Buffy the Vampire Slayer's strongest villains to its most minor ing characters, the series served up big high school personalities and unforgettable monsters. Spears would have fit right in, if not for a few issues.

While Sarah Michelle Gellar played Buffy, unforgettably, James Marsters played Spike, and David Boreanaz played Angel, there was a wide range of Buffy the Vampire Slayer side characters. This made it easy for the show to platform up-and-coming talent among its many episodic standalone stories. And Spears was actually contemplating ing Buffy the Vampire Slayer for one of the most memorable of these.

Britney Spears Was Originally Supposed To Play April The Robot In Buffy The Vampire Slayer

She Ended Up Turning It Down

Warren Mears, who later became one of the major Big Bads in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, created April the robot to make him happy, laying the groundwork for Britney Spears' involvement with the show. In Buffy the Vampire Slayer season 5, episode 15, "I Was Made To Love You," the Scooby Gang ran into April, speaking in a strange, stilted staccato. They quickly deduce she's a robot and learn that she poses a real threat. However, in the end, though she is stopped for good, Buffy is sympathetic to April's plight, and what Warren put her through.

Joss Whedon reportedly wrote the Buffy role specifically for Spears, and was rumored to have made April a robot to cover his bases if he felt the pop star couldn't act. However, Spears was reported to have pulled out due to scheduling conflicts, which was probably for the best. Actress Shonda Farr played April instead, and she did an excellent job, really making the robot character sympathetic.

People Would Have Turned Spears' Buffy Role Into A Punchline

The Media Was Already Objectifying The Star

Britney Spears could have easily had one of Buffy the Vampire Slayer's most iconic character entrances and delighted fans worldwide, but her role would have become a running joke. At the time, Spears was almost too famous for the role to do her good in the long run, and she was so creepily oversexualized by the media that playing a girlfriend sex robot would have doubled down on their mistreatment of her.

In 2001, when the episode with April's character aired, objectifying women in this way was even more rampant than it is today. It would have been especially uncomfortable given the allegations surrounding Joss Whedon and his toxic Buffy workplace culture that have come to light in the years since the episode aired.

Spears Later Played A Robot In The Austin Powers Movies

Her Fembot Character Was Also A Villain

Interestingly, Britney Spears would still find herself playing a robot in Austin Powers 3, and one bizarrely similar to the role she turned down in Buffy. Playing April may have had more of an impact on her career than it seems, at first glance. Spears was rumored to have wanted to be in the Scooby Gang at first, which, perhaps, she would have made time for. But after her scheduling conflicts, perhaps her missed opportunity played on her mind, and that's why she signed on for Austin Powers.

With or without Spears, season 5 was one of the best seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but Spears definitely improved Austin Powers as a villainous Fembot. The talented Spears was definitely subject to trolling and haters throughout her career, including those who used this movie to draw misogynistic comparisons between her and evil sex robots. But this effect may have been amplified had she also taken the role in Buffy, and may have been worse, given that Buffy the Vampire Slayer took itself (slightly) more seriously than Austin Powers.