28 Years Ago, Buffy Introduced a New Character That Changed Everything (and Set Up One of the Best Season 3 Arcs)

28 years ago, Buffy the Vampire Slayer subverted its own Slayer rules for the first time. We all know the line; “In every generation, there is a Chosen One. She alone will stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer.” Buffy Summers never particularly wanted to be the Slayer, but this was her destiny; to stand alone, apart from the world she protects, battling against the evils that lurk in the shadows.

Buffy, of course, is a very different kind of Slayer. From the outset, Buffy’s Watcher Giles learned she didn’t want to accept the isolation that comes from being the Slayer; rather, for all she carried the weight of responsibility on her shoulders, Buffy insisted she would do so as part of a group – a “found family” that constantly grew in number, embracing the most unlikely allies. And yet, for all that’s the case, even Giles never saw one major twist coming.

28 Years Ago Today, Buffy The Vamprie Slayer Broke Its Own Rules

Played by Bianca Lawson, Kendra Young made her debut in the Season 2 episode “What’s My Line (Part One).” Her introduction left both Buffy and Giles shocked, because her mere existence broke the most basic rules of the Slayer. Suddenly there were two Slayers at once, not just one, and Buffy was no longer alone. Naturally, the magic woven through the Slayer line rebelled against this, because Buffy and Kendra struggled to adapt to an actual alliance.

There was a simple explanation for Kendra’s existence. Buffy briefly died in Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s Season 1 finale, activating the next Slayer, but Xander saved her life by performing CPR. She was only dead for moments, but it was enough for the next Slayer to be activated. It’s striking to note that this seems to be the first time a Slayer’s life was saved in history, indicating that no other Slayer had Scoobies around her to protect her.

Kendra’s Legacy Changed The Slayers Forever

Unlike Buffy, Kendra had been raised with full awareness she was a potential Slayer. It is tragic, then, that she survived less than a year; she was killed by Drusilla, and Buffy was briefly blamed for her death. This is, perhaps, the first real hint that the Watcher Council’s whole approach with the Slayers is wrong. Traditional Slayers are doomed to die, while the Slayer who breaks the rules and builds a found family around herself – Buffy Summers – is the one who survives, who learns and grows, and who becomes a true force to be reckoned with.

But Kendra’s death had other implications. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 3 built on all this by introducing Eliza Dushku as Faith Lehane, the new Slayer activated after Kendra’s death. Where Kendra served as a more traditional Slayer, representing everything the Watchers thought a Slayer should be, Faith initially served as a sort of mirror-image antagonist for Buffy. She embodies the darkness within Buffy, with a desperate desire for a normal life coupled with a temptation to indulge in power without consequence. Faith is, in a sense, Buffy’s “un-Slayer” – the antithesis of the Slayer that Buffy desires to be.

Kendra and Faith are key to Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s success. Already, within just two seasons, the show was daring to subvert its own lore. A Slayer is supposed to stand alone, but Buffy used the characters of Kendra and Faith to place its protagonost alongside other Slayers, using this to show what made Buffy truly unique. She was no traditional Slayer, like Kendra, and so she survived her enemies thanks to the love of her friends. Nor was she willing to embrace the lure of power without consequence like Faith, instead choosing responsibility.

Kendra and Faith Foreshadow how Buffy Would End

There’s a sense in which Kendra and Faith foreshadow the ultimate subversion of the show’s lore, the final twist in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 7. Buffy chose to share the power of the Slayer, with Willow activating every potential Slayer in the world. “In every generation, one Slayer is born,” Buffy declared as she outlined her plan. “Because a bunch of men who died thousands of years ago made up that rule… So I say we change the rule. I say my power should be our power.” From that moment on, every woman who had the potential to become a Slayer would become one.

Being a Slayer had always been an isolating thing, with one woman standing out from all her peers. Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s Kendra debut foreshadowed a time when that would change, when the rules would be bent and broken, and when Buffy Summers would no longer stand alone. It was the smartest approach possible, the complete subversion of everything the show had shown about what it meant to be a Slayer, and it was absolute genius. It simply remains to be seen how the Buffy the Vampire Slayer reboot will handle all this.

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