Interesting lady. Can I kill her?

She said:

Oooh, Buffy and Angel, together again. Yay! Yay? Also boo, because it made Giles mad and sad. You see in this episode how the Watchers function like parents to the Slayers; as much as the Slayers bitch about their Watchers’ meddling ways, it still hurts when they meet their Watchers disapproval or rejection. Poor Faith has to play the little-girl-lost trope once again, when Mrs. Post is revealed to be not just uptight, but evil as well. That’s OK, Faith. You get better outfits.

He said:

Even television as compelling as Buffy is sometimes left with its gears showing, and this episode, penned by story editor Doug Petrie has all the signs of being a piece of connective tissue, not least the fact that since the audience is clued into Angel’s return, “Revelations” is a little shy of being all that revelatory. Artfully played by celebrity sibling and Bond Girl Serena Scott Thomas, the world may not have been enough for Mrs. Gwendolyn Post late of the Watcher’s Council, but one episode was plenty to manipulate Faith to the dark side. That, plus Angel’s return to official “good guy” status, some Xander-Willow and Angel-Buffy kissy-face and all, disappointingly, has been revealed.

Teenagers. It’s a sobering mirror to look into, huh?

He said:

This episode is the writing debut of one of my favorites of the Buffy stable of behind-the-scenes talent, Jane Espenson. Espenson is probably, following Whedon, Greenwalt, and Noxon, one of the central organizing team for the show, and arguably one of its most prolific creative forces, writing, supervising, and producing many of its key canonical episodes. It doesn’t hurt that Espenson’s first foray into the Buffyverse is also an Ethan Rayne story, who I freaking love as a villainous foil to the Scooby Gang.

If Whedon’s self-written episodes tease the larger canonical story, Greenwalt’s play with the shadow universe of demon lineages, curses, and all things making up bang-on good vs. evil action adventure horror stories, and Noxon keeps us firmly ensconced in the trials and tribulations of an extraordinary high school girl, Espenson’s angle is her highlighting the adults that inhabit the Buffyverse, and she’s already at it in this story, twisting a Mayor/Trick/Rayne plot involving cursed candy, the adult population of Sunnydale regressing to teenage-dom, and a hungry reptilian demon with a jones for newborns. Espenson and director Michael Lange get amazing and off-the-wall performances from Anthony Stewart Head and Kristine Sutherland, who, as the two people yoked with responsibility for Buffy’s double-life, do a little bit more than bond when those reins are loosened. Also notable is Armin Shimerman’s turn, subtly letting the audience on to Principal Snyder’s unsuspecting complicity in some of the Mayor’s nefarious plans while taking the comedic lead in a particularly zany episode.

She said:

One of my favorite episodes. Probably a little because it evokes very specific memories of fundraiser candy sales (and the associated thrill of being allowing to eat Skittles in English class), but more so because it’s so awesome to see Giles and Joyce play rebellious teenagers. Aren’t they just the cutest, especially when listening to music, and the choice of Kahlua as illicit beverage just kind of telegraphs the whole teenagery aspect. Though you can’t help but feel badly for the discombobulated kids, who are kind of grossed-out and dismayed by the whole thing. 

You’ve awakened the prom queen within.

She said:

For whom was taking a limo to homecoming or prom ever a good idea? Seriously, I’m wondering. I know that I count former homecoming court members and even queens (um, of homecoming) among my adult friends, so I don’t want to be too disparaging, but the whole limo thing was always weird to me. I think that’s what this episode is trying to underscore. The limo only leads to mayhem. 

Excited to finally see the Mayor, though. 

He said:

The season really starts cooking with this Greenwalt-penned episode, which deftly parallels a 4-way race for Homecoming Queen with a consortium of supernatural “hunters” (including the return of the surviving vampiric Gorch brother) engaged in “Slayerfest ‘98,” a Mr. Trick-sponsored safari with Faith and Buffy as the ultimate in blood trophies (cribbed a bit from Richard Connell’s 1927 short story “The Most Dangerous Game,” and also the totally-worth-watching 1932 Hollywood film version). The glacial introduction of the Mayor as the season’s Big Bad pays off well, with Harry Groener creating some magical moments of scene stealing from his first moments of screen time as one of the most memorable of Buffy villains. The episode also showcases what Buffy - at its best - is best at: pretzel-like plot twists, lots of “interpersonal dynamics” between the main characters (including Scott and Buffy’s breakup, and, of course, “the kiss”) and keeping the horror/occult related stuff at a campy and ironic remove. In short, it’s high school - with a body count - and it’s a hell of a lot of fun to watch. 

