Her TV Obsession & Forgetting The End Of 'Buffy'

Jetlag isn’t so bad when you’ve been set up in a nice hotel and have Netflix to keep you company while you adjust to a different hemisphere. For actor, former Buffy star and TV enthusiast Emma Caulfield, that’s exactly how she spent her first day in Perth. She’s been binging on Tina Fey’s new hit, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and Vikings, and when she finally gets talking about The Walking Dead, her eyes light up. “The Walking Dead is my entire life,” Caulfield begins. “I would do anything to get on that show. There have only been a handful of shows that I’m so emotionally invested in that everything just shuts down. I don’t go out, I watch the East Coast feed live, I tweet it. It’s my everything.

But perhaps being cast for the show might spoil some of the magic. “When you’re in a show, there’s no mystery. I’ve had fun on shows, but you know everybody and all the mystery is dispelled, and it stops and starts with multiple takes, and you’re not shooting in order most of the time, so there’s no real fluidity.”

Although obsessed with new shows, if Caulfield went back and re-watched Buffy, she might have a whole new outlook on it. Despite watching as much TV as possible, she hasn’t watched Buffy since it wrapped up in 2003. “I’m not even kidding you, I’m having a hard time remembering how it ended. I know some things blew up,“ she laughs. “I don’t remember! I think it ended on a positive note. I’m the worst; I haven’t seen the show since it went off the air.

“We watched a lot of them at lunch, so I’m seen them all, but I’ve really only seen them that one time through and I don’t tend to want to re-watch anything I do. I watch it once and I either hate it or I’m like, ‘Yeah! I killed that,’ so I’m literally the worst. Fans will ask me questions and I honestly don’t remember. If you tell me that happened, then it probably did.”

The current focus on vampires, other supernatural elements and superheros on our screens apparently means all is well in world. “I swear I know this is a true thing – I definitely read it, but somebody smart said depending on where people are and how they feel about how the world is going; how the state of affairs are, is directly related to which is more popular out of zombies or vampires.

“Traditionally, zombies tend to be more popular when people are less trusting of the government, and more pessimistic or jaded. When people are feeling more optimistic, it tends to circle back and vampires and more supernatural/fantasy shows tend to be more popular. I think The Walking Dead is such a juggernaut that we don’t need to worry about that. I could literally spend the entire interview talking about The Walking Dead,” she laughs.

Constantly taking fan questions on Twitter and Instagram, following Caulfield on social media is almost like having a running commentary on current TV. She’s not one to shy away from the public spotlight on social media, but refuses to operate a public Facebook page. “Facebook was the one that was impossible to get around. I’ve tried a couple of times to run public Facebook pages and they were awful.

“In fact, people that I’m close with go, ‘Oh, I saw that thing you posted on Facebook,’ and I’m like, ‘You idiot, I’m not on Facebook! That picture came from my phone that I put on Instagram and then they copied it and put it up on Facebook as me.’ I do not have a public Facebook page. I just do not like Facebook; I’ve tried, but it feels a little bit too much like high school, and high school wasn’t always fun for me.”

You can catch Emma Caulfield at Oz Comic-Con in Perth (11 & 12 Apr) and Adelaide (18-19 Apr). Find everything you need to know right here.