Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Created by Joss Whedon

The Series Summary
Season One put the "high school is hell" concept into literal action. Buffy Sum
mers just moved to Sunnydale, California after burning down her old school's gym
nasium due to an infestation of vampires. Once at Sunnydale, she hopes to escap
e her duty as the Slayer. Her plans are interrupted by Rupert Giles, her new Wa
tcher, who reminds her of the inescapable Slayer life. Sunnydale High was built
atop a Hellmouth, a portal to hell that attracts the forces of darkness to the
area. Her first day at school, Buffy meets Xander Harris, Willow Rosenberg, and
Cordelia Chase. She befriends Willow and Xander, becoming instant enemies with
Cordelia. Buffy saves Willow and Xander's life the same night, and they help h
er defeat evil through the series. The first big bad they face is The Master, a
n ancient and super-powerful vampire, who plans to open the Hellmouth and take o
ver Sunnydale.
Season Two begins with new vampires Spike and Drusilla arriving in town, along w
ith Kendra, a Slayer called to take the place of Buffy after her brief death in
Season One. Xander soon becomes romantically involved with Cordelia Chase in se
cret, while Willow becomes involved with witchcraft and falls in love with Oz Os
bourne, who is revealed to be a werewolf. The vampire Angel (from Season One) b
ecome fall even deeper in love, but their relationship of passion soon turns to
terror and tragedy after they sleep together, causing Angel's curse to take his
soul and bring Angelus, the sadistic killer vampire, into his body. He torments
the gang and murders multiple people throughout the season, including Gile's gi
rlfriend Jenny Calendar. Buffy realizes that she must murder Angel, and after t
he final fight, she stabs him with a sword after passionately kissing him once h
e returns to his old self. At the end of the season, Buffy leaves Sunnydale on
a bus, after leaving a letter for her mother, emotionally shattered.
After starting a new life in LA, Buffy returns to Sunnydale after rescuing a com
munity held underground by monsters. Once Buffy returns, Angel is resurrected,
but he leaves Sunnydale and goes to LA after he realizes that he and Buffy canno
t be together. Giles is fired from his job as Watcher when the Watcher's Counci
l becomes convinced he has a fatherly love for Buffy. Buffy, at the end of the s
eason, quits working for the Council. Early in the season, she is bombarded wit
h an unstable Slayer, Faith Lehane, who was called after Kendra's death at the h
ands of Drusilla. The Mayor plans to become a giant snake-demon during Sunnydal
e High's graduation. Although Buffy and Faith work together against evil when t
hey first meet, Faith later turns evil after accidentally killing a man and fail
ing to see the bad side of it. After Faith poisons Angel, Buffy figures out tha
t she needs Slayer blood to make him well and she attacks Faith at her apartment
, stabbing her with her own knife on the roof of the building. Faith jumps off
the side of the building, landing on a passing truck, and is in a coma until Se
ason Four. At the end of the Season, Buffy and the entire Graduation Class defe
at Mayor Wilkins by blowing up the school.
Season Four sees Buffy and Willow enroll at UC Sunnydale while Xander joins the
workforce and begins dating Anya, a former vengeance demon. Spike returns as a s
eries regular and is abducted by The Initiative, a top-secret military installat
ion based beneath the UC Sunnydale campus. They implant a microchip in his head
which prevents him from harming humans. He reluctantly helps the Scooby Gang thr
oughout the season and eventually begins to fight on their side after learning t
hat he can harm other demons. Oz leaves town after realizing that he is too dang
erous as a werewolf, and Willow falls in love with Tara Maclay, another witch. B
uffy begins dating Riley Finn, a grad student whom she later realizes is a membe
r of The Initiative. Although appearing to be a well-meaning anti-demon operatio
n, it is realized that it had more sinister plans as its demon/Human/computer hy
brid secret project, Adam, escapes and begins to wreak havoc on the town. The se
ason also marked the first year in which Joss Whedon oversaw other TV series.
