12 Small Details You Only Notice Rewatching Buffy The Vampire Slayer

Tara suffers a terrible fate in season five. The poor, quiet, kind girl has her brain tampered with by villainous God Glorificus, and spends many episodes ranging between comatose and frantic gibbering. It’s one of the leading motivations for the gang to defeat their foe - but it might just have left Tara with powers of foresight.

In the season finale, Buffy and co arm themselves to go into war, with Tara babbling away. As they file past her, she seems to experience a moment of lucidity, locking eyes on Giles and stating “you’re a killer”. This is easy to dismiss, until you remember how the episode ends.

Glory, bruised and beaten, reverts to her human form of Ben. Buffy, saintly as ever, can’t finish the job, even though neglecting to do so will leave the door open for the murderous deity to return. So who steps up - but Giles. Acknowledging the questionable nature of his actions, he suffocates Ben, killing the monster as well as the mortal man.

While Giles is undoubtedly a good man, he was capable of dark acts the rest would seldom dream of. He keeps that side of himself from the gang for the most part - but in her altered state, he can’t keep it from Tara.