#rachaeljurrassic this is for you

[melonsmessymusings]

Just seen a post about S6&S3 parallels and @rachaeljurassic made some super interesting points in the tags about Giles’ departure and how INFURIATING it is that I really want to expand upon, so I guess this one’s for you :) I get it, the mentor figure needs to be gotten out of the way in order to progress Buffy’s own arc, that’s fine. It narratively makes complete sense, but it was handled badly.

@rachaeljurassic suggested that maybe we could’ve gotten him out of the way with a coma. I vibe with that. Let’s have the head injuries catch up to him and have him totally incapacitated. Big battle, dire injuries, that works. We could still have Buffy spiralling after, but this time she’d be blaming herself because Giles got hurt as a result of her being the Slayer (even though he’d never blame her for it and it isn’t her fault except for like twice). That also works better because it would be more in character than having Giles go “I know you can’t even breathe right now but I’m gonna flake because you need to be a grown up. Even though when I was your age I was raising demons, doing dr*gs and having orgies so like lmao.” Plus, have a couple of gratuitous scenes of a very injured Giles being visited by someone to pepper throughout the season that were pre-recorded so we don’t get confused as to why they wouldn’t be sat there with him at least every now and then to make us cry. Imagine a scene with Buffy in a hospital room watching a ventilator force air into her Watcher to keep him alive and pouring her heart out because she’s terrified with no idea what to do and he always knew and she needs him and just cries. You could even have it where he’s like slowly deteriorating or something and Dark!Willow uses her magic to cure him so that would explain how he just got better and was like... fine.  

I also love the idea of him having a total breakdown after Buffy’s death. I absolutely thrive off him becoming a completely numb droid (he probably was and only bothered to put on façade for the Scoobies but that’s for another day) and the Scoobies decided it’d be better for him to try and find a new purpose in life by sending him to England. We could’ve had like the first episode of them helping him settle with the Coven or something and it’d have been AWFUL to watch, but it would make sense and then when Buffy gets resurrected, they just don’t tell him and they tell Buffy that the grief killed him or something like that? idk... or having them explain that Giles isn’t Giles anymore and he’s doing better (because Tara gets updates from the Coven) but being in Sunnydale was killing him and they never told him that Buffy was resurrected. That wedges the group dynamic enough tbh and would cause Buffy to turn to Spike because he’d have had no clue about anything except that Giles had gone off the bloody rails big time and it was good he was away from this hellhole. 

Family emergency? Let’s be honest, the Giles family are probably scum so I’d buy that way less but it’s still more convincing than what actually happened. 

Another suggestion was having the Council snatch him. I also adore this. That would make sense. But let’s have them make it look like they killed him because I love that. So they send in a team, take him away but make it look like he’s been completely murdered. 

My idea is that they put a glamour or something on a vampire to make it look like Giles (but the audience don’t know this yet) and so Buffy drops by and finds a body that is in every way identical to Giles in a destroyed apartment and just breaks and is like clutching at him or something and there’s blood and its horrendous. Then you could either have swoopy Council guys come in and take Giles away when he ‘wakes up’ as a vampire because “there’s a procedure to this Miss Summers” or have her stake him herself then and there because after Angelus she’s taking no chances. Could you imagine the emotional payoff of that? She then has to go and tell the others, who don’t believe her but they all see the apartment, bloodstains and pile of dust and they all have to cope with the grief of losing him throughout the season in addition to everything else.

But wait! There’s more. Travers ends the episode with a folder in front of him, a report from the team that carried out the operation and smiles saying something evil like “I warned her of dealing with grown ups” so the audience all thinks that Giles got offed by the Council. 

BUT REALLY Giles was taken and held in a like prison facility thing, very much alive. Then we get like a showdown of Giles chained to a chair in this cell being forced to watch the video footage of the whole operation and Travers telling him that it’s over and his oh so precious Slayer will end up killing herself with guilt/grief and the Council can have a new start because they’re going to off Faith too. And the last shot is Giles crying in a dank hole.

