Buffy / Tropes O to Z

O

• Obvious Stunt Double: Buffy's stunt double was quite a bit larger than she. During one commentary, Joss Whedon says of the switch that Buffy "straps on her fightin' boobs". The stunt double for Spike was more heavyset than James Marsters, and wore a wig that did not quite mimic the slicked-back hair. Perhaps the most egregious, however, was when a heavyset cafeteria lady was replaced by a stunt double half her size. And male. Or the balding guy sword fighting in place of David Borenaz in the season 2 finale.
• Offscreen Afterlife: Twice — Buffy in Heaven and Angel in Hell.
• Ominous Latin Chanting: Most of the spoken magic in the series. Gaelic is a rare variation
• Only I Can Kill Him: Followed in the first few seasons, averted in Seasons 5, 6, and 7.
  • Subverted in season 2, in which the prophesy actually states Buffy cannot kill the Anointed One. Spike does it instead.
• The Only One: The Slayer is supposed to be this. Due to some supernatural Loophole Abuse, it's only technically true until the end of the first season.
• On the Rebound: After Angel leaves the show for LA, Buffy falls for Parker, a TA in her class who promptly dumps her after a one night stand.
  • Spike returns to Sunnydale with newly-vampirized Harmony on his arm as an obvious rebound from Drusilla.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: The characters whose accents were different from their actors tended to maintain them quite well. There are a few exceptions.
  • David Boreanaz had a great deal of difficulty with Liam's Irish accent in flashbacks and in an episode of Angel asked that he not have to use it during an episode where he otherwise should have. It was lampshaded as part of the weirdness of the episode.
  • James Marsters was very good with his accent (as far as most Americans could tell), with only slight wobbles. Later in the series, according to some, he's finally mastered a lower-class overlay on top of an upper-class accent, allowing Marsters to play with his presentation of Spike, using his history to drive his voice to motivate certain scenes.
  • In-universe: Once Spike had to try and fake an American accent and it was hilariously awful.
    • This gets brain bending when you realize that this is an American man (James Marsters) pretending to be an upper-class Englishman (Spike's actual origin) pretending to be a lower-class Englishman (Spike trying to sound tougher) pretending to be an American (to fool Riley).
  • Alexis Denisof's accent for Wesley was normally impeccable, to such a degree that his natural accent sounds disturbingly false on other shows, but even he slipped once or twice.
  • The she-mantis in Season 1. The actress is from South Africa and her American accent is far from perfect. However, since she's a giant, man-eating bug, this could be acceptable or justified.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted — there are three characters named "Nancy" over the course of the series. In Season 3, the bizzaro universe of The Wish has a White Hat called Nancy who fights vampires alongside Giles, Oz and Larry. Later in the same season, Earshot has a highly competitive student named Nancy who dislikes Buffy. In the Season 7 episode Beneath You, Anya grants a wish to another Nancy, turning her ex-boyfriend Ronnie into a giant carnivorous worm. (Ronnie could also be an example, as Faith mentions a pre-Sunnydale ex with this name, but technically it could be the same guy, wildly unlikely though that is)
• Opening Narration: Only there for the first season and occasionally the second, thankfully. First spoken by a generic narrator then by Giles.
• Open Secret: Some people believe that The Masquerade in Buffy the Vampire Slayer was broken early on, if not before the show started. This is made much more clear in the third season episode "The Prom", during which Buffy is given the "Class Protector" award. Jonathan mentions while he's presenting that everyone present knows that Sunnydale isn't like other schools, but it's an unwriten rule that no one ever talks about it.
  • In the very first episode:
  Buffy: Was there a school bulletin? Was it in the newspaper? Is there anyone in this town who doesn't know I'm the Slayer?
  • And when Wesley first came to Sunnydale and finds out even Cordelia knows:
  Wesley: Does everyone know you're the Slayer?
  • The school newspaper has a regular obituaries section. We know it's a regular item because Oz mentioned always reading it first.
  • Lampshaded directly in season 7; after finishing a set at The Bronze, Aimee Mann mutters about how she hates playing in "vampire towns".
• The Ophelia: Drusilla and, to some extent, Tara after Glory wrecks her mind.
• Orcus on His Throne: Glory and the First Evil, both of whom spend long stretches of time not doing very much of anything.
• Our Vampires Are Different: The vampires in the series are stated to be demons taking over a human body after they've been sired. Since the souls of the victims are gone, the demon takes over the victim's memory and builds on their personality, with a sense of unlocking new potential or getting rid of the humanity that was in their way. Everything else though, is in line with classic vampire traits: blood sucking, sunlight bad, crosses and holy water are harmful, stake to the heart is lethal, etc. The Master and some other powerful vampires have demonstrated that the aversion to crosses is psychological to some (ambiguous) degree, and can be overcome with willpower.
  • One point that causes a small degree of confusion in-series is the rule about vampires needing an invitation to enter a home: once they're invited the first time, they're always "welcome". And welcome signs count.
  • This trope is played with in the Dracula episode. Dracula fits all the tropes you would expect him to, in contrast to the usual vampires on the show. He can shape-shift & turn people into obedient minions, he lives in a Big Fancy House, and he's more focused on romance than just finding food. This is partly down to personal taste—he's seen as an eccentric celebrity by other vamps—and partly due to having unique and mysterious powers, which Spike attributes to some kind of Romani magic.
  • There's also the whole "soul" aspect of the lore; vampires can restore their souls, which essentially returns every part of the original persona that was stripped when they became a demon, including their sense of humanity and guilt—making the "ensouled" version of said vampire the amalgam of the original human and the demon which was built from them. Depending on how similar the demon was to their original self, this may make a big difference in their personality (like with Angel) or not (like with Spike).
• Our Werewolves Are Different: They can "infect" you even in human form via biting. They don't just change under the full moon, they change the night of the full moon, the night before, and the night after. They can learn to suppress the change though this comes at the cost of transforming in broad daylight given enough emotional turmoil.
• Our Witches Are Different: Witchcraft has no gender restriction: though most practitioners are female, there are male users. Giles borrowed the power of an entire coven to take on Dark Willow, Angel and Xander are both shown to use spells, Oz and several frat boys accidentally summon the demon of fear, and there are a few guys in UC Sunnydale's Wicca group.
• Our Zombies Are Different: Season 3 gives us Type V zombies, Season 8 gives us Type O, popped into existence by an angry witch.
• Outlaw Couple: Most notably Spike and Drusilla, but also Angel & Darla, Evil Willow & Xander and Spike & Harmony.

