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Storylines

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Fray

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Melaka Fray lives in the 23rd century in the ruins of Manhattan, which has become a slum known as Haddyn.[1][note 1] The world is heavily polluted, and the Sun's radiation has mutated a portion of the population and their descendants, who are called "radies".[3] People believe that vampires are a different type of these mutants, referring to them as "lurks".[4] Melaka grew up in a poor area of Haddyn with her twin brother Harth and her older sister Erin. She recognized as a teenager that she had supernatural strength, but did not question it. Due to her family's poverty, she often stole food; when she was fourteen, she took Harth along for one of these robberies, in which he was seemingly killed by the vampire Icarus. Erin blamed Melaka for Harth's death, and the two sisters became distant. While Erin became a police officer, Melaka continued to be involved with crime.[5]

By the age of nineteen, Melaka has become a professional thief who works for the radie Gunther; she frequently uses a raygun. She also looks after a young radie girl named Loo.[5] The demon Urkonn of the D’Avvrus informs Melaka that she is part of a line of Slayers—young women destined to fight the forces of darkness.[5][6] A Slayer possesses supernatural strength, speed, stamina, and agility, as well as accelerated healing and prophetic dreams.[7][8] He tells her about vampires and how in the 21st century, a Slayer and her allies had banished all demons and magic from the Earth's dimension.[5][note 2] Melaka was previously approached by a Watcher, who had immolated himself; although Watchers were meant to guide Slayers, they had become insane zealots by the 23rd century. Since Melaka never had prophetic dreams, she initially does not believe that she is a Slayer, but after encountering vampires while on a job for Gunther, she agrees to be trained by Urkonn.[5]

When confronted by Icarus, Melaka is too afraid to fight, but is saved by Urkonn. She attempts to learn Icarus' whereabouts from Gunther, but he sets her up to be arrested. Vampires ambush the police, kidnapping Melaka and taking her to their leader, Harth. As Melaka's twin, Harth had inherited her prophetic dreams instead. To survive being bitten by Icarus, he ingested the vampire's blood to turn into one. He used his instinctive knowledge to become the vampires' master. Harth reveals to Melaka his obsession with her and his plan to open a gateway to bring back the Old Ones. After escaping, Melaka talks about everything with Erin, who refuses to believe her. Melaka finds out that Loo was killed, which motivates her to wage war against the vampires.[5]

Urkonn gives Melaka the scythe—an ancient Slayer weapon—to aid her in her upcoming battles. Despite an unsuccessful attempt to rally her community to take action, Melaka grows more confident in herself as a Slayer and hunts down vampires. This attracts Icarus' attention, but before the two can face off, Erin kills him by crashing her flying car on top of him. Melaka and her community, along with Erin and several police officers, battle an army of vampires. While this is occurring, Harth resurrects an Old One whose womb is an dimensional portal, but Melaka defeats her. He kisses Melaka before escaping. Following this, Melaka tells Urkonn that she knows he pushed her to fight by murdering Loo; she then kills him, doing so quickly as she had considered him a friend. Melaka returns to her work as a thief, while also protecting others from vampires as the Slayer.[5]

Other appearances

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During a job for Gunther, Melaka encounters a demonic spider monkey, who leads to her to an abandoned apartment with a library that has Watchers' diaries. By reading them, she feels less alone and more connected to past Slayers.[9] She moves into the apartment with the monkey, who she calls Gates. Melaka and Erin work together to locate Harth, learning that he has teamed up with a madwoman. While checking out this lead, Melaka meets Buffy Summers, a Slayer from the 21st century. The two fight until Buffy convinces her that they are allies. Buffy had traveled forward in time to investigate a temporal anomaly.[10]

Melaka and Fray gather information from Gunther and look into reports of vampires in the exclusive, wealthier areas of Haddyn. They disagree on whether to intervene in a vampire attack. Melaka wants to fight, while Buffy recalls Gunther's intel about Harth organizing groups of vampires and suggests tracking their movements. After separating from Buffy to slay the vampires, Melaka meets the madwoman, who is the future version of Buffy's best friend, the witch Willow Rosenberg. Willow convinces Melaka to prevent Buffy from returning to her time, saying this would change the timeline and erase Melaka's reality. Buffy escapes through a temporal rift after being forced to kill Willow. Melaka and Erin realize that despite this, their world remains intact.[10]

Harth travels to the 21st century and organizes an army of demons. Buffy and her allies attempt to stop him, but when they are overwhelmed, they go to the future to recruit Melaka and Erin to join the battle. Willow casts a spell to provide Buffy with the collective power of all active Slayers, which Harth intercepts and takes for himself. His body breaks down from the strain of this energy, and Buffy kills him. With Harth's death, Melaka receives the memories of past Slayers. She returns to the 23rd century with Erin and finds it has improved dramatically. Gunther no longer recognizes Melaka, and a group of Slayers say that they have read about her in the Watchers' diaries. One of them tells her that she can find a home and a family in this future.[11]

