Bigger age range of potentials?

nightshade

nightshade

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Should there have been a bigger age range of the potentials that were at Buffy's house?
 
I think it would've ben interesting to see some older potentials who were adults so Buffy could get a glimpse of what her life might've been like if she hadn't been chosen as the slayer. It would also mean you can have potentials moving freely without having to wonder where their parents were.
 
Well it seems like potentials tend to be in a certain age group as an average. Kennedy at 19 thought she might be too old to ever be called and Buffy was called at 15 so I'd say 14-18 is the average. Some people theorised that Chloe was supposed to be younger than the others and about 14.
 
To what end? It would have been interesting as @DeadlyDuo describes it but is there an inverse of that? For me, it depends on how you read the word "potential". Does it refer simply to a female having the physical attributes to be a slayer - or is it more insidious? Is it related to a female's potential to be a good slayer and what does good mean? (see Faith's "Am I the good slayer now?"). Is a good slayer one with a high kill rate or one who's malleable and disciplined and can be trained not just to fight but to adhere to the rules of the Council? Does a potential develop more of a mind of her own as she gets older? Certainly Kennedy seems to. It's the youngest who's most easily swayed (with tragic results).

It seems to me that Buffy's the first (high kill rate) but not necessarily the second (malleable/disciplined) and this might be down to her outgrowing her reliance on her "parent" Giles. The point I'm making is, what's to be gained from showing us older potentials if Buffy's there to make the same or similar point?

DeadlyDuo said:
so Buffy could get a glimpse of what her life might've been like if she hadn't been chosen as the slayer.
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Good point but there's a wide range of potentials (class, race, sexuality). Can we extrapolate a commonality from that? Would Buffy's background match that of an other potential?
 
I just found it odd that they were all a similar age, when in Chosen and the Tales of the Slayer books they were a bigger age range, from young child to adult.
 
I thought, prior to the spell, potentials aged out. So you were a potential as a teen, but by your mid 20's all that 'potential' had gone and you could never become a Slayer. After the spell anyone who had ever had the potential became Slayers, no matter how old or young.
 
Yes, but not so much older as you did tend to grow out of it as Kennedy mentioned. But should have had younger. Preteen girls would have added an really unique perspective.
 
nightshade said:
I just found it odd that they were all a similar age, when in Chosen and the Tales of the Slayer books they were a bigger age range, from young child to adult.
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But, aren't these the Slayers telling their own stories? Nikki's story is so much more interesting than the one we get from either Spike or Wood. By the same token the Vampire Tales give a much more rounded view of Vampires than Giles ever did (the father/son one was particularly moving). The Potentials were the ones Giles had been told to collect. Perhaps it's in the Council's best interests to perpetuate certain myths. It's the Watchers - not the Slayers who tell their story. It's the Watchers' diaries that constitute the history of the Council. The Slayers are too dead to tell their own story...to record their own history. There's a parallel with the Guardian. Her story is told to Buffy then she's killed (by a father). If Buffy dies in battle her story will be told by her "father" - Giles. Just as the story of Anya's death is told by Andrew and retold through Xander's recollections of her.

Priceless said:
I thought, prior to the spell, potentials aged out. So you were a potential as a teen, but by your mid 20's all that 'potential' had gone and you could never become a Slayer. After the spell anyone who had ever had the potential became Slayers, no matter how old or young.
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But why...why does it change? Perhaps because a female (Willow channeled the energy of a Goddess through a weapon designed for "her" use) sees female potential in a different way?

Spanky said:
Yes, but not so much older as you did tend to grow out of it as Kennedy mentioned. But should have had younger. Preteen girls would have added an really unique perspective.
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Is it linked to menstruation as a "rites of passage" (thus linking with the film)?
 
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The point is more that they're not all 15-19 age, which is basically all the potentials in the show.
 
TriBel said:
Which is the point I was making - that when they tell their own story we get a greater diversity of voices.
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I don't understand your point, a slayer is a slayer, why does it make any difference to who tells the story of her life. There's slayers at various ages both in Chosen and the books, but the potentials don't reflect that.
 
Even the jaded, bored writers probably weren't brave enough (either that, or not allowed) to show 13-year-olds (at least if they're obviously that age as opposed to played by actors who are years older) getting their necks snapped by Caleb or killed by Bringers while under Buffy's command.

On the other hand, wasn't Chloe like 13-14 and into Winnie the Pooh? If Buffy can get away with that speech there (not saying it was right or wrong, just that I'm surprised many people who would have sensibilities tolerant of that if a young girl was bullied to death by an older girl who was so hard not to prepare them for battle, but to exercise her own sadism, which Buffy knew about and approved by her doing nothing) then maybe anything was possible. Certainly enough other outrageous behavior was.
 
TriBel said:
why does it change? Perhaps because a female (Willow channeled the energy of a Goddess through a weapon designed for "her" use) sees female potential in a different way?
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More than likely it was because the power of the slayer, in the form of the slythe, was released. Previously it was only dispersing on a one-to-one basis. The spell 'opened' that up so that all of the options received the boon instead of simply one.
 
I take it to mean that the bringers took out most of the potential slayers, so it was mostly the young (and more inexperienced?) ones that were left, as a purposeful choice on the part of the writers to make it seem as if the odds were stacked even more against the potentials.
 
I get why they didn't want older ones, but we know that Kendra was spotted as a potential at a very young age, so did those girls also die with their watchers? I guess sending an 8 year old across the world on their own is more problematic.
 
nightshade said:
I guess sending an 8 year old across the world on their own is more problematic.
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But then did that, per the show, as it was the only way to protect them. Maybe they didn't care if an 8 year old potential died as they wouldn't make as good as a fighter anyway. Can't really stab a vamp in the heart when you're only knee high.
 
Spanky said:
But then did that, per the show, as it was the only way to protect them. Maybe they didn't care if an 8 year old potential died as they wouldn't make as good as a fighter anyway. Can't really stab a vamp in the heart when you're only knee high.
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But weren't they originally sent to Buffy for protection, not to fight?
 
nightshade said:
But weren't they originally sent to Buffy for protection, not to fight?
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They were sent there for protection. Hence the they didn't want to protect them. But what's the point in having a bunch of potentials if you don't have them throw down? That be like watching a TV show about feminism and having some bloke save the day.
 
Potential is tied in with womanhood, and that only once a girl begins to menstruate does the potential become apparent. That would also tie in with the film, where Buffy recognises vampires through menstrual cramps.
 
Priceless said:
Potential is tied in with womanhood, and that only once a girl begins to menstruate does the potential become apparent. That would also tie in with the film, where Buffy recognises vampires through menstrual cramps.
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But how can it be when Kendra was sent to live with her watcher at a young age, and according to the film it was a mole that was the sign of a potential. Buffy had hers removed before Merrick found her.
 
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