Helpless

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"Helpless" is the twelfth episode of season 3 of the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

As Buffy turns 18 the Watchers Council makes her take a test.

Synopsis

Buffy and Angel go a few rounds of fighting until Buffy pins him and holds a breadstick to his heart. They talk, and Buffy reveals her plans to go to an ice show with her father for her 18th birthday. That night in the library, Giles is quizzing her on stones and having her concentrate on staring at them. Later, while on patrol, she's nearly staked by a vampire with her own stake when her powers suddenly stop playing to her advantage.

Buffy's worried about her powers, and talks to Giles about it while trying to throw knives at a target but missing terribly. Meanwhile, Quentin Travers, the head Watcher, is setting up a "test" for the Slayer, assisted by two men named Hobson and Blair. She is to be locked up in a building, without any powers and defeat a powerful and insane vampire--Zachary Kralik. Giles meets with the head Watcher, and tries to convince him to stop the test, but it does no good. At home, Buffy is disappointed to find that her Father can't come and take her to the ice show for her birthday. While she tries to get Giles to take her to the ice show, Giles has Buffy stare into a rock where she then falls into a trance. He injects her with a needle filled with muscle relaxant and adrenaline suppressors.

After Cordelia fights off an aggressive suitor who had knocked Buffy down, Buffy really begins to worry, and enlists the help of her friends to figure out what's wrong. Buffy visits Angel and he gives her a book for her birthday. She tries to sound enthusiastic about it, but losing her powers has really begun to bother her. He tells her about how he saw her before she was the Slayer and how he loved her from the second he first saw her. Kralik has the chance to break out of his strait jacket while Blair is getting his pills and water. He then turns Blair into a vampire and when he wakes up, Kralik is completely freed from his restraints.

Giles goes to find Quentin at the Sunnydale Arms building, but instead finds Kralik free and Hobson dead. Buffy, walking home alone is first confronted by two men looking for a lap dance and then Kralik. Blair chases her until Giles drives by and picks her up. At the Summers' home, Joyce hears a noise out front and goes to check it out where she then finds Kralik wrapped up in Buffy's jacket. Giles tells Buffy that she's lost her strength due to the injections of muscle reaction he'd been giving her, and about the rite of passage. Buffy is very angry and tells him she doesn't know him anymore--that he should stay away from her or she'll kill him. Cordelia shows up and drives Buffy home, where she then finds a picture of her mother in the hands of Kralik.

Buffy goes to the Arms building, beats Blair into unconsciousness and then is chased by Kralik until his need for his pills becomes unbearable. Buffy steals them away, and slides down a laundry chute where she finds her mother tied up. Kralik breaks through the door looking for his pills and water. After he downs the water, he's surprised to find out that Buffy replaced his regular water with holy water. After he explodes, Buffy tries to free her mother, then Giles shows up and stakes Blair before he can hurt anyone.

Back at the library, Quentin congratulates Buffy on her accomplishment, and then Buffy tells Quentin that he better be gone by the time she gets her powers back. Quentin tells Giles that he's fired because he's grown too close with the Slayer--his relationship with her is as more of a Father than a Watcher. The next day, Buffy celebrates her birthday with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and her close friends. When Buffy, minus her strength, can't open the peanut butter jar, Xander offers to help, but he can't do it either.

Cast

Starring

Guest Starring

Co Starring

Dominic Keating as Blair
David Haydn-Jones as Hobson
Nick Cornish as Guy
Don Dowe as Construction Worker

Trivia

Jeff Kober, who plays Kralik, returns to play Rack in Seasons 6.

This story had the working title "18" as it is set around Buffy's eighteenth birthday.

David Fury reveals in the commentary of this episode that the name "Zachary Kralick" came from his own nephew's name.

Continuity

Buffy is disappointed by both of her father figures in this episode - her father does not follow through on their tradition of attending the ice show, and Giles betrays her trust.

This episode marks the beginning of Buffy's father's estrangement.

Giles reveals his now parental feelings towards Buffy.

The book Angel gives to Buffy for her birthday is Sonnets From the Portuguese, by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

Buffy talks about getting Mr. Pointy, Kendra Young's stake, bronzed.

Head of the Watchers Council Quentin Travers is seen for the first time. He will reappear several times, usually in opposition to Buffy's methods and activities.

Giles being fired from the Council makes way for Buffy's own rebellion towards the Council and her decision to operate outside their authority. The separation of Council and Slayer - and Giles' own situation with the Council - will not be solved until "Checkpoint".

Willow finds a curse for Lawyers, this could be slight foreshadowing of Wolfram & Hart in Angel.

This episode shows for the only time what happens when a vampire drinks holy water.

The 12th or 13th episode of each season is traditionally when Buffy celebrates her birthday; her birthday takes place in episode 13 of Season Two ("Surprise"), episode 12 of Season Four ("A New Man"), episode 13 of Season Five ("Blood Ties") and episode 14 of Season Six ("Older and Far Away"). Buffy's birthday is not shown celebrated in Season One (it presumably occurred before the beginning of the half-long season) or in Season Seven.

Music

Christophe Beck - "A Father's Love"
Christophe Beck - "Betrayal"
Christophe Beck - "Kraliks House"