Buffy Summers

"I'm Buffy. The Vampire Slayer. And you are...?"

- Buffy Summers

Buffy Anne Summers is a Slayer active in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Born in 1981, she was activated as the Slayer in 1996 at the age of fifteen. Initially based in Los Angeles, she later moved to Sunnydale where she acted as guardian of the Hellmouth for seven years before the town's destruction in 2003. Buffy is unique as a Slayer in many ways; she refuses to sacrifice her ordinary life for her supernatural destiny, often operates as part of a team with her friends the "Scooby Gang", and has maintained several romantic relationships, two of which were with notorious vampires Angel and Spike. Buffy is one of the longest-lived Slayers, and has returned from the dead not once but twice, an event which disrupted the traditional Slayer line. She later abolished the line completely with her plan to activate all the world's Potential Slayers, and is now dedicated to training the young Slayers she was responsible for creating.

Buffy first appeared in the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie, but the later television series marked her first canonical appearance in 1997. Since then, she has been featured in spin-off series Angel as well as various expanded universe material. In 2007, the character's history was continued in the comic book series Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight. Buffy was played by actress Kristy Swanson in the movie, but Sarah Michelle Gellar portrays her on television and is more closely associated with the role.

Los Angeles
Buffy was born to Hank and Joyce Summers in 1981, in Los Angeles, California. At the age of eight, Buffy was close friends with her cousin Celia, and enjoyed playing superhero with her. Buffy looked on helplessly as Celia was murdered in her hosptial bed by Der Kindestod, a demon that killed sick children and was only visible to those who were ill, an experience which instilled in Buffy a fear of hospitals. Growing up, Buffy came to idolize Olympic ice skater Dorothy Hamill as she learned the sport herself. In fifth grade, she developed a crush on sixth grader Billy Fordham; although the two were friends, he never returned her feelings. Buffy started attending Hemery High School in 1995; during her time there she became a popular cheerleader and was elected both Prom Princess and Fiesta Queen.

"I've got a few things the other girls didn't have. For one thing, there's my keen fashion sense..."

- Buffy identifies her strengths as a Slayer.

At the age of fifteen, Buffy started having violent dreams about women from different period of history slaying monsters. One day, she was approached by Merrick, a mysterious man who revealed her destiny as the Chosen One and became her first Watcher. Buffy initially did not get along with Merrick, who was sarcastic and intolerant of her valley girl nature, but the pair eventually gained a mutual fondness as he prepared her for battle against the vampire king Lothos. As Buffy's increasingly strange behaviour alienated from her peers, she befriended fellow social outcast Pike, relying on him for support after Merrick shot himself to protect her from Lothos. Despite little training, Buffy managed to defeat Lothos and his minions at her school dance, burning down the high school gym in the process, for which she was subsequently expelled. Shortly after her expulsion, Buffy and Pike ran away to Las Vegas looking for vampires. Upon her return, Buffy's parents found out about what had really happened Hemery and about her destiny as the Slayer. Worried that she was losing her mind, they sent her to a mental institution. While there, Buffy realized that attempts to persuade others of the existence of demonic forces would be futile. She kept quiet and was released after a couple of weeks. Buffy and her parents never spoke of it again.

Sunnydale High
"Do-do you think I chose to be like this? Do you have any idea how lonely it is? How dangerous? I would love to be upstairs watching TV or gossiping about boys or... God, even studying! But I have to save the world. Again."

- Buffy Summers

Buffy's parents, who had been experiencing marital troubles for years, finally divorced, and Buffy moved with her mother to 1630 Revello Drive in Sunnydale, a small town in California. Little did they know that the town was located on a Hellmouth, and that Buffy's presence there was pre-destined. Buffy enrolled at Sunnydale High, where she became friends with Xander Harris and Willow Rosenberg, as well as her new Watcher, Rupert Giles. She also met Cordelia Chase, a superficial cheerleader reminiscient of Buffy before she became the Slayer, and Angel, a mysterious and handsome stranger who aided Buffy with cryptic advice. . After successfully stopping the vampire ritual known as the Harvest together, Buffy, Xander, Willow, and Giles formed the "core four" of the "Scooby Gang" and continued to investigate the various supernatural mysteries that occurred on the Hellmouth. Buffy developed an attraction to Angel, and was horrified when he turned out to be a vampire. Steeling herself to do her duty and slay him, she relented after learning that he had a soul, having been cursed by gypsies over a century ago as punishment for his vicious crimes. Giles warned Buffy that she would eventually be forced to battle the thousand-year-old vampire leader known as the Master. Upon learning that the infallible Pergamum Codex prophecised her death at the hands of the Master, Buffy contemplated leaving town, but accepted her fate after Willow discovered bodies of their classmates slaughtered inside the school. Buffy was overpowered and left to drown in a pool of water in the Master's dwellings, but Xander resuscitated her and she managed to defeat the Master and stop him from opening the Hellmouth. "Giles, I'm sixteen years old. I don't want to die."