Great. Now I’m gonna be stuck with serious thoughts all day.

He said:                                                                                   

After the revelation of Angel’s return last episode, we need this not-horrible-but-not-that-memorable episode to kind of bridge the gap between the end of one story arc and the beginning of another. Another Noxon script blends the first sustained look at Oz’s difficulties adjusting to lycanthropy with literary and pop-culture references (here Jack London’s Call of the Wild from 1903 and Robert Louis Stevenson’s 1886 novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde run headlong into elements nicked from Sam Raimi films and comic book characters, including The Incredible Hulk and the contemporaneous Batman villain, Bane) with a thoughtful meditation on teen dating violence, taking on an important topic without losing sight of its audience demography or lapsing into preachy ponderousness. We then, of course, get the promised Buffy-Angel reunion. It’s workmanlike episodes like these, neither the series’ high points or low, that really stand up to multiple viewings.

She said:

Well, a timely werewolf episode for Halloween! And I’m writing this in between trick-or-treaters, so this won’t be long.

I appreciate what the writers are trying to do here, but I would disagree with John that this was a “thoughtful” treatment of teen dating violence. It was fairly rote, in my view, which I suppose is necessary if you’re going to have to share the plot with Buffy and Angel and still get wrapped up in under an hour. Still, the whole “all guys are beasts, all girls are potential victims” is a little tired. Yawn.

But that’s OK, I like this episode for the Oz factor. And he’s high on likability, even when he’s suspected of murder. Gets all the best lines this episode.

And I’m glad that the school psychologist wasn’t a total loser.

Isn’t it crazy how slaying just always makes you hungry and horny?

She said:

God, don’t you just hate girls like Faith? I was probably just a little too teenaged still, when I first watched this series, to feel anything but animosity and distrust toward her, and the poor-little-Slayer-girl twists to make her appear more vulnerable never did anything to disabuse me of these notions. Now, with the benefit of many, many years of accumulated wisdom and cynicism, I can spot her shtick a bit sooner, but I still want to wipe that stupid tribal tattoo off her upper arm. 

Though I’m glad to see Buffy and Joyce back on hilarious terms. Joyce is getting much quicker on the uptake in figuring out that Buffy died already, and her deadpan “Oh, I hate your life,” is my favorite moment in this episode.

He said:

With its third episode, this season maintains forward momentum, and also the feeling of being overstuffed. While I usually find this annoying, as in the last episode, writer David Greenwalt makes the “everything-but-the-kitchen-sink” style of plot development more palatable by making the divergent elements canonical, if sometimes subtly so. This is probably best evinced through the three titular character introductions.

The first is, of course, the new Slayer, Faith Lehane, played literally to perfection with equal parts moxie and vampishness by the awesomely talented fellow Tumblrite Eliza Dushku. As an audience, we’re given probably the most time to settle in with Faith, as scenes with both Joyce (a little nonplussed at learning of her daughter’s death, natch) and Cordy (yes, Cordy) give us the necessary background for how Faith got her Slayage on. Plus, multiple set pieces involving the prickly rivalry emerging between the respective Chosen Ones, the fate of Faith’s Watcher, and a few choice references to Barbet Schroeder’s 1992 psychological thriller Single White Female give us the shape of things to come.

The second, in the form of dreamy Scott Hope, serves as a conduit to get Buffy to make a stab at “getting over” Angel. In perhaps the most clever bit of writing in the episode, only after Buffy comes to terms with the fact that she consigned a re-souled Angel to Hell, we, as an audience, get to see that it is Giles, in fact, who saw the need for Buffy to “move on” (a thematic touchstone in this season) and created the ruse of needing details for a spell to lure Buffy into confronting it herself. An interesting question raised by the Giles-Buffy-Willow interaction was whether or not anyone else knew that the ill-fated Miss Calendar’s spell worked. Giles must have surmised it some time ago, but since Willow repeatedly considered it a magical failure, it was news to her, and thus, as a magical success, pushes her more in the direction of becoming a witch. Buffy’s admission gives her the strength to “do girly stuff” and approach Scott for a date. Unbeknownst to her, it also comes at a time when Angel is magically returned to the earthly plane from Hell, the hows and whys of which will take an entire spin-off series to adequately address and explain. So, brace yourself for a love triangle!

