymoonlight]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Homecoming

[1998]

[megiddo-ichi]

[Now Live with Beat Slayer & Fate/Extra CCC]

Do you like fighting the establishment with good tunes? Then do I have an offer for you. Come on down while we try out a bit of beat slayer to start the stream.

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[cosplayinamerica]

Zohakuten of Hantengu from Demon Slayer Cosplayer: @aerospace.ace Photo: @jaecin_88 @gkcarter21 Convention: AnimeFest 2022 (Dallas, TX)

I was drawn to Zohakuten's design and since I generally lean towards the shorter characters when cosplaying, it was perfect. This cosplay was a chance to challenge myself with sewing his skirt and making his drums since it was only my second time working with EVA foam. Besides that, I love to cosplay characters that not many have cosplayed before. It makes me happy seeing reactions to characters I love that may not get as much recognition.

I learned quite a lot through this cosplay. It was pretty tedious but overall it was super fun to create and design everything. I'm most proud of how the skirt and drums turned out. Since he has no official coloring yet or have been cosplayed barely at all, I wanted to make the cosplay my own. I love the fabric I used for the skirt and even added details that aren't in his official design. I think it makes him look more extravegant and demon like versus how his manga design would look in real life. I think the biggest challenge was making the harness to wear the hoop of drums. Luckily I was able to figure it out but I was really crunching for time since I barely gad a week left until the convention.

At Anime Fest I expected maybe a few people to know my cosplay since he's only in the manga right now but I was honestly surprised with the response I got. Including those who didn't know the character but loved my cosplay! It really made me feel like all the work I put into it was worth it.

I was honestly surprised I won best prop in the cosplaycontest! That may be the perfectionist in me talking but when the judges said that the prop looked real I genuinely didn't think it was me! What was even more surprising was when an actual drummer (unconnected to the con) thought they were real as well! Winning best prop was one of the happiest moments I had at the con! I can't wait to enter more in the future!

Cosplay is like an escape from reality for me. With college and work, it's exhausting to live day to day only thinking about my future and studying. My motivation comes from the breaks I make to work on creating my cosplays and dressing as some of my favorite characters. I find a challenge in every costume and prop I make but it's more fun than anything. I've made amazing friends through this hobby and feel like I can really express myself.

[kenpiercemedia]

Slayer Adds One Final Date to its Summer Festival Itinerary

Slayer Adds One Final Date to its Summer Festival Itinerary

The Press Release: Last week, Slayer – Tom Araya, Kerry King, Gary Holt, and Paul Bostaph – announced that they plan to return to the concert stage for the first time since they concluded their Final World Tour in November 2019, to headline two summer festivals, Riot Fest and Louder Than Life. Today, the band announces they’ve added one last U.S. 2024 festival date, headlining the Aftershock…

[jamiemarsters]

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Pics of the Day: No love lost between James Marsters & Charisma Carpenter either... at @parisfanfestival back in April

@realjamesmarsters #JamesMarsters @charismacarpenter #CharismaCarpenter #ParisFanFest #NoLoveLost #CosItsRightThere #ClearAsDay #ParisLoveFest #ButInAPlatonicWay

[nikkitodd]

Comic-Cons: Building Cosplays & Communities

[thephotopitmagazine]

SLAYER ANNOUNCES THE ADDITION OF ONE FINAL SUMMER FESTIVAL DATE

SLAYER ANNOUNCES THE ADDITION OF ONE FINAL SUMMER FESTIVAL DATE   Last week, Slayer – Tom Araya, Kerry King, Gary Holt, and Paul Bostaph – announced that they plan to return to the concert stage for the first time since they concluded their Final World Tour in November 2019, to headline two summer festivals, Riot Fest and Louder Than Life. Today, the band announces they’ve added one last U.S.…

[iproteus]

Some photos from Friday at Colorado Anime Fest.

