Jesse McNally
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Jesse McNally | ||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Eric Balfour as Jesse McNally |
||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
Jesse McNally is a fictional character on the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He is a major character in the series premiere (broken into two episodes in reruns) and is played by Eric Balfour.
Contents |
[edit] Biography
[edit] Character information
Jesse McNally is a student of Sunnydale High and a close friend of both Willow Rosenberg and Xander Harris at the time that Buffy Summers transfers to Sunnydale High from Hemery High. He also has a crush on Cordelia Chase. While at times summoning enough confidence to talk to her, she constantly dismisses him due to his nervous "puppy attitude" around her, which causes Jesse to back off until he once again works up the nerve to approach her.
During a visit to The Bronze, Jesse is lured by the vampire Darla of the Order of Aurelius and taken to one of the entrances to the Order's lair in order to be offered as food for The Master. While briefly rescued, the Aurelian vamps take Jesse back from Willow and Xander, and later sire him as part of a trap for The Slayer.
The newly sired Jesse goes alongside Darla, Luke and other vampires to The Bronze to celebrate The Harvest, a ritual which will release the Master from his prison. Jesse, however, only has one thing in his mind: making Cordelia like him. When Jesse sees her, he takes her to dance without actually asking. Somewhat mesmerized by Jesse's new attitude and look, Cordelia accepts, oblivious to the danger she is in. Minutes later, when Darla tries to take Cordelia to Luke, Jesse takes her away, not wanting to see her made into a sacrifice.
When Jesse attempts to sire Cordelia, Xander interrupts him. Rupert Giles had earlier warned Xander that when he saw Jesse, he wouldn't be looking at his friend but rather at the creature that killed him. In the ensuing fight, Jesse is killed by accident when someone running away from the Bronze pushes Jesse onto the stake that Xander is using to defend himself and threaten Jesse with.
[edit] Powers and abilities
Jesse possesses the common powers and weaknesses of vampires. He also shows the typical attitude of newly-sired vampires, astonished by his newfound powers and immortality.
As a vampire, Jesse is filled with self-confidence and bravado, unlike his past self who strived for Cordelia's attention. His potential to be a confident, seductive man perverted into the confidence of a stalker who is obsessed yet always in control.
[edit] Romantic Relationships
- Cordelia
- Darla
[edit] Appearances
[edit] Quotes
(After being turned into a vampire) "I feel good, Xander! I feel strong! I'm connected, man, to everything! I, I can hear the worms in the earth! . . . You're like a shadow to me now." ("The Harvest")
(To Cordelia) "Shut up!" ("The Harvest")
(To Xander) "Okay... Let's deal with this. Jesse was an excruciating loser who couldn't get a date with anyone in the sighted community! Look at me. I'm a new man!" ("The Harvest". In the DVD commentary, Joss Whedon expresses remorse for making him say excruciating loser through prosthetic vampire teeth.)
[edit] Character trivia
It is rumored that Joss Whedon planned for Jesse to return as an "avatar" or shape of the First Evil for the seventh-season episode "Conversations with Dead People" to provide a dead person for Xander to talk to, but when Eric Balfour was unavailable, the Xander act was scratched.[citation needed]This led to Xander not appearing in the episode at all, his only non-appearance throughout the series.
Joss Whedon planned to include Balfour in the opening credit sequence of the pilot, to make it even more shocking when this supposed main character was immediately killed off. There was not enough money to do this at the time, but Whedon later used the trick in the sixth season, putting Amber Benson in the credits for the first time in the episode where her character Tara was killed. He also used this gimmick again in the spin-off "Angel," killing Doyle nine episodes into the first season.