Finally, there’s the mysterious Mr. Trick. Played almost exclusively for laughs in this episode and looking, for all intents and purposes, like a filler character, he is surprisingly the glue that holds much of the Faith story arc - and, thus, this season - together. Without looking too far ahead past this episode, the obvious link is made between Trick and the circumstances that led to Faith’s status as a “troubled” Slayer, and some hints are dropped that connect Trick with the “something serious” on the horizon that Giles occasionally mentions, providing probably the most drawn-out soft introduction to a Big Bad ever in the series. 

Look. I’m sorry that your honey was a demon, but most girls don’t hop a Greyhound over boy troubles.

He said:

The second episode of the season suffers from something of an identity crisis, or, perhaps, after the austerity of season opener ‘Anne,’ simply a case of trying to do too much. But that’s not to say that it does it poorly. Written by the esteemable Marti Noxon, the episode continues addressing the unintended consequenses of Buffy’s absence from Sunnydale. Unusually for the genre, in which the heroine’s return would be both needed and duly celebrated, Noxon and director James Whitmore, Jr. brilliantly underscore that Buffy is not quite a superhero, but a teenager, and, as the world of a teenager is not made up of perfectly-timed comic book rescues, but one in which absence is often read as abandonment, returns are resented, if they are even acknowledged at all. This awkwardness is made plain in the opening dialogue between Buffy and Joyce, which has some wonderful moments. Will you be slaying? Joyce tentatively asks, which immediately reminded me of my own mother asking in her you’re-an-adult-now-we-can-have-an-adult-conversation-even-though-I-don’t-want-to-because-I’m-your-mother-and-all-I-can-do-is-picture-you-in-diapers voice “Will there be drinking?” as my high-school self got ready to go out, and Buffy is seen to almost shrivel. As Xander and Willow both explain later in the episode, Buffy’s choice to leave did not protect them at all, but rather left them even more vulnerable, while also forcing them into “moving on” without her. In the end, of course, Buffy gets welcomed back, but each character must come to terms with the glimpses they have had of both a world with Buffy and without her, a theme with which successive seasons will continue to wrestle.

Lest Buffy become as overwrought as an episode of Donahue, this character study gets a healthy dose of zombies added on as a counterpoint companion storyline (get it? Buffy comes back, the dead come back!) With liberal borrowings from W.W. Jacob’s classic tale of horror “The Monkey’s Paw,” Stephen King’s 1983 novel Pet Semetary (or its 1989 film adaptation) and George A. Romero’s iconic zombie films, specifically 1968’s Night of the Living Dead, as well as a timely mention of Jacquelyn Mitchard’s The Deep End of the Ocean. A sad omission from the soundtrack is the Oingo Boingo song that gives the episode its name. Overall, the story is passable but ultimately less compelling than its source material, although even a far superior horror narrative would be crowded out by the pathos of Buffy’s mordant packing and unpacking of both her emotions and her waitress uniforms. In the end, both narratives suffer for being grafted on to one another.

She said:

Poor Buffy is a little bit depressed at the beginning of this episode, and you know this because she’s wearing the most unflattering pants you could imagine. Or this might just be an instance of 90s fashion that ages poorly, I don’t know. 

I actually find the interactions between Buffy and Joyce to be far more implausible than usual - typically I love how well these interactions capture mom-teen daughter dynamics, but this is a tough one to negotiate and still keep the narrative moving forward. Because there’s no way a real Joyce-mom would be that cool with a runaway kid coming home and resuming a relatively unsupervised high-risk lifestyle. Also implausible, yet satisfying, is the airing of grievances among Buffy and the other Scoobys. It’s kind of the conversations you wish you could have had with your best friends in high school when they let you down or grew more distant, but you don’t have the emotional wherewithal to talk like that until you’re an adult, or have an adult scriptwriter. 

All of this heavy emotion, and yet the scenes with the principal steal the show. He was so deliciously evil before Sue Sylvester was even a twinkle in Jane Lynch’s eye.