As far as the audience goes: imagine having Giles showing up at the end of S6 if THAT had been the departure? It’s already an “AAAAAHHHHHH HOLY SHIT!” moment but it’d be magnified tenfold. Then Buffy being completely confused because “I killed you!” then having that moment when she ends up hugging him and he’s warm and breathing and not dead. And Dark!Willow being really confused but trying to kill him anyway because if he was alive all this time why didn’t he come back? That’s when we get the scene with Giles watching what happened on the monitor. Everyone is confused and Giles explains that the Council kept him in one of their facilities and now Buffy feels sick because she’s like “they tortured you... for months!” and Giles is like “Well yeah but it’s fine because I’m here now and I’m so sorry for abandoning you all.” Still can have Evil Willow being evil and Xander saving the day. I don’t care that much but we could’ve had this worked in.

Because the Council would’ve tortured him for fun. Not necessarily physically but they would’ve paraded him around as the example of what happens if you don’t toe the line. They could’ve completely humiliated him and it caused like cracks in the Council because some of them hate that Travers is abusing his power like this on one of their own and others finding it good that such a strong message is being sent. At which point, Travers would give the order for the Special Ops team to start the beatings. Of course, Giles is used to having the seven bells kicked out of him, but to be used as a training dummy by other human beings? They’d practice on him and that’s as far as I think the physical side of it would go, the rest would be mental/emotional torture. Or having hexes/curses tested on him and all the while, Giles genuinely wants them to kill him because everyone he cares about already thinks he’s dead so it makes no difference if it’s the reality. All the while, he’s being kept vaguely up to date with the events of Sunnydale so that he can hear how his Slayer is edging closer into just giving up and it breaks his heart. So Giles spent a year either being locked in a cell translating texts or being used as a punchbag to teach the S.O. team how to interrogate people. That’s how I see it going anyway. We could’ve seen like flashbacks of parts of it in S7 or something idk.

That would explain why he’s so distant in S7. Because he was kept prisoner for almost a year by the people who practically raised him (because the Council kind of did) and how that would mess anyone up and the First tormenting him about how he should’ve gone through with any attempts to end it instead of being a coward because Buffy doesn’t need him and she already thought he was dead. 

I dunno if this is actually what you were going for but it’s where my mind went and it would’ve given Tony Head something really juicy to do by playing a slightly crazed version of Giles who freaks out if there’s more than five people in the room because a year of living on your own in the dark drove him mad. He would’ve completely nailed it. Way better than sitting there going, “I’m headed back to England, and I plan to stay indefinitely”. Ugh we were robbed.

[melonsmessymusings]

More S7 ideas...

You may remember eons ago I had a marvellous exchange with @rachaeljurassic discussing potential ways of writing Giles out or putting him to better use in S7. I have another one and like 20 minutes before I have to road trip home after spending all day being yelled at by my parents (storytime when I get home), so buckle up because I’m feeling feral:  

What if the First could use his image even though Giles isn’t dead? Say Giles technically died for a hot second but is now very much alive and kicking. The First would utilise the hell out of that and could you imagine the angsty drama that would emerge?

Giles rocks up with his apocalypse and potentials. He’s all doom and gloom and stress, as he was, but then Buffy has a late night conversation with him when neither can sleep. They just talk. She pours her heart out to him and tells him how much she misses him, how she's doing the best she can but she’s scared it won’t be enough. He’s then a total dickhead to her in return because she has no idea what he sacrificed for her and all she ever did was hurt him and he always managed to deal with it and get the job done without complaint.

The next day, Buffy is weird and feeling really bad but she doesn’t want to talk about it with Giles when he asks. We tick on and it’s like a slow build Jekyll and Hyde deal. One minute Giles is completely ‘normal’ the next he’s a total arsehole. And Giles doesn’t understand why everyone is so weird around him and puts it down to him ruining their lives with the apocalypse. And you think he’s just having a breakdown or something. Maybe his year away turned him into a husk (not that he wasn’t already by this point), who knows?

