Rupert Giles

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Rupert Giles
Watchers' Council
Scooby Gang
ClassificationWatcher
Notable powersSuperior knowledge of demonology, mystical artifacts, and the black arts.
Genius level intellect.
Fluency in several languages.
Experience in hand-to-hand combat.
Trained in library and information science.

Rupert Giles is a fictional character created by

Expanded Universe
material such as novels, comic books, and short stories.

Giles' primary role in the series is

her group of friends costs him his job for a time. As the series progresses, Giles increasingly becomes a father figure to Buffy and her friends Willow (Alyson Hannigan) and Xander (Nicholas Brendon). His encyclopedic knowledge, affinity for magic, moderate fighting skills and willingness to kill when necessary make him an asset to Buffy in her fight against the supernatural evils that plague Sunnydale, California
.

Following Buffy's conclusion in 2003, Whedon intended to continue Giles' story as a spin-off series, Ripper, which he intended to produce with the BBC. The series was to depict Giles in ghost stories set in present-day England, coping with loneliness as well as figurative ghosts from his own chequered past. Over several years Whedon restated his commitment to the project, though announced it would take the form of a one-off TV movie. Despite Head's availability and the BBC's willingness to fund the project, rights issues concerning the character ultimately led to it not developing further. Canonically, the character's story is continued in the comic book Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight (2007–2011) and subsequent stories. The Season Eight sequel Angel & Faith (2011–) heavily features Giles and utilizes ideas and characters from the proposed Ripper spin-off.

Biography

Character history

Rupert Edmund Giles (most frequently called Giles) was born circa 1955 in England. His family has worked within the

Council of Watchers for at least three generations; both his father and grandmother, Edna Giles (née Fairweather), were also Watchers. As a child, Giles dreamed of being either "a fighter pilot or possibly a grocer", but he soon learned that being a Watcher is a calling, much as being a Slayer is, and Rupert's father explained his destiny to him when he was ten years old (revealed in "Never Kill a Boy on the First Date
").

Although the Scooby Gang later joked that he wore tweed diapers as a child, Giles was in fact a rebellious youth, rejecting his responsibility as a Watcher and dropping out of

Where the Wild Things Are". Spike also saw him singing "Free Bird" by Lynyrd Skynyrd in "The Yoko Factor
".

He began to explore dark magic and befriended a group of young people who delved into the dark arts for fun or money:

Ethan Rayne
, Philip Henry, Dierdre Page, Thomas Sutcliff, and Randall. Giles gained the nickname "Ripper" during this time. Together, the group summoned a demon called Eyghon, who would possess and eventually destroy Randall. Following Randall's death, Ethan and the others failed to exorcise Eyghon, and Giles accepted his destiny of becoming a Watcher. Before becoming a fully-fledged Watcher, he also worked as "the curator of a British museum, maybe the British Museum" as Willow says ("Welcome to the Hellmouth"), although, given the context, she may well have been repeating a rumor that was going around the school.

Sunnydale

At the behest of the

Watchers' Council, Giles travels to Sunnydale, California, and works as the librarian at the local high school. There he meets the current Slayer, Buffy Summers
, whom he begins training. The library, a sort of command center for Buffy's demon-hunting gang, sits right above the Hellmouth.

As the

technophobic, a fact which often brings him into conflict with technopagan and computer science teacher, Jenny Calendar. However, after Jenny aids him in casting the demon Moloch out of the Internet, the pair reach an understanding and begin a romantic relationship. Despite his obvious fear with modern technology, Giles is quite adept with computers, which is required in his occupation as a librarian (Season Three episode "Gingerbread") and likely had received this training while earning his master's degree in library and information science. It was never revealed of which library school Giles attended or whether he had pursued his PhD
in this field.

In Season Two, Giles' dark side is revealed and his relationship with Jenny deepens. In "

Acathla
. Buffy is forced to kill Angel to save the world, despite Willow's restoring his soul, and subsequently leaves Sunnydale.