Development

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Creation and design

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= An photograph of Joss Whedon
A photograph of Karl Moline
Melaka Fray was created by Joss Whedon (pictured in 2015) and Karl Moline (pictured in 2012)

Melaka Fray first appears in Fray #1 (2001), a limited series published by Dark Horse Comics.[12] Part of a shared universe with the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer,[13] the character was developed by Buffy's creator Joss Whedon and artist Karl Moline.[14] Prior to Fray, Dark Horse Comics had published Buffy the Vampire Slayer comics without involvement from Whedon or the show's other writers.[15][note 3] As Whedon was developing Buffy's spinoff series Angel, he offered to write a tie-in comic for Dark Horse Comics; editor Scott Allie worked with him on ideas.[15] Whedon considered writing about a different Slayer–Faith–but he did not want to interfere with her storylines on Angel, opting instead for a new character.[4][18] He established Melaka as from the future to keep her distinct from Buffy and related projects.[19]

Whedon had a single demand for Dark Horse Comic–that there would be "no cheesecake, no giant silicone hooters, [and] no standing with her butt out in that bizarrely uncomfortable soft-core pose" with Melaka's character design.[20] While promoting Fray in 2001, he discussed giving up 1990s comics, feeling that superhero comics oversexualized its female characters and were made to indulge "adolescent power fantasies".[4] Whedon instead wanted Melaka to be a "real girl, with real posture, a slight figure", and a "distinctive face".[20] Whedon worked closely with Moline, who described the process as a "back and forth, collaborative effort". According to Moline, Whedon pictured Melaka as "both beautiful and modestly built" and as "more of an athlete than a supermodel, as most comic heroines tend to be".[21] In early concept art, Moline modeled Melaka after Natalie Portman's appearance in the film Léon: The Professional (1994).[5] While working on Fray, Whedon and Moline were still relatively new in the comic book industry.[22][note 4] Moline became well-known for his art for Fray, and in 2011, he said that she was the character that people requested the most for a sketch.[21]

Moline drew Melaka for the entirety of her limited series and for her subsequent appearances in the anthology comic Tales of the Slayers and Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight.[24][25] Writer Ryan P. Donovan felt that for Season Eight, Moline adopted a similar style as Georges Jeanty—the principal artist of the series—for the "character designs and action sequences".[24] Whedon and Allie had planned for Melaka's return for Season Eight during early stages of development, working on her story arc prior to the sale of the comic's first issue.[14] Melaka was drawn by Jeanty for Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Twelve,[26] and Moline included her on his variant cover for the first issue.[27] Christos Gage, one of the main writers for Season Twelve,[26] said that Whedon wanted a happy ending for Melaka;[28] Gage believed that Whedon "wanted to present a future that was hopeful", especially "as our world gets more dystopian".[28][note 5] According to Allie, Dark Horse Comics would use Melaka only if Whedon wrote her.[30] In separate interviews, Whedon and Allie said that there were no plans for a movie, ongoing comic book, or a television show about Melaka.[31]

Characterization and relationships

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Melaka is initially characterized as a criminal, who is street smart and rebellious,[19][32] but throughout Fray, this is shown to be her way of protecting herself in the bleakness of her world.[32] She uses crime as a way to survive and accepts her life as hard but ordinary.[22][33] Over the course of her series, Melaka is portrayed as kind, compassionate, and willing to help others;[32][34] these characteristics are presented as unusual in her world and something that makes her stand apart.[34] Whedon described Melaka as “hard, defensive, vulnerable, goofy, and yes, wicked sexy” and identified her as a "cool girl hero".[5] He said that he enjoyed writing female characters like Melaka, who he called "hard-edged but heroic", because he was drawn to "the people nobody takes seriously, having been one the greater part of my life".[19]

Melaka has a similar sense of humor and type of slang as other characters created by Whedon,[13][35] although she has a unique speaking style.[14] Her work as a thief for a crime boss is reminiscent of Whedon's television series Firefly,[22] about a renegade crew of the starship Serenity do odd jobs to survive.[36] Melaka is like Buffy, in that they both have loved ones who are vampires,[37][note 6] but they also have their differences.[39][32] Melaka's focus is on saving individuals; while Buffy used to be like this, she becomes more concerned about bigger picture issues by Season Eight.[39] Unlike Buffy, Melaka wears pants rather than dresses and heels,[32] preferring function over style.[13] Melaka is instead drawn in boots and baggy pants and with a nose piercing, hoop earrings, dark lipstick and nail polish, and black hair with magenta highlights.[34] Melaka has more similarities with Faith,[40][41] sharing a confidence in themselves and their skills as well as a self-hatred.[40] As opposed to Faith, Melaka is shown as feeling more guilt for her actions and a responsibility toward protecting others in her community.[40]