Xander eventually confronts him like “I heard you talking to Willow last night and you were bang out of order. You don’t get to say things like that.” To which Giles is the Error 404 message like “wtf I didn’t talk to Willow last night, I was in here researching.” Confusion but Xander doesn’t back down and threatens to throw hands.

Anyways, time passes, then one night, Giles is patrolling with Buffy and says something really out of pocket and Buffy’s like “wtf” and goes to reach for him only to have her hand go straight through him. Oh my god, he’s the First! The First capitalises on this and tells Buffy how Giles died in agony all alone thinking he deserved it and she’d be happier without him. She rushed home absolutely distraught. OOOHHH imagine if it made her believe that he killed himself because of her? AAHH

Bursting in the door, everyone is scared and confused and Giles is standing there like “why are you looking at me like that?” And Buffy tells him to get the hell out and stop messing with them. And that he never gets to use that face and it’s all bullshit etc. Meanwhile poor Giles is so confused but everyone else seems to be on Buffy’s side because he’s been so weird with them all for ages. Failing to convince them, Buffy throws something at him, only for it to hit him.

Then it’s the whole “I don’t understand!” moment. Giles explains that he’s very much alive, lots of awkward poking and hugging. Buffy explains everything, as do the others and Giles is really fucking hurt that they all were so ready to believe he was evil. But the cat’s out of the bag now so it’s fine, right?

Wrong! Because the first keeps messing with them as Giles. They develop rules like, before you talk to Giles, you have to poke him or watch him pick something up (which he hates). Doesn’t always work because if Giles is like in the kitchen and you can hear him puttering about for a bit then ten seconds later he’s standing in front of you, the assumption is it’s him. It just works. So the first is messing with them all still and it’s taking a toll on the actual Giles. Because nobody wants him around because whenever they see him, they freak out and panic until he proves he’s real.

Take a second to admire the utter evil genius behind having everyone doubting Giles is real... 

But when did he die? They’re going to bring that up and try and figure it out. And there’s endless possibilities as to when that happened and whether Giles had a clue about it. Also there’s so many ways of having a “when did Giles die?” moment. Like is it from years ago when he was a kid, or maybe he and Ethan partied a little too hard, or the night with Angelus resulted in him coding at the hospital, or what if Willow killed him when she ripped his magic out? There’s endless ways of doing it. Did he even know? If he did, why didn’t he warn them? Was it because he knew that nobody would listen to him?

We never see what happened, whichever way it went. He explains that he doesn’t know but then they talk and he thinks about it, comes to the conclusion that it must’ve been one of the reasons above. Then Buffy gets really sad and guilt ridden because she had no idea.

But it wouldn’t matter because the damage is done. The group is splintered and the First’s plan has succeeded. Like they could make adjustments if Giles appeared, someone has to make sure he’s corporeal but eventually everyone would get so sick of it and just ignore him. And he’d just be so defeated by that and frustrated because everyone’s treading on eggshells around him and not discussing anything important because what if the First can tap into his consciousness? Obviously it can’t but they don’t necessarily know that. How can they differentiate the broken Giles from S7 from the First?

I just think it’s such an interesting concept. It would add loads of drama to the group and we could’ve spent more time focusing on that and it’d be really cathartic for the group to work out tensions. Like imagine Buffy discovering that Willow killed Giles, even if only temporarily. And how Willow would feel about that. Then Xander having to choose sides because Buffy is so angry at Willow but he can’t bring himself to be. Giles getting completely frustrated because nobody will just listen to him and he feels completely useless. Ugh the angst would be glorious. 

And you’d never know what was Giles and what was the First because S7 Giles did just lose it at times, he would say something very ‘ooc’ so you couldn’t tell even if he was standing in front of you. And with all the bad things he said/did before they knew, you’d never know!!!!!

It’s just an idea tbh. Like I said, crackhead energy at this point but I had to get this out there.