- Buffy upon learning of her prophecised death.

Buffy took months to recover emotionally from her clinical death, finally moving on after destroying the Master's remains herself. In her junior year of high school, she came into conflict with Spike and Drusilla, a vampire couple intent on wreaking havoc in Sunnydale. Buffy's relationship with Angel heated up and the pair began officially dating. Buffy also met and formed an awkward friendship with Kendra Young, a second Slayer who had been activated when Buffy drowned. Kendra helped Buffy appreciate that being a Slayer was part of who she was, and not just a burden. On the night of her seventeenth birthday, Buffy lost her virginity to Angel, and unknowingly lifted the curse placed on him a century earlier, causing him to lose his soul and revert to the evil Angelus, the most notoriously evil vampire in history. Angelus became obsessed with destroying Buffy's life and joined Spike and Drusilla, who had reconstructed an invincible demon called the Judge. Buffy managed to defeat the Judge with a stolen rocket launcher, but Angelus' pathological abuse continued to take a heavy toll on Buffy and her friends over the months. When faced with Angelus's subsequent plan to destroy the world, Buffy reluctantly accepted an alliance with Spike, who had become tired of Angelus' presence. While strategizing with Spike, Buffy was forced to reveal her identity as the Slayer to her mother, who reacted badly to the news. Buffy confronted Angelus and tried to prevent him from opening a vortex to a hell dimension while Willow worked a spell to return Angel's soul. The spell was successful but too late, and Buffy was forced to send the re-ensouled Angel to hell in order to close the vortex. Traumatized and alone, Buffy then left Sunnydale and escaped to Los Angeles.

In L.A., Buffy spent the summer waiting tables in a diner under a false identity (her middle name, Anne), trying to turn her back on her destiny. However, after rescuing a runaway from a hell dimension, Buffy returned to Sunnydale to face her own demons. She reunited with her loved ones and tried to find closure to her relationship with Angel. However, when he returned mysteriously from hell, Buffy found herself still drawn to him, much to the disgust and confusion of her friends. Meanwhile, a rebellious new Slayer, Faith Lehane, who had been activated upon Kendra's death, arrived in town. Faith was initially a powerful ally for Buffy, but their opposing personalities led to antagonism and acrimony as Faith indulged her dark side. Increasingly alienated from the Scoobies, Faith found a friend in the affable yet sinister Mayor of Sunnydale, who was preparing to become a pure-blood demon on Sunnydale High Graduation Day. As the Mayor used Faith to help him prepare for his ascension, Buffy worked first to thwart his efforts, then to organize a resistance. When Buffy learned that Angel, who was on the verge of death after being poisoned by Faith, must drink the blood of a Slayer in order to survive, Buffy attempted to sacrifice Faith to save him. Their battle left Faith in a coma, and Buffy ultimately saved Angel with her own blood. Buffy then led her classmates in a climactic battle against the transformed Mayor and his minions, which culminated in an explosion that destroyed the Mayor as well as Sunnydale High. After the smoke cleared, Angel left for Los Angeles so that Buffy could try to have a more normal life without him.