Melaka starts her series alone and disconnected from her family and from past Slayers.[42] Her issues with her siblings are prominent storylines throughout Fray.[14] Melaka and her sister Erin have different ways of handling their world,[18] and are portrayed as opposites: as the good girl and the bad girl and as the criminal and the cop.[14][43] Estranged from her biological family, Melaka creates a community of her own, being especially protective of Loo.[44] She trusts Urkonn, who trains her in a similar fashion to a traditional Watcher, and views him as a friend.[45] At the end of Fray, Melaka begins working on her relationship with Erin, and they are shown to be closer by Season Eight.[14][46] She also finds a way to connect with past Slayers in Tales of the Slayers through reading Watchers' diaries.[47]

Themes and analysis

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Notes

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  1. ^ Whedon said that Haddyn is a shortened form of Manhattan and that this type of language was commonly used in this world, explaining "everything’s sort of shortened".[2]
  2. ^ Urkonn describes himself as not being from Melaka's reality.[5]
  3. ^ Fray is consider a part of the Buffyverse canon, while earlier Buffy comics, with the exception of The Origin, are not.[16] Joss Whedon defined canon as a "demarcation between the creation and ancillary creations by different people".[17]
  4. ^ Fray was Whedon's first time writing a comic,[19] and Moline had started as a penciller in 1995.[23]
  5. ^ SlayAlive is a fansite and Internet forum with interviews from those involved with the Buffy the Vampire Slayer comics published by Dark Horse Comics, such as Scott Allie and comics artist Georges Jeanty.[29]
  6. ^ Buffy has had romantic and sexual relationship with vampires Angel and Spike,[38] while Fray finds out that her brother Harth had been turned into a vampire.[37].

References

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Footnotes

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  1. ^ Ash 2011, p. 19; Dark Horse Comics A; Frankel 2015b, p. 163; Haist 2021, p. 99
  2. ^ Ash 2011, p. 19.
  3. ^ Elder 2001, p. 3; Frankel 2015a, p. 165; PopMatters 2011
  4. ^ a b c Elder 2001, p. 3.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Fray 2003.
  6. ^ Cocca 2016, p. 158.
  7. ^ Frankel 2014, p. 155.
  8. ^ Pateman 2006, p. 198.
  9. ^ "Tales" 2002.
  10. ^ a b "Time of Your Life" 2008.
  11. ^ "The Reckoning" 2018.
  12. ^ Radford 2001, p. 2.
  13. ^ a b c Thompson 2011.
  14. ^ a b c d e f Furey 2008.
  15. ^ a b Pascale 2014, p. 279.
  16. ^ Dowell 2016.
  17. ^ Whedon 2007.
  18. ^ a b Ash 2011, p. 18.
  19. ^ a b c d Price 2001.
  20. ^ a b Sterba 2016, p. 110.
  21. ^ a b Manning 2011.
  22. ^ a b c Pascale 2014, p. 280.
  23. ^ Comic Book Resources 2001.
  24. ^ a b Donovan 2013, p. 153.
  25. ^ Ash 2011, p. 21.
  26. ^ a b Dark Horse Comics C.
  27. ^ Dark Horse Comics B.
  28. ^ a b Gage 2018.
  29. ^ Wenxina 2011.
  30. ^ Allie 2011.
  31. ^ Allie 2011; Ash 2011, p. 20; Elder 2001, p. 3
  32. ^ a b c d e Clayton 2010, p. 28.
  33. ^ Koontz 2008, p. 57.
  34. ^ a b c Frankel 2015a, p. 166.
  35. ^ Haist 2021, p. 94.
  36. ^ Rotten Tomatoes.
  37. ^ a b Frankel 2014, p. 195.
  38. ^ Burnett 2010, pp. 121–126.
  39. ^ a b Frankel 2014, p. 196.
  40. ^ a b c Kaveney 2007, p. 221.
  41. ^ Frankel 2014, pp. 195–196.
  42. ^ Frankel 2015a, p. 165; Key 2015, pp. 88–89; Koontz 2008, p. 59
  43. ^ Frankel 2015a.
  44. ^ Koontz 2008, p. 59.
  45. ^ Koontz 2008, pp. 61, 63.
  46. ^ Koontz 2008, p. 63.
  47. ^ Key 2015, pp. 88–89.

Citations

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