P

• Papa Wolf: It would be wise not to harm or threaten Buffy (to a lesser extent the entire Scooby Gang) and let Giles find out. He may not look like much, but the guy isn't her Watcher for nothing.
  • The Mayor, as well. Don't. Touch. Faith.
  • Lay a finger on Dawn's head, and Spike will probably break it off and feed it to you. (The finger, not the head. That would sort of defeat the purpose.)
• Parrot Expo-WHAT?: Both Buffy and Willow do this a fair amount.
  Anya: Buffy's got some kind of job there helping junior deviants, Spike's insane in the basement, Xander's there doing construction on the new gym —
  Willow: Wait, Spike's what in the what-ment?
  Anya: Insane, base.
• Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: The school library in the first three seasons sees very little use for actual school work, and is mainly used for research and planning against supernatural threats. An occasional recurring gag was for regular students to come in during one of these sessions, and Giles telling them to leave.
• Place Worse Than Death: The high school paper has an obituary section. 'Nuff said.
  • It's still better than Cleveland.
  • Sunnydale is home to twelve cemeteries and forty-three churches. And only one nightclub and Starbucks. And no malls, according to Cordelia.
• Planet of Steves: The writers seem to love the name William and all its derivatives. Here’s a list of all the William variants used on the show: William the Bloody (Spike’s human name and original title), Liam (Angel’s human name), Billy Fordham ("Lie to Me"), Billy Palmer ("Nightmares"), Billy Crandal ("I Only Have Eyes For You"), Billy Blim (the eponymous Angel episode), Willy the Snitch, and Willow's name being shortened to Wil (yeah, this one is a bit of a stretch).
• Plot Archaeology: The First Evil makes a one-off appearance in "Amends". It shows up four seasons later as the Big Bad.
• Plot Armor:
  • In "Choices", Faith strikes Willow across the mouth in genuine anger. Since Faith is a Slayer (and not inclined to pull punches even when she's in a good mood), only a solid layer of Plot Armor prevents Willow's jaw from shattering, and broken teeth flying about like so much popcorn.
  • Angel and Spike are much hardier than your run-of-the-mill vampire because of this. No-name vampires are seen immediately bursting into flames the moment they're pushed into even indirect sunlight while the two regulars can stand around in a perfectly bright room with only mild shadows without so much as sizzling. They're even able to run around in daylight provided they have a handy blanket to cover themselves with. In the comics, Spike can walk around in daylight like normal, as long as he's got a hood and gloves on.
  • Spike takes it to egregious levels in "Pangs" where his torso is liberally peppered with arrows that just manage to miss his heart, despite multiple minor vampires being dusted for less.
• Polyglot: As part of her Character Development to The Smart Guy, Dawn has learned at least Turkish and Sumerian between Seasons 6 and 7. Giles can read five languages, including German and Sumerian.
• Positive Friend Influence:
  • In her first proper conversation with Willow, Buffy encourages her to seize the moment and ask out a boy. Hell, she directly and indirectly inspired her friends to come out of their shells (Willow and Tara), unlock their hidden potential (Xander) or become better people (Cordelia, Angel and Spike).
  • Xander can sometimes be relied on to get people on the right track with some wise words, getting Buffy out of her crisis of confidence and helping her through her Spike's infatuation, giving Willow some male perspective on her relationship with Oz and telling Dawn that just because she has no superpowers that doesn't mean she's not special.
  • Tara helps Buffy through her breakup with Riley, her mother's death and her relationship with Spike. Really, she's the glue of the group.
• Plot Pants: Buffy is the Action Fashionista, the exception being when she takes a serious hit to her self-confidence and changes into the Dungarees of Depression.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner: An absolutely chilling one from Dark Willow in Season 6's "Villains"
  "Bored now."
• Previously on…: Season 6
  • The Season 5 finale had one that included clips from nearly all of the previous 99 episodes.
• Promotion to Opening Titles: David Boreanaz (as Angel), Seth Green (as Oz), Mark Blucas (as Riley), James Marsters (as Spike), Emma Caulfield (as Anya), Michelle Trachtenberg (as Dawn)
  • Played with for Amber Benson as Tara. After she and Willow get back together, she's finally in the opening credits for the first time in the next episode...the episode where she dies. Joss Whedon said that he had intended to do this with Jesse in the Pilot, but didn't have the budget to make two sets of opening credits.
• Private Tutor: "Doppelgangland" has Principal Snyder forcing Willow to tutor a Jerk Jock so he doesn't fail all his classes. And by "tutor him", Snyder of course means "do all his schoolwork for him so he can focus on sports".
• Product Placement: Buffy's iBook almost becomes a tertiary character in later years.
• Profane Last Words:
  • In "Doppelgangland", Willow's vampire Evil Twin dies saying "Fuck".
  • Played With with the Mayor, who goes with a much more tame, "Well gosh."
• Prom Wrecker: Tucker Wells tries to do this by unleashing hellhounds, specially trained to attack people in formal wear, on the Sunnydale High prom. Buffy learns of the plot and stops it without anyone at the prom ever realizing they nearly came under attack.
• Protagonist-Centered Morality:
  • Anya is considered to have become good once she's depowered and teams up with the good guys, even though she shows no remorse for going around killing people for a millennium. Of course, it helps that once she became human she stopped killing people and started romancing one of the Scoobies. Angel is forgiven pretty easily, as well, despite literally killing a former member of the group (though it makes a bit more sense when you take into consideration that the gang (mostly) considers Angel and Angelus to be different people).
  • A version of this is in "Doppelgangland". Apparently the Scoobies thought it was perfectly fine to send vampire Willow back to her universe instead of stake her, based on the fact that she was willing to go home and only kill people there, where they can't see it (she would be staked there, but the Scoobies had no way to know that).
  • In both Buffy and Angel, when Angel loses his soul, the characters go to great lengths to restore it - but they never try to do the same for anyone else who gets turned into a vampire. It's only because they already know Angel that they make an exception for him. Every other vampire just gets slain. It is possible they have considered the fact that Angel's soul was restored as (apparently very successful) punishment for the crimes of his demon half, and come to the conclusion that pulling a more-or-less innocent soul out of the afterlife to inhabit the body of an undead murderer might not be the most merciful of acts, but it's never mentioned on screen.
  • In "Selfless", Anya has killed over a dozen people and Buffy decides she'll have to kill her. Xander tries to dissuade her, saying that Anya's her friend, and Buffy gives him an epic chewing out on how she doesn't get to play favorites, while conveniently forgetting her own hypocrisy. The guy Buffy was in love with gets infinite forgiveness, but the person she only sort of likes? Has to die, no question. Xander notes the hypocrisy however, granted Buffy also points out that she did kill Angel when it came down to it.
  • Ironically the reverse happened in Season 2. Xander didn't like Angel (who at the time was Angelus) so he told Buffy that Willow said to "kick his ass" when she really told him to inform Buffy about the planned restoration of Angel's soul. Buffy ended up running Angel through with a sword and sending him to hell for about a century.
    • For that matter, Xander constantly snarks at and chews out Buffy for forgiving Spike and Angel's soulless misdeeds, but never actually confronts Anya's centuries of evil—despite the fact that she's much older than both of them combined, and has done far less to make up for her actions. This is never really brought up or questioned In-Universe.
  • In "Gone", a social worker sent to look after Dawn sees legitimately suspicious activity. Buffy, who has turned invisible, sets things up to make it look like the social worker is insane in a way which could easily get her fired or sent to a mental institution. This is portrayed as a comedy routine and we are apparently supposed to feel sympathy with Buffy harassing an innocent person merely because she's frustrating a main character.
  • Spike and Harmony are quite sympathetic in the latter series, mainly because they are both so ineffective as to be laughable, and because Spike is such a martyr for love. Meanwhile, Harmony is killing a whole bunch of people while Spike is completely unrepentant and cares so little for other's welfare that he helped a Big Bad bring on the end of the world at least once, and was selling weapons (demon eggs) - the sort which could kill entire cities - to the highest bidder. Granted, their sympathy is generally held with the caveat that they are soulless, and thus unable to actually feel remorse of no fault of their own. To their credit, Spike and Harmony are remarkably non-malicious for vampires, and the former ends up doing the unthinkable and outright seeking out a soul. Spike in particular doesn't really get treated well by the other characters until he's gotten a soul and made heavy changes to himself.
  • Willow's Roaring Rampage of Revenge is forgiven fairly easily, even though (in-universe) it was really just luck and timing which prevented her from bringing about the apocalypse. She also flayed somebody to death. Given a notice in the final season episode "The Killer In Me", where it's pointed out by a bad guy who put a hex on her not for almost destroying the world but just because they're jealous. "She almost destroyed the world! And yet everyone keeps on loving her?"
• The Public Domain Channel: Faith watches it a lot in her hotel room.
• Public Domain Character: Dracula. Apparently, he's one vampire immune to Permadeath. Even Whedon couldn't off the classic vampire. Spike, however, is pissed in that apparently thanks to Drac, everyone knows about vampire Weaksauce Weakness.
• Pushed at the Monster: When Spike and another vampire try to escape from the Initiative, Spike throws the other vampire at the soldiers so he can get away. This could be seen as an inversion since its actually the monsters running from the (mostly) good guys.
• Put on a Bus: Oz, Faith, Angel, Amy and Cordelia. We know where all of them went, and all of them eventually return ^note Cordy's return was on Angel, even if for only a single episode. Everyone who survived in the final episode actually escaped town in a school bus.
  • The Bus Came Back: Oz and Riley both get episodes like this, softening the harsh ways they left the show—Oz giving his blessing to Tara and Willow, and Riley giving Buffy a pep-talk that helps pull her out of her self-destruction.
  • Amy comes back in a big way in the comics, as a major antagonist.
  • Cordy never returns after getting Put on a Bus. At least, not on Buffy anyway. Even in Season 8, she's dead before the comic even begins and only shows up in dream sequences and flashbacks.
  • Spike comes back for an episode in season 3, then comes back yet again for season 4 and stays for the rest of the series as a main cast member.
  • Anya left in late season 3, but returned for season 4, also sticking around until the finale.
• Put on a Bus to Hell:
  • Oz cheats on Willow with another werewolf, kills said werewolf after she attacks Willow, then leaves in order to get his wolf under control.
  • Riley is written out of the show by cheating on Buffy with vampire prostitutes, giving her an ultimatum to forgive him, then leaving to go rejoin the army in another continent without so much as a goodbye.