College
Buffy initally experienced some difficulty adjusting to life as a college freshman, something made even harder with her Slayer duties and her separation from Angel. After sharing what she believed to be a night of emotional intimacy with fellow student Parker Abrams, she became depressed when he neglected to contact her afterwards. Eventually, Buffy attracted the sincere attentions of teacher's assistant Riley Finn and began to wonder how she would balance her Slayer duties while dating a seemingly-normal guy. However, while fighting the Gentlemen, she discovered that Riley had a secret of his own; he was in fact a member of the Initiative, a U.S. government task force created to research mystical and demonic creatures led by Buffy's psychology professor Maggie Walsh. Buffy briefly joined forces with the Initiative, but her relentless questioning of the Initiative's plans and motivations, as well her relationship with Riley, began to unsettle Professor Walsh, who tried to dispose of her by having her killed in action. Afterwards, Walsh was murdered by her own creation, a monstrous bio-mechanical demonoid named Adam, who subsequently escaped and began his plan to create an army of similar super soldiers. Meanwhile, Faith, having awakened from her coma, used a mystical device to switch bodies with Buffy. In Faith's body, Buffy was taken into custody by the Watchers Council Special Operations Team. She managed to escape and convince Giles of her true identity, and with Willow and Tara's help, reversed the body swap. Faith escaped to Los Angeles, where Buffy was dismayed to find her under the protection of Angel, who insisted that she could be rehabilitated. Eventually Riley, who had been torn between the Scooby Gang and the Initiative for some time, turned his back on the corrupt organization to join Buffy. Although the Scooby Gang had been drifting apart over the last year, Buffy, Xander, Willow, and Giles finally reconciled and combined their essences by invoking the spirit of the First Slayer, allowing Buffy to physically destroy Adam.

After an encounter with the famous vampire Dracula, Buffy began to fully accept her duty as the Slayer for the first time in her life. A younger sister, Dawn, mysteriously appeared in Buffy's household, her existence seamlessly integrated with the memories of Buffy, her friends, and her mother. Buffy discovered that Dawn wasn't her sister, but rather a ball of mystical energy that could open interdimensional portals. A group of monks transformed the "Key" into human form to hide it from a hell-god known as Glory, choosing the Slayer to protect it because they knew she would protect her sister with her life. Buffy's relationship with Riley began to deteriorate as she failed to give him the emotional intimacy he craved. Riley began visiting vampire brothels where he would allow himself to be bitten, and when Buffy discovered this, they finally broke up and Riley returned to the military. As Buffy recovered from this, she was disgusted to learn that Spike, now unable to harm humans due to the Initiative's experiments on him, had fallen in love with her. Buffy was devastastaed when her mother, who had been experiencing health problems for months and only recently received surgery for a brain tumour, died unexpected from an aneurysm. Taking up the role of Dawn's legal guardian, Buffy was forced to drop out of college to look after her sister. As she struggled to fully understand what being the Slayer meant, Giles took Buffy on a vision quest, where the spirit of the First Slayer told her that death was her gift, a message she found confusing and hurtful so soon after her mother's death. When Glory finally discovered the Key and captured Dawn, Buffy retreated into her subconscious, where she battled with the possibility that she may have to kill Dawn to save the world. Willow successfully drew Buffy back out into consciousness, and the Scoobies attacked Glory's stronghold in full force. Despite everyone's efforts, Dawn's blood was used to open the interdimensional portal and chaos reigned on Earth. Buffy defeated Glory and, finally understanding the meaning of the message from the First Slayer, sacrificed her own life, using her own blood to close the portal so Dawn wouldn't have to. Afterwards, Buffy was buried on the outskirts of Sunnydale with the epitaph, "She saved the world. A lot." Finally able to rest, she ascended to heaven and found peace. "Dawn, the hardest thing in this world is to live in it. Be brave. Live. For me."

- Buffy's dying message to her sister.

