Season Eight

Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season Eight premiered on March 10th, 2003 and concluded on June 2nd, 2004. It wad adapted from the Dark Horse and IDW publishing comic continuation of the series which originally concluded on television that same year of 2003 with the finale episode Chosen, in which major characters Spike portrayed by James Marsters and Anya Jenkins portrayed by Emma Caulfield were killed off in an end battle which destroyed the central fictional town of Sunnydale, California where the television series took place. The series was renewed by The CW network the new WB take over network in place of UPN which helmed the previous two seasons following WB's decision to end their contract with the series following the Season 5 finale The Gift. Season Eight also sees previous recurring actors DB Woodside, Iyari Limon, Tom Lenk and long-time recurring actress Eliza Dushku upgraded to main cast members as of the season's premiere episode The Long Way Home Part One. Also added to the main cast of the season is newly introduced slayer character Satsu, a lesbian love interest for Buffy during the season portrayed by Erin Cummings.

Principal Cast

 * Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers (22/22)
 * Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris (22/22)
 * Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg (22/22)
 * Eliza Dushku as Faith Lehane (20/22)
 * Iyari Limon as Kennedy Marshall (20/22)
 * Tom Lenk as Andrew Wells (22/22)
 * Erin Cummings as Satsu (17/22)
 * DB Woodside as Robin Wood (16/22)
 * Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles (20/22)

Recurring Cast

 * Elizabeth Anne Allen as Amy Madison
 * Adam Busch as Warren Mears
 * Rudolf Martin as Dracula
 * Mike Colter as Clive Morris
 * Will Peltz as Max Greening
 * Indigo as Rona
 * Felicia Day as Vi
 * Kristina Klebe as Rowena
 * Mercedes McNab as Harmony Kendall
 * Seth Green as Daniel Osbourne
 * Daniel Kirschner as Sephrillian
 * Marc Blucas as Riley Finn
 * Ivana Milicevic as Samantha Finn
 * Jane Elizabeth Mendez as Leah
 * Lois Neville as Gia
 * Jeff Jack as Roden
 * Emma Caulfield as Anya Jenkins
 * David Boreanaz as Angel
 * James Marsters as Spike
 * Kristine Sutherland as Joyce Summers
 * James Charles Leary as Clem
 * Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase
 * Danny Strong as Jonathan Levinson
 * K.D. Aubert as Nikki Wood

