Season 3, Episode 22: Graduation Day: Part 2
Original Air Date: 13 July 1999

Buffy forces Angel to drink her own blood to rid his body of Faith's poison. With Buffy in a severely weakened state, the gang decides to rally the masses of Sunnydale High to defeat the Mayor once and for all.

I found this really cool skull head and it got me thinking about making the mayor when he transformed into the demon at the Sunnydale graduation. It was quite a fun piece to make but very time consuming. I used a plastic piece for the bottom of the demon and screwed that to a circular tube. I then screwed an arch piece that I had to the tube and also the top of the skull.

Here are some pictures of the parts I used for the demon.

I used so many random parts for this that I don't even recall. It was quite fun using parts that were basically useless. I then taped on cheese cloth. I didn't even want to imagine how much clay I would have to use for this so I opted to use Plaster of Paris. I used to have the stuff they use for casts (which is essentially the same thing) but I got rid of it. So I ended up cutting up strips of cheese cloth and dipping it in the plaster and then covering the parts. It was painful and messy and it took many days to complete. I am very happy with how the head turned out. I got the eye area looking very reptilian looking and the mouth area. It's quite impressive considering what I was working with and how quickly this stuff dries! For the eyes I cut a balloon (for the Prom Buffy) in half and then covered around it with cheese cloth/plaster. It has a see-through look to it and it is extremely creepy if you peer into it but I couldn't get a picture of this. Here are some in-progress photos.

Finished with the plaster of Paris, unpainted.

The demon stands about 17 inches high. I'm also a pretty detailed person and in the show the demon has these scales on the back. I originally started with scales on (as you may notice) but I decided it was not something I wanted to keep, plus it was hard to keep the pieces glued to the plaster. I also decided to add a snake-like tongue. I don't think there was a tongue in the show but I just decided to add it.

The scene that I decided to make was where the demon is getting ready to eat the principal. I wanted to make this scene since I've always wanted to make the principal and I just thought it was a cool part of the show. For the principal I used a X-Files Molder (?) body and a Nicki (?)from Heroes head. I used a screw for the neck and filled it in with clay. I was a bit worried using a female head for the old guy. Plus I had to sculpt ears which I'm still working on. I have to say I love how it turned out. There are no traces of female that I can see and the modifications I made to the head aged the head.

The base was a challenge but fun. I wanted to make the stage area (since that is where the show took place). I started off with a piece of foam board (but I should have used a thin piece of wood since I ended up screwing the demon to the base) and I mixed in some cut up cheese cloth to green paint for the grass. I added fine sand to grey paint to make the sidewalk and I had this cool brick material I used for the sidewalk. This is real to the show. Most of this is covered by the stage, however.

Here is the thing about the stage. In the show the demon does not crash through the stage. But for this huge thing to be on a tiny stage it would make sense for it to break. So I decided to make the stage look like the demon smashed through it and took the diploma table and podium with it. For the stage I used a large table (?) from maybe a Barbie thing. There are random bits of wood around the demon to make it look like it is busted stuff. I used a heat gun to melt the stage and the plastic (Iron) bars that hold up the stage. I'm not sure if you can see this in the pictures. I also had some really cool velvet paper that matches the library carpet so I covered the stage with that. I then used some plastic paper and made the decorations going around the stage. I cut up some cylinder items and put them in a box for all the diplomas.

Here is a picture of the stage.

From the show:

The demon was a digital cartoon in the show so it was very hard to try to paint it accurately. I painted the demon using greens, blacks, blues and then dry brushed with with a lighter green. It was my hope that it would pick up on the cheese cloth texture and appear to look like scales, and it did!

I also love how the principal turned out!

(Show picture of principal)

Here are the final pictures!

(Show picture of the demon)