Joss Music

It may be April, where people are recovering from March Madness and are now looking forward to baseball.
However, some are already making plans for this year's Comic-Con in San Diego. As we have seen with the four-day tickets already selling out, and concerns abut getting hotel rooms, it's never too early to plan.

Some are also hoping that another screening of the classic Buffy musical episode, "Once More With Feeling," will close this year's event, just like last year. Whedonopolis, and the WB.com, sponsored the OMWF screening that ended this year's Wondercon last month. Hundreds of people packed the Esplanade ballroom at the Moscone Center in San Francisco to sing along to "I'm Under Your Spell", "Rest in Peace" to "Something to Sing About", among others. Attendees also were lucky enough to get buttons, monster finger puppets and fake Sunnydale parking tickets (in honor of Marni Noxon trying to sing her way out of a ticket). The ballroom was close to full as people finished their Wondercon experience with this show. Even those who participated for the first time kept up, thanks to the lyrics being shown on screen. It was a bright moment for many who attended, especially after a cloudy weekend.

Last year's showing of OMWF at Comic-Con was the first official sing-a-long after Fox suspended previous public showings because of concerns about royalties. Now, it looks like the episode is becoming the traditional closing event to both Comic-Con and Wondercon. It's not confirmed if the episode will be shown again at Comic-Con this year, but we will keep you posted.

Of course, Joss followed up that classic episode with Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog, which could become even more popular. Its first big-screen showing at Comic-Con last year was so successful they needed a couple of extra rooms to fit in all the fans. There will also be a panel on this show at the Paley Festival later this month, a first for any internet media production. There's even going to be a high school musical version in Dayton, Ohio. The difference, of course, is that Joss has control of Dr. Horrible, while Fox officials decide whether to allow OMWF screenings. Otherwise, we'd have just as many OMWF versions at some high school and maybe a prep school or two.

I'm hoping that eventually, we'll get the ultimate doubleheader of OMWF and Dr. Horrible. Aside from it being entertaining, it would be an interesting comparison between the two musicals. OMWF is structured just like those MGM musicals of the past, aside from the fact that some demon is killing people by having them sing and dance to their deaths. With Dr. H, it's more like a comic book set to music. For one thing, instead of "crazy dancing" that we get in Sunnydale, we have one short dance between Dr. H and Penny, hands swaying while Captain Hammer signs his version of "We Are The World", and Dr. H as Godzilla eying the Captain as his own little Bambi, ready to stomp on. That would top last year's OMWF return at Comic-Con. Maybe we'll get that someday.