#giles x anya

[dailybtvs]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003)

[buffysummers]

Anya Jenkins and Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003)

[bisexualdawnsummers]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer -> 4.19 -> New Moon Rising

[starryeyesxx]

[thepunkmuppet]

have you thought about anyiles because I have Thought About Anyiles. strap the fuck in guys

first question. why does anya like xander?? like obviously anybody can be attracted to anybody, that makes perfect sense and is fine, but WHY does she love him and pursue a relationship with him?? she’s not actually a teenager, they have literally nothing in common! he makes it very very clear that he doesn’t understand her at all, not to mention constantly belittling and undermining her. when he tries to be “helpful” and teach her social skills and cues, he only does it because it embarrasses him, not to actually help her understand, and is just so fucking condescending and rude!!!! (can you tell that autistic/neurodivergent-coded anya in relation to the way xander treats her makes me mad??)

basically, regardless of how much I just don’t really like it, I genuinely never understood why that relationship ever even happened.

anya and giles however. it’s not necessarily my favourite ship in the fandom as it is, but the idea of what the show would have been had it been canon instead of xanya makes me love it more and more by the second.

let’s talk about canon moments. they have a connection! when they bicker, buffy compares them to her divorced parents, he calls her “dear” at one point for literally no reason, and the biggest one is of course tabula rasa. sure they pieced together the context that they ran the shop together and then just ran with it, assuming they were a couple, but tara and willow were fully attracted to each other and seemed to somehow know that they had a connection, as did xander and willow. xander and anya barely even speak to each other, while anya and giles fall into the role of a couple so easily, kissing passionately without even breaking a sweat

so just think about an alternate version of the show, where instead of liking xander for absolutely no reason, anya pursues giles.

they are both incredibly knowledgeable on demons and history, they both have crazy evil pasts, they both have dry senses of humour, they’re both way more powerful than they come across. and just the poetry of it - giles was the one to destroy her necklace and essentially curse her with humanity. him being the one to make her fall in love with humanity and want to be human again is so FUCKING BEAUTIFUL! and just the idea of exploring his trauma around jenny, unwillingness to love again, etc.

also ik it makes perfect sense for xander’s character so I don’t have beef with it from a writers perspective, but it needs to be said. GILES WOULD NEVER LEAVE HER AT THE ALTAR

[once-more-with-tabula-rasa]

Hi! I finally succumbed to the allure of Tumblr and am happily here - but friendless :) A little about me: 30s (don't worry, I'm quite immature for my age), 4w5 enneagram, INFJ, Ravenclaw, huge fan of a soft and mostly canon divergent spuffy, one of the few who's in love with the limitless potential of giles x anya, in awe of Tara Maclay. But we don't have to have any of this in common for me to follow you, so please just like this post if you still occasionally watch or reblog about BtVS!

[gh-0-stcup]

Falling down the Giles/Anya rabbit hole.

[charmedbuffy]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer 4.10 | Hush

[williamprattz]

anya and giles study

[beatriceeverytuesday]

Separately, Giles and Anya are really smart. But when they work together in the Magic Box, they only share one brain cell. Xander has at least two and therefore functions better than the two of them together, which is Saying Something

[jennycalendar]

also something about how in the later seasons anya is the only one who actually manages to totally shatter giles’s detached veneer and reach the petty unselfconscious-in-his-own-ridiculousness version of himself is so …… i’m thinking about that.

[digopheliadug]

I’m feeling very Giles x Anya right now

[starryeyesxx]

[whatisyourchildhoodtrauma]

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER | 6.08 “Tabula Rasa”

[once-more-with-tabula-rasa]

Not telling anyone how to consume or perceive media (obviously!), but for me I've found it's so crucial to take the show's tone and genre(s) into account - not to mention the prevailing norms during the era it was written. So like when people excoriate '90s sitcom characters for being (gasp) 'problematic', it's not that those fans are technically WRONG, but they're failing to take into account that sitcom characters' flaws and missteps are deliberately exaggerated for comedic effect and that some of what a majority of fandom now views as intolerable was far more generally accepted a couple of decades ago.

Similarly, I think it's futile to apply contemporary ethics and human rules of decorum to supernatural creatures who have been around for centuries. So as someone who loves a few human/vampire ships and is one of like six living Giles/Anya shippers (don't mock me - I'm fragile!), someone once asked if I'm bothered by the age gap and...no, because Anya is a vengeance demon, and BTVS is a mixture of fantasy and horror and comedy and soapy drama rather than a documentary, so for me 'age gap discourse' just doesn't apply as it would between two real human beings. I also just think sometimes we need to focus more on what evokes emotion and stimulates thought and imagination rather than compiling lists of what technically constitutes as problematic by today's rigid yet constantly shifting standards, but I'll stop here before all six mutuals (I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!) unfollow me :)

[gh-0-stcup]

Giving me Anya/Giles feeeelinggs!!!