R

• Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil:
  • Xander, while possessed by an evil hyena demon, attacks Buffy in this manner, playing off of and twisting his crush on her.
  • When the Trio make the dive into the deep end of actual evil, it's through hypnotizing Warren's ex to be their sex-slave—which she, horrified, points out to them to be rape when the hypnosis wears off. Andrew and Jonathan are alarmed by this accusation, but Warren, the more malicious of the three, doesn't particularly care.
  • A flashback implies that Angelus raped and killed a serving girl at some point, which is a particularly sore spot of guilt for Angel. The First uses this, among other particularly terrible murders he committed, to torment him into committing suicide.
  • An accidental near-rape Spike commits against Buffy, caused by a Destructive Romance lacking boundaries and Spike's own inability to dictate objective morality, horrifies even him and is the tipping point to Spike deciding to earn himself a soul.
• Rebuilt Set: Sunnydale High 2.0. in season 7, stated directly to be built on the foundation of the original.
  • The Bronze underwent a major renovation following the rampage of Olaf the Troll, including a new sign.
  • Giles renovates The Magic Box to accommodate the gang's exploits, including a gym in the back room.
• Reminiscing About Your Victims: Spike is quite fond of recalling the Slayers that he killed, though this becomes a point of shame for him in the comics.
• Rescue Equipment Attack: When Spike gets attacked by Initiative soldiers at Buffy's dorm in "The Initiative", he grabs a fire extinguisher and strikes one of them with it.
• The Renfield: Xander in "Buffy Vs. Dracula" and Glory's minions present as that sycophantic, twitchy brand of loyalty to their respective masters. Xander even eats flies while under Drac's thrall.
• Resurrected Murderer: Zachary Kralik was once an Ax-Crazy cannibalistic serial killer who took the lives of a dozen women. Kralik was sired as a vampire and become a member of the undead. Kralik remains just as violent and psychopathic as a vampire.
• Retargeted Lust: Spike has sex with Harmony while thinking of fighting Buffy (in a later episode he gets her to dress up as Buffy before sex). Then he has a Buffy Sex Bot built for him for the same, though it's implied he likely wanted to date it too, given that he had it programmed to do things like patrol.
• Retcon: Throughout the series it is firmly established that Sunnydale is the center of all evil activity (thanks to the Hellmouth) and has been for a long time. However, in the first season, no one in town (including Willow, Xander and Cordelia) seem to be aware of the existence of vampires and demons until Buffy shows up. Whedon tries to cover this up by claiming that everyone in town was just ignorant and/or in denial. Another possible subtle (justified) retcon occurs with regards to ages of vampires. Vampires played by humans will naturally age over time. If the actor starts at 25, it implies that the vampire was turned at 25. If the actor ends up 35, it implies the vampire was turned at 35 and that that's the age the vampire always was. Flashbacks especially seem to reinforce the "always 35 view". In particular, flashbacks with Julie Benz and David Boreanaz during Angel set over a century before the first season of Buffy show both of them looking older than they did when they were first introduced and therefore imply that they'd always been that age.
  • There's also the infamous "you were my sire" retcon, in which Spike claims Angelus sired him, despite that Drusilla is later revealed to be his actual sire. This is handwaved to be because while Drusilla did the actual siring, Angelus was the one who taught Spike how to be a vampire.
  • Another smaller detail; Giles claims that Spike is "just over 200" in "School Hard", but it's later revealed he's less than 150. Given that Spike is a Breakout Villain, not intended to stick around nearly as long as he did, he's prone to a lot of these.
• Retired Badass: Giles in his youth was a rebellious demon-summoning warlock known as "Ripper".
• Retired Monster: Spike, after he got the Chip in Series 4.
  • And then when he got his Soul back in Series 7.
  • Dracula, in the comics.
• Ridiculously Alive Undead: Even though vampires are said to no longer need to breathe oxygen, it doesn't seem to stop Spike from smoking as long as it looks cool. Of course, just because they don't need oxygen doesn't mean they can't choose to breathe (in the sense of moving their diaphragm to inflate and deflate the lungs that are still in their body), and in fact they at least do need to breathe in order to talk - speech is basically using your larynx to modulate the sound your exhaled breath makes.
• Ritual Magic: Very popular in the Buffyverse, whether it be the Roma who cursed Angel, or Willow doing incantations.
• Rhetorical Question Blunder: In "The Harvest", Angel tries to talk Buffy out of going into the sewers.
  Buffy: I've got a friend down there. Or at least a potential friend. You do you know what it's like to have a friend? (Angel bows his head) ...That wasn't supposed to be a stumper.
  • Mr Whitmore lecturing his Teen Health class. ("Bad Eggs")
  "The sex drive in the human animal is intense. How many of us have lost countless productive hours plagued by unwanted sexual thoughts and feelings? (Xander puts his hand up) That was a rhetorical question, Mr. Harris. Not a poll."
  • Cordy bitching at Xander for dragging her out of bed for a ride. "What am I, mass transportation?" ("What's My Line, Pt.1")
  Xander: "That's what a lot of the guys say, but it's just locker-room talk."
• Rogues Gallery: Across the show's seven seasons and its tie-in material (including Angel), Buffy and the Scooby Gang defend Sunnydale from a wide and varied list of recurring supernatural enemies. These range from vampires (naturally) such as the Master, Spike, Drusilla, Angelus (Angel's Enemy Within), the Anointed One, Darla, Mr. Trick, the Turok-Han, and even Dracula himself, to non-vampiric monsters like Adam, Glory, the Judge, Anyanka/Anya (who went through the Heel–Face Revolving Door quite a bit) and the First Evil, to human foes (some of whom are supernaturally powered) such as Faith Lehane, Mayor Wilkins, Amy Madison, Professor Walsh, Caleb, Ethan Rayne, and the Trio.
• Rubber Forehead Demons: A lot of demons are pretty much indistinguishable from humans apart from skin tone and horns or some other head feature. There are also a fair number of non-humanoid ones. Justified by the backstory in that they're actually descended from Uneven Hybrids of pure demons and humans or animals. Or the descendants of said hybrids crossing with something else.
• Rule of Escalating Threat: Season 1: The Master, an extremely powerful vampire lord. Season 2; Spike & Dru, who are remnants of Angel's buried past and then Angleus, a more personal threat, seeing as it was Buffy's boyfriend having a Face–Heel Turn that Buffy herself was partly responsible for. Season 3, the Mayor, a century old sorcerer who can't be injured or killed, and is a Villain with Good Publicity. Season 4 was Adam, a government-funded demon/human/cyborg hybrid that was so strong, it took tapping into the primal forces of the Slayer to defeat him. Season 5 was Glorificus, a hell-god capable of destroying all reality. Season 6 had life itself as the Big Bad, featuring the Scoobies struggling against becoming adults, with relationship problems, addiction and depression as major themes (all of this somewhat personified by Dark Willow). In Season 7, Buffy fought the personification of all evil.

