The Naughty Secret Of Everyone’s Favorite Buffy Character
While he didn’t have mystical powers of his own, Giles played a very important role in Buffy the Vampire Slayer as the title character’s mentor. He came into this role with a bit of baggage, including his own nemesis…Ethan Rayne is one of the few people who knew Giles when he was a fierce young magic user nicknamed “Ripper.” These characters always had great chemistry onscreen together, and legendary Buffy writer Jane Espenson credits this to Giles secretly having had a previous relationship with his longtime foe.
Giles And Ethan
To contextualize the secret relationship between Giles and Ethan, we’re going to need to bring you up to speed on both Buffy characters. Giles is introduced to us as a stuffy librarian of Buffy’s high school, a role that masks his true role as the Watcher of the Slayer. As the seasons go on, though, we discover that Giles had a very dangerous past that included recklessly experimenting with magic and even demonic possession before he got on the straight and narrow.
Embraced Black Magic
As for Ethan Rayne, he shows up in Season 2 as Giles’ old colleague, a warlock who worships Chaos and torments Buffy and her friends with Halloween costumes that transform everyone into what they dressed as. Across his later appearances, we discover his shady past with Giles…the two of them were part of a cult that basically worshiped a demon named Eyghon.
When the demon took control of one of the groups and an attempted exorcism killed the host, a shaken Giles returned to the Watchers Council while Ethan descended further into the world of dangerous black magic.
Writers Have Come Out And Basically Admitted To It
Now that you have the relevant backstory about Giles and Ethan Rayne, what’s the deal with these two Buffy characters having a hidden sexual history? At the 2004 Writercon event in Las Vegas, fan-favorite Buffy writer Jane Espenson was a guest, and she answered a string of questions from fans, most of which concerned their favorite characters. One fan asked about Giles and Ethan, and the writer confirmed that she thought they had a romantic past, joking, “Come on, they both went to public school!”
Giles History Would Fit Right In
So, does this make Giles being bisexual (we only ever see him romantically involved with women in the show) an official part of Buffy canon? Yes and no: as this history with Ethan is never explicated in either the show or the official comics, it is not technically part of Buffy’s sprawling canon.
At the same time, Espenson was a longtime writer and co-executive producer on the show who worked very closely with showrunner Joss Whedon, so her thoughts about these characters carry far more weight than, say some random fan theory.
Incidentally, even though Giles and Ethan being romantically involved is never directly mentioned, such a plot would arguably be fully in the spirit of Buffy, a show that frequently used the supernatural as a metaphor for the more mundane realities of our own world.
Maybe It Will Be Canon On-Screen Someday
When Giles and Ethan were younger, they and their group took turns allowing the demon they worshiped to possess their bodies, resulting in a spectacular high. In other words, these two Whedon characters took turns letting a demonic male pleasurably invade their bodies…is it really a stretch that they might have been practicing a little non-demonic body invasion on their own time?
It’s always possible that Giles’ bisexuality will be confirmed by one of the canonical Buffy comics and we’ll learn more about his love life. Until then, though, we’ll have to leave this subject to be explored by the wildest Buffy fans of all: the fanfic writers.
