Tara Maclay (born October 16, 1980 and died May 7, 2002 in Sunnydale, California) is a fictional character created by Joss Whedon for the cult television series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Tara was played by Amber Benson.

CHARACTER HISTORY
Tara is introduced in the Season Four episode "Hush." A member of UC Sunnydale's Wicca group, she meets Willow Rosenberg, herself a practicing witch. In many ways, the painfully shy and quiet Tara is reminiscent of Willow of seasons past. As Willow's romantic relationship with Oz caused her to bloom, it is through Tara that Willow becomes a powerful young woman, and through Willow that Tara's confidence grows. As the season progresses, it becomes increasingly clear that the pair are destined for a romantic liaison. Willow realizes that Tara is the person she loves, choosing Tara over her ex-boyfriend Oz. The two thus became one of the few lesbian couples on television and the first-ever prime-time lesbian couple which included a starring character. Magic came to serve as a metaphor for lesbianism and love.

Not much is known about Tara's past. Her family life was clearly traumatic, and she had not had many friends before meeting Willow. In the episode "The Body," Tara tells Buffy that she lost her mother when she was 17, at which point she went through a brief rebellious period. In the episode "Family," it is revealed that her father had told her at a young age that she was partially of demon descent on her mother's side. After she finds out this was merely a lie designed to keep control over her, Tara's ties with her family seem entirely severed, leaving Willow and the Scooby Gang her only remaining loved ones, her new family. In the episode "Tough Love," Willow points out that Tara has been out longer than Willow has, perhaps implying that Willow is not Tara's first girlfriend.

Although Tara is a recurring character rather than a regular, through her relationship with Willow, she plays an important role in the story on several occasions, such as at the end of the fifth season, when the evil hell-god Glory sucks her mind out, leaving her in a babbling, childlike state until Willow cures her, or in Season 6, when Willow's magic addiction (by this time, magic had become a metaphor for drug use) causes Tara to leave her, although they reconcile some episodes later.

By the beginning of the sixth season, Tara and Willow have been surrogate parent figures to Dawn Summers since Buffy's death at the end of Season Five, and Tara remains devoted to Dawn even after she leaves the Summers house following her breakup with Willow. Inasmuch as Dawn was unaware of the plan by Willow and the others to resurrect Buffy, it would seem she expected to remain in Willow and Tara's guardianship until she turned 18, and her overjoyed reaction to their reconciliation in "Seeing Red" reflects her love for them. Tara is also supportive and understanding of Willow's efforts to deal with the pressure of Scooby Gang leadership, reminding her that their bedroom is "the room where you don't have to be brave."

Also during the sixth season, Tara is, aside from Dawn, the only character depicted as being genuinely friendly toward Spike, whom she did not meet until after he was rendered incapable of attacking humans (in the fourth season). When Buffy discusses her troubled feelings toward Spike in "Dead Things", Tara tells her, "It’s okay if you do love Spike. He’s done a lot of good, and he does love you," clearly more impressed by Spike's character and feelings for Buffy than any of her fellow Scoobies. Also, a deleted (and therefore non-canon) line from the original script casts further light on her willingness to support Buffy's situation: When Buffy laments the toll of keeping her feelings a secret, Tara tells her: "Sweetie, I'm a fag. I been there."

Tara is killed, randomly, by a stray bullet aimed at Buffy by Warren, in the episode "Seeing Red." As a result, Willow is propelled into a destructive fury, and soon attempts to destroy the world.

After Tara's death, it was fiercely debated whether it constituted an example of a cliché in television that lesbian relationships usually turn out badly , often with one partner dying or turning out to be evil. Joss Whedon later explained that Tara's death had nothing to do with her being a lesbian, but it was just another plot twist designed to further Willow's personality; allegedly, if Willow had still been involved with Oz in Season Six, he would've been killed just as Tara was, so Tara was doomed not for being a lesbian but for being Willow's lover. In particular, it had become a well-known cliché of the series that any couples in the series tended to have their relationships brutally interrupted when they're at their closest.

Amber Benson was originally going to return to the show in the Season Seven episode "Conversations with Dead People," in which Tara would appear as one of the many forms of The First Evil, and attempt to coerce Willow into committing suicide. However, Benson decided that she didn't want to return, believing that appearing as a form of the season's villain, taunting Willow about her love for the real Tara, would ruin Tara's image and needlessly upset Tara's fans. Instead, the First appeared to Willow as Cassie Newton and claimed to be speaking for Tara.

While speaking at the Wizard World Chicago Convention in August 2004, Joss Whedon claimed that he had planned to bring Tara back from the dead at the end of Season Seven. According to Whedon, the episode would have centered around Buffy being granted one "life-altering" wish. Buffy would have spent the whole episode trying to decide what she wanted to do with the wish (including, possibly, restoring Angel's humanity). The episode would have ended with Buffy telling Willow that she'd just gotten a great new pair of shoes, and when Willow asked her if she used up her wish on new shoes, Buffy would have said, "No, silly!" and stepped aside to reveal Tara. This plan was abandoned when Amber Benson was unavailable for filming.

Tara was a skilled spell caster and performed a wide range of spells during her time on the show. She has successfully created fire, light, smoke, and has done minor blinding curses. Tara also has shown some ability of telekinesis, which, when she is in physical contact with Willow, is stronger than it would otherwise be (i.e. she and Willow pool their power by concentrating on moving the same object). An unusual ability she displayed is the ability to magically know something is wrong with someone and to sense the use of mental powers, which she did by "reading" a person's aura (such as when Buffy was possessed by Faith). This ability was one of very few that Willow Rosenberg did not have during the show. In the Buffy the Vampire Slayer RPG this ability is known as "The Sight". Tara had a good knowledge of Latin and grew up riding horses. She rarely used the Internet because the preponderance of bad spelling depressed her.

In season four, Tara was the only character to notice that Faith's spirit was trapped in Buffy's body, and she was also central in sending Willow to the "nether-world" in order to discover how they could reverse the soul-switching ("Who Are You"). In the episode "Where the Wild Things Are," Tara aided Giles and Willow in an attempt to reach and reason with the residual spiritual manifestations of numerous abused children who were plaguing a fraternity house.

In season four's "Restless" Tara is 'borrowed' out of time and space in order to speak for the First Slayer who is a primitive without speech. From Tara's mouth we first hear the prophetic line that is later repeated (almost verbatim) by Dracula in Buffy vs. Dracula, "You think you know, what's to come, what you are. You haven't even begun."

In the season five episode "Family," Tara cast a spell to stop the Scooby Gang from being able to see demons so she could hide her supposed demon side. This spell almost got the entire gang killed but Tara reversed it in time. Tara was also seen casting more offensive spells in combat situations.

In season six, once again Tara is the only one that sees Buffy for what she is after she returns from the dead. In the episode "Older and Far Away," she cast a spell to free the trapped party goers in Buffy's house but the spell instead freed a demon from a sword.

Willow Rosenberg — Tara met Willow in a Wicca group during college, and began a relationship which became sexual ("The I in Team"). Unlike the heterosexual couples on Buffy, the two were very rarely shown in remotely intimate situations with each other, not kissing on screen until the season 5 episode "The Body", nearly a full season after they came out. They were portrayed as each others' "true love" throughout the series, shadowing Willow's Season Seven relationship with Potential Slayer Kennedy. During the episode "Tabula Rasa," in which the Scoobies fell victim to an amnesia spell, there was still a heavy attraction between Willow and Tara, reinforcing the message of true love.