In Season Three, Giles's paternal feelings for Buffy strengthen significantly. He spends the summer desperately following up every clue as to Buffy's whereabouts, and is overjoyed when she finally returns months later. Giles briefly serves as Watcher for Kendra's replacement Slayer,

Faith Lehane. The Scoobies are given another disturbing glimpse in Giles' past when, along with every other adult in Sunnydale, he reverts to being a teenager by enchanted band candy supplied by Ethan Rayne. He indulges in theft and vandalism, and makes out with and has sex with Buffy's mother, Joyce Summers. When Buffy keeps Angel's return from hell a secret from the other Scoobies, Giles feels betrayed by her love for the man who tortured him and murdered Jenny, but later agrees to help Angel in "Amends
".

As Buffy's Cruciamentum approaches (a brutal tradition of the

Sunnydale High
, putting himself out of a job.

In Season Four, Giles must cope with unemployment and a growing awareness that Buffy no longer needs him. He continues a sexual relationship with his old friend Olivia. Lacking a sense of purpose, he spends most of his time lounging around his apartment, watching

A New Man"), he must enlist Spike's help to escape the Initiative and Buffy, which believes him to be a demon who murdered Giles. Buffy, about to kill him, at the last moment recognizes his eyes and "annoyed" expression, and Ethan is taken into custody by the Initiative. In order to defeat the cyber-demonoid Adam
, Buffy, Willow, Xander and Giles cast a spell to combine their strength. Giles provides the "mind," and Buffy is able to defeat Adam.

At the beginning of Season Five, Giles no longer sees his place in Sunnydale and decides to go back to England, telling no one except Willow, whom he needs to organize the research documents for the Scoobies. He quickly abandons this decision when Buffy asks him to be her Watcher again, confessing that she needs him, both emotionally and in order to discover more about what being a Slayer means.

When the owner of The Magic Box is killed by vampires, Giles is convinced by the shop's high profit margins to buy it, hiring Anya as his overly enthusiastic assistant. Buffy learns that her sister,

Watchers' Council for more information about Glory. In "Checkpoint
", Quentin Travers tries to coerce Buffy to obey the Council's demands, by threatening to have Giles deported. Buffy stands up to the Council, pointing out that without her there is no need for a Council, and tells them to give her all information concerning Glory and to reinstate Giles as her official Watcher. Travers reluctantly agrees, and leaves.

As the Scoobies labor to find a way to defeat Glory, Giles brings up the difficult idea of killing Dawn to end Glory's plans to take over the world. Buffy vows to protect Dawn at all costs. Glory shares her body with an innocent human named

Ben, and can be killed if Ben dies. In the final battle against Glory, Buffy abandons the fight when Glory turns back into a wounded Ben, so that she can save Dawn. Giles is less merciful. Explaining that Buffy is a hero and therefore different from the rest of humanity, he suffocates Ben with his bare hands ("The Gift
").

Season Six sees Giles reluctantly stepping back to allow Buffy to gain independence. One hundred and forty-seven days after her death, Giles decides to return to England. On the very day he leaves, Willow, Xander, Anya and Tara resurrect Buffy, and he comes back as soon as he hears of this. Despite being overjoyed to have Buffy back, he is furious at Willow for invoking such dark magic, and angrily dismisses her as "a rank, arrogant amateur." While the other Scoobies believe Buffy was in Hell, Giles is not convinced, and his suspicions prove true when a demon's musical spell causes Buffy to reveal to them all that she was indeed in Heaven. As Buffy begins to rely excessively on Giles for financial and emotional support, he decides his presence is preventing her assuming responsibility for her life. He leaves again for his native England, moving to a place near Bath, where he works with a powerful local coven.

