Julie Benz was already an action babe from playing Darla on Buffy, the Vampire Slayer and Angel. Now she's really rolling around in the mud for Rambo. She's also completed a role in The Punisher: War Zone for which she sports fabulous new brunette hair. Hopefully she'll be black to her blonde Dexter self when the writer's strike resolves, but at least there are some movies to see in between.

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CraveOnline: So is the hair to look like a comic book character, or is it just an original?

Julie Benz: It was a mixture of both. Her name's Angela Donatelli. She's an Italian from Brooklyn, New York. I think they thought the darker hair would give me a little bit more of that edge, as well as I think it's a visual concept as well.

CraveOnline: So who is Angela?

Julie Benz: Unlike Sarah who is very soft and vulnerable, Angela has got a little bit more of an edge. She’s more of a fighter. She’s a bit of a momma bear. She’s got a little child she’s protecting. She’s not really happy with anybody. She’s kind of in a bad mood.

CraveOnline: What is the action in Punisher 2 like?

Julie Benz: It's really good. I'm a part of some of it but I'm not part of a lot of it. It'll be a surprise for me to see. But we had an amazing team working with us up there. It was a lot of the guys from 300 and Ray Stevenson trained very, very hard and so did Dominic West. I think the two of them are really going to make it exciting.

CraveOnline: Did you have a comic book reference for Angela?

Julie Benz: She's actually I think mentioned in the comic book. I don't think you actually ever see her. I know her husband is mentioned as well, and there might be a small story with the husband but she was actually never seen. She's kind of a creation.

CraveOnline: What does a female director bring to the film?

Julie Benz: Compassion. Also, Lexi Alexander first of all, a world champion kickboxer. She's not a fragile flower here. I think we all knew at any moment she could kick our ass. Most of her films, it's interesting because she's more of a dramatic director. She's done a lot of very dramatic movies and I think to take on an action movie like The Punisher, she's extremely creative so creating the world that exists, her mind is just spinning with ideas, but you also have this whole other side with bringing the characters a level of humanity so they're not just comic book characters. They're not just caricatures of that but you can really believe in the world of that. I think that's the female touch.

CraveOnline: Do you have intense moments personally on Punisher 2 compared to Rambo?

Benz: There are some very emotionally intense moments. The conditions were different. There was a controlled environment and we were working mainly interiors. It didn’t have that quality to it. There was just something about you shooting in the jungle. There’s nothing like it and it just raised the intensity level of everything.

CraveOnline: What does it mean to you to be in a Rambo movie?

Julie Benz: It's unbelievably exciting, especially to be the girl in a Rambo movie that doesn't die. I think in Rambo 2 there was a girl and she got killed halfway through, poor thing. To actually star opposite Sylvester Stallone in a Rambo movie, if you'd asked me 10 years ago if I'd be here today, I'd say no way. It's just unbelievably exciting.

CraveOnline: Rambo 2 is amazing because she dies within 30 seconds of saying she loves him and please take me with you.

Julie Benz: Yes [laughs]

CraveOnline: Did you grow up with Rambo movies?

Julie Benz: Obviously, I'm a girl. I knew about the Rambo franchise. I had never really seen any of the Rambo movies. I'm a huge Rocky fan. I've seen every single Rocky movie at least seven, eight times. So huge Rocky fan. I have since watched the Rambo movies and I loved the first two. I think those two are really brilliant.

CraveOnline: Why do you think Rambo connects with this woman of all people?

Julie Benz: I think she's a reminder of what he was in his past, in his youth. I think in a way it's like a mirror being forced up into his space of the hopes, the idealism, the belief in humanity that he believed in before he went off to Vietnam and was faced with the atrocities of war and what it's about and what kind of changed him. I think he's been living a pretty isolated life and at this point is a shell of a man. Here comes this very pure, very idealistic woman into his world. They come from two opposite ends of the spectrum in their beliefs about how the world should be, and yet they are able to influence each other. It's a really interesting relationship.

CraveOnline: How do you think she's able to risk very likely rape for her ideals?

Julie Benz: I think at that point, she starts realizing that maybe [she shouldn't.] She carries a huge responsibility, especially at the end of the movie where it's almost like her fault all these people have died. She was the one who insisted on going and he fought her so hard. He tried to protect her from all of this. He tried to keep her this idealistic, innocent, hopeful woman and she wore him down and insisted on going. I think you feel that she has this sense of responsibility that she's going to have to carry with her for the rest of her life. She's a completely changed person at the end of the movie than she was at the beginning. I don't know if her belief in humanity is going to be as strong as it was.