[filipmagnuswrites]

Steam Next Fest Had Some Great Games...And a Few Mediocre Ones | Darkest Dungeon 2, System Shock, Planet of Lana

Every time Steam sets up one of its Next Fests promises to be busy – and this latest one was no different. Join me as I do a quick run-down of the demos that left an impression on me one way or another–and if you’d like more content like this, don’t forget to let me know in the comments. A subscription would also mean a lot, but not getting one is okay, too! Let us let me tell you all about some…

[magneto666666]

The Perseus Titan Slayer Demo Did Not Impress - Steam Next Fest

[githvyrik]

one time my friend made (I think) a joke like “why does it feel like everything is building up to [his wizard pc] vs [my monk pc]” and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it

[mysticdragon3md3]

[megiddo-ichi]

Beat Slayer Demo - Stream Announcement

Today, Batheads, is something a little different.

After being reached out to by ByteRockers, we get to talk about the demo for the upcoming rhythm roguelike Beat Slayer. A Hades meets necrodancer affair.

Tonight at 6PM CST.

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[buffythecomicslayer]

In an exclusive interview, Amber Benson, James Marsters, and Charisma Carpenter dove into the new Audible original Slayers: A Buffyverse Story, which debuts on October 12. Due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, they could not speak on their experiences on Buffy, Angel, or any other struck work.

Slayers is co-written by Amber Benson, who portrayed Tara in Buffy, and Christopher Golden, who has penned multiple books in the Buffyverse. Before the COVID pandemic, Benson began calling her former costars to see who might want to be involved, focusing on the characters she felt weren’t serviced enough in the original show. She also wanted to find a way to highlight what it means to be a slayer who is also a woman of color.

Amber, why did you want to do this now?

Amber Benson: The reason I got excited about doing Slayers was because I wanted to see Charisma be a vampire slayer. I want to live in the meta world where Charisma Carpenter is Cordelia, the Vampire Slayer. That was the pull for me. We spent a ton of time trying to create satisfying arcs for all of these characters that we love so much. It’s been a labor of love. For me, doing this was about diving into a world where I get to have some control over things.

Why set it in 2013 instead of 2023?

Benson: We wanted a passage of time so there was an entrenched world where slayers existed in our world and they were everywhere — especially because we have Laya who takes audiences through this mythology. She’s like a fangirl of vampire slaying, and is on the Reddit forums. We didn’t want it so entrenched that we were so far removed from other times. We wanted that sweet spot of the world knows about this stuff, but it’s not an old hat.

What was it like getting back in the room to record with everyone?

James Marsters: We love each other so much that it was absolutely fabulous. I was just able to watch Charisma step into this role and have it make complete sense. It is so far from the Charisma that we started with years ago. It couldn’t be further, and yet, it makes absolute sense. Just her as an actor, being able to give a strong, loving, slightly world-weary, wise perspective to it, this absolutely seems like what Cordelia would be like in 2013. And I loved watching Amber take her character in a completely new direction. It absolutely makes sense, but it couldn’t be further from the Tara that we started with. And I was in awe of Juliet Landau.

And then Seth Green showed up! He’s not even in it, but he was recording something else in another booth at the building, and he heard we were in there. He comes in, and the whole thing stops. We didn’t do any work for 45 minutes because we’ve just gotta love on Seth. It was a complete love fest the whole time. We’re all in a really good place. All of our lives are going really well, so we could brag about how well we’re doing. Plus, meeting Laya DeLeon Hayes, having her fold into our family — and she’s the most experienced voice actor of all of us!

The last time you played Spike was in 2004. How did feel stepping back into it?

Marsters: I had told the producers way back when: “I’ve been doing Spike for about seven years, and if you want me to do the character, you’ve got about seven more years. I think we can get away with it for a 14-year window.” Spike is a vampire, he ain’t aging, but James is! Seven years came and went; it hadn’t happened, and I put it in the rear-view mirror. Then Amber calls me! And it was perfect.

Tara was a very important character on TV, and it was really devastating how that arc ended. Amber, can you hint at what she’s like now in this alternate universe?

