In 1992, Espenson won a spot in the Disney Writing Fellowship, In 1998, Espenson joined
Mutant Enemy Productions as executive story editor for the
third season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Over the rest of the run of the series, Espenson wrote or co-wrote twenty-three episodes, starting with "
Band Candy" and ending with
Buffys penultimate episode, "
End of Days". After her role as an executive story editor, she was promoted to co-producer in
season four. In the
fifth season she was promoted again to producer. She took up the role of supervising producer in the
sixth season and was promoted once more to co-executive producer in the
final season. She wrote episodes both humorous (e.g. "
Triangle" and "
Intervention") and serious (such as "
After Life"). Espenson and
Drew Goddard co-wrote the seventh-season episode "
Conversations with Dead People," for which they won the
Hugo Award for
Best Short Dramatic Presentation in 2003. Espenson is credited as the writer or co-writer of the following
Buffy episodes: She also co-/wrote several comic book stories for
Tales of the Slayers,
Tales of the Vampires and
Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, the
one-shots Jonathan and
Reunion and the
limited series Haunted.
Battlestar Galactica and Caprica Espenson joined the crew of
Sci Fi's
Battlestar Galactica (
BSG) just after
Battlestar Galactica: Razor, BSG's first
television movie, was conceived. As one of BSG's co-executive producers, she worked on every fourth-season episode starting with "
He That Believeth in Me"; she was also the writer of "
Escape Velocity" and "
The Hub" and co-wrote
The Face of the Enemy webisodes. Prior to joining the show's staff she wrote
one third-season episode and
co-wrote another. In August 2008, the
Los Angeles Times broke the news that Espenson was the writer behind BSG's second television movie,
The Plan, news confirmed in her writer's blog. In January 2009 it was announced that she had joined the spin-off series
Caprica as co-executive producer and would take on showrunner duties midway through the first season. Espenson later gave up showrunning duties to focus more on writing.
Torchwood In August 2010 it was announced that
Torchwood creator, lead writer and executive producer
Russell T. Davies had hired Espenson to write for the show's fourth series,
Torchwood: Miracle Day to be broadcast in 2011. She later confirmed that she would be writing episodes 3, 5, 7 and co-writing episode 8 (with Ryan Scott) and episode 10 (with Davies). Prior to her involvement with Torchwood, Espenson had said she was a fan of the show, particularly the third series, "
Children of Earth." To tie in with the launch of
Torchwood: Miracle Day, Espenson and Scott collaborated on the Starz-produced 2011
Torchwood webseries entitled
Torchwood: Web of Lies, which stars American actress
Eliza Dushku. Following the broadcast of each episode of "Miracle Day" on Starz, Espenson wrote a blog on
AfterElton mixing her reaction to the episode with behind the scenes information on the devising process.
Husbands In 2011 Espenson also co-wrote and produced her first independent web series with partner Brad Bell. Entitled
Husbands, it revolved around the life of two newly married gay men. Espenson self-funded the first season. A Kickstarter campaign and the involvement of
CW Seed allowed subsequent production. The show eventually comprised four "seasons" and concluded in 2014. The series premiered Tuesday September 13, 2011. The series also generated
Husbands, a hardback comic-book collection of stories rendered in a variety of different drawing styles, from Dark Horse Comics ().
Once Upon a Time In May 2011, Espenson was brought on to the
ABC fantasy series
Once Upon a Time, as a writer and consulting producer. She stayed with the show for its entire seven-year run, and became a co-executive producer on the project. She was also involved in creation and writing of the spin-off series
Once Upon a Time in Wonderland.
Game of Thrones In 2011, working as a freelancer, Espenson wrote episode 6 of season 1 of
Game of Thrones, titled "
A Golden Crown". It is notable as one of only four
Game of Thrones episodes written by women.
Jessica Jones In 2015, during the hiatus between seasons of
Once Upon a Time, Espenson consulted on the series
Jessica Jones, earning a "thanks to" in the credits. In 2019, she returned for a larger role on the staff, and wrote the eleventh episode of the third season "
A.K.A. Hellcat".
The Nevers In 2018, Espenson joined the
HBO series
The Nevers, as a writer and executive producer. The series premiered on April 11, 2021.
Foundation Espenson consulted on the
Apple TV+ series
Foundation in season 1, joining the writing staff in season 2 with writing credits on half of the episodes.
Other Espenson has written episodes for several other television shows, including episode 4.17 ("
Accession") of
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and one episode ("
Shindig") of
Firefly. She has worked on
Angel,
Tru Calling,
The Inside,
The Batman,
Andy Barker, P.I.,
Jake in Progress and
Dollhouse, and was the co-creator of
Warehouse 13. Espenson is the editor of the book ''Finding Serenity: Anti-Heroes, Lost Shepherds and Space Hookers in Joss Whedon's Firefly
(BenBella Books, 2005, ), a collection of non-fiction essays on the short-lived television show Firefly
. She edited the follow-up collection Serenity Found: More Unauthorized Essays on Joss Whedon's Firefly Universe
(BenBella Books, 2007, ) She is the editor of Inside Joss' Dollhouse: From Alpha to Rossum
(BenBella Books, 2010, ), a similar collection of essays about Dollhouse''. Espenson wrote the short story "What Holds Us Down", which appears in
Still Flying from Titan Press, . Her short story "Int. Wolf-Night" appears in
Empower: Fight Like a Girl She also has short stories which appear in the
Tales of the Slayers book series. Her short story, "Nobel Prize Speech Draft of Paul Winterhoeven, With Personal Notes", was published in the September 2021 issue of
Future Science Fiction Digest. In 2016, Espenson served on the MoPOP (Museum of Pop Culture, Seattle) committee to select inductees into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame. She is featured as a video/voice commentator in the museum itself. Espenson has written for three of the 101 Best Television Series as determined by the Writers Guild of America:
Battlestar Galactica,
Game of Thrones and
Buffy the Vampire Slayer. ==Appearances in media==