S

• Sadly Mythcharacterized: The Halloween episode is notorious among certain circles for portraying Janus as a god of chaos. Nothing could be further from the truth; while the "division of self" does fit the idea of people and their costumes becoming one, Janus could better be portrayed as a god of Order, not Chaos, especially in his role as the Roman god of portals, doors, and gateways.
• Safety in Muggles: Sometimes people break off a fight by hiding in a crowd. The Scoobies don't want to break the masquerade.
• Sapient Fur Trade: In "Phases", Kane is a werewolf hunter who hunts werewolves to sell their pelts on the black market. The fact that his targets are humans for all but three nights a month does not bother him in the slightest.
• Saved by the Coffin:
  • In "Bad Girls", Buffy hides from the Eliminati in a sarcophagus.
  • In "Goodbye Iowa", when Initiative soldiers kick down the door to his crypt, Spike hides beneath a corpse in a sarcophagus. Note that vampires do not usually inhabit coffins in this universe.
• Scenery Censor: The Monster of the Week in The Dark Age is naked when he comes out of his body bag in the morgue, with a conveniently placed autopsy table to cover his lower half.
  • In "Wrecked", Spike's crotch is censored by a conveniently placed pole.
• School Is Murder: Being a student at Sunnydale High is so bad for your health, Buffy's senior class celebrates the lowest mortality rate in school history after the audience spends four seasons watching teenagers be murdered by the handful by the Monster of the Week. How many members of the previous senior classes died?!
  • Oz mentions at one point that he reads the obituaries in the school paper before he reads anything else. Sunnydale High has so many deaths they have a regular obituary section in the school paper and no one bats an eye.
• Sealed Evil in a Can:
  • The Master, who's trapped in an ancient church underground. Acathla, who's trapped in a hell-realm. The Seal of Danzalthar, which keeps the Turok Han ubervamps from entering into the human world. In a more abstract sense, The First Evil, as it is "trapped" in it's own incorporeal form.
  • Sealed Evil in a Six Pack: The Judge could not be killed in ancient times, so instead he was cut into pieces and scattered in a number of boxes around the world. Cue modern times and Spike and Drusilla reassembling them.
• Second Prize: Subverted for comic effect in "Homecoming". Cordelia and Buffy compete for the title of Homecoming Queen. As expected, the two descend into vicious (albeit hilarious) rivalry, find themselves in danger, pull together, etc. The writers save the high school cliché through outright parody: CORDELIA: "You know, after everything we've been through, this whole question of who gets to be homecoming queen seems..." BUFFY: "Pretty damn important!" CORDELIA: "Right!" In the end, Sunnydale High awards the prize equally to two people in its first-ever tie. Luckily for us viewers, those two people aren't Buffy and Cordelia, but the two other girls who were competing against them. Buffy and Cordelia leave the auditorium in disgust.
• Secret Relationship: Xander and Cordelia in the second season, given their Rich Bitch and Class Clown pairing wouldn't sit well with the school social order. Willow and Tara in the fourth, given that Tara was Willow's Closet Key, and Willow had to work up the courage to come out of the closet. And Buffy and Spike in the sixth, who were Dating Catwoman, and thus Buffy was unwilling to come forward with the relationship.
• Self-Punishment Over Failure: The Three attack Buffy and Angel, who defeat them. Their code of honor insists that they then offer their lives to the Master in penance. He comments that their deaths will give him little pleasure...then kills them anyway, because hey, a little is better than nothing.
• Series Fauxnale: "Prophecy Girl", "Graduation Day" and "The Gift". Also "Chosen", if you want to count the Season 8 comics. This happened a lot.
• Sex Is Violence: Heavily implied with Spike and Buffy. It's pretty obvious that when Spike talks about "dancing", that he's not talking about fighting.
• Shadow Archetype: Faith is this to Buffy and Ethan is this to Giles.
• Shaped Like Itself: Buffy writers love this trope.
  • In the pilot, Buffy tells Giles that she's taken an early retirement, and suggests that if he's so keen on slaying, why doesn't he go slay vampires instead? Giles protests that he's a Watcher and his duty is to... "Watch?" Buffy pipes up.
  • After being inducted into the Scooby Gang ("The Harvest"), Xander and Willow are left discussing their new knowledge while the rest of the school parades around innocently. "It's like we got this big secret!"
    Willow: [beat] We do. That's what a secret is, when you know something other guys don't.
  • In the episode "Witch", when Buffy is very loopy due to the effects of a witch spell, she tells Xander, "That's because you're my friend. You're my Xander shaped friend".
  • Jenny Calender had a similar reaction to Giles demanding to know details of their "secret" date. ("Lie to Me") Unluckily for him, it was a monster truck rally.
  • Buffy makes a mess of advising Giles how to talk to Jenny in "Some Assembly Required":
    Buffy: Speak English, not whatever they speak in...
    Giles: England?
  • To Willow's question about when the Reconstruction began, Buffy tries to focus and replies, " Um, Reconstruction...uh, Reconstruction began after the...construction, which was shoddy so they had to reconstruct." ("Angel")
  • In the same episode, Giles sits at Joyce's sickbed and chats about Buffy. Giles confesses that Buffy is having trouble in history class because she "lives very much in the now. And, um... history, of course, is very much about the, uh... the then."
  • In "School Hard", Buffy and Willow scurry around trying to keep Joyce and Snyder from exchanging words. Buffy, seeing Snyder coming, babbles that Joyce hasn't seen the boiler room yet.
    "The boiler room is really interesting! What with the boiler being in the room and all."
  • Oz complimenting Cordy's Halloween costume, which consists of a black unitard with cat ears and drawn-on whiskers. "You're like a big cat."
  • Ms. Calender apologizing to Giles for spying on him for over a year. ("Passion")
    Jenny: I know you feel betrayed.
    Giles: Yes, well, that's one of the unpleasant side effects of betrayal.
  • In "Anne", Cordelia seems to have a feeble grasp on what being "The Bait" entails.
    Cordelia: What's the plan?
    Xander: The vampire attacks you.
    Cordelia: And then what?
    Xander: The vampire kills you. We watch. We rejoice.
  • In "Earshot", One of the headlines in Freddy's school newspaper reads, "APATHY ON THE RISE — NO-ONE CARES."
• Shared Fate Ultimatum: In "Becoming, Part 2," Buffy and Spike end up in an Enemy Mine alliance against Angelus, who plans to destroy the world, has captured Giles to torture him for information about it, and is stealing Spike's girlfriend Drusilla. Buffy is not happy to let two vampires escape, but with the world in danger and her usual allies in hospital, she's forced to make the compromise. However, as Spike leaves, she gives him some incentive to do his part properly:
  Buffy: If Giles dies? [Drusilla] dies.
• Shipper on Deck: Tons.
  • Willow shipped Buffy/Angel, and Riley/Buffy.
  • Dawn shipped Tara/Willow, and Spike/Buffy in the comics.
  • Xander shipped Riley/Buffy, and surprisingly, eventually Spike/Buffy in the comics.
  • Buffy shipped Anya/Xander, Tara/Willow, Oz/Willow, and Dawn/Xander in the comics.
  • Andrew shipped Anya/Xander, Buffy/Spike and Spike/Wood.
  • Faith shipped Xander/Buffy.
  • It's implied that The First and/or The Mayor ships Faith/Buffy.
• Shipping Torpedo:
  • Xander's pretty infamous for hating Buffy with Angel and Spike—granted, he comes around on the latter after years of rigorous Character Development in the comics.
  • Giles also didn't much support Buffy with Angel or Spike—the former for killing his girlfriend, the latter due to their Destructive Romance in season 6.
  • Willow was heavily opposed to Cordelia and Xander, due to her old crush on Xander. She eventually got over it once she got with Oz.
• Shirtless Scene: Angel seemed to develop an aversion to shirts in season 3, and Spike developed an aversion to clothes in season 6.
• Shoot the Dog: Giles does this when he kills Ben in order to kill Glory. He also later attempts to do it with Spike, though Spike manages to fight off the attempt on his life and shake off the hypnotic trigger that Giles was justifying his death over.
• Shout-Out:
  • In "Lie To Me", Ford says that they (the people who believe that they will become vampires) will be able to "Die young and stay pretty"
  • The Master’s sunken lair is reminiscent of the 1987 vampire classic The Lost Boys, one of Whedon’s inspirations for Buffy.
  • In "Nightmares", the Master tells Buffy that "a dream is a wish your heart makes. This is real."
  • Buffy gives a shout out to Charmed: in the series finale, Willow, after performing the spell that awakens all the Slayers on earth, exclaims, "Oh my goddess!" This is the title of the fifth season finale of Charmed. Apparently Joss Whedon saw the title of the episode, thought it was awesome, and threw it into the finale.
  • Joss has stated that Buffy's last name is a Shout-Out to Cyclops (IE Scott Summers).
  • Dawn wolfing down two bowls of "Sugar Bombs."
  • On the eve of the final battle, when Xander, Giles, Amanda, and Andrew are playing Dungeons & Dragons, they encounter Trogdor the Burninator.
  • During "No Future For You", Giles mentions the great bearded wizard of Northampton.
  • The one time Giles is skeptical of the supernatural effect of the week, Buffy tells him not to "Scully me."
  • The cover of the sixth issue of Season 9 comics is stylized after the tenth issue of The Tomb of Dracula.
  • The ending of "Forever", where Dawn attempts to resurrect Joyce and Buffy opens the door to reveal no one is there, is based on the ending of The Monkey's Paw.
  • The Season 3 episode "Dead Man's Party" takes it's name from an Oingo Boingo song.
• Shrinking Violet: Willow and Tara. Also, Marcie Ross from the first season: She was so shy that she eventually began to feel invisible, a feeling that was made worse by the fact that no one in school really noticed her. The power of the Hellmouth made that feeling into reality and Marcie could no longer be seen by anyone.
• Shrouded in Myth: Some demons, and to some vamps, Buffy or Slayers in general.
• Simple Score of Sadness: Buffy and Angel's love theme.
• Sinister Minister: Caleb: Taking mass and kicking ass.
  • The Anointed One's guardian, Abasalom. ("When She Was Bad")
  • A Catholic Priest, Josephus du Lac, wrote a number of books containing dark rituals, resulting in du Lac being excommunicated. ("What's My Line?")
• Slashers Prefer Blondes: The whole show could be considered a subversion of this trope.
  • Darla is a villainous subversion. First introduced to us as a simpering 'victim,' she ends up luring two hapless males into her web.
• Slave Mooks: Strangely common. The mooks of the various Big Bads are this, some only because of the Big Bad being a very Bad Boss and some due to brainwashing. Also shows up with some weekly villains like the giant worm demon thing in "Bad Eggs"'s baby-controlled people and Spike becomes one for a bit in Season 7.
• Smoking Is Cool: Spike, Faith. Parodied with Harmony, who tries to smoke and well, looks like an idiot.
  • But not as much of an idiot as Andrew does, in his opening "Storyteller" fantasy, when he has his big Meerschaum pipe. (Which he still hasn't got the hang of, when he pops up in Angel...No, not like that!)
  • Subverted in "Nightmares". Smoking gets you beat up by a boogeyman
• Soft Glass: Glass breaks pretty easily, particularly in "I Was Made To Love You", in which a Sexbot easily throws Spike out a window and shatters it.
• Somewhere, a Mammalogist Is Crying: 'The Pack' is riddled with misinformation about hyenas, starting with the title - a group of hyenas is called a clan, not a pack. They are not "an unholy mix of cat and dog" - they belong to a family of their own (though they are more closely related to cats than to dogs). They are portrayed as evil and gluttonous, when in reality they are no more aggressive or voracious than any other predator. And when Willow is researching them, most of the time the animals on her computer screen aren't even hyenas - they're African wild dogs.
• Sophisticated as Hell: Many demons are surprisingly this like D'Hoffryn and the Beljoxa's Eye.
• Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Subverted sometimes, but when in use it's exponential. Big Bads in order:
  • Season 1: Vampire (The Master)
  • Season 2: Vampire(s) (they also used demons to try and end the world)
  • Season 3: The Mayor and his desire to become a "True Demon"
  • Season 4: Cyber-Demonoid and a Government agency.
  • Season 5: A dethroned God.
  • Season 6: Dark Willow, with the power to destroy the world. Also The Trio (a bunch of nerds who spend most of the season as Ineffectual Sympathetic Villains). Life, according to Word of God.
  • Season 7: The First Evil, the embodiment of that concept in that universe. Life.
  • Season 8: The Universe itself! Life.
  • Season 9: Slayer vampires (as in Slayers turned. Life.
  • Season 10: Super vampires. The King of Hell. Life.
  • Season 11: Donald Trump-esque plot to depower all supernatural beings to rule the world.
• Sparing Them the Dirty Work: In the Season 5 finale it is determined the only way to stop Glory, the villainous Hell God of the season from returning to Earth is to kill Ben, the human conduit she lives through. Ben is actually a pretty nice guy, though the fact that he tolerates Glory does break a little sympathy for him. After Buffy defeats Glory and she returns to Ben, Giles shows up, says that Buffy is a hero and "not like us" and smothers Ben to death so that Buffy doesn't need to do the fairly unheroic action of killing a defenseless man.
• Speculative Fiction LGBT: Started using the genre with gay vampire Willow, then with actual Willow and Tara, Kennedy, etc.
