OK, so she may not be joining those crime-fighting kindergartners of Townsville, but The WB's quippy Vampire Slayer is gearing up to take on 'toon form. "We're in the early stages of a Buffy animated series," Slayer scribe David Fury tells us. "We're just trying to get all the people lined up and get the studio behind it. It's coming together, but it's a hard process to get any project together. We're just waiting for people to say, 'OK, go.'"

The inimitable Fury, supervising producer on the live action show (he penned such stellar episodes as "Helpless," "Fear, Itself," and this season's "Real Me"), briefly mentioned the possibility of an animated series in a Fandom online chat a few months ago.

While chattin' it up with me via phone today, he elaborated on the actual concept for the show. "The animated series would take place in the early years of Buffy -- back to high school," he says. "The premise is, it's all the episodes you didn't see that took place back when Oz was around, and Angel and Cordelia [were] there. So it could easily co-exist with the [live action] show, where the show [has evolved to] now. It would just be those episodes you never saw. We get to revisit that whole world."

And rest assured, Buffy Buffs, that should the show become a reality, the 'toon Scoobies will be as quick with the one-liners as their live action counterparts. "The writers of Buffy hope to be writing many of the animated scripts," Fury says. "And we will be available to do so, should the [Hollywood writers] strike happen in May." He adds that it's a "very likely thing" that the show's actors will lend their voices to the 'toon version.

The animated Buffy would have at least one advantage over the real deal: no pesky budgetary restrictions. "The sky's the limit for effects or creatures or anything else we want to do, because it's animation!" says Fury, gleefully. In other words: monsters everywhere!

And, because he just can't resist throwing in a little suspicious-sounding Fury-centric tidbit (after all, this is the man who's known for stopping by the Buffy posting board bearing shady spoilers), Mr. Fury adds one last thing. "By the way, I'll be doing some of the voices on [the cartoon]...or all the voices! I'll be doing the voice of Buffy."

Uh, yes...that's exactly what the fans are crying out for.

"Well, I certainly hope so," he laughs. "Or just crying."