Buffy The Vampire Slayer Stopped Making Sense For One Reason

Just as the first three seasons of Buffy were meant to mirror the life of a teenage girl going through high school, the seasons that followed continued the thread. In the case of Season 6, with Buffy resurrected and her mother gone, the eponymous vampire slayer finds herself learning to be an adult. There are bills to pay and most of the money left by her mother was eaten up by medical bills.

Buffy learns how bad things are in “Flooded,” when she tries to get paid by the bank and is denied the loan in spite of saving the loan officer from a demon. Giles throws her a financial life line in the following episode, but it’s clear she’s going to have to find some other way to keep the lights on long term.

Early in “Flooded,” Anya suggests that if Buffy wants to get paid, the best way to do it is to charge the innocent civilians she saves from demons on a nightly basis. Sure, plenty of those civilians would no doubt be grateful enough to cough up some cash, but there are plenty of people who might not have the means.

Not to mention it feels a little bit like the fire department putting out the fire in your house and then asking for your debit card.

But as ludicrous as Anya’s idea is, Buffy clearly should be getting paid for what she does, and one of the best episodes of the previous season tells us why and how.

Season 5’s “Checkpoint” is a pivotal moment in Buffy’s growth. At the time Buffy is dealing with shocking revelations about her sister Dawn, her mother’s failing health, her break up with Riley, and an increasing number of confrontations with the villain Glory who seems utterly unkillable.

The Council of Watchers suddenly shows up, closes Giles’ magic shop, and reveals they know who Glory is but will only cough up the info if Buffy passes a complicated series of tests. Along the way Buffy is paid surprise visits by Glory and the fanatical Knights of Byzantium.

The experience teaches her that everyone–Glory, the Council, the Knights–are telling her she’s powerless precisely because the opposite is true.

The Council, she realizes, is meaningless without her. They’re desperate to get her back, but are doing everything they can to make her feel like they’re doing her a favor. She refuses to do any more tests, demands the info on Glory, and they agree.

She also gets them to hire back Giles and to give him backpay for all the time he was fired.

Think about that.

Rupert “I’m chiefly here to be knocked unconscious” Giles deserves to get paid by the Council… but Buffy doesn’t get paid by the Council?

Why in the holy name of the Incredible Hulk is Buffy not getting paid by the Council of Watchers?

We’re told very early on in the series that the life expectancy of vampire slayers is not very long. If a slayer survives to her thirties she was probably either the best slayer ever, the luckiest slayer ever, or the laziest slayer ever.

As we learn later in the series from flashbacks, like Season 5’s “Fool for Love,” Slayers often leave behind family, including children. They could certainly use the kind of money Giles & co. are making, so why isn’t Buffy getting paid?

Obviously, the folks making Buffy didn’t want her to get paid in Season 6, because if she was paid, they couldn’t tell the Broke Buffy story they wanted. Fair enough.

But at the very least, there should have been a conversation. Buffy had an incredibly empowering moment in Season 5’s “Checkpoint” and she used it, in part, to help out Giles–Giles who, let’s remember was getting paid by the Council and the high school for the first three seasons, and apparently was paid well enough during that time that he survived without any kind of employment for over a year after his firing.

Survived–I might add–in a fairly pricey-looking apartment in Southern California.

And yet when Giles gives her some money in Season 6, it’s treated like charity and he later leaves the country out of fear of Buffy becoming too dependent on him.

There should have at least have been a conversation in which someone said, “hey, Buffy, why aren’t you getting paid by the Council?” Then, if the writers wanted to keep Buffy broke, they could have invented some way to make that happen–have the Council refuse, have them unable to pay for some reason.

They all get blown up in the following season anyway–just kill them all one season earlier.

But to not at least have the thought occur to Buffy that she should’ve been paid by the Council undercuts her growth in “Checkpoint.” And frankly it makes her and all of her friends seem a little stupid, because it was the first thing I thought of when her money problems came up in Season 6 and I’m sure not I’m not alone.