• Spell My Name with a "The": The Three ("Angel")
  • The Judge.
  • The First Evil.
  • Not to mention The Slayer. Though starting with the second season, there were actually two or more Slayers due to supernatural Loophole Abuse. With the exception of the third season, the latter part of the seventh season, and the eighth season, any Slayers other than Buffy were usually Put on a Bus somewhere.
• Spider-Sense:
  • Slayers are said to be very attuned to vampires in the area; trying to sneak up on one is a bad idea. However, we've seen normals like Giles use this ability, too, so it could just be a matter of training.
  • Angel is able to detect Darla lurking in his apartment ("Angel"). The spin-off series established (late in its run, waaaaay at the end of Season 5) that vamps can sense each others' presence.
• Spoofy-Doo: Buffy and her companions have been referred to both in universe and out as the Scooby Gang. And while there is a fair bit of mystery to their adventures, the monsters they face are unambiguously real and end up being killed rather than unmasked.
• "Spread Wings" Frame Shot: When Buffy is resurrected from the dead at the start of Season Six, she's walking through a graveyard and due to the camera angle she appears to have the wings growing from her back. The wings belong to a statue of an angel.
• Stacy's Mom: Joyce Summers is unfeasibly gorgeous (hence her equally beautiful daughters) with both Xander and Giles (and even Faith?) attracted to her
• Staging an Intervention: The Scoobies stage an intervention for Buffy when her odd behavior towards Spike worries them. It was actually Spike's Buffybot that was acting out of character.
• Stealth Hi/Bye: Used by Angel in the early seasons, such as when he moves in and out of Buffy's room through her window while she looks away without any discernible sound. This is joked about in the penultimate episode of the third season when Angel walks quietly into a room Buffy is in, only to accidentally walk into a cardboard box laying around which blows his sneakiness.
• Stock Monster Symbolism: A hallmark of the series, especially in early seasons. The Monster of the Week would often, and not particularly subtly, represent something like peer pressure, drug addiction, or sexual predators.
• Stock Phrases
  • From "The Harvest"
  Luke: Ladies and gentlemen, there is no cause for alarm. Actually, there is cause for alarm...it just won't do any good.
  • From "Real Me"
  Harmony: So, Slayer. At last we meet.
  Buffy: We're met, Harmony — you half-wit!
  • From "Once More With Feeling"
  Giles: Spike, if I want your opinion... (looks at him in contempt) I'll never want your opinion.
  • In "As You Were" Riley insists on searching a shirtless Spike's crypt.
  Spike: Over my dead body.
  Riley: I've seen enough of your dead body for one night, thanks.
• Stock Sound Effects: The occasional scream and a few others.
  • Does Joss Whedon have only one chanting sound effect that shows up roughly every other episode?
• Stronger with Age: Vampires' demons get stronger (and less human) the older they are; the average fledgling being not much of a threat, moderately aged vamps like Spike, Dru and Angelus being substantially bigger, and ancients like The Master and the Turok Han being comparable to demons.
• Such a Phony: Xander complains about how much he hates Angel, and when the latter enters, he calmly adds "Oh, hey, Angel" without bothering to revise his statement.
• Sudden Soundtrack Stop: Played for Laughs in "The Zeppo" when Faith seduces Xander in a montage of pretty tv sex with mood music playing over writhing sheets reflected in a tv screen, post-coital cuddling - which comes to an abrupt halt when she shoves him half-dressed out the door. There's a Beat where the only sound is crickets chirping. Then Xander walks away.
  Faith: That was great. I gotta shower.
• Superman Stays Out of Gotham: Buffy would be a big help in Los Angeles since, as Angel admits, she's stronger than even he. After appearing twice on Angel to read him the riot act (and wring Faith's neck), Angel tells her to take her cowboy antics someplace else.
  • Fortunately for Angel, he has a spare Slayer stewing in jail.
  • The demonic activity in Sunnydale is constant, so it wouldn't make sense for Buffy to leave it undefended, and Angel and co. rarely have trouble dealing with problems in Los Angeles themselves before they become big enough Buffy would hear about them. Even in the apocalyptic Season 4, Team Angel managed to stop the localized blotting out of the sun and the reign of Jasmine before they became global, and Buffy was in the middle of her own apocalypse that season.
  • The opposite is in effect, too. Angel turns up again in the Series Finale, ready to help fight the Big Bad, but Buffy immediately sends him away so he can prepare "a second front" in Los Angeles in case she dies.
• Supernatural Angst: Angel suffers from this, spending much of his screentime angsting about being a monster.
• Supernatural Fear Inducer: Gachnar, the Fear Demon from the fourth season Halloween episode.
• Supernatural Hotspot Town: Sunnydale (and more specifically, Sunnydale High School) is built on a Hellmouth, a portal to Hell, that routinely attracts vampires and demons. The Mayor of the town is revealed to have built the town specifically to draw humans to the Hellmouth as food for demons. Giles also reveals that there's another Hellmouth in Cleveland, but Buffy doesn't travel there until the sequel comicbook series.
• Supernaturally Delicious and Nutritious: Slayer blood is tastier than that of normal humans, to the point of possessing healing properties.
• Super-Strength: One of the Standard Powers of Slayers, vampires, and the majority of the enemies encountered on the show.
• Super-Toughness: Slayers can take quite a bit of damage when it comes to blunt force trauma. One episodes does a Bait-and-Switch when Buffy is hit by a truck before the commercial break and serious music plays to make us concerned, only for Buffy to get up and run off without a care in the world at the start of the second act.
  • Vampires are likewise tougher to hurt than humans, especially any member of the Scourge Of Europe, who have an extra layer of Plot Armor keeping them alive on top of vamp toughness.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • In the premiere of season 2, "When She Was Bad," Buffy returns from summer vacation with her father having Took a Level in Jerkass. Willow initially believes that Buffy may have been a victim of Demonic Possession, thus explaining her current behavior, but Giles quickly deduces (correctly) that Buffy's actions are a result of her having been traumatized by her Disney Death at the Master's hands during the first season finale.
  • "Anne":
    • With Buffy gone, the Scoobies manage to slay some vampires, but in the most awkward, realistic way possible. When one runs away, Oz hurls a stake at it... and it bounces off a gravestone and lands pathetically on the ground a few feet away.
    • The Monster of the Week knocks a girl down and does a speech about how his realm is inescapable. Then the girl gets up and pushes him off the edge.
  • Season 3 episode "Homecoming": Buffy repeatedly uses the Dramatic Gun Cock for emphasis. This comes back to bite her when she runs out of ammo quickly.
  • Season 3: After the events of Angel's Face–Heel Turn in the previous season, his relations with the Scoobies are now heavily strained. It doesn't matter that all his actions during that phase were from the Hyde part of his Jekyll & Hyde personality and he now has his soul back; after all the torment Angel's evil personality put them through they've lost any and all trust they previously had for him. Even after he proves he's one of the good guys again by saving Willow's life, that doesn't automatically dispel all the distrust; Giles for example now keeps a crossbow nearby whenever Angel shows up just in case anything goes wrong.
  • "Bad Girls": Before Wesley was assigned to be Buffy and Faith's Watcher, his only encounters with vampires were brief and, in his own words, "under controlled circumstances," arrogantly declaring himself to be capable in the field. Needless to say, when he gets in a real fight later on, he turns out to be completely useless and Giles has to save him.
  • Season 4 episode "Wild at Heart:" Spike attempts to make a big speech vowing to get revenge on Buffy, only to get zapped unconscious and abducted by some Initiative soldiers in the middle of it. What, did you think Talking Is a Free Action? Guess again!
  • Season 4 episode "A New Man": Meddlesome chaos sorcerer Ethan Rayne is once again thwarted, but gloats that he'll just walk away as usual, since, as a human, he's out of the Slayer's jurisdiction. Then Buffy's new boyfriend from a (para-)military organization calls some MPs and has him arrested.
  • Season 4 episode "This Year's Girl" revisits the Season 3 finale. Despite the heroic final stand and defeat of the Mayor, it was still considered a slaughter by the community. The freight train-sized Mayor!snake and two dozen vampires versus the Scoobies and the students armed with stakes and spears. The Mayor eats a couple of the unarmed adults, Harmony becomes a vampire, and several students are violently beaten. And that's just what appears on screen.
  • In season four The Yoko Factor, through a series of events, Angel and Riley end up in a fistfight. Riley is a regular person (who was drugged with supplements to be peak human) with soldier training, some fighting experience, and weapons. Angel is much older, has much more fighting experience, is the better fighter, and is much, much stronger. While Riley is able to use a few of his weapons to his advantage, he is in no way, shape or form prepared to fight Angel and the moment Angel starts taking the fight seriously, Riley is utterly decimated.
  • When Joyce gets ill in season 5, Buffy seeks to prove that there is some supernatural cause behind it. There isn't and it gets worse.
  • Season 5 finale "The Gift": Buffy approaches The Dragon atop a tower. He gears up for a fight, and she just knocks him off the tower.
    • From the same episode, when the Big Bad stops to gloat during the final fight, on a construction site, Xander manages to send her through a wall with a wrecking ball.
  • Season 6, "Flooded". Being a superhero does not make Buffy any less vulnerable to typical homeowner problems, such as a pipe bursting in the basement. Nor does being a superhero provide her with any viable income to pay for home repairs, and having a construction foreman for a friend (Xander) doesn't entirely resolve the issue of costs.
  • Season 6 episode "Seeing Red": The villain's plot is thwarted, the heroes have their denouement with the talking about their feelings, and Tara is shot dead by a stray bullet when Warren comes back with a gun and just fires as much as he possibly can.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Though they started out as unrelated characters originally, and have completely different personalities and motivations, Anya and Spike essentially replaced Cordelia and Angel from Season 4 onwards as Xander's tactless girlfriend and Token Evil Teammate/Buffy's love interest respectively.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial:
  • Xander engages in this more than once, such as when he gets drafted into being the wheelman for a zombie gang in "The Zeppo":
    Willow: What are you doing here?
    Xander: Nothing. Certainly not crime!
  • Anya in the episode "Sleeper", when Spike catches her snooping through his room while trying to find proof that Spike has been killing people. After being caught, Anya tries to cover it up by seducing him.
    Anya: Why else would I be here? I mean, it's not like I'm snooping around looking for proof that you're some sort of wacked-out Serial Killer.
  • Anya when she tries to convince the Watchers that she's certainly not a demon, and does a suspiciously specific assurance in "Checkpoint":
    Quentin: Excuse me miss? Do you work here?
    Anya: Yes I do. Ever since I moved here from South-Eastern Indiana where I was raised both by a mother and a father!
    ...
    Anya: [in a later interview] Anya Christina Emanuella Jenkins, twenty years old. Born on the fourth of July, and don't think there weren't jokes about that my whole life, mister, 'cause there were. "Who's our little patriot?" they'd say, when I was younger, and therefore smaller and shorter than I am now.
    Watcher: [taking notes] So, you spell it A-N-Y-A, yes?
    Anya: [sheepishly] Yes.
    Watcher: Fine, now we can get to the questions.
  • In "Angel", Buffy notices her diary is askew; she automatically assumes that Angel has read her innermost thoughts about him, and goes into a tirade about privacy. Angel then mentions that Joyce moved the diary while straightening up.
  "Hunk" can mean a lot of things, bad things. And— and when it says that your eyes are "penetrating", I meant to write "bulging". And "A" doesn't even stand for "Angel", for that matter, it stands for..."Achmet", a charming foreign exchange student, so that whole fantasy part has nothing to even do with you at all...
  • Giles in awkward British mode is quite susceptible to this.
    Giles: [greeting Buffy after a mauling has occurred the previous night] It's good to see you! Um... no need to panic.
    Oz: Just a thought... Poker: not your game.
  • There's the Sunnydale news, which is very clear on the fact that "Mayhem Caused: Monsters Definitely Not Involved". That was in "One More, With Feeling", to be clear.
• Suspicious Ski Mask: In "Him", Anya pulls one of these over her face as she stands outside a bank before robbing it to prove her love to R.J. while under the influence of the Love Spell from his letterman jacket.
• Sweeping the Table: In "Witch", Giles knocks some bottles and stuff off a table to lay down the sick Buffy while he casts the spell to reverse all of the witch's. Spike clears the table in "Entropy" when he and Anya have sex in the Magic Box
• Swiss-Cheese Security: Nobody in Sunnydale ever locks any doors.