Benson: She’s a very kind-hearted character, and we wanted to give her some meat. So we found a way, without spoiling anything, to give her something to sink her teeth into. We also wanted to keep the goodness of her, and it’s still in there, but we go to some darker places. And selfishly, as an actor, I wanted to work with Charisma, to do more with James, to spend time with Juliet. I have a lot of fun stuff with Juliet!

Charisma, you’ve been very vocal about your experience on Buffy. What was your reaction to getting the ask to come back into this world and bring Cordelia back? Were you hesitant at all?

Charisma Carpenter: When I got a call from Amber in 2020, I said, “You know, my friend, I would follow you anywhere. Of course, I want to be a part of it.” I didn’t know where it would end up, or certainly what medium it would be in, but it wouldn’t matter. I would just do it because I trust her vision. I trust her and I respect her talent as a writer and creator and I just love her to pieces.

How did it feel for you to be able to give Cordelia this entirely new life?

Carpenter: I think I felt a bit lost. Because the description of Cordelia and the scenes were the world-weary, kind of doom and gloom. I’m kind of saddled with this young player that’s super excited. How do I play this embattled slayer, who’s living their purpose and sees it really as the burden that it is — taking on the big bad — and infusing that with the Cordelia from before, which is sassy and witty and pithy and all those superficial things? How do I balance them? So for me, it was such an interesting dilemma to figure out. I spent a lot of time with Christopher and Amber, stressed, going, “I don’t know what I’m doing.” I didn’t think it was possible to bring more layers to Cordelia, because I feel like she went through so much in terms of her character arc from beginning to end.

Marsters: It’s so funny because, from my perspective, you came in and effortlessly did this. It didn’t seem to be a struggle at all!

When this was announced, many referred to it as a Spike-focused series because he’s the narrator, but this universe has always been so about female empowerment. Do you guys see it that way?

Marsters: I saw that, and was like, “Oh, didn’t clock that before. I don’t think so, but OK! It’s called Slayers!”

Benson: And he came up with that name!

Marsters: Yeah, first we thought of Spike and Dru, but reading the script, that wasn’t really the thing. We have two new slayers that we haven’t had before: Cordelia and Indira. We’ve been promising the audience there’s a new slayer for a new generation. Every generation has one. We never made good on that promise. So, you had to wait — now you get two.

Benson: I think it’s a multi-pronged narrative. We have amazing Spike stuff. And he is the narrator and he takes us through this and has so many amazing arcs and relationships. The Juliet/James combo is electrifying.

Marsters: Spike is a great character, but he doesn’t encapsulate the theme. I’m in the project a lot, but what are you going to call it, Spike, the Vampire, Slayer of Vampires? It’s not the same thing. It is much more exciting to keep it focused, as it always has been, on a woman who is overcoming the challenges of life, and using a vampire demon metaphor to talk about those challenges. That’s one of the big strengths of the project since the beginning. I was glad with all the changes, all the updates and all of the surprises that we’re offering, that that kernel is kept. I would never want to get away from that.

Benson: Charisma, you should also talk about this because the “Justice for Cordelia” aspect is very important.

Charisma, please! Let’s hear it!

Carpenter: One of the most important things to me about Slayers is that it is an opportunity to give the Buffyverse fandom permission to enjoy the show, enjoy these characters again in a way that is representative of perseverance, of work ethic, of the familiar. It has really been made clear to me how much entertainment in general and the previous show and what this future show will do to provide comfort, empowerment, self-belief and reminders of our purpose. I think it will be an opportunity to give credit and justice to Tara, to Anya, to Cordelia. Because that show involved hundreds of people to make, and it wasn’t about just one person. So I feel like it’s really a beautiful thing to have this opportunity to bring her back to life — Cordelia specifically — and have her live out a very empowering life, and share her wisdom from that battle. I just feel like it’s very poetic in a lot of ways.

