This page is a work in progress. We don’t know much about his character, what we do know I will try to convey in a coherent way on this page. If you feel I’ve left anything out or notice any mistakes, feel free to let me know using my ask box.

Rupert Edmund Giles (henceforth referred to as ‘Giles’) was born in England in the year 1955. We don’t know much about his family, only that his father and grandmother (Edna Giles) were both watchers. When he was seven years old Giles’ father sat him down and told him of his destiny to become a watcher; much to his dismay since he wanted to be a fighter pilot or a grocer.

Eventually Giles attended university at Oxford where he studied History. However, when he was twenty-one he went through a rebellion and ran away, from school and his destiny, and fell in with the worst crowd that would have him. At which point he gained the moniker ‘Ripper’.

This crowd we know for sure consisted of at least six people Giles, Ethan Rayne, Dierdre Page, Philip Henry, Thomas Sutcliff, and Randall (surname is unknown). We know that during this time the group dabbled in dark magics and most likely criminal activity, if his remark about hotwiring a car being like riding a bloody bicycle (Dead Man’s Party) and his ability to pick a lock (Gingerbread) are anything to go by.

At some point Ethan and Giles came across a summoning spell for the demon Eyghon. They would create a circle and one person would become possessed by Eyghon and was apparently an extraordinary high. Unfortunately all did not go according to plan one day and they were unable to exorcise the demon from Randall and Eyghon took him whole, effectively killing him. After this incident Giles went back to Oxford and the council and resumed his studies.

We don’t know much about what happened between when he went back to the council and when he came to Sunnydale, except that he was a curator at either a British museum or the British museum.

In 1997 Giles arrives in Sunnydale, under the guise of the local High School Librarian, to become the watcher to the active slayer, Buffy Summers, who arrives some weeks later. In his first year as Buffy’s Watcher, and librarian of Sunnydale High School, we learn many interesting things about him. Firstly, the three things he fears most is getting lost in the stacks, being illiterate, and Buffy’s death. Tragically, the last one is something he would have to face on more than one occasion over the next few years. We also learned that he would do anything to save his Slayer, including die in her place. Luckily for us, Buffy nipped that plan in the bud. It was also in this first year that he meets, computer science teacher and techno-pagan, Jenny Calendar, with whom he would form a romantic involvement the following school year.

His second year in Sunnydale brought to light many different facets of Giles’ character, which up to this point had never even been hinted at. It is in this season, after Eyghon returns to try and kill Giles and Ethan, that we learn about Giles’ rebellious past. We learn that Giles was in a band, during his youth. He also starts an on again/off again relationship with Jenny Calendar. They started dating at the beginning of the school year, and after the incident with Eyghon they took a break until reconciling around the time that Buffy’s mother’s boyfriend turned out to be a homicidal robot. Things seemed to be looking up for the couple, until circumstances led to the discovery that she wasn’t Jenny Calendar at all, but a Gypsie sent to Sunnydale to keep Buffy and Angel apart. After this incident, Giles and Jenny broke up, and on the night of their reconciliation, Jenny was murdered and left in Giles’ bed. When he got home, there was a rose on his front door, La Bohem coming from the record player, a bottle of chilled champagne, and a note telling him to go upstairs. What he found was not a romantic gesture as he had expected, but Jenny, dead on his bed.