Adulthood
Buffy was resurrected by her friends, who worried that she may have been in hell due to the mystical circumstances of her death. Buffy's transition back to her life was difficult; she experienced an overwhelming sense of loss after being ripped from heaven, as well as the added everyday responsibilities of raising Dawn and paying bills. She attempted to keep her problems secret from her friends, not wanting them to share in her grief, and confided only to Spike that she had in fact been at peace while dead. Buffy's depression worsened when Giles, believing that he was standing in the way of her growing up, left Sunnydale and returned to England. Struggling to feel alive and seeking someone who understood her, she began a violent sexual relationship with Spike which left neither of them satisfied. At the same time, she was forced to deal with the ongoing efforts of the villainous Trio, a group of nerds she went to high school with who had decided to take over Sunnydale. In order to deal with her increasing financial problems, Buffy started working at local burger bar the Doublemeat Palace, a job she found degrading and disturbingly mundane. A brief reunion with Riley shocked Buffy into finally breaking up with Spike, admitting to him that she was just using him and it was killing her. Confused and angry, Spike later cornered her in the bathroom and tried to rape her; Buffy fought him off, and Spike fled Sunnydale, horrified by his own actions. When Warren Mears, the leader of the Trio, killed Willow's girlfriend Tara in an attempt to kill Buffy, Willow, possessed by dark magic and grief, exacted bloody revenge against Warren. Unable to condone Willow's actions, Buffy battled her best friend to stop her from committing more murders, but was promptly defeated before Giles came to her rescue. Willow then tried to destroy the whole world to end everybody's pain, leaving Buffy and Dawn trapped underground. Xander eventually came through for Willow in the end and Buffy promised to change her self-destructive behavior in order to be there for her sister and appreciate life.

As Dawn enrolled in the recently rebuilt Sunnydale High, Buffy was offered a job as guidance counselor by Principal Robin Wood, which she gratefully accepted. Spike returned to Sunnydale after regaining his soul in an attempt to prove himself to Buffy. Buffy recognised the difference in him, and even when it seemed he may revert to a dangerous killer, she assured him that she believed in him. When agents of the First Evil, the Bringers, began tracking down and killing Potential Slayers in an attempt to wipe out the entire Slayer line, Buffy's home quickly filled up with teenage Potentials who came to Sunnydale for protection. Buffy stepped into a leadership role to the girls, who initially looked up to her with respect, and worked to train them into an army that could stand against the First and it's army of ancient Turok-Han vampires. However, as the dangers around them increased, Buffy's unforgiving methods began to alienate the terrified girls. A reformed Faith, having escaped from prison to help Angel, travelled to Sunnydale to aid the Scoobies in the battle. Upon learning that the First's minion Caleb had something of hers, Buffy led the Potentials into battle to retrieve it, which resulted the loss of several girls as well as Xander's eye. Blaming Buffy for the deaths and injuries, the Potentials held a mutiny and appointed Faith as their leader instead; even Buffy's friends and sister refused to stand up for her and Buffy was forced to leave her own house. Only Spike remained loyal to her, and his love and encouragment gave her the strength she needed to keep fighting. Buffy found the object Caleb was keeping from her—an ancient Slayer Scythe—and earned back the Scoobies' trust, informing them of her plan to share her power with every single Potential. Willow used the Scythe to perform a spell which activated Slayers all around the world, and a huge battle was waged in Sunnydale between the Slayers and the Turok-Han. During the fight, Spike sacrificed himsef to close the Hellmouth one and for all. Before he crumbled to dust, Buffy admitted to his disbelief that she loved him, before escaping the ruins of Sunnydale with the other survivors. "Slayers... every one of us. Make your choice. Are you ready to be strong?"

- Buffy's speech to the Potential Slayers.

Leader to the Slayers
Following the destruction of Sunnydale, the Scooby Gang scattered around the world to locate and train newly-activated Slayers. When Xander once again fell under the thrall of Dracula and went to live with him as his manservant, Buffy was forced to break into the vampire's castle and convince Dracula to let Xander go. Encompassing mystics and a wide technological armory, the Scoobies expanded to keep on top of demonic threats on a more global level. Buffy funded this organization by going on a bank heist with other Slayers, which she reasoned was a "victimless crime" due to the bank's insurance. For Buffy's protection, decoy Slayers were set up to divert enemy attention, one in Rome, who was supposedly dating the Immortal, and the other underground; not even former allies like Angel were aware of her true location. Buffy, Dawn, and Xander eventually set their base in a Scottish castle, with Buffy training a squad of new Slayers, including Satsu, Rowena, and Leah. However, she failed to experience the feelings of connection that the other Slayers did, and began to employ ruthlessly aggressive tactics against the Slayers' enemies, demon and human alike.

