First forming in the Season One episode " The Harvest " to prevent The Master from opening a portal to hell, the line-up of the group varied from year to year, but the core that remained intact throughout the series ' run was Buffy herself and her best friends, Xander Harris and Willow Rosenberg, as well as her Watcher, Rupert Giles.

Due to the show's strong themes of female empowerment, the most powerful members of the team are often female ( Buffy and Willow ), while the men play passive roles such as that of father-figure ( Giles ) and supportive best friend ( Xander ).

The series begins as Buffy, Willow, and their friend Xander are in 10th grade and Willow is a shy and nerdy girl with little confidence.

Whedon created a group of friends for the main character, including Willow Rosenberg and Xander Harris.

In the second season when the characters are in 11th grade, Willow becomes more sure of herself, standing up to the conceited Cordelia Chase ( Charisma Carpenter ), and approaching Xander, on whom she has had a crush for years, although it is unrequited as Xander is in love with Buffy.

Willow becomes much more confident in college, finally finding a place that respects her intellect, while Buffy has difficulty in classes and Xander does not attend school.

Willow is able to escape with Buffy, Xander, Giles, and Kennedy as Sunnydale is destroyed.

Willow appears to Buffy and Xander, who are in charge of thousands of Slayers, a year after the destruction of Sunnydale.

Willow is part of a powerful quartet: she represents the spirit, Giles intelligence, Xander heart, and Buffy strength of the Scoobies.

She becomes best friends with Xander Harris ( Nicholas Brendon ) and Willow Rosenberg ( Alyson Hannigan ), and meets her new Watcher, Rupert Giles ( Anthony Stewart Head ).

Willow then tries to destroy the world to end all suffering, although Xander gets through to her in the end.

The shallow cheerleader of the original film had grown more mature and open-minded, identifying with social outcasts such as Willow and Xander, and instead, the character of Cordelia was created to embody what Buffy once was.

He kidnaps Willow and Xander, and forces Willow to conduct a love spell for him to make Drusilla love him again, even coercing Buffy and Angel to help him in exchange for the safe return of their friends.

The excitement of a brawl with the Mayor's vampires helps him see that Drusilla left him because he had begun to go soft ; he resolves to win her back by torturing her until she likes him again, and tells Buffy where to find Willow and Xander.

( Though he still spars with Buffy, provided he has no real intent on harming her ) His inability to bite is comically compared to impotence, much to Spike's constant humiliation ; in " Doomed ", he attempts to commit suicide by staking himself at Xander's house, but is stopped by Willow and Xander.

As the series progresses, Giles increasingly becomes a father figure to Buffy and her friends Willow ( Alyson Hannigan ) and Xander ( Nicholas Brendon ).

He is a father figure to Buffy and an advisor to her friends Xander Harris and Willow Rosenberg, together forming the " core four " of the Scooby Gang.

In order to defeat the cyber-demonoid Adam, Buffy, Willow, Xander and Giles cast a spell to combine their strength.

On the very day he leaves, Willow, Xander, Anya and Tara resurrect Buffy, and he comes back as soon as he hears of this.

It also allows Xander to reason with Willow as the good magic brings out her natural love and compassion, eating away at the evil within her.

He lost all of these powers when Willow drained him and left him on the brink of death, but he recovered immediately after Xander calmed her down from her rampage.

She's come to Sunnydale in response to the distress of Cordelia, who is upset after catching her boyfriend, Xander Harris, kissing their friend Willow.

Her best known works include the gesso panel The May Queen, which was made to partner Mackintosh's panel The Wassail for Miss Cranston's Ingram Street Tearooms, and Oh ye, all ye that walk in Willowood, which formed part of the decorative scheme for the Room de Luxe in the Willow Tearooms.

Hikers can park at the north Willow Springs campground and walk to the summit.

Buffy and Willow walk down a familiar street, arm-in-arm and easily startled, and see a bank closed and patrons running into a liquor store that is obviously open.

Willow becomes a real ghost, able to walk through walls, Xander a soldier, and Buffy an 18th-century noble woman.

* As Buffy, Dawn and her friends are exiting the basement, Buffy comments that the school seems ' a bit smaller ' which is the same comment Willow and Xander make as they walk through the charred remains in season 4.

