Buffy The Vampire Slayer

Throughout the years, the makers of Buffy the Vampire Slayer provided us with a myriad of monsters, demons, ghouls and ghosts; one scarier than the last. Here’s my list of the scariest Buffy monsters throughout the series.

10. Glory (throughout Season 5)

Glory is not visually horrifying, in fact she’s rather attractive, but she easily beat Buffy on numerous occasions, which is slightly more worrying. Also, she has to suck people’s sanity in order to stay sane herself, by digging her fingers into their skulls no less, leaving them as nothing but babbling crazy people.

Most horrifying moment: She repeatedly beat various Scooby-gang members to a pulp, but nothing was as shocking as when she fed off Tara’s sanity, making her a shell of her former self.

9. Gill Monsters (Go Fish, Season 2)

In a bid to impress Cordelia, Xander ends up joining the school swim team, only to find out that the swimmers are being turned into hideous fish monsters by the coach. Not only do these monsters look slimy and gross, they’re also extremely fast swimmers.

Most horrifying moment: When the afflicted transform into gill monsters, they literally shed their human skin. The transformation looks something akin to being turned inside out.

8. Norman Pfister (What’s My Line pts. 1 & 2, Season 2)

Norman Pfister was a member of the Order of Turaka, a group of assassins employed by Spike to kill Buffy. Pfister was actually made of maggots that somehow joined together giving him a human appearance. Posing as a door-to-door cosmetics salesman, Buffy’s neighbour invited him into her home only to meet her worm-induced downfall. From there he could spy on the Slayer’s house to carry out the assassination.

Most horrifying moment: Cordelia, whilst looking for Buffy at her house, invites Pfister in, where she and Xander are rained upon with worms.

7. The Bezoar (Bad Eggs, Season 2)

In Bad Eggs students’ bodies are taken over by hatchlings from the eggs that they were “parenting” in Health Class. By latching themselves onto the lower backs of their host bodies, these grizzly parasites get each student to do their bidding, namely going to the school basement and digging up more eggs. Needless to say, sometimes parents are simply controlled by their children.

Most horrifying moment: Not only do the Bezoar babies look spookily similar to Ridley Scott’s aliens, the mother Bezoar is a pulsating, gooey pink mass that lives underground, complete with squelching eyeball.

6. Adam (throughout Season 4)

Adam was an experiment conducted by a governmental demon research organisation. An ultimate killing machine, Adam comprised human, demon, and machine parts; a Frankenstein’s monster. At first, he is fascinated by the mechanics of living organisms, wanting to learn more about humans and demons alike. He later decided that his purpose in the world was to create chaos, and he planned to wage war by creating a race of demon-human-robot hybrids. Powered by a uranium core, Adam was almost unstoppable.

Most horrifying moment: Upon awakening, Adam skewered his creator, greeting her with ‘mommy’. A boy also met his untimely demise after Adam wanted to find out how he ‘worked’.

5. The First Evil, Bringers and Turok-Han (throughout Season 7)

The First is an ancient manifestation of all evil in the world and can be summoned by Bringers, its soldiers. It is incorporeal, so can’t physically harm anyone, but it can manipulate them psychologically. Taking the form of any person who has died, it worms its way into its victims’ psyches and drives them to madness. In Season 7, The First is accompanied not only by Bringers, but the cave-man equivalent of the vampire – Turok-Han, or Übervamps. These vampires look more ghastly than any regular vampire and prove much, much harder to kill.

Most horrifying moment: In Amends, The First drives Angel to suicide by sunlight and it takes a tacky-as-can-be Christmas miracle to save him. Bringers have no eyes and no tongues, which is creepy enough as it is. To top things off, these Übervamps have a primitive appearance that isn’t exactly something you’d want to come across in the middle of the night.

4. Gnarl (Same Time, Same Place, Season 7)

Gnarl is a Gollum-like creature that lives in a cave. His modus operandi is particularly disturbing. He takes to flaying his victims, eating their skin and drinking their blood, but to make matters a whole lot worse, his razor-sharp talons secrete a paralysing poison, meaning that the victim is conscious whilst all this is happening. When the gang unknowingly traps Willow in the cave, Gnarl taunts her before tucking in. Thankfully he doesn’t get far.

Most horrifying moment: How about the bit where he paralyses his victims and eats their skin?

3. Angelus (throughout Buffy and Angel)

Angel may be the puppy-faced vampire with a soul, but give him one moment of true happiness and Angel becomes Angelus – a bloodthirsty, cold-hearted killer who tortures his victims physically and psychologically. One of the most violent vampires in his day, Angelus was punished by gypsies and given a soul so he would forever suffer for all the pain he inflicted. The soul should be regarded more as a safety leash though, because once let loose, it’s hard to stop the rampaging evil of Angelus.

Most horrifying moment: One of Angelus’ most memorable moments is the murder of Jenny Calendar, and torment of her lover Giles.

2. Der Kindestod (Killed By Death, Season 2)

“Kindestod” means “child’s death”, which gives an indication as to what he does – he kills children. With his eyeballs. A classic childhood bogeyman, Der Kindestod stalks the corridors of hospitals, only to be seen by children and the sick. Here he can safely suck the life-force out of them using his eye-stems, as it appears they died from their illnesses.

Most horrifying moment: He kills children for a start, but the scariest thing about Der Kindestod is his appearance: huge teeth, white eyes, hooked nose, straggly hair, and a funny hat.

1. The Gentlemen (Hush, Season 4)

Possibly the scariest villains to ever appear in Buffy, the Gentlemen went to Sunnydale to obtain seven hearts. Because they have a slight allergy to the human voice (it makes their heads explode), the Gentlemen first stole all the voices of Sunnydale’s residents and conveniently put them in a box. Then, with the aid of their straitjacket-wearing footmen, they get to work, with horrific results.

Most horrifying moment: Much like Der Kindestod, the Gentlemen have a very visceral effect on a viewer, with their grotesque appearance. Bald, pale, with permanent silver-toothed smiles on their faces, they hover over the ground, and are guaranteed to have an impact on the viewer.