Get It Done - Origin of the Slayer

nerd4hire

nerd4hire

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OK I admit it, I could probably post this in any of a number of threads open right now, but I feel this deserves it's own thread.

Get It Done is one of my favourite episodes, and contains what I believe may be the only real description of the Slayer's origins and how the power actually works.

Sometimes I almost feel like I'm the only one who actually saw it, but then I realize, "No. It's just that other people have different interpretations.

So I'm interested in discovering exactly what those interpretations are. I'll post the pertinent passages. Please tell me exactly what you think they mean. What do they say about the origins of the slayer, and how the power works.

36 EXT. CAVE IN DESERT - DAY
Buffy's groggy and disoriented as she regains consciousness. She's sitting on the ground.

BUFFY
What is this?

Buffy stands only to find she is shackled at the wrists and chained to the ground. She struggles against the chains. The three men are standing in front of her in a circle.

BROWN HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: We are at the beginning. The source of your strength. The well of the slayer's power.

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: This is why we have brought you here.

BUFFY
I thought I brought me here. Listen, you guys. I'm already the slayer, bursting with power. Really don't need any more.

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: The First Slayer did not talk so much.

Buffy pulls on her chains again. The men start tapping their staves against the ground, rhythmically. The man in the red hat fetches a box and brings it to the center of the circle, where he takes off the box top.

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: Herein lies your truest strength.

BLACK HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: The energy of the demon. Its spirit.

BROWN HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: Its heart.

BUFFY
This is how you"”

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: Created the slayer? (nods) Yes.

Black smoke comes out of the box in long tentacles; it seems sentient as it dances around the circle. The men keep tapping their staves rhythmically.

BROWN HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: It must become one with you.

BUFFY
No! (struggles against her chains)

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: This will make you ready for the fight.

BUFFY
By making me less human?

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: This is how it was then. How it must be now.

BLACK HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: This is all there is.

Buffy struggles against her restraints in vain as the black smoke comes toward her, entering her body through her nose and ears.

Fade to black.
ACT IV:

37 EXT. CAVE IN DESERT - DAY
Resume. Buffy's screaming as the black smoke tries to enter her body. The men just stand there, watching. The smoke can't get in through her head while she's screaming, so it rises to the ceiling of the cave and comes back down to her, encircling her hips. Still, she resists.

BUFFY
(through gritted teeth) Make this stop!

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: This is what you came for.

BUFFY
No, this isn't the way.

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: Do not fight this.

The black smoke heads toward Buffy again.
Click to expand...

then

42 EXT. CAVE IN DESERT - DAY
Buffy's still chained to the ground as she stands, addressing the three men who put her there.

BUFFY
You think I came all this way to get knocked up by some demon dust? I can't fight this. I know that now. But you guys? You're just men. (rips her chains out of the ground) Just the men who did this...to her. Whoever that girl was before she was the First Slayer.

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: You don't understand.

BUFFY
No, you don't understand! You violated that girl, made her kill for you because you're weak, you're pathetic, and you obviously have nothing to show me.

Buffy uses the chains that are still shackled to her hands as weapons. She swings the chains, at the legs of one man, and the staff of the other. She knocks them down, but they get up again. A fight ensues.
Click to expand...
 
Well I think the the first part that you have highlighted:
We are at the beginning. The source of your strength. The well of the slayers power.
Click to expand...
They were saying that they created the slayer, and it's the source of the slayer power.(Obviously)

Herein lies your truest strength.
Click to expand...
I had never noticed that line before, but I guess they are saying that the slayer is a demon, but a demon that is being controlled by limiting it's power.

BLACK HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: The energy of the demon. Its spirit.

BROWN HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: Its heart.

BUFFY
This is how you"”

RED HAT SHADOW MAN
SUBTITLE: Created the slayer? (nods) Yes.
Click to expand...
This part I think means that they took the essence of a demon and mixed it with a girl, making a human/demon hybrid, The Slayer.

You violated that girl
Click to expand...

Then that part, is pretty self explanatory, they had no right to make her the slayer, but they were weak and could not fight for themselves. Also the way that there seems to be a raped thing about how they did, it. The demon essence raped the girl in order to make her the slayer!
 