A few months later, Tara is killed by a stray bullet as Warren Mears attacks Buffy. Willow, still recovering from an addiction to magic, suffers a relapse, kills Warren and attempts to kill his former partners in crime, before resolving to end humanity's pain (and her own) by destroying the world. Hearing of a dark power rising in Sunnydale, Giles teleports back there, wielding great magical power borrowed from the Devon Coven. As Dark Willow boasts of her indestructibility, Giles knocks her to the floor with a blast of magic energy, saying "I'd like to test that theory" ("Two to Go"). After being filled in on everything that has happened to the Scoobies in his absence, Giles apologizes to Buffy, insisting that he never should have left them, but Buffy assures him that he did the right thing. Knowing that Willow is too strong to defeat, he tricks her into draining him of his white magics, which brings him near death. It also allows Xander to reason with Willow as the good magic brings out her natural love and compassion, eating away at the evil within her. Giles returns to England with Willow for her rehabilitation. A few months later, he brings

Watchers' Council, which is soon afterward destroyed by Caleb, an agent of the First. An injured Watcher named Robson witnessed Giles about to be decapitated by a Bringer before blacking out. When the Scoobies hear about this, they worry that Giles may have been killed and the First is merely impersonating him. They are relieved when Anya, Dawn, Xander and Andrew tackle him to the ground, proving he is corporeal and therefore not the First. Giles later loses Buffy's trust somewhat when he takes part in a scheme with Robin Wood to kill Spike ("Lies My Parents Told Me
"). Buffy tells him, "I think you've taught me everything I need to know." Giles believes that Buffy kept Spike around for personal reasons rather than tactical ones; this is confirmed when she talks to Spike the night before the final battle under the Hellmouth. In the series finale, Giles participates in the battle of the Hellmouth, and survives.

Shortly after Buffy ended its seven-year televised run, there was talk of a Giles-based spin-off series for the

Ripper. At Comicon in 2007, Joss Whedon stated that Ripper was still planned and in the pipeline, but as of 2012, nothing has come of the project.[1]

In season five of Angel, Angel contacts Giles via phone twice. It is established that, after the events of "

Damage", Andrew claims to be "faster, stronger and 82% more manly" as a result of Giles' mentoring. Later in "A Hole in the World", after Fred dies, Angel phones Giles, desperate to get in contact with Willow, who cannot be located. After Angel confirms that he still works for Wolfram & Hart, Giles coldly hangs up on him. Originally, Giles was to appear in "A Hole in the World
" as the one whom Angel and Spike approached in an attempt to save Fred, because Whedon needed a character who would be instantly believed (by the characters and by the audience) when he said there was no way to save Fred. As it was too expensive for Anthony Stewart Head to fly out to Los Angeles to guest-star, Whedon created Drogyn the Battlebrand, who was mystically compelled to tell the truth.

Literature

A main character from the beginning of the series, Giles has appeared in most of the spin-off books published based on the series. He plays a particularly key role in The Lost Slayer series, where a chain of events lead to Buffy (from a point early in the fourth season) being projected into the body of her twenty-four-year-old self in a timeline where Giles was turned into a vampire by the followers of an Aztec bat god, forcing Buffy to face a foe who knows her every technique before she manages to find a way to return to the past and prevent Giles being captured and turned.

In the canonical comic book continuation of the series,

Faith
to request her assistance assassinating another Slayer, who will bring about the Apocalypse if left unchecked. After they are both forced to make the difficult decisions to kill the rogue Slayer Gigi and her mentor Roden, they decide to work together in the future as equal partners, keeping Slayers from turning down the dark path that both Faith and Gigi walked. As a result of their covert operation, Buffy and Giles are no longer on speaking terms.

In the story "

Twilight
's attacks. The entire group are later transported to Oz in Tibet to learn how to suppress magic to stop Twilight tracking them.

In the penultimate issue of Season Eight, Angel is possessed by a powerful mystical entity known as Twilight, and while under its influence, murders Giles, after Giles deliberately put himself in harm's way to provoke Buffy to action. Angel does so by snapping Giles' neck, homaging Angelus' murder of Jenny Calendar.[3] While Angelus killed Jenny in vampiric face—a result of Joss not wanting the audience to truly hate Angel's face—Giles is murdered while Angel's face is in human form. Afterwards, it is revealed that Giles has left to Faith his entire estate in his will (with the exception of the 'Vampyr' book from the first episode of the series, which he leaves to Buffy), and Faith assures Buffy this doesn't mean Giles cared about her less but rather felt Faith needed it more.