T

• Tailor-Made Prison: Unique example with Angelus having his soul restored to torment him (which he gets out of via perfect happiness brought on by deflowering Buffy.) The Ubervamps are in one (the Hellmouth) as well.
• Talking in Your Dreams: Buffy and Angel in "Amends", though there's no actual talking involved. The First Slayer also communicates with Buffy and the gang this way in "Restless".
• Tangled Family Tree: Angel has one, which gets even worse on his own show and in the final season of Buffy. The Master sired Darla, who sired Angel, who sired Drusilla who sired Spike. Angel killed Darla, who was later brought back from the dead on Angel, as a human. Dru then sired Darla, making her Darla's mother grandchild and Darla her own Great Grandchild. This makes Spike her brother and Great Grandchild and Angel her son and Grandfather. Angel and Darla then break the laws of reality, having a child. This child is Angel's brother, child and Great Grandchild. His Grandchild/Brother/Child then has Jasmine with Cordelia, making Jasmine his Grandchild, Great Great Grandchild and Niece. Meanwhile, Spike went on a siring rampage against his will. Some of those vamps can be assumed to have sired others, making them all clean, if numerous, branches on a very fucked up tree.
• Tap on the Head: Giles getting knocked unconscious occurs so often it's turned into something of a Running Gag. The jaw-punch version occurs in "Prophecy Girl", when Buffy settles the issue of who is going to fight the Master by punching Giles in the jaw, putting him to sleep just long enough for her to be off on the mission. Later Giles is seen nursing a bruise, but it seems no dental attention was required. The trope is subverted in "Dead Things" when Warren's ex-girlfriend Katrina is escaping the Trio's lair and plans to go to the police after their attempt to rape her. Warren clocks her on the head with a bottle, trying to knock her out — and she dies.
• Tattooed Crook:
  • Faith and Angelus both have tattoos (Faith has one on her arm, Angel/us on his back).
  • Giles and Ethan's Mark of Eyghon, which is not just a demon-cult tattoo but an Artifact of Death in itself. Ethan later removes his, though.
• Teen Horror: Albeit an example where one of the teenagers was supernaturally empowered to fight back against the forces of darkness menacing her high school.
• Temporarily a Villain:
  • Faith. She goes nuts as a result of accidentally killing a man and the repeated betrayals of the Scooby gang, then continues after waking up from being nearly killed by Buffy and finding out the one person who was decent to her was dead. She gets better.
  • Willow at the end of Season 6 when she becomes Dark Willow and eventually tries to destroy the world. She gets better.
• Temporary Scrappy:
  • "Bad Girls": Subverted. Since Giles was fired by the Council, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce becomes Buffy and Faith's new Watcher. Too bad that, per design, he acts in an obnoxiously pompous way that erodes the girls' patience soon enough. Wesley was intended to be this trope (his name seemingly hinting at a Creator's Pest status) —he'd fail at getting aid from the Watcher Council and then be unceremoniously killed off in the season's finale. However, the audience felt that his efforts were earnest and he became a fan favorite, instead. So the creators decided to keep him around. He takes a level in badass and becomes a permanent cast member of the Angel spin-off.
  • "Living Conditions": After Buffy and Angel break up, a Romantic False Lead called Parker Abrams shows up. His main purpose is to ease the viewers into Buffy's next major love interest (aka Riley). Parker and Buffy enjoy a romantic date that gets Buffy's hopes high. Unfortunately, Parker reveals himself as a womanizing jerk who only wanted a one-night stand with her but didn't have the decency to tell her. He then spends a few more episodes popping up only to end up suffering some sort of humiliation.
• Tempting Fate: Colonel McNamara, in response to Buffy saying the Initiative is playing on her turf, arrogantly says, "Up there, maybe, but down here, I'm the one who's in control," right before the power goes out courtesy of Adam.
• That Came Out Wrong:
  • From "Wrecked", Dawn, after taking a bite of pizza:
    Dawn: It's like a meat party in my mouth. (pause) Okay, I'm just a kid and even I know that sounded wrong.
  • In "The Freshman", Willow, describing college:
    Willow: But here, the energy, the collective intelligence, it's like this force, this penetrating force, and I can just feel my mind opening up — you know? — and letting this place thrust into and spurt knowledge into... That sentence ended up in a different place than it started out in.
  • Willow again:
    Willow: He likes you. He wanted to ask you out last year, but you weren't ready then. But I think you're ready now, or at least in the state of pre-readiness to make conversation, or-or to do that thing with your mouth that boys like.... Oh! I didn't mean the bad thing with your mouth, I meant that little half-smile thing that you... You're supposed to stop me when I do that.
  • And Buffy herself, in "Once More with Feeling", talking to Spike.
    Spike: So you're just here to pump me for information?
    Buffy: What else would I want to pump you for? (beat) I really just said that, didn't I?
  • In "Tough Love", Anya, comforting Willow after Tara has been driven insane:
    Anya: You can sleep with me! That came out a lot more lesbian than it sounded in my head.
  • In "Get it Done", Anya is disappointed that Souled Spike didn't fight a demon to the death when Buffy and Robin Wood walk into the conversation.
    Spike: No need to thank me. I'm just the one who beat him off.
    Buffy & Robin: ...
    Spike: Repelled him would perhaps be the better phrase. Demon...
  • Buffy explaining why she's not ready for a real relationship (namely with Angel) in "Chosen":
    Buffy: I'm cookie dough, I'm not done baking yet, I'm not done becoming whoever the hell it is I'm going to be... maybe one day I turn around and realize I'm cookies, and then if I want someone to eat me... (beat) Er, enjoy "delicious cookie" me...
  • Buffy even managed to do this without saying anything: In "Hush", she mimed a staking by jerking her hollowed right hand up and down, before she realized what that gesture normally refers to.
  • In "Where the Wild Things Are", when Buffy & Riley fought a vampire/demon tag team, she said to Riley "You get fangs, I'll get horny! I mean..."
    • Later in the same episode, Buffy and Riley have been magically induced into having sex indefinitely. Meanwhile, fighting and commotion occur just outside their door; Giles wonders why they didn't hear anything:
      "In the midst of all that? Do you really think they were keeping it up?" [beat] "Oh, for a different phrasing."
  • Non-sexual example in "Inca Mummy Girl", while discussing costumes for a fancy-dress-dance.
    Xander: Okay, no shirts with ruffles, no hats with feathers, and definitely no lederhosen. They make my calves look fat.
    Willow: Why are you suddenly so worried about looking like an idiot? That came out wrong.
  • In "Smashed", depressed over Giles leaving for England, Buffy snogs Spike and then tries to convince him It Doesn't Mean Anything.
    Buffy: When I kissed you? You know I was thinking about Giles, right?
    Spike: (Double Take) You know, I always wondered about you two.
  • And Xander after interrogating Andrew in "Never Leave Me":
    Xander: He's primed, I'll be pumping him in no time. [Beat] I mean, he'll give us information soon.
  • In the Season 6 episode "Gone", a social worker comes at absolutely the worst time, everyone says absolutely the wrong things, and ends up with the following:
    MS. KROGER: I think I've seen enough.
    BUFFY: No, actually, I really don't think that you have. It's just ... it's been kind of, kind of a, a bad time.
    MS. KROGER: It's been a bad time now for a while, hasn't it, Ms. Summers? [...]
    BUFFY: But there—there are good reasons.
    MS. KROGER: Oh, I'm sure there are. But my interest is in Dawn's welfare. And the stability of her home life, something I'm just not convinced that an unemployed young woman like yourself can provide.
    BUFFY: I can. I, I do!
    MS. KROGER: Well, we'll just have to see about that then, won't we? Oh, and I'm, uh, going to recommend immediate probation in my report.
    BUFFY: What does that mean?
    MS. KROGER: It means that I'll be monitoring you very closely, Ms. Summers. And if I don't see that things are improving, well, I'll be forced to recommend that you be stripped of your sister's guardianship.
    BUFFY: You can't do that.
    MS. KROGER: I do what is in Dawn's best interest ... as should you. Have a nice day.
• The Alleged Car: Giles' first car, a potentially very cool but dreadfully run-down Citroën DS, is one of these until Spike breaks its' back in Season 4's "A New Man." In the first series, he drove a Familiale station wagon, arguably a suitable car for carting boxes of books around in.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: A lot of Spike's backsliding into evil, has to do with the Scoobies never really giving him much credit or guidance whenever he makes an effort to reform. It's frequently shown that he behaves better when treated with respect or even simple neutrality, and lashes out when slapped with abuse or insults—hence his amicable relationship with Dawn, Joyce, and Buffy post-"Intervention". Despite this, he remains a frequent victim of scorn, despite genuine efforts to curb his soulless thirst for evil and inability to understand morality. It's only when he makes the grand gesture of seeking out a soul that it really breaks through to Buffy that he legitimately wants to be better, after which she is much more respectful and supportive.
• There Are No Therapists: Played straight with almost no exceptions (a guidance counselor gets murdered in season two), but never moreso than in the sixth season when the Scooby core are dealing with their worst issues (depression, addiction, a history of childhood abuse). Actually, they're largely failing to deal with their worst issues.
• There Can Only Be One: Mostly averted with the Slayers. In theory, there is only supposed to be one slayer in each generation. (At least, as indicated by the page quote.) However, due to Buffy's first death, a girl named Kendra became a Slayer. After Buffy was resurrected, they both acted as Slayers. Then, a year later, Kendra was killed by Drusilla and Faith became a Slayer, resulting in a similar situation.
  • Of course, it's averted at the end of Season 7, when Willow casts a spell to make all of the Potential Slayers into full fledged Slayers.
  • Absent in Seasons 5 and 6, when Buffy dies a far more permanent (supposedly, anyway) death, but no new slayer appears, or is even mentioned. Because as far as the rules were concerned, Buffy died already. Instead of calling a third Slayer, Buffy's death in Season 5 caused a disruption in the Slayer line that led to the events of Season 7. (To elaborate on that, the Slayer line runs through the most recently called Slayer. In other words, Faith was the rightful Slayer at the time. In order for a third Slayer to be called, she, not Buffy, would have to die. Buffy's continued existence after her second death represents a weak point in the line, because Buffy herself doesn't belong.)
• The Three Faces of Eve: beautiful, sophisticated mother Joyce, gorgeous young woman in her physical prime Buffy, blossoming teenage ingenue Dawn.
• Title Drop: "I'm Buffy. The vampire slayer. And you are?"
  • Many episodes have a title drop on the episode title as well.
• To Create a Playground for Evil: "The Wish" shows that this is what Sunnydale would become if Buffy hadn't stopped The Master.
• Too Happy to Live: Willow and Tara get back together after a season of relationship troubles? What a perfect time for Tara to be murdered by a stray bullet!
  • Spike and Buffy patch things up? Time for a little vampire flambé!
• "Too Young to Die" Lamentation: In the season 1 finale, Buffy learns of a prophecy that she will face the Master and die in the process. She tries to get out of this by outright quitting and walking away, not ready to face death at such a young age.
  Giles: Buffy, if the Master rises...
  Buffy: I don't care! [calms down] I don't care. [softly] Giles, I'm sixteen years old. I don't wanna die.
• Took a Level in Badass: Xander, Willow, Giles, Dawn, Warren, Amy, Harmony, Oz, the entire 1999 Class of Sunnydale High, ALL of the Potentials and more. Giles' levels are more "Regained Levels In Badass" though.
• Town with a Dark Secret: There's an entrance into Hell under the high school, the Mayor wants to be a demon, vampires rise from the cemetery every night and there are buried (sometimes magical) treasures hidden in the right mausoleum. The secret government lab under the college is the least exciting secret there was.
• Tracking Device: Willow's oft-used "locator spells". Spike additionally gets shot with one in Season 4.
• Trash the Set: Many times.
  • Spike's factory is set aflame thanks to Angelus' recklessness. However, Spike did revisit the charred ruins.
  • Giles lighting up Sunnydale High with a Plunger Detonator would be the Ur-example. It was so big it woke up residents and broke windows, getting the show banned from further shooting at that location.
  • The Bronze seems to have an unlimited refurbishment and furniture-replacement budget and, throughout all seven seasons of Buffy, seems to have self-repairing capabilities (like the school) since major damage is completely fixed by the next episode. An exception is when Xander rebuilt the window jamb after a Sex Bot tossed Spike through the window.
  • The Magic Box is destroyed after Dark Willow, crazed by magic, sucks its contents dry. Her battle royale with Giles doesn't help.
  • There's also a dining-room chair in the battle-weary Summers household that's conspicuously duct-taped through most of the end of the series.
  • Lampshaded in Season 7:
    Buffy: Every piece of furniture has been destroyed and replaced since you left, so actually, new house.
  • Late in Season 7, Xander finally declares that he is tired of the picture window being smashed in over and over again, and refuses to repair it again. It remains boarded up for several episodes.
  • In the finale, the entirety of Sunnydale sinks into a crater, completely levelled into the ground.
• Trespassing to Talk: People often break in to have a chat with Buffy, or leave her a note. Happens once or twice with Angel, too.
• Triple Shifter: Dealt with by a minor Slayer power being able to get by with very little sleep.
• Truce Zone: Willy's Bar. Later subverted in "The Zeppo" when it gets trashed and Willy is beaten to a pulp by a bunch of demons.
• Two Girls and a Guy: Buffy, Willow, and Xander, who remain the untouched core of the Scoobie right from the start.