Spike is a bit of a controversial character, especially through the 2023 lens. Amber, how did you come to the decision to have him narrate?

Benson: No. 1, it’s always important to separate the actor from the character. And I know that James has spoken about this. He is one of the best humans, I adore James. But yeah, there is problematic stuff with the character, especially around consent. We really wanted to do something different and not live in the past. So for us, it was sort of a reinvention of the Spike character. We wanted to see more of that human and empathetic version of Spike. That was really important to us — the more James-version of Spike. He still has all the Spike bells and whistles. He’s still sexy as hell. But we also wanted to see that humanity and I think that was one of the reasons James Leary is such a big part of this. There is a humanity. James really wanted to make sure we still kept him Spike, but we updated for 2023.

Again, I know you can’t talk about the past projects here, but many of these characters weren’t there at the end — specifically Cordelia, who’d died in Angel. Are you ignoring the events of Angel completely?

Benson: We really created Slayers away from everything else. We wanted to create a world that felt familiar, but also was different — because I think putting your own stamp on something is really important. I think that’s what Chris and I wanted to do — find a way to do the things that we thought were important, some of those righting of wrongs things. That was important for us. We weren’t really looking at other versions of these worlds to draw from it really was. We tried to keep it its own unique thing.

Well, it is based on characters previously created. Was it a struggle to get permission to take ownership of these characters?

Benson: We can’t really talk about this stuff because of the strike and because also, sometimes, the creation is the creation, and the creators are totally removed. And for me, just personally, I will say this, I always had trouble going to conventions and not being honest about certain situations. And now that all of that is sort of grist for the mill, I feel this relief that I can love this world and these characters and have a little bit of a little tiny, tiny piece of ownership in them. I love this world, I love the family I have because of it. I love the fans I have in my life. A show is not always just the person that came up with a show. A show is a collaboration for us on Slayers.

Speaking broadly about ownership of creative material, it really is a collaborative media. It’s not one person. The auteur theory does not apply here. It takes a village.

Marsters: The genetic material is there because Amber breathed it. She is a fabulous writer, and Christopher Golden has been writing books in the Buffyverse for years. So it’s kind of a seamless continuum. It’s not just like a bunch of people who don’t know much about the lore or don’t care about it. There are people who’ve been involved from the beginning, in the driver’s seat.

Were there other characters or actors you wanted to bring back?

Benson: For us, the important thing is to do service to characters that maybe didn’t get the right servicing in other versions. So we really focused on that. That was really important for us.

Well, Seth Green popped in! Were there ever any talks of bringing him on?

Benson: We were talking about it, but we had such a full slate of characters that once we looked at it, we were like we can’t service everybody if you have too many characters. It was really important for us to make sure everybody had a satisfying arc. If we do multiple seasons, then we can bring in other people and give them new things to do. Seth is definitely on our list. Clare Kramer too, we would love to have Glory come and play. There’s just so many amazing characters to bring in.

Do you see this going for multiple seasons?

Benson: I would love to do more seasons. Emma Caulfield was like, “When do we do the next one?” We really would love to do more. We love the team at Audible and Audible UK. They’re all fans. They all love this world. So we would love to jump back in and do more. It’s really up to the fans!

[kenpiercemedia]

Slayer Announces Their Return to the Concert Stage

The Press Release: For the first time since the band wrapped the last concert of its Final World Tour back in November 2019, Slayer – Tom Araya/ bass & vocals, guitarists Kerry King and Gary Holt, and Paul Bostaph on drums – announce they will return to the stage this fall, headlining two major festivals, Riot Fest and Louder Than Life. Continue reading Slayer Announces Their Return to the…

[jamiemarsters]

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Pics of the Day: James Marsters & Amber Benson not enjoying each others company... *at* *all* .... at @fandomfestny in August last year

@realjamesmarsters #JamesMarsters @rebma_nosneb #AmberBenson #FandomFestNY #WhyCantTheyJustGetAlong #Giggles