In a 2011 interview, Whedon stated that his decision to

narrative exposition, and paternal figure - didn't work well in the comic book format. Whedon killed off Giles where he did so that it might have a greater effect on the coming season, "because [he] wanted to make all this matter".[4]

In the follow-up comic series

Whistler (Buffyverse)
, Pearl and Nash to mutate humans into a magical species at the cost of a few billion lives. Before confronting them, Giles says to Faith she has grown into a fine woman and they may have wanted him back, but none of the group needs him like they used to. The villains plan to unleash their plague by releasing an orb of pure magic into the upper atmosphere. Giles is able to use ambient magic to attack Nash with a fireball causing him to drop the orb but it also mutates a nearby crowd. Nash is killed causing Pearl to flee. Whistler sees the error of his ways and sacrifices his life to destroy the orb. In the aftermath of the battle, Giles wants Faith to keep his money. He decides to return to America because he was at his best with Buffy, not noticing he has hurt Faith's feelings. He parts on good terms with Angel who is staying in London's new Magic Town suburb.

While resenting the challenges of his youthful body compared to his adult mind, Giles adapts to his new situation, particularly with the discovery that his command of magic is more potent in his youthful body; his aunts speculate that he is tapping into the full potential that he repressed to focus on his studies as a Watcher.

Powers and abilities

Giles has extensive knowledge of

First Date"). While he has no prominent supernatural
powers of his own, his extensive experience with dealing with vampires, demons, and other creatures makes him capable of handling them effectively.

Giles has moderate skill in

The Gift"). Typically, however, Giles' calm demeanor and professionalism offer him a detached state of authority even in the face of fearsome monsters, as demonstrated during his confrontation with a violent demon in "The Long Way Home". He is also shown to be able to quickly hotwire a car in the episode "Dead Man's Party
".

In the

telekinesis
, and energy projection. He lost all of these powers when Willow drained him and left him on the brink of death, but he recovered immediately after Xander calmed her down from her rampage. His moderate proficiency in magic combined with his natural acumen and intelligence still make him quite formidable; in Season Eight's "No Future for You", he kills the warlock Roden, who could fly and conjure easily, through using a spell inventively. After being resurrected in the form of an adolescent, Giles displays much more magical aptitude, which is briefly lost when Willow temporarily ages him back into an adult form. Sophronia and Lavinia theorised that if Giles had been tutored in magic by them rather than being trained as a Watcher at the wishes of his father and grandmother, he would have become an extremely powerful magician, and could achieve this potential in his new life.

Despite his vast intelligence, Giles is not what one would call technology-savvy and is, by his own admission, somewhat technophobic. However, being a librarian, his occupation requires the use of up-to-date technology and skills to further a library service's goals to serve its patrons efficiently, and in one episode ("Gingerbread"), shows that Giles is proficient with computers at least on a basic level. However, he is dependent on Willow for tasks that are beyond his computer skill set.

Reception

Head's portrayal of Giles was largely well received by television critics. An article for

Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor, but lost out to co-star James Marsters.[6]

References

  1. ^ "Joss Whedon on writing horror and superheroes for fanboys and casual viewers alike". The A.V. Club. 18 April 2012. Retrieved 30 October 2014.
  2. ^ Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 - #24 "Safe"
  3. ^ "Exclusive Scott Allie interview". Buffyfest. December 2, 2010. Retrieved December 9, 2010. confirms that the resemblance between the two deaths was intentional.
  4. ^ Vary, Adam B. (January 19, 2011). "Joss Whedon talks about the end of the 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' Season 8 comic, and the future of Season 9 -- EXCLUSIVE". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 8 May 2011.
  5. ^ "Welcome Back, Anthony Stewart Head and Other 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' Alums". TheWrap.com. May 17, 2011. Retrieved May 24, 2011.
  6. ^ "Saturn Awards for 2001". IMDB.com. 12 June 2001. Retrieved 24 May 2011.

External links

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