U

• Unconventional Food Usage: In Season 3, Buffy and Angel are trying to make things work despite Angel's curse. "Choices" opens on them leaving a movie called Le Banquet d'Amelia, which their dialogue indicates was basically a nonstop orgy.
  Buffy:: From the title, I thought it was about... food...
  Angel:: There was food.
  Buffy:: Oh, right, that scene... with the food... [Thousand-Yard Stare]
• Undead Abomination: The Turok-Han are a race of humanoid demons that are offshoots from normal vampires. They are stronger and more resilient than the average vampire, lacking many of the vampire's conventional weaknesses (they are unaffected by crosses, do not have to be invited into a place and their tough hides make them unstakeable) and the only means of killing them are either sunlight or decapitation. They are described as the vampire equivalent to Neanderthal man, possessing no real signs of sapience compared to human-vampires.
• The Unfavorite: Buffy, Giles, and The Scoobies generally are somewhat despised by the Council of Watchers. He was assigned to an out of the way position, and they hoped she would die and be replaced by a more obedient Slayer.
• Unnervingly Heartwarming: Early in the second season, Spike and Drusilla are completely devoted to each other despite the fact that she is quite out of her mind. Their first episode ends with them going off to relax and watch tv together - after Spike has just casually murdered the local Big Bad, who looks like a little kid.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: It's amazing how they just walked around Sunnydale High throwing words around like "Vampire", "Slayer", "Witch", "Demon", "Disembowelment", "Innards" in full view of others with no one paying attention.
  • It was implied that most of the town either knew or was in such deep denial that you could dust a vamp in front of them and they wouldn't change their views. Hell, that happened a bunch of times.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Buffy trains constantly to prevent this. Oddly enough, when her powers are taken, Weak, but Skilled wasn't invoked.
• Urban Fantasy: Naturally. There's demons and vampires and prophecies taking place alongside high school and modern (at the time) life.

V

• Vampire Hickey:
  • In the first of The Harvest two parter. Willow and Xander are led into a trap by Luke and Darla, the latter who reveals their friend Jesse to them who's holding his neck in pain and notable blood seeping out of the bite wound as he stumble towards them proclaiming "Heck of a kiss", showing that Darla clearly bit him (which we find out later was against The Master's orders, but she couldn't help herself and wanted a little taste).
  • In Angel, Darla uses this to frame Angel and turn Buffy against her by tricking Buffy's mother, Joyce into letting Darla into their house, biting her, then leaving Angel holding Joyce as she leaves just as Buffy returns. Making her think Angel had bitten Joyce due to the bite wounds on Joyce's neck.
  • In Phases, Buffy finds out a former classmate of hers was attacked and killed, at first thinking it a werewolf attack. But when the way the classmate was killed doesn't stack up to how a werewolf would operate (as they don't normally leave bodies in pristine condition), she visits the funeral parlor during her wake and finds the bite marks on her neck confirming a vampire got her... right before said classmate turns and rises from her casket.
• Vampire Hunter: Buffy, of course, but all the Scoobies get in on the action. Even the ones who are also vampires.
• Vampire Procreation Limit:
  Buffy: To make you a vampire, they have to suck your blood. And then you have to suck their blood. It's like a whole, big, sucking thing. Mostly, they're just gonna kill you.
• Vampires Are Sex Gods: Darla, Drusilla, Spike and Angelus frequently emphasize their seductive qualities. Particularly notable with Spike and Darla, who knowingly and frequently use seduction to lure prey.
• Variations on a Theme Song: For "Once More With Feeling" the usual theme song by Nerf Herder is changed to a bouncy, classical-styled orchestral version.
• Villain-Beating Artifact: The series had some of these-such as Olaf's Hammer, used to whomp Glory down to size.
  • This gets lampshaded in the comics, when the characters discover a God-killing artifact, noting how conveniently common such things are.
• Villain Episode: "Fool For Love" (Spike) and "Who Are You" (Faith).
• Villain World: The world we see in The Wish.
  • The Wicked Willow trilogy of books explored what would've happened if Willow had stayed power mad.
• Villain Pedigree: Vampires, the Big Bads for the first two seasons, are little more than no-name Mooks by the end.
• Visit by Divorced Dad: Buffy encounters what she thinks is her father in "Nightmares", but is actually a cruel manifestation of all of her own insecurities as a delinquent daughter. She spends the summer with her dad over the first season hiatus, but their relationship remains frosty.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Spike and Angel, and Willow and Anya.
• The Virus: Played with with vampirism. Vampires are sentient, with individual personalities and feelings, but their soullessness strips them of their empathy and predisposes them to being chaotic evil.