Season Summary
Season Eight revolves around the aftermath of the destruction of Sunnydale that came with Spike's sacrifice in the Battle of the Hellmouth in 2003, a year following on from that cataclysmic event the Scoobies and activated potentials that survived the fight have disbanded into groups and taken to separate corners of the earth. Buffy, Xander and Dawn lead a group of Scotland based activates who find themselves threatened by a mysterious government organization. Buffy, Xander and Dawn set up the slayers at an abandoned Scotland Castle Citadel and Dawn begins to undergo strange changes. Faith and Giles lead a collective in England where Giles attempts to reform the Watcher's Council with Faith and himself at the helm, to cater to the England based slayers and Watcher descendants who find themselves at peril from the basic dangers of the supernatural they will face and so as to assume control and a vantage point from the mother country. Andrew temporarily at Faith and Giles' companionship is initiated himself into a watcher and sent to Rome to begin to the training of his own recruits there whilst keeping a safeguard on a Buffy decoy slayer, which serves the purpose of throwing the government installation attempting to find Buffy and learning their intentions. Andrew also finds himself tasked with keeping tabs on an ancient neutral warrior known as the Immortal, a lothario seducer of women with a keen interest in the Buffy decoy whom he believes to be the actual Buffy Summers. Willow and Kennedy to begin with are together in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and split apart for a time when Willow heard of Winifred Burkle's death after master astral projection. Studying under the tutelage of Saga Vasuki a snake like woman with whom Willow began a passionate affair on Kennedy with. Kennedy after distraught and breaking up with Willow had at some point through the course of flashbacks of the first premiere episodes of the season died a mystical death and was resurrected by Willow who reformed her broken relationship with Kennedy and diminished contact with the others, in particular Buffy out of paranoid concern that like Tara should she and Kennedy both together fall back into that fold she would meet a similar fate. Amy Madison former Sunnydale High alum, town resident and on and off meddling witch is called upon by the organization desperate to get a hold of Buffy Summers and coerced in to launching an attack on her, Xander and Dawn's slayer based Scotland Castle Citadel which she does alongside a resurrected, skinless Warren. From there the scoobies come back together in full as Dawn transfigures into a colossal giant and the organization's intentions are revealed as eliminating all key supernatural players in order to avoid the coming of Twilight, a powerful force which threatens the foundation of the world and the end of magic. Dracula makes his return in the season as the Slayer Organization, a global outfit headed by the groups devised by Buffy and Giles following the destruction of Sunnydale meet the resistance that comes with rogue slayers, an army of demons and powerful Japanese vampires. Willow masters the ability of flight among her many other growing abilities and reforms the close friendship her and Buffy share, Andrew is finally accepted into the scoobies as a fully recognized, respected and cared for member, Dawn transitions into a centaur and an alarming old one entity before being broken of her body morphs by Buffy who solidifies their stronger than blood sisterly bond. Xander begins a string of unsuccessful flings with activated slayers in he and Buffy's care before even striking it up with former Sunnydale Hellmouth activated slayer Rona whilst the group travels between their continental outposts to throw back their oncoming threats. It is revealed that Xander has the spirit of former dead love Anya on his shoulder who materliazes to confirm her and Tara have a good afterlife set for them as does all those were foolish enough to die for he and Buffy's cause along the years, she also however confesses she is there to set him on track and help him to finally let her go. Andrew as finally assumes the role of a grown man and under the influence of a spell and the support of his newfound friends comes to confess himself as a homosexual male who has never experienced an actual relationship, under the push of his slayer charges in Rome he comes into his first relationship with new Watcher's council recruit Clive Morris and things stir along until the Buffy decoy is tragically killed. Buffy strikes a lesbian fling with slayer Satsu who awoke from a dreamspace comatose state induced by Amy and Willow and Andrew triumph over Amy and a skinless, reanimated Warren. Faith almost treads back down the path as an aggressive killer as Giles tasks her with the assassination of the English slayer threatening what he believes to be another apocalypse, but in actual fact just the death of original twice resurrected slayer Buffy. Twilight is revealed as a malevolent primordial entity which has assumed the body of Angel following the fall of Los Angeles and Spike rejoins the group as they make their shift from their respective continental outposts which are jeopardized to San Francisco. Harmony goes from L.A. following the fall to San Francisco and strikes it big as a reality star eventually crossing hairs with the scoobies and facing the opportunity to actually have her soul reconstituted. Faith and Robin Wood restart their previously terminated relationship and Andrew's relationship with Clive ends before he takes up with a handsome demon conjurer and former Sunnydale alum positioned in San Francisco named Max Greening. Twilight's plan is revealed as intending to end all magic by using the vampire with a soul from the Shanshu prophecies as a conduit to drain out through a primordial ritual of three steps the essence of magic in the world. Giles however proving to be a major threat to Twilight's plan using Angel his host kills him in the same fashion his former love Janna Kaldersash (AKA Jenny Calendar) had been killed a soulless Angelus in Season Two. The devastated others resurrect Giles in the only way possible, as a rapidly aging child. Spike eventually with the others helps to loosen Twilight's grip on Angel freeing him of the possession and with the help of a returning Daniel Oz Osbourne, Riley Finn and his wife Samantha a final battle is waged against a separated Twilight. Following Twilight, rogue slayer Genevieve Savidge, the rebellion and the organization's destruction the group settles down in their new home in San Francisco before planning on what to be done with still active rogue slayer Simone Doffler and her followers. Andrew has settled into a loving relationship with Max, Willow and Kennedy have ended their relationship on the best of terms, Xander and Dawn have confessed their love for one and another, Giles begins the next part of his rapidly aging evolution as teenage Giles, Faith and Wood start up on training the slayers which have taken up in San Francisco.