Over a year after Sunnydale's destruction, Buffy investigated signs of an attack from a new enemy known as Twilight and her team came under attack from the United States military, who had employed her old enemies Amy Madison and Warren Mears. Questioning General Voll as to his motive for attacking them, Buffy learned that the military now considered all Slayers to be a threat, should they start to think of themselves as above the law. While searching for information about upcoming dangers, Buffy discovered that Twilight planned to eradicate all magic from the Earth and that Buffy would suffer a betrayal; "The closest. The most unexpected." In her first encounter with Twilight, she was warned that her decision to activate the Slayers had been a mistake, and she began to question her own actions. Feeling lonely, Buffy shared a one-night-stand with Satsu, but her inability to return Satsu's feelings caused the other Slayer to leave the squad. On a mission to New York, Buffy was transported several centuries into the future, where she discovered that the thousands of Slayers had been reduced to one individual, Melaka Fray. Fray and a future version of Willow tried to prevent her from returning home, prompting Buffy to kill future Willow just as present Willow brought her back to her own time.

Personality
"The Slayer does not walk in this world. I walk. I talk. I shop, I sneeze. I'm gonna be a fireman when the floods roll back. There's trees in the desert since you moved out and I don't sleep on a bed of bones."

- Buffy rejects the First Slayer's insistance that she live alone.

Before becoming the Slayer, Buffy's personality was that of a superficial blonde valley girl; she herself claimed that even Cordelia "looked like a classical philosopher next to me". Initially snobby towards people of a lower social class such as Pike, the isolation she experienced from her popular friends at Hemery gave her new-found empathy towards outcasts like Willow and Xander. Nevertheless, Buffy was something of a rebel who did not conform to traditional Slayer conventions; Giles once admitted that "some flexibility is required" when it came to being Buffy's Watcher. Buffy is unique as a Slayer in that she refuses to give up her "normal" life for her destiny and works with a group of close friends who know her identity. The spirit of the First Slayer once insisted to Buffy that the Slayer must work alone, a belief which Buffy rejected. Kendra, who had been trained as a Slayer from early childhood, told Buffy that a Slayer did not have the luxury of emotions. Buffy responded by claiming that her emotions gave her power and she considered them "total assets".

Appearance
"The part that gets me, though, is where Buffy is the Vampire Slayer. She's so little."

- Jenny Calendar

Buffy's distinguishing features include a bite-mark scar on the right side of her neck. She originally received this bite from the Master, but the scar was not displayed directly on screen until after Angel bit her. She has since also been bitten by Dracula. In high school, Buffy unwilling received a tattoo of the Mark of Eyghon from Ethan Rayne, but later spent her allowance on having it removed.

Slayer powers

 * See Slayer

Buffy is a Slayer and has the normal powers that other Slayers do, including superhuman strength, speed, agility, reflexes, durability, accelerated healing, and a limited ability to sense the presence of demons. She possesses the collective memories of all past Slayers, and has some degree of precognition that allows her to see upcoming events in her dreams, such as her temporary death at the hands of the Master ("Prophecy Girl"), Angel's transformation into Angelus ("Innocence"), and the arrival of the Gentlemen ("Hush"). Although she is often called a dumb blonde by herself and others, she has strong leadership skills in battle and has a natural flair for cunning plans, such as her strategy to activate all Potential Slayers to defeat the First in "Chosen".

Other powers
Buffy has gained other powers since the end of Season Seven:
 * Mystical protection — After becoming leader to the activated Slayers, Xander comments that Buffy has some degree of mystical protection over her now, at least while she sleeps. To that end, her protection means even daggers split apart so as not to pierce her skin.
 * Mystical link with Willow — Buffy's connection to Willow is now so strong, that even when unconscious, Willow's consciousness can at will channel an amount of her power through Buffy.