W

• Wainscot Society: Vampires, demons, and other supernatural beings run a society of sorts in parallel to the humans on whom they prey, mostly preserving a Masquerade.
• Walk and Talk: The hallways of SHS and UC Sunnydale.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: Spike, particularly in season 6 and 7. Whenever possible, he's stripped and left to bare his chest. Angel and Riley too, but to a much lesser degree.
• Wardrobe Wound: Glory often seems more upset about her outfit being ruined than say, the fact that a teleporting spell was being put on her.
  Glory: Look what you did to my dress!
  • Also a variation where she was hit on the head by a crowbar.
  Glory: Hey! Beat Watch the hair!
• Was Once a Man: Vampires obviously. Also, one episode had Giles turn into a demon.
• Water Torture: While captive by the First, Spike's head is held underwater by the Turok Han. It was supposed to be holy water but they forgot to add the sizzle sound effect so it looks like he's being drowned - except vampires don't breathe so they can't drown.
• Water Tower Down: The tie-in comic Viva Las Buffy Buffy is combating vampires on a rooftop. Realizing she's outnumbered, she tosses a conveniently nearby priest into the rooftop water tower and tells him to bless the water. He does so, and Buffy knocks down the tower so the vampires disintegrate from exposure to the now holy water.
• Weapon Twirling: Buffy frequently twirls her stakes.
• Weirdness Magnet: Sunnydale in general, but especially Xander.
  • Taken to its extreme in an episode where Willow lampshades this and accidentally turns Xander into a literal demon magnet.
  • Also one could take note of Ted a robot serial killer who dated Buffy's mom so he could murder her that what are the odds, out of all the single moms in the city, he chooses Buffy's (who just so happens to deal with these situations on a weekly basis).
• We Used to Be Friends: Faith, Cordelia, Angelus, Giles, Willow - a lot of characters at some point in the story.
• What the Hell Is That Accent?: Kendra's obscure Jamaican accent, and Angel's Irish accent (featured only in flashbacks).
• What Would Buffy Do?: Xander in The Freshman, and mantra fans adopted.
• Where Do They Get All Those Wonderful Swords, Axes, Knives and Medieval Crossbows? Seriously, is there a mail-order catalog?
  • In Real Life, there are several, though they tend sell strictly display-quality pieces that would fall apart in actual combat. The Watchers probably have genuine blacksmiths on payroll, and/or the weapons are well-cared-for legitimate antiques.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Guns can hurt vampires and kill demons, so why doesn't Buffy load up? This is examined throughout the series, she Doesn't Like Guns for one thing, if vampires get the idea the job will be that much harder, vampires can be really good at dodging bullets and in any event it's a covert war, so even with something like a crossbow that's generally more effective and harder to come by, such a weapon would be more conspicuous.
  • Even so, there were many instances throughout the show where a gun would have been the most practical way of dealing with the given situation. Guns Are Worthless, I suppose.
  • Joss himself is fairly anti-gun.
• Wimp Fight: Xander versus Harmony in "The Initiative", complete with slow-mo and combat music.
• With Friends Like These...: A big reason for Faith's Face–Heel Turn. The Mayor, a guy who planning on turning into a demon to eat the town, was more concerned that a teenage girl was living by herself in a No-Tell Motel than the Scoobies were. In fact, what made Gwendolynn Post's manipulations of Faith so successful was that she didn't have to lie to her.
• "With Our Swords" Scene: Buffy goes into battle against the Master in the Series 1 finale wielding a crossbow given to her by Giles, a leather jacket she got from Angel, and a prom dress previously worn by her mom.
• The Worf Effect: This happens many times in general to Buffy and Angel. Although you occasionally have smart or crafty villains, it seems the writers' first choice is go with with someone who can smack these two around.
  • Buffy first meets Glory in "No Place Like Home". The episode opens with Buffy defeating a large vampire with her usual Casual Danger Dialogue. When Buffy first confronts Glory, it's the latter who's making the quips while Buffy is punching her in the face. Buffy only gets out alive because Glory accidentally knocks down the building in a fit of petulance. For the first time, Buffy expresses doubt that she can beat an enemy.
    • Also used to emphasize Willow's newfound magical strength. Glory effortlessly knocks Buffy, the resident badass, around week after week; until the finale only Willow manages to make her feel pain.
  • Used to establish Caleb:
  Caleb: So, you're the Slayer. The Slayer. The strongest, the fastest, the most aflame with that most precious invention of all mankind — the notion of goodness. The Slayer must indeed be powerful. [Knocks Buffy out with one punch] So, what else you got?
  • Adam is another villain to casually see off Buffy at their first encounter.
  • The first time Buffy tries to take down a Turok-Han in "Bring on the Night", it beats her unconscious.
    • That was mostly because she was sleep deprived though, once she finally slept (like her premonition told her to do) she beat it rather easily.
    • Depends upon your definition of "easy". She gets her butt handed to her the first 90% of the fight before somehow turning the fight around and killing the guy (with help).
  • Spike is semi-vulnerable to this. His fights tend to start with him being beaten almost unconscious by whatever man/woman/fluffy rabbit he's fighting, then proceeding to destroy his opponent in the span of a few seconds. Of course, he likes fighting, so it's possible he doesn't go all out at first to avoid the fight ending too quickly.
  • Angel suffered this in seasons two (prior to his Face–Heel Turn) and three, regularly getting his ass kicked or being the first member of the good guys' side to get taken out. He received much less of this treatment after moving to his own series.
• Working-Class Werewolves: After leaving Sunnydale part way through Season 4 to get his wolf side under control, Oz only leaves with his van and a few essentials. He spends several months living out of his van and at one point had to trade his guitar to repair the van after it broke down.
• Working with the Ex: Buffy The Vampire Slayer is not shy about using this trope.
  • Angel and Buffy during Season 3 of her show.
  • Buffy ended up working briefly with Riley and his wife in the sixth season in the episode As You Were.
  • Spike and Buffy work together through season 7, in spite of the pieces of their shattered Destructive Romance laying at their feet.
• Workplace Horror: The episode "Doublemeat Palace" is about Buffy getting a job at a fast food burger joint, where she suspects something is wrong with the meat being served. It turns out the meat itself is fine, but there is a demon in the restaurant that she must defeat.
• World of Snark: Just about every character ever seen is snarky as hell. Even Shrinking Violet Tara gets a couple of slams in their, while the likes of Buffy, Xander and Spike are near-constant spouts of snark.
• Would Harm a Child: Many times, Der Kindestod stalks and preys on sick children within hospital, a monster in the sewers only eats babies, and the vampires and mayor had no issues with attempting to give it baby sacrifices; Spike kills the annointed one in his first appearance, though at this point he was less of a child and more full fledged demon; a demon was stalking a kid in his nightmares, and the nightmare became one with reality; the demons in "Anne" had a few children as slaves; the list goes on.

Y

• Yaoi Fangirl: It's revealed that Buffy's one in "Chosen" when she says to Spike "You know one of these days, I'm just going to put the two of you on a room and let you wrestle it out" When Spike seems to like the idea, Buffy then excitedly adds, "There could be oil of some kind involved."
• Yoko Oh No: Spike's "Yoko Factor" plan in Season 4 revolves around this. Spike sees a conflict brewing among the Scoobies and pushes just the right buttons to set it off. Notably, Spike himself notes to Adam during the episode that Yoko, for all she got blamed, didn't break up the Beatles; it was internal strife, much as he wasn't so much the cause of the Scoobies' breakup, just the catalyst that (deliberately) brought their grievances into plain view. It's ultimately subverted, however — while the Scoobies do have a vicious argument and falling out thanks largely to Spike's prodding, when tempers have cooled a bit they're savvy enough to realize that Spike's been manipulating them, approach either other more calmly about their recent tensions, and mend bridges.
• You Could Have Used Your Powers for Good!: Played for laughs at the end of "Ted".
  Buffy: Willow, tell me you didn't keep any parts.
  Willow: Not any...big ones.
  Buffy: Oh, Will, you're supposed to use your powers for good.
  • Coming right after a discussed example, when Willow comments on how tragic it is that the original Ted's brilliance was turned to evil. Though this isn't addressed to the villain, and it's a might-have-been uttered when it's far too late for him.
• You Have Failed Me: The Master kills one of his minions in episode 2. "You have something in your eye."
  • The Anointed One and his lackeys try to pull this on Spike. Tried.
  • It looked like Spike was going to pull this on Billy Fordham in "Lie To Me" when Billy's plan to deliver several dozen people to Spike is foiled by Buffy. But not only does Spike not kill Billy, he keeps his end of the deal and sires Billy. After all, Billy kept up his part of the deal, and Spike probably knew that Buffy would be waiting at Billy's grave to stake him when he rose anyways.
  • Glory does this to 2 of her minions in "Intervention" (although they're in the next episode, so whatever she did can't be that bad).
• Your Vampires Suck: Aimed at Anne Rice a few times, but Buffy's also been on the receiving end.
  • Dracula gets this a lot from Spike. To be fair, Drac still owes him money.

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