CraveOnline: How did the physicality and action compare to Buffy?

Julie Benz: [Scoffs] it's extremely different. Way more intense. When I was on Buffy and Angel, because it's television, you don't have the luxury of time. We had amazing stunt doubles. To be completely honest, a lot of the action stuff on Buffy and Angel was shot second unit on different days when we were shooting other things because just in television, you don't have the luxury to shoot these big action scenes. You only get eight days to shoot an episode and they've got to get it in. In Rambo, the whole movie is action. Sly said to me in the very beginning, "It makes for a richer film if you're willing to try as much of the stuff as possible. If they see your face falling down, it makes for a richer film." I had an amazing stunt double, Heidi Moneymaker who was always there for me if I got too scared or couldn't do it or got too tired. You say, "Yeah, I can take the tumble" but you don't realize 10 takes later, and she's standing by right there to do it. Our stunt team as well made me feel very safe to take the risks I needed to take. It's exciting. It's exciting to do an action movie and put yourself through those physical challenges.

CraveOnline: What can you tell us about the next season of Dexter?

Julie Benz: As far as I’ve heard it’s been unofficially announced that we’re having a third season which will be nice. I most definitely think we are having a third season. Right now with the strike who knows. We’re not scheduled to go back into production until April or May so we wrapped production when the strike began so technically this is our natural hiatus. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I hope the strike ends. We wrapped production October 31st before the strike started. Definitely we're all feeling it on many different levels. A lot of our people on our production team, production assistants, all of that, they're all out of work and that affects me greatly. Our writers are strike captains and the longer it goes on, the longer it will affect us. We're supposed to go back into production in May but the longer the strike goes on, the less chance that will happen.

CraveOnline: How has it been going off book for season two?

Julie Benz: For me, Rita actually, all the stuff that happened to Rita in the book is what you saw in the pilot episode, the very first episode of Dexter. So she's a complete creation the whole first season, so yeah. I had no bible to follow. I think we've done an amazing job. I think first of all, Jeff Lindsay, let's give him credit, he created a great series of books and he created great characters. I just love, I'm a big fan of his as well. I think our writing staff, our creative team as well has done a great job of veering off and creating Dexter in this other world.

CraveOnline: Where would you like her to go in season three?

Julie Benz: I just would like her to be happy for once, like truly happy. It'd be nice if her and Dexter got married and he stopped killing and their kids grew up, and maybe they had a baby. Maybe it turned into a romantic comedy or something.

CraveOnline: Too bad TV doesn't deal in happy characters.

Julie Benz: No, no, no. Just when you think everything's going to work out, the rug gets pulled out from underneath you. That's life.

CraveOnline: How does it feel to have another long running character?

Julie Benz: I'm a lucky girl. I'm a very, very lucky girl and I am so thankful.

CraveOnline: How are Dexter fans vs. Buffy fans?

Julie Benz: I think they're the same fans. I think it's the same, they're very intelligent, very passionate about the shows. The Dexter fan is very similar to the Buffy/Angel fan. The show to them operates on many different levels, just like it does to us who are creating it. So it's great. So much better than having an unintelligent audience.

CraveOnline: So equally obsessive?

Julie Benz: Yes, and I love it. I get stopped all the time with questions about Dexter. It makes me think more about the show and about the character and about the different levels that it operates on, so I'm inspired by the fan obsessiveness.

CraveOnline: My mom just discovered Dexter on DVD and told me, "Fred, there's this show called Dexter and it's soooo good." I was like, "Yeah, mom, I know it."

Julie Benz: I gave the DVDs to one of my best friends who doesn't have Showtime and had never seen it. She wanted to see it and she was texting me last night, she's like, "Oh my God, I'm on episode four, you just did this and this and this. Oh my God, that's just really disturbing." And I'm like, "Be careful, you're not going to be able to sleep tonight." She's like, "I know, I've already watched four hours of it so I can't stop." And she has a little baby and it's like the little baby's completely secondary now. All of a sudden it's like I have to finish watching your show.

CraveOnline: What is your interaction with Buffy fans at this point?

Julie Benz: Right now it's just street action because I've been working so much. I run into fans on the street, they come up. They tell me they're a fan and it's great.

CraveOnline: So they still come up?

Julie Benz: Yeah, definitely. I think Buffy and Angel is going to be one of those shows that I'll be hopefully be 72 years old, still in the business and they're still talking about the characters