Temporary powers
Buffy has had possession of other abilities for brief periods of time:
 * Telepathy — In high school, Buffy received an aspect of a demon that she killed, and gained the ability to hear the thoughts of others (although not vampires, which leave no reflection in the mind). She became unable to control all of the thoughts in her head, so Angel killed a second demon of this type and fed her a potion containing the demon's heart, stopping the ability altogether.
 * Super Slayer — In order to defeat Adam, Buffy became the focus of a complex spell that drew on the pure source of the Slayer's power and briefly gave her the combined abilities of Xander, Willow, and Giles. She became faster, stronger and had magical abilities. For example, she telekinetically stopped Adam's bullets in the air and turned a missile into a dove. She was able to punch through Adam's armored hide and rip out his radioactive uranium power core without ill effects. Immediately after Buffy defeated the nearly invincible Adam, the spell faded. Though Xander suggested that they perform the spell again in order to defeat Glory in "The Gift", Buffy decided against it, believing that even the Super-Slayer would be inferior to Glory in addition to the fact that she would need everybody conscious in order to help her.
 * Invisibility — Shortly after her resurrection, Buffy was accidentally rendered invisible by the Trio. At first, she enjoyed her new ability, before she learned that her life was in danger. Willow reverses the effects when she gets a hold of the Trio's gun.

Deaths
"Hey, I've died twice."

- Buffy Summers

Buffy died at the age of sixteen after being bitten and drowned by the Master. This was a clinical death, in which the heart stops beating, but there is still brain activity. People who experience clinical deaths have often been revived. This death activated Kendra Young as the Slayer.

Buffy's second death occurred when she was twenty years old, when she sacrificed herself to save Dawn and the world by hurling herself off a tower and using her own body to close a mystical portal. She was buried in a Sunnydale cemetery, where her body rested for 147 days until Willow, Xander, Tara, and Anya resurrected her.

When Buffy was shot by Warren Mears, she briefly flatlined in the hospital before being saved by Willow, who removed the bullet via telekinesis. It is never acknowledged by Buffy or anyone else whether this constituted a third death. Buffy's nightmare came true when she was turned into a vampire by the Master because a comatose Billy Palmer was inadvertently merging the line between reality and dreams; this death was quickly reversed when Billy woke up. An alternate version of Buffy also died at the hands of the Master, who snapped her neck, but this timeline was erased by Giles.

Relationships

 * See Buffy Summers/Relationships

Buffy's primary romantic interests in the series are Angel and Spike. The two characters have both their parallels and rivalries. When Angel and Spike search for Buffy, Andrew Wells tells the two vampires that Buffy loves them both, but she has to live her life. In the season eight comics, Buffy is shown dreaming a scenario where both lovers are naked and holding her. The three of them are wrapped in chains and surrounded by cupids or putti, and Buffy wears a nurse outfit. In the Buffy series finale, "Chosen", Buffy both indicates to Angel and to Spike that she loves them, although they react with varying degrees of belief.

Other love interests in the series have been relatively more short-lived, including Pike from the movie and "The Origin" adaptation as well as Riley Finn, an antithesis to Angel and Spike who was her third longest running relationship.

Gallery

 * See Buffy Summers/Gallery

Canonical appearances
The following appearances are considered canonical and form Buffy's official biography.
 * Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Buffy was a regular character for all seven seasons of the televsion series (1997-2003). Buffy and Willow were the only two characters that appeared in all of the series' 144 episodes.


 * "The Origin": A 1999 comic book adaptation of the non-canonical Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie.


 * Angel
 * Season One


 * "I Will Remember You" (1999)
 * "Sanctuary" (2000)


 * Season Five


 * "Conviction" (2003) (Archive footage from "Chosen".)
 * "Soul Purpose" (2004) (Seen only from back of head. Audio clips taken from "The Prom".)


 * Tales of the Slayers
 * "Broken Bottle of Djinn" (2002)
 * "Tales" (2002)


 * Tales of the Vampires
 * "Antique" (2004)


 * Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight
 * "The Long Way Home" (2007)
 * "No Future for You" (2007)
 * "Anywhere But Here" (2008)
 * "A Beautiful Sunset" (2008)
 * "Wolves at the Gate" (2008)
 * "Time of Your Life" (2008)
 * "After These Messages ... We'll Be Right Back!" (2008)

Other Appearances
As the main character in the franchise, Buffy has also appeared in the majority of Buffy expanded universe material.


 * Buffy the Vampire Slayer film: Buffy's first ever appearance, in 1992. "The Origin" replaces it's role in Buffy canon.


 * Buffy the Vampire Slayer comic books: Comic books not written or plotted by Joss Whedon are of unknown canonicity.


 * Buffy the Vampire Slayer novels


 * Buffy the Vampire Slayer video games