During Season Five, a younger sister to Buffy, Dawn, suddenly appears in Buffy's
life, and although she is new to the series, to the characters it is as if she
has always been there. Buffy is confronted with Glorificus (Glory), an exiled he
ll-God that is searching for a "Key" that will allow her to return to her Hell d
imension and in the process would blur the lines between dimensions and unleash
Hell on Earth. It is later discovered that the Key's protectors had turned the K
ey into Human form as Buffy's sister Dawn, concurrently implanting everybody wit
h lifelong memories of her. The Watcher's Council aids in Buffy's research of Gl
ory, and she and Giles are both reinstated by the Council. Riley leaves early in
the season after deducing that Buffy does not love him and joins a military dem
on-hunting operation, while Spike, still implanted with the Initiative chip, rea
lizes he is in love with Buffy and continually helps the Scoobies in their fight
. Buffy's mother, Joyce, dies of a brain aneurysm, while at the end of the seaso
n, Xander proposes to Anya. Glory later discovers that Dawn is the key and kidna
ps her. Buffy sacrifices her own life to save Dawn's and prevent the portal to t
he Hell dimensions from opening.
At the beginning of Season Six, Buffy's friends resurrect her through a powerful
spell. Although believing that they had taken her out of Hell, it is later reve
aled that she was in Heaven during her death and she falls into a deep depressio
n for most of the season. Giles returns to England after realizing that Buffy ha
s become too reliant on him, while Buffy takes up a fast-food job for money and
develops a secret, mutually abusive relationship with Spike. Dawn suffers from k
leptomania and feelings of alienation, Xander leaves Anya at the altar, after wh
ich Anya once again becomes a vengeance demon, and Willow becomes addicted to ma
gic, causing Tara to temporarily leave her. They also begin to deal with The Tri
o, a group of nerds led by Warren Mears who use their technological proficiency
to attempt to kill Buffy and take over Sunnydale. Warren is shown to be the only
competent villain of the group and, after Buffy thwarts his plans multiple time
s and the Trio breaks apart, he comes unhinged and attacks Buffy with a gun, kil
ling Tara in the process. This causes Willow to descend into darkness and unleas
h all of her dark magical powers, killing Warren. Giles returns to face her in b
attle and infuses her with light magic, tapping into her remaining humanity. Thi
s causes Willow to attempt to destroy the world to end everyone's suffering, alt
hough it eventually allows Xander to reach through her pain and end her rampage.
At the end of the season, Spike leaves Sunnydale and travels to see a demon and
asks him to "return him to what he used to be" so that he can "give Buffy what
she deserves". After passing a series of tests, the demon restores his soul.
During Season Seven, it is revealed that Buffy's revival at the beginning of sea
son 6, and the instability caused by it, has allowed the First Evil to begin tip
ping the balance between good and evil. It begins hunting down and killing all o
f the inactive Potential Slayers, and begins raising an army of ancient, powerfu
l Turok-Han vampires. After the Watchers' Council is destroyed, Giles arrives wi
th a number of the Potential Slayers, and over the course of the season an incre
asing number of Potential Slayers takes refuge in Sunnydale. Faith returns to he
lp fight the First Evil, and the new Sunnydale High's principal, Robin Wood, als
o join the cause. The Turok-Han vampires and a sinister preacher known as Caleb
begin causing havoc for the Scoobies as the year goes on. Throughout the season,
the Hellmouth became overly active and the increasing amount of supernatural ph
enomena caused everyone to leave the city. At the end of the season, the Scoobie
s descend into the Hellmouth while Willow uses a spell that activates all of the
Potential Slayers, granting them Slayer powers. Angel returns to give Buffy an
amulet, but Buffy instead gives the amulet to Spike, who has returned to Sunnyda
le. Anya, who has returned to being Human, dies in the fight, as do some of the
Potential Slayers. At the end of the fight, Spike uses the amulet, which channel
s the power of the sun and kills all of the vampires in the Hellmouth, apparentl
y incinerating Spike in the process. This causes the Hellmouth to collapse, and
the entirety of Sunnydale collapses into the crater with it, just as everyone ma
nages to escape.