(Meta) Slayer Abilities

[stormwreath]

I've been thinking about Slayer powers: how they work, what their limitations are, and what the experience of using her powers would feel like to the Slayer in question. Hence this essay, which is the first long meta I've written for quite some time.

Comments

[diachrony]

I love this. Your meta is so fascinating & thorough.

[stormwreath]

Thanks. :-)

[icemink]

Wonderful article. There were several things I'd never thought of before, especially about Buffy being the peak of human physicality but not being way beyond it. However that does bring up an interesting point, in one of the episodes near the end of season 5, Spike tries to pick up the troll hammer and can barely do it, but Buffy picks it up with ease. I think this is the only time we see that she is clearly stronger than Spike, unless maybe her kind of mystical strength is simply more inline with the magic of the hammer. Or she may be able to do it because at that point she is very in tune with her power and focused so it's easier for her

[stormwreath]

Thanks! To be honest, the idea that a Slayer's strength is "only" equal to the absolute pinnacle of human capabilities wasn't something I'd really thought about until I began writing this and worked it out.

But then again, Angel says that Buffy is stronger than him, and she seems to be as strong as/stronger than Spike, so presumably vampire strength is also no greater than human potential. On the other hand, since vampires ignore (or enjoy) pain, they'll be able to push their limits further than a human might.

maybe Slayers are born leaders, but have been forced into a lower position

That's pretty much how I see it. One question the show never really addressed is to what extent the Shadowmen, and then the Council, really understood and controlled the Slayer and her abilities. I sometimes think they knew just enough to control her, but not really the full depths of her abiities; perhaps the original Shadowmen were opportunists who found a really cool spell, but didn't fully understand it.

[eowyn_315]

Very thorough. :)

Fighting her will be a bewildering experience for someone more used to fighting natural opponents, or even demons who are superstrong due to their muscles rather than magic. (Note: credit goes to, um, someone? Maybe eowyn_315? for originally suggesting this particular aspect of a Slayer's powers. I didn't think of it myself.)

Nope, wasn't me. It does make me sound smart, though. :)

And given that Buffy's idea of binge eating is "craving a low fat yoghurt", it could be that when Dawn describes her sister as "such a pig" she's using Hollywood actress terms of reference rather than anything connected to the real world. It could also be that Buffy's indulging her cravings more by the time Dawn makes that observation. When she met Faith (and confessed to the yogurt cravings), she was pretty uptight about her slayerness - as evidenced by that very conversation. She could've refrained from eating as much as she wanted to because she's still trying to conform to normal teenage girl expectations. In season 6, she's

[stormwreath]

Nope, wasn't me. It does make me sound smart, though.

I was sure it was you. Hmm. Hopefully the person who did come up with the idea will reply here in the comments so I can give proper credit...

Good point on Buffy's eating habits. It could also be that rather than not caring about appearances after S6, she's discovered through trial and error that she can eat whatever she likes and not put on a single pound thanks to Slayer metabolism. (Thus earning her the undying hatred of non-superpowered women everywhere...)

I think you're right, it was Faith's head trauma that caused the coma. It was just that the similarity between her injuries and Buffy's suddenly struck me.

I disagree with this. I think Buffy's leadership qualities are entirely her own.I think the show itself was confused on the issue. Yes, on the face of it you're right: the Council surely wouldn't have wanted a Slayer with leadership abilities. But there are also plenty of references to the idea that the Slayer is supposed to be a natural leader - think of the big

[mikeda]

why would Faith rather than, say, Giles or Robin be the automatic candidate for leader

Part of it is almost accidental. Buffy says that she's in charge "Because I'm the slayer". Which leads to the obvious retort.

Perhaps more important is that I think both Giles and Willow are deliberately avoiding a leadership role. Which leaves Faith as the obvious alternative to Buffy.

(There doesn't seem to be anything in particular that would lead to Robin as a likely alternative.)

[stormwreath]

But after Faith is chosen as leader, Giles seems to take it upon himself to nurture and encourage her talents: it does suggest to me that it's how he sees part of a Watcher's role.

Plus, of course, Buffy clearly thinks that being a Slayer is what makes her qualified to be the leader.

Robin is (a) an experienced and mature adult among a crowd of teenagers (b) a qualified manager in a leadership position (school principal) (c) someone who's been trained by a Watcher and has been fighting evil for longer than many of the Potentials have been alive.

[rebcake]

I wrote a fic wherein Faith ends up in the sick bay of the Starship Enterprise, and McCoy is fascinated by her readings, which show her to be a "perfect" specimen of a human female. I think I was trying to overlay a bit of The Fifth Element and the "perfection" of Leeloo with Slayer powers. 'Cos I just liked it. It doesn't really add anything to your excellent thesis, but that was my take, with less analysis.

Great job.

[stormwreath]

Interesting idea. I suppose it depends on how you define "perfect", but a human with absolutely no scars, no abnormalities, no signs of childhood disease, no cavities in her teeth, etc etc - I'm sure Starfleet technology would detect that. The only question is whether they've achieved that level of perfection themselves...

[majingojira]

Honestly, I tried to quantify the Buffyverse before--I mean, by going episode by episode, and recording instances of various physical powers on display. How high did she jump--and how quickly did she jump?

How far did someone fly when punched, and how fast?

I had to stop, because thanks to an episode of Angel I realized something: We are watching things through a filter. Thanks to the episode "Somnambulist", we know that a lot of the footage is slowed down for our benefit, making exact quantification impossible due to insufficient data.