Sarah Michelle Gellar fans everywhere were beyond stoked to learn that the queen would finally be returning to our screens via Paramount+’s Wolf Pack. The cherry on top was that the series would plant the Buffy the Vampire Slayer star back into her supernatural roots. After years away from taking on any sort of long-term live-action roles, many have wondered exactly what it took for Gellar to sink her teeth into the new series. According to an interview with Digital Spy, the actress said that at the end of the day, she was drawn to Wolf Pack because of its very real characters.

Gellar puts forth the example of the leading character Blake (Bella Shepard), a teenager who proudly stands front and center with acne. Taking one of the horrors of those teenage years and putting it on display for the world to see is something that Gellar says has never been done “on television like that” before. Just like the big bads of Buffy were metaphors for what high school-aged kids were dealing with in their lives, Gellar says the same rings true for Wolf Pack.

One of the star’s favorite issues tackled in the show is stress and anxiety, and how it affects not only teens but also adults. “Normalising anxiety, that was one of the themes that really struck me when I first read it,” Gellar says, adding that uncovering ways to “harness” and “manage [anxiety]” is the way to turn it into a “superpower.”

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Image via Paramount+

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For many of us queer kids who grew up during a time when on-screen LGBTQ+ representation was minimal, Buffy the Vampire Slayer made us feel seen through Buffy’s best friend and witchy nerd, Willow Rosenberg (Alyson Hannigan). For Gellar, Wolf Pack really pushed things forward with the introduction of main character Harlan (Tyler Lawrence Gray), who is an open and proud gay man, and, “the only real character that has, for quite some time, [had] a love interest.” She adds that his sexuality is not made into a plot point, as it’s just normalized from the jump. Throwing things back to Willow, Gellar says that the folks behind Buffy were forced to “fight to make Willow gay, and she wasn’t even the lead character.” All of this is to say that as if we weren’t thoroughly obsessed with Gellar before, we’re even more so now.

In Wolf Pack, Gellar stars as arson investigator Kristin Ramsey, who’s hot on the case of a forest fire that’s ripped apart a sleepy California town. The flames have also stirred a sinister creature living from its slumber while several local teenagers learn that there’s more linking them than their adolescent years.

The first episode of Wolf Pack is now streaming on Paramount+ with new episodes to follow weekly on Thursdays. Check out a trailer for the supernatural series below.