In May 1999, Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans were waiting anxiously for its big season 3 finale when it was dramatically pulled from TV at the last minute.
The fantasy drama series began in 1997 on the US channel The WB and quickly became one of the most popular TV shows for teenagers and young adults. Its popularity has stood the test of time, too, with a reboot now in the works.
It followed high school student Buffy Summers (Sarah Michelle Gellar), a ‘slayer’ who was tasked with protecting the citizens of Sunnydale from dark supernatural forces while balancing her studies.
By the end of season 3, Buffy and her friends Xander (Nicholas Brendon) and Willow (Alyson Hannigan) had completed their final year of high school and were ready to graduate.
However, their plans for final year are disrupted by The Mayor (Harry Groener), Sunnydale’s initially unassuming mayor who has secretly been enabling the town’s evil supernatural phenomena all along.
Things come to a head when the Mayor plans to unveil his demon form—a giant serpent—and unleash evil on graduation day at Sunnydale High School during his keynote speech.
Part one of Graduation Day, the 22nd episode of season three, had already been broadcast on May 18 to more than five million people, with the exciting conclusion set for broadcast a week later on May 25.
The WB’s plans started to change a month earlier, on April 20, 1999, when 17-year-old Dylan Klebold and 18-year-old Eric Harris perpetrated the Columbine High School massacre.
Using high-powered rifles and homemade explosives, Klebold and Harris killed 13 students at the Colorado school, injuring 23 others, before turning their guns on themselves.
The emotional, political, and cultural impact of Columbine was wide-reaching, with the United States in a state of shocked mourning for weeks afterwards.
Its impact is still felt today and is referred to as ‘the Columbine effect’.
During Graduation Day Part Two, Buffy arms Sunnydale’s students with weapons (including guns and flamethrowers) to defeat The Mayor, with the school eventually being blown up to destroy his demon form.
Naturally, The WB was nervous about broadcasting an episode that depicted a full-scale battle on school grounds so soon after Columbine and pulled the episode just two hours before its premiere.
An older episode of Buffy was broadcast instead—the decision was mocked by comedy skits on The Daily Show, with host Jon Stewart suggesting a new title for Buffy: The Vampire Inconveniencer.
Buffy actor Seth Green questioned the decision, saying: ‘It would have seemed really callous and inappropriate. But the actual episode has nothing to do with school violence. It’s a red herring in the story.
‘The simple fact is, this is a topical issue. It’s a growing problem, and Colorado isn’t the only place it’s happened. We just don’t want to think these things happen, but they happen all the time.’
TV broadcasts changed after tragic events
Heathers (2018) The Heathers reboot series, inspired by the 1988 film starring Winona Ryder, got off to a rocky start in 2018 when it was pulled off the air not once but twice as a result of a mass shooting. Two episodes were pulled from TV schedules after 11 people were killed in a shooting at a synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA.
Mr Robot (2015) Rami Malek series Mr Robot had its season one finale, titled Zero Day, postponed for a week after news reporter Alison Parker and her camera operator Adam Ward were both shot dead in Moneta, VA. The Mr Robot episode featured a character taking their own life on live TV.
Friends (2001) Friends had to completely change Monica and Chandler’s honeymoon after the 9/11 attacks in New York. Their story originally saw Chandler questioned by authorities after joking that he’d brought a bomb into an airport. This was replaced by the storyline in which Monica and Chandler find themselves falling foul of a lucky couple also on their honeymoon.
FBI (2022) Cop drama FBI had one of its major episodes urgently pulled from TV schedules after a school shooting in Texas. 21 people, many of whom were children aged between nine and 11, were killed in the small city of Uvalde. FBI was to feature a fictional school shooting in its season four finale, which was postponed.
Active Shooter (2017) An episode of the eight-part 2017 documentary series Active Shooter: America Under Fire was pulled from TV after the Route 91 Harvest shooting in Las Vegas. 60 people were killed, making it the deadliest mass shooting by a lone gunman in US history. FBI episodes continued as normal a week later.
A WB spokesperson added: ‘Although financially we’d have every reason to run the episode, we think the timing is bad. We want everyone who’ll be out wearing caps and gowns to remain safe.’
Graduation Day Part 2 was eventually broadcast on this weekend in July 1999, two months later, and is regarded as one of the strongest episodes of the entire Buffy series.
The season 3 finale wasn’t the first Buffy episode to be affected by Columbine, however, with season 3’s Earshot only broadcast in September 1999 after originally being slated for an April release.
In Earshot, Buffy—briefly given the gift and curse of telepathy—begins hearing the thoughts of others and has to track down somebody who is planning to kill students at Sunnydale.
Eventually, the prospective killer is found while assembling a rifle in a clock tower, although it is later revealed that he was only intending to shoot himself rather than any students.
Watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Disney Plus.
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