H
Hero
they are saying that the slayer is a demon, but a demon that is being controlled by limiting it's power. - very well thought!
i have a question...don't know if it's been answered before or whatever, but i'm still curious.
where did the men get the spirit of the demon? i mean, it wasn't just lying around in a cave somewhere...it was either given to them by 'a higher power' or they took it out of a demon with their own power.
 
Well I guess they riped the heart out of a demon stuck it in a box, and can call it's essence out of it?
 
Hey, does anyone remember a story, something about they originally filmed the scene to make it look like the demon essence was interested in actually, kind of raping Buffy, or something, but the network, or the censor, wouldn't let the scene past?
 
nerd4hire said:
OK I admit it, I could probably post this in any of a number of threads open right now, but I feel this deserves it's own thread.

Get It Done is one of my favourite episodes, and contains what I believe may be the only real description of the Slayer's origins and how the power actually works.

Sometimes I almost feel like I'm the only one who actually saw it, but then I realize, "No. It's just that other people have different interpretations.

So I'm interested in discovering exactly what those interpretations are. I'll post the pertinent passages. Please tell me exactly what you think they mean. What do they say about the origins of the slayer, and how the power works.



then
Click to expand...

I'm not sure how you anyone can interpret it differently. They took a girl and imbued her with the power of a demon. How they did that, I do not know, or care for that matter. Such things never seem important to me. There are no answers within the text to those sorts of questions, so anything you or anyone (other than Whedon) comes up with is just speculation. I like hard proof, or I don't care much for the discussion.

What I find interesting is that they took the power of an "evil" thing and used it to do "good".


nerd4hire said:
Hey, does anyone remember a story, something about they originally filmed the scene to make it look like the demon essence was interested in actually, kind of raping Buffy, or something, but the network, or the censor, wouldn't let the scene past?
Click to expand...

Ugm, I'm pretty sure I've had several "discussions" about this which tend to end badly..

In the literal context of the Slayer story, it makes NO sense. She gets "raped" and that gives her a power? Explain how that would work.
 
Just for you PJ, because I think you might get a kick out this writers sardonic style I'll post the Television Without Pity episode recap to that scene -

A black mist rises out of the box. The shaman tells her that it must "become one" with her and will prepare her for her fight with The First. "By making me less human?" Ruh-roh. I see tentacle sex in the future. Buffy screams, which for some reason disrupts the black smoke. It quickly recovers and then attempts to go up her skirt. Ah. The dreaded Martiphor. Could someone please get this woman some rape-crisis counseling? I'm sick and tired of being subjected to week after week of her working out her screwed-up sexual assault issues. What kind of freak is she that she would think it's an okay message to send that Buffy is attracted to the man who tried to rape her? Why does the Slayer's power, arguably the greatest physical power that a female in the Buffyverse can aspire to, have to be rooted in the act of rape? Why? Why must this woman bring the label of rape to everything? If, say, Wood steals a kiss from Buffy, does that mean we're going to be subjected to Marti working out her "mouth rape" issues? Buffy struggles and grunts. "Make this stop," she grits out through clenched teeth. "This is what you came for," says a shaman. Well, now. If that isn't the mystical vision quest way of saying, "You must have wanted it or you wouldn't have come back to my place." Hmm. Is that phrasing right? Is that what a rapist says? I'll have to ask Britboy. He would know, because he's a man, and if there's one thing that Buffy has taught me this season, it's that all men are rapists.
Click to expand...

http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/story.cgi?show=12&story=4711&page=11&sort=&limit=
 
nerd4hire said:
Just for you PJ, because I think you might get a kick out this writers sardonic style I'll post the Television Without Pity episode recap to that scene -



http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/story.cgi?show=12&story=4711&page=11&sort=&limit=
Click to expand...


Ah, Television Without Pity. I've read that recap before. " It quickly recovers and then attempts to go up her skirt. Ah. The dreaded Martiphor." Funny stuff. TWoP is ok, I go there to read the episode threads for Lost and Veronica Mars. Personally, though, I don't much like that site... partly because I was banned from it.

