I am – Hercules!!

Activity over the hellmouth! The post-Warren Willow! How much we’ll be seeing of Giles! Dawn stands taller still! Doublemeat Palace scares sponsors! The size of Marsters’ sock! A yellow crayon makes a cast member cry! And what series creator Joss Whedon means when he refers to “Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s” seventh season as “Buffy: Year One.”

(Alyson Hannigan’s “No Emmys ever” line emerges out of the fact that the the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS) is comprised of the folks who vote for the Emmys.)

A correspondant we will call “Richard” (until he tells us differently):

I had the pleasure of attending “Behind the Scenes of BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER” at the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences earlier tonight, where Joss Whedon, Marti Noxon, Alyson Hannigan, Nicholas Brendon, James Marsters, Michelle Trachtenberg, Cary Meyer and Raymond Stella spoke about the best series on television.

The big scoop is that next season will begin with the re- opening of Sunnydale High. Other news about season seven was that Joss has promised Michelle that Dawn will, occasionally, be allowed to wear heels and black; there will be repercussions from Willow’s killing Warren but she won’t be weepy and plagued with guilt all season, and that the theme of the season will be a restatement of the theme from the first season – the joys of female empowerment.

And Joss says he hopes to be able to use Anthony Stewart Head more next season.

There was a lot of talk about “Once More With Feeling.” Joss said he first got the idea when members of the cast came to his house to read a play, and they all got a bit drunk, - and at that point there were jokes about Marti’s pregnancy – but what really happened was people got drunk and started singing, and Joss realized he had the talent to do a musical episode.

Nicholas said that he wasn’t nervous about the musical because he’d never sung or danced before, so he figured whatever he did would be better than the nothing he’d done before. That didn’t really make a lot of sense, but it seemed to make sense to Nick. A lot of what Nick said tonight didn’t make a lot of sense, but he was having a great time, and it was enjoyable. Michelle apologized to everyone for not giving Nick his meds, and Alyson said to him, “Can you say, ‘No Emmys, ever’?” And Nick said, “No Emmys, ever.” And Joss put his hands over his head.

Joss and Marti were asked if they felt the sixth season was maybe a little too dark. At first Joss joked that this was the first time he’d heard that, - but then he said, “oops.” They acknowledged it had been very dark, but that it was the result of dealing with Buffy’s coming back from heaven, and the unhealthy relationship with Spike, and the death of Tara.”

Everyone complemented Alyson on how well she’d reacted when Tara died, but she said a lot of it was that she was tired of doing take after take after take. They were having trouble finding a way of splashing blood just right on her shirt. And they only had two shirts, and they kept having to wash the blood out, and putting the shirt back on her before it was fully dry. It was hard.

But also everyone was sad about the story, and they all spoke of how much they loved Amber, particularly Michelle.

They acknowledged that there’d been lots of sex this season, and James said he was tired of having to wear a sock to cover himself up in the nude scenes. There was a lot of joking about what size sock he needed.

Joss said they had all the sex with Spike because they’d explored romantic passion with Angel in season two, and they wanted to do something different and explore sexual passion in season six.

The moderator asked Joss if there was a chance of Angel making a guest appearance on “Buffy,” and James interrupted with a firm “No.”

Notwithstanding all the sex and misery, Joss said the only thing this season that had caused any problems with the sponsors was the Double-Meat Palace episode. Some sponsors pulled out because they didn’t like the show making fun of fast food restaurants.

There was some concern about the time Joss will need to spend on “Firefly,” and apparently he is taking some of the “Buffy” crew with him. Marti even referred to Joss “wouldn’t be leaving the show unless he was comfortable they could carry on without him,” – which seemed an odd thing for her to say because Joss had made it clear he’s not leaving.

Everyone spoke very highly of Carey Meyer’s work as a Production Designer and especially of Raymond Stella’s work as Director of Photographer. Alyson was particularly impressed that Stella had only been cranky twice last season.

And, of course, everyone praised Joss and Marti for the writing. James said that on most shows people would get bored, but no one was ever bored on Buffy. Often they were terrified of what Joss would spring on them next. Joss quoted James as saying that if they weren’t terrified at least once every season, Joss wasn’t doing his job. And Michelle said that she didn’t mind that this season was so downbeat, because everyone has times like that in their lives, and that made the show real. And Nicholas talked about how the first draft of the final script didn’t have the lines about the yellow crayon, but the second draft did, and when Nick read it, it brought tears to his eyes, and that was what the season was about to him, Willow’s yellow crayon.

Those were the highlights for me.