Sarah Michelle Gellar and David Boreanaz reunited on the Emmys stage on Monday, September 14, in what was reported as their first joint public appearance in nine years.
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I’ve loved Buffy The Vampire Slayer since I was 12 years old, so this felt like such a special thing to happen.
The former Buffy the Vampire Slayer co-stars, who played Buffy Summers and the vampire-with-a-soul Angel, presented the award for outstanding lead actor in a limited or anthology series or movie, which went to Matthew Rhys for The Beast in Me.
Before they got to the envelope, the pair leaned straight back into their old on-screen romance for a bit.
Boreanaz recapped Buffy’s premise, calling her “a teenage girl chosen by fate to fight vampires, demons, forces of darkness” who “falls in love with a vampire with a soul, carrying around a couple 100 years of regret”.
Gellar noted her character’s love interest was “241 years old”, joking it was “more like a May-December 1787 romance”.
Then Boreanaz turned earnest for a second. “I always thought that Buffy and Angel were endgame,” he said.
“Well, I guess we won’t find out,” Gellar replied.
It was a pointed line. Hulu quietly cancelled Buffy: New Sunnydale, the planned reboot that would have seen Gellar’s Buffy training a new generation of slayers, before a single episode aired. Gellar has previously said the project fell over under an executive who was “not only not a fan of the original, but was proud to constantly remind us that he had never seen the entirety of the series”.
The reunion wasn’t all jokes, though.
“David and I would like to acknowledge that it has been a tough two years for our beloved cast and crew,” Gellar said, turning the moment into a tribute.
Buffy has lost three of its own since 2025. Michelle Trachtenberg, who played Buffy’s sister Dawn, died in February 2025 aged 39. Nicholas Brendon, who played Xander Harris, died in March 2026 aged 54; his family said he passed away in his sleep of natural causes. Anthony Head, who played Watcher Rupert Giles, died in June 2026 aged 72; his daughters said he passed away due to complications from pneumonia.
It’s the kind of loss that would have been unthinkable to the cast during the show’s original run, when Buffy was, famously, all but ignored by the Emmys despite the acclaim it built over seven seasons and a devoted fanbase that has only grown since. A reunion on the Emmys stage, even nearly a quarter of a century later, landed as a small piece of the recognition the show rarely got at the time.
On the red carpet beforehand, Gellar wore a hot pink backless gown to Boreanaz’s classic suit, and the pair posed for photos together ahead of the ceremony. When a photographer asked for a kiss, Gellar laughed it off: “I don’t think his wife will appreciate that.”
Boreanaz has been married to Jaime Bergman since 2001.
Nine years after their last joint appearance, and with a reboot that never made it to air, it turns out the hardest thing in the world for Buffy and Angel is just to live in it.
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