Xander and Willow walk down the hallway with Buffy before each one peels off, leaving Buffy walking alone to the seal.

* The scene in which Giles, Buffy, Xander, and Willow are together in the hallway before they eventually split off into their separate parties mirrors a scene in " The Harvest ", in which Buffy, Xander, and Willow ignore Giles completely and walk off talking to each other leaving Giles to remark to himself, " the earth is doomed.

" In this episode, the same thing occurs when Buffy, Xander, and Willow ignore Giles completely and walk off talking to each other and Giles is left standing there alone where he comments that " The earth is definitely doomed.

Willow and Xander walk together and talk about Buffy's struggles and Willow's worries about her role in dealing with the impending Hellmouth danger.

This section eliminated a lengthy road walk to Willow, albeit at the price of a two-mile ( 3 km ) road walk into Stony Clove Notch.

" when she and Willow walk into the Bronze.

Willow and Tara walk around the school grounds holding hands and talk about Tara getting a cat as a pet.

Oz takes Willow for a walk outside during a full moon, showing her that he's not in werewolf mode.

The Willow Road and University Avenue junctions with Bayfront Expressway are at-grade intersections controlled by traffic lights ; there are two additional controlled intersections at Chilco Road and Marsh Road, and the Marsh Road interchange on U. S. 101 is a parclo.

Manchuria was originally separated from China proper by the Inner Willow Palisade, a ditch and embankment planted with willows intended to restrict the movement of the Han Chinese into Manchuria, as the area was off-limits to the Han Chinese until the Qing government started colonizing the area with them later on in the dynasty's rule, especially since the 1860s.

The Qing Dynasty started colonizing Manchuria with Han Chinese later on in the dynasty's rule, but the Manchu area was still separated from modern-day Inner Mongolia by the Outer Willow Palisade, which kept the Manchu and the Mongols in the area separate.

Harding visited Snow River on the Kenai Peninsula, Anchorage ( July 13 ), Chickaloon, Wasilla and Willow ( July 14 ).

Both Willow ( in the season one episode " Witch ") and Spike ( in the season four episodes " The I in Team " and " The Yoko Factor ") have used the term in the show on different occasions.

Through the gamut of changes Willow endures in the series, Buffy studies scholar Ian Shuttleworth states that Alyson Hannigan's performances are the reason for Willow's popularity: " Hannigan can play on audience heartstrings like a concert harpist ... As an actress she is a perfect interpreter in particular of the bare emotional directness which is the specialty of writer Marti Noxon on form.

Willow transitions into Dark Willow in " Villains ( Buffy the Vampire Slayer ) | Villains ", with Tara's blood splattered on her neck

Dark Willow is preternaturally focused on revenge, relentless and unstoppable.

People picked on Willow ... and now Willow's a junkie.

Willow takes on the leadership role when Buffy is unavailable, and her growing powers sometimes make her resent being positioned as Buffy's sidekick.

Buffy earned international attention for its unflinching focus on the relationship between Willow and Tara Maclay.

The scene was, upon completion, noticeably sensual to Whedon, the producers, and network executives, who encouraged Whedon to develop a romantic storyline between Willow and Tara, but at the same time placed barriers on how far it could go and what could be shown.

Whedon made a conscious effort to focus on Willow and Tara's relationship instead of either's identity as a lesbian or the coming out process.

Some critics regard this as a failure on Willow's part to be strong ; Em McAvan interprets this to mean that Willow may be bisexual.

Some fans loyal to Willow reacted angrily as she chose to be with Tara when Oz made himself available, and they lashed out at Tara and Amber Benson on the fansite message boards.

From now on, Willow will no longer be a Jew.

" where Willow and Tara chant and perspire in a circle of light until Willow falls back on a pillow gasping and moaning.

Willow and Tara's influence on specifically younger female viewers is, according to Driver, " remarkable ".

Willow and Tara are shown in some scenes to be " intensely sexual ", such as in the sixth season episode " Once More, with Feeling " where it is visually implied that Willow performs cunnilingus on Tara.

Willow and Tara's relationship became the first long-term lesbian relationship on U. S. television.