Rupert Giles
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Rupert Giles is a fictional character created by Joss Whedon for the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The character is portrayed by Anthony Stewart Head.
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Character history
Giles was born in 1954 into an upper-class family in London, England. His family has worked within the Council of Watchers for at least three generations; both his father and grandmother, Edna Giles, were also Watchers. Being a Watcher is a calling, much as being a Slayer is, and Rupert's father told him his destiny. A rebellious youth, Rupert dropped out of his history degree at Oxford University when he was 21. He delved into dark magics and befriended a group of young people who delved into the dark arts for fun or money: Ethan Rayne, Philip Henry, Diedre Page, Thomas Sutcliff, and Randall. Together, they summoned a particularly grotesque demon called Eyghon, who would eventually murder Randall. Rupert gained the nickname "Ripper" during this time. The past would later come back to haunt him in the second season episode, "The Dark Age."
During this time, Ripper employed tales of demons and dark magics, and also claimed to be a founding member of Pink Floyd in order to impress girls, although he later admitted this was untrue. It is also possible that he delved into criminal activity, primarily stealing cars, but most likely for joyriding ("Like riding a bloody bicycle," he says as he hot wires his car in the episode "Dead Man's Party").
Following the death of Randall, Ethan and the others failed to exorcise Eyghon, and Rupert accepted his destiny of becoming a Watcher. According to the comic Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Giles, his mentor was Archibald "Archie" Lassiter. Rupert also became "the curator of a British museum, maybe the British Museum" as Willow says (cf. "Welcome to the Hellmouth").
[edit] 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 the gang, sits right above the Hellmouth.
As the Watcher, librarian, and general authority figure, Giles often delivers exposition. He is a father figure to Buffy and an advisor to her friends Xander Harris and Willow Rosenberg. Giles is often portrayed as somewhat of a "straight man" and his "stuffy" Oxford sensibility serves as counterpoint to the stereotypical Southern Californian characters and setting. He makes a "weird cluck-cluck sound with his tongue" when he is angry but "too English to say anything" (cf. "Faith, Hope & Trick").
Giles shares with Kendra Young (in Season Two) an appreciation for obscure texts and serves as Faith's Watcher for a few weeks during Season Three. After pressing the trigger that destroys Sunnydale High and puts him out of a job, he spends months unemployed before buying the local magic shop, The Magic Box, after its last owner is murdered by Harmony and her gang of vampires. Giles brings up the difficult idea of killing Dawn when the Scooby Gang labors to find a way to defeat the insane hell-god Glory, and when Buffy spares Ben's life, he decides that he cannot give Glory the chance to return. Telling Ben that Buffy is different from them, Giles suffocates Ben with his bare hands.
After Buffy sacrifices herself to save the world, Giles decides to return to England. On the very day he leaves, Willow, Xander, Anya, and Tara resurrect Buffy. When he learns of this, Giles returns, but soon decides that his presence is preventing Buffy from assuming responsibility for her own life, and 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 dark 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. Giles teleports back to Sunnydale, wielding great magical power borrowed from the Devon Coven. Knowing that Willow is too strong, he tricks her into draining him of his magics, which bring 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 Potential Slayers to Sunnydale to protect them from The First Evil and its Bringers. Giles had removed a few volumes from the headquarters of the Watchers' Council, which is soon afterward destroyed by Caleb, an agent of the First. After the First's plan is foiled by the destruction of the Hellmouth and of Sunnydale, Giles travels to Europe with Buffy to train new Slayers.
Shortly after Anthony Stewart Head's departure from the series, there was talk of a spin-off series for the BBC entitled Ripper. As of 2004, the project was dead; however, in 2005, Joss Whedon said he was still trying to get it off the ground, "but the ground is kinda sticky."
[edit] Powers & abilities
Giles has immense knowledge of demonology and Slayer combat (including at least a theoretical knowledge of jujitsu and aikido, as well as a fair degree of fencing), mainly due to his training as a Watcher. He dabbled in dark magics as a youth, and his interest in witchcraft and sorcery has endured into his adult life, though his natural aptitude for it is only moderate (much less than that of Willow Rosenberg or Amy Madison). Giles is fluent in several languages, including Latin, ancient Greek, German (as seen in the episode "Gingerbread"), Sumerian (see the episode "Primeval"), Japanese (cf. "Checkpoint"), and possibly Gaelic (cf. "Fear, Itself"), but weak in Mandarin and Cantonese (cf. "First Date").
Giles was briefly transformed into a Fyarl demon in the episode "A New Man." In that form, he had superhuman strength and resistance to injury, and could shoot a powerful binding mucus from his nose. Giles could also only speak the language of Fyarl demons (which Spike luckily understood), and had a powerful rage which he suppressed with difficulty.
Giles was briefly granted the awesome, combined powers of a coven, which he used to bind the powers of Willow when she had gone mad from grief and rage. He has also shown moderate skill in hand-to-hand combat, as well as various melee weapons.
While his demeanor is typically mild and polite, Giles is not above using raw violence to solve a problem, physically threatening Principal Snyder into not expelling Buffy, pummeling Angelus senseless with a baseball bat and then attempting to set him on fire upon discovering that he had killed Jenny Calendar, and suffocating Ben, Glory's human host, with his bare hands.