Also because I get annoyed with the way a lot of the posters there act towards the recappers.They aren't god's gift to writing(or snarking). I dislike suck-ups, and some of them take it to the extreme. Seriously, it's not that difficult to rip apart an episode of tv. (I'd be awesome at it) Also, whoever initiated the usage of "Hee!", should be tortured and murdered.
 
Yeah, I had a hunch you might be familiar with the TWoP ep recaps, but I thought that particular one is worth being reminded of. I get a kick out of it, and thought you might also.

However this is a speculation thread, and you tell me you don't like spec so I have to bid you a saucy adieu, and get back to my peeps.

What I'm interested in in particular is how people relate this passage in Get It Done to the slayer(s) of BTVS.

The First slayer was created by merging demon essence with a human girl. What happens after that, I wonder. Does the original essence bounce from girl to girl, or does it somehow make it's way from the Shadowmens' dimension to our own on each slayer death, and new slayer's creation? or does this demon essence even continue it's connection to the modern slayers in any way? My question is how do you interpret the text from Get It Done? Is it relevant to the rest of BTVS?
 
So maybe this answers the question about how the new slayer i chosen. Maybe this demon essence chooses the one it likes or something?

which would mean, evil chooses the current slayer. now theres a horrible thought.
 
wolf said:
So maybe this answers the question about how the new slayer i chosen. Maybe this demon essence chooses the one it likes or something?

which would mean, evil chooses the current slayer. now theres a horrible thought.
Click to expand...

Whats a Horrible thought.
You are assuming that the Demon itself is evil.
Remember what Jasmine said. The Demons(i would assume for something this powerful it would have to be an 'Old One') all 'evolved' from the same place, good and bad.....what if the Demon WAS a Good Demon.....but then taking in context, that same demon could be a PTB itself......
 
I'm wondering about something. When the Shadowmen are talking about the "heart of the demon", are they talking about the actual heart, or are they referencing a more metaphoric demon essence kind of thing?
 
Dia DeLa Muerte said:
Whats a Horrible thought.
You are assuming that the Demon itself is evil.
Remember what Jasmine said. The Demons(i would assume for something this powerful it would have to be an 'Old One') all 'evolved' from the same place, good and bad.....what if the Demon WAS a Good Demon.....but then taking in context, that same demon could be a PTB itself......
Click to expand...

Giles: This world is older than any of you know. Contrary to popular
mythology, it did not begin as a paradise. For untold eons demons walked
the Earth. They made it their home, their... their Hell. But in time
they lost their purchase on this reality. The way was made for mortal
animals, for, for man. All that remains of the old ones are vestiges,
certain magicks, certain creatures...
Click to expand...
JASMINE
Yes. In the beginning, before the time of man, great beings
walked the earth. Untold power emanated from all
quarters: the seeds of what would come to be known as
good and evil. But the shadows stretched and became
darkness and the malevolent among us grew stronger.
The earth became a demon realm. Those of us who had
the will to resist left this place but we remained ever
watchful.
GUNN
You're a Power That"¦ Was?
JASMINE
(smiles)
But then something new emerged from deep inside the
earth"” neither demon nor god.
WESLEY
Man.
Click to expand...

By the time man "came" to earth the only demons on it were evil.
 
I'm not sure demons are necessarily evil. I look at examples like Clem and Lorne, and I wonder.

Fray tells us the Mage, and the Lorranites came along pre-history sometime, and chased the demons off the earthly plain right? The vampires were seen as kind of a half human, half demon mutant. Urkon described them as a disease. Then there appears to be demons that migrate back here somehow.

So what's the story on Old Ones, I wonder? The Mage, and the Lorranites chased the demons off, but Old Ones remained in some kind of stasis in the Deeper Well. Are they the PTB Jasmine describes who went bad? Are they demons, or the creators of demons, or something completely different? Illyria was an Old One. She didn't really seem evil - more amoral. My impression is Wolfram & Hart are demons. I don't get the impression Illyria necessarily recognizes them as one of her species.

Is Giles understanding of what the Old One's were as exact as the knowledge which would come to Angel through Wolfram & Hart, who actually knew Old Ones.

From the Shadowmen's perspective though an Old One might be a demon irregardless of what the technicalities are. What if Joss comes out in this next canon comic series he's writing, and tells us the Shadowmen have an actual Old One's heart they use to make slayers.
 
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