When Buffy the Vampire Slayer first premiered 26 years ago, it changed the landscape of television, inspiring countless spinoff novels, video games, and Buffy-related academia in the process. Additionally, its titular heroine broke the customs of how the Slayer herself goes on in the world.
During Buffy’s dream encounter with Sineya (Sharon Ferguson), the First Slayer, in the Season Four finale “Restless,” Sineya enforces the belief that the Slayer operates alone as she goes on her nightly battle against the forces of evil. Alone without friends or even family to aid her in her fight. But from the show’s beginning to its end, Buffy disproves the theory as she fought countless evil forces and prevented the apocalypse time after time with the help of her Scooby Gang who showed how friends can become close enough to feel like family. The one and only Rupert Giles (Anthony Stewart Head) is particular proof of such.
By day, Rupert Giles, who was once known as “Ripper,” worked as the librarian for Sunnydale High School. But by night, he served as Buffy’s Watcher meant to train her for battle and who acts as the brain of the Scooby Gang, using the school library’s occult and demonology books to decipher the identities of the evil forces at hand each episode. Giles could also be relied on for a humorous barb and would be knocked out so often in battle that one has to wonder how he didn’t get severe bodily trauma.
But ultimately, one of Giles’ defining character traits besides being an accident-prone Watcher is his role as a father figure. Given how Buffy’s biological father has been heavily absent from the picture since she and her mother moved to Sunnydale, Giles ended up filling that paternal void in her life. It first became evident he would take on such a role in the Season One finale “Prophecy Girl.”
After Buffy learns of the prophecy where she’s destined to sacrifice herself as she battles with the Master (Mark Metcalf), Giles frantically chooses to fight in her place. As a Watcher, he’s meant to be impartial and take a step back as the Slayer treads into battle. Yet, his willingness to put his life on the line for Buffy, temporarily relieving her of her Slayer duties, was a sign of parental instincts.
Those instincts became more apparent in the Season Three episode “Helpless.” Because Buffy reached her 18th birthday, she’s forced to go through a test by the Watchers Council where she must fight a dangerous vampire, Zachary Kralik (Jeff Kober), without her Slayer abilities. Giles being the one giving her the substance that was temporarily suppressing her powers causes a slight riff on their relationship as he did it without her knowledge. Once again avoiding the role of the impartial instructor, Giles offers to risk his life and stop Kralik to regain Buffy’s trust even if he eventually pays the price for it. Recognizing that he’s close with Buffy to the point where he shows a father’s love, Giles’ boss Quentin (Harris Yulin), the director of the Watchers Council, dismisses him.
Since that pivotal episode, Giles would continue acting as the brains of the Scooby Gang and Buffy’s trainer. He would also be rehired as a Watcher by the Council in the middle of the show’s fifth season. Yet, Giles would come to terms with how, like any parent when their child grows up, he’d have to find a way to let Buffy go so she can fully spread her wings. In the show’s musical episode “Once More..With Feeling” from Season Six where everyone’s forced to sing out their innermost thoughts, Giles’ solo number “Standing” encapsulates his fear that his ongoing presence in her life limits her from fully maturing. For her to learn how to be a better guardian to her younger sister Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg) in addition to navigating her Slayer duties, Giles commits an act of tough love by leaving Sunnydale. After always standing in the front line of battle like when he swore to face the Master and Zachary Kralik for Buffy’s safety, Giles does the unthinkable. He finally took a step behind.
At that point, we saw how instrumental he was to the lives of the other Scoobies as well as Buffy’s. Without Giles in town to prevent her from becoming consumed by her addiction to dark magic, Willow (Alyson Hannigan) hits rock bottom before withdrawing from magic entirely and then relapsing in the season’s end. In addition, if Giles were around to give him a speech of encouragement, who knows if Xander (Nicholas Brendon) would still have second thoughts about marrying Anya (Emma Caulfield) and let his fear of turning into his own father get to him.
Like the Scooby Gang, we were all surely saddened by Giles’ departure. As much as I like the episode “Tabula Rasa,” I personally feel that I can only watch it up until the end where Giles does leave. Watching him waiting for his plane to take off while Michelle Branch’s acoustic rendition of “Goodbye to You” plays during the scene is simply a lot to bear. The fact that he left in a time where Buffy needed him more than ever as she was in a deep depression since being pulled from Heaven makes his exit even more agonizing.
Painful as his exit might’ve been, not only did Giles return in a more recurring role in the show’s final season, but his absence showed how he was the glue holding the series together. He was the lynchpin keeping the group closer and a figure of both stern authority and unconditional support. Giles wasn’t perfect nor was his abrupt leave from Sunnydale the most well-timed. But parents and parental figures like him aren’t capable of always making perfect decisions. They occasionally fall and slip like their own children and Rupert Giles only reflects the complicatedness of parenthood in that way.
The unwavering fatherly love he’s constantly shown is one of various reasons that Rupert Giles still lives in the hearts of series fans everywhere.
Tags: Alyson Hannigan, Anthony Stewart Head, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Emma Caulfield, Harris Yulin, Michelle Branch, Michelle Trachtenberg, Nicholas Brendon, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Tributes, TV
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