[edit] Relationships
[edit] Romantic
- Jenny Calendar — A computer science teacher at Sunnydale High, Jenny was a techno-pagan. Giles saw her at first as a symbol of the encroachment of sterile technology into the organic world of books, but they grew closer after cooperating to defeat the demon Moloch in the episode "I, Robot... You, Jane." When Angel lost his soul in the second season, Jenny was found to be part of the Gypsy clan who had cursed him with a human soul in 1898. She had been sent to Sunnydale to keep an eye on him, not knowing about the loophole in the curse that cost Angel his soul. Angry at not being told the truth, Giles initially joined Buffy in ostracizing Jenny. They eventually reconciled, but Jenny was soon murdered by Angelus in the episode "Passion," devastating Giles.
- Joyce Summers — As Sunnydale's adult population came under the influence of magical chocolate in the episode "Band Candy," Giles reverted to his rebellious teenage persona, Ripper. He got intimate with Joyce Summers twice, including once on the hood of a police car. They were too embarrassed afterwards to be romantically involved again.
- Olivia — Whilst unemployed during Season Four, Giles saw this "old friend," a black English woman with whom he seemed to share a casual, albeit sexual, on-again off-again relationship. Olivia seemingly met him during his Ripper era, the 1970s, as he had once claimed to her that he had been a founding member of Pink Floyd, as well as being into the occult. She was last seen in reality in the episode "Hush." Olivia is seen once more in a dream state in the episode "Restless," in which she appears pregnant as she and Giles take Buffy to the "demon carnival."
- Anya Jenkins — When the gang lost their memories because of a spell Willow performed in the episode "Tabula Rasa," evidence led Giles and Anya to believe that they were engaged. They shared a kiss while amnesiac, ironically seconds before the spell wore off; they were so embarrassed afterwards that they never mentioned it again. (Compare Joyce, above.)
[edit] Paternal
The episode "Grave" makes reference to Giles' parental role in the lives of Buffy, Willow and Anya. After Giles comes to stop the havoc Dark Willow is wreaking and Buffy and Anya call his name in surprise, Willow snidely remarks "Uh-oh, daddy's home! I'm in wicked trouble now."
- Buffy Summers - Buffy and Giles formed a close bond over the years. Giles had become the father Buffy always wanted, and Buffy became the daughter Giles never had.
- Willow Rosenberg — Since she first asked Giles, "What can I do?" and he responded, "You can help me", Willow has proven to be an invaluable assistant in the fight against evil for both Giles and Buffy. The most recent indication of their relationship featured Giles' assisting Willow after her brief time as Dark Willow, helping her overcome her dark side so she could again assist her friends. Willow once mentioned that she had had a crush on him early on, but obviously nothing came of that.
- Anya Jenkins - Anya looks up to him as a keen business man and as her boss, and he treats her like a daughter, albeit a strange one.
[edit] Other
- Angel — At first, Giles regards Angel with an even temper (even commenting that his relationship with Buffy was "rather poetic...in a maudlin sort of way"), regarding Angel almost as a peer, sharing books and prophecies with him. But when Angel became Angelus and murdered Jenny Calendar, Giles, devastated to the point of irrationality, set fire to the vampire's warehouse lair and attacked him with a flaming baseball bat, severely beating him before being disarmed by Angelus and rescued by Buffy. When he later needed information, Angelus kidnapped and tortured Giles. After Angel returned from Hell, Giles was upset and wary. He kept a loaded crossbow in hand when talking to Angel in the episode "Amends," yet he also attempted to help Angel with his hallucinations. Giles and Angel come together again in the episode "Pangs," by which time he seems to have lost some of his anger towards Angel, even suggesting that it would be less cruel if Buffy were allowed to see him. When he starts to work for Wolfram & Hart, Angel calls on Giles for help twice. The first time, when the insane Slayer Dana is on the loose, Giles sends Andrew Wells. The second time, when Angel and his crew need help to cure Fred of the infection that becomes Illyria, Giles tells them Willow is unavailable. Both times there are indications that because of Angel's association with the evil law firm, Giles, like the other Scoobies, no longer trusts him.
- Ethan Rayne — Giles and Ethan used to be best friends, but by the time the series begins, they are mortal enemies, since Giles beats up Ethan for information and later just to improve his mood. Yet they also end up getting drunk and reminiscing together.
[edit] Appearances
Giles has appeared in:
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- Giles was a series regular in the show's first five seasons. Following the events in "The Gift", he disappeared from the opening credits. He appeared in 121 episodes overall, including guest appearances in the following:
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- Season 6 (2001–2): "Bargaining, Part One"; "Flooded"; "Life Serial"; "All the Way"; "Once More, With Feeling"; "Tabula Rasa"; "Two to Go"; "Grave"
- Season 7 (2002–3): "Lessons"; "Beneath You"; "Sleeper"; "Bring on the Night"; "Showtime"; "The Killer in Me"; "First Date"; "Lies My Parents Told Me"; "Dirty Girls"; "Empty Places"; "Touched"; "End of Days", "Chosen"