I don’t want any trouble. I just want to be alone and quiet in a room with a chair and a fireplace and a tea cozy. I don’t even know what a tea cozy is, but I want one.

We said:

This season opener does twice the work, setting up both an unusually meditative “where’s Buffy” plot along with glances at the trials and tribulations of the Scoobies trying to maintain the slayage in a Buffy-less Sunnydale. Though usually played for laughs and pretty thin on substance (save for a juicy dramatic face-off between a emotionally bereft Joyce and Giles, who, true-to-form, is constantly researching/looking in vain for Buffy) the start of the school year is a good counterpoint to Buffy’s somber self-imposed L.A. exile under her middle name - Anne - working as a waitress and mourning the loss of Angel by fantasizing of an impossible future life together.

Cutting back and forth between L.A. and Sunnydale also gives the ensemble something to do in what otherwise would have been an episode in which Buffy is the focal point of literally every scene. A particularly Whedon-esque casting curveball is thrown in the form of Lily, who we’ve seen before as the vampire groupie Chanterelle, played with doe-eyed perfection by Julia Lee. While Lily inadvertently sets in motion the homeless youth-as-victims-of-ambiguous-demon-plan that culminates in Buffy’s return to Sunnydale, its lack of depth would be otherwise unsatisfying if it weren’t revisited in the second season of Angel. Suffice it to say that, much like Joyce in the final scene, we’re less concerned with how Buffy got her groove back and more willing to silently welcome her with open arms.

It never stops. Do you think I chose to be like this? Do you have any idea how lonely it is? How dangerous? I would love to be upstairs watching TV or gossiping about boys or, god, even studying! But I have to save the world. Again.

She said:

Oh dear. This is what happens when I wait too long after watching an episode to write about it. The main thing I remember is Spike being adorable, awkwardly waiting with the mom in the suburban living room for Buffy to be ready to go out. 

And a poignant guest appearance by Ms Calendar, so sad and yet so creepy. Though the saddest is saved for last, of course, when the costs of saving the world (“a lot,” as it were) start to mount. Hella bummer episode, but with lots of badassery thrown in for good measure.

He said:

Continuing from my previous post, Whedon’s hallmark as a writer is, I believe, in the details, and making those details matter. In the climactic episode of Season 2, it is precisely those details that Whedon deploys like so many genre-shattering, game-changing smart bombs. The first, and most obvious, is Buffy’s apprehension, escape, eluding, and re-capture by the Sunnydale police that forces her to reveal her secret life to her mother. Joyce, so blinded by her concern for Buffy and her desire for familial normalcy that she literally does not want to see what’s right in front of her (in this case, a staked vamp’s dust explosion). Buffy, who, out of her own desire for that same sense of normalcy, or protectiveness, or, as in later seasons, possible other reasons, expects Joyce to readily understand, as every member of the Scoobies has up to that point. The results of this are, obviously, devastating and lead to one of the most surprising (and brilliant) downer endings.

In many respects the actual storyline (i.e., demon statue thing, Angelus, etc.) parallels the Buffy-Joyce conflict, with Buffy recognizing the sacrifices that must arise from trying to balance love with fate, and being “normal” with being the Slayer and the final confrontation of the episode mirrors that of the mother-daughter argument and Joyce’s “blindness,” with Angel being unable to remember his tenure as soulless Angelus and Buffy, with resignation, forced into choosing a relationship-ending action. A parallel that might not be immediately evident is that both of these conflicts are based, ultimately, on falsehoods. The first (Joyce-Buffy) conflict hinges on Joyce’s exclamation that the Slayage “stop,” to which Buffy responds with the quote above about how being the Slayer “never stops.” But, if anything, much of the action in this episode would indicate that it has stopped - Buffy is no longer the Slayer and hasn’t been for a while. With Kendra dead, Buffy should surely remember that another Slayer will soon be “activated.” In fact, in another great detail-oriented twist, Spike, roiling with the Dru-fueled jealously teased for several episodes, joins forces with Buffy mainly because, as he explains: 1.) Vamps don’t usually go for the whole “let’s destroy the world” stuff, since it compromises their food source, and, 2.) However, Angelus is just crazy enough to go through with it.

The second falsehood, is, ostensibly, Xander’s lie to Buffy about Willow’s warning, neglecting to tell Buffy that the spell to re-soul Angel was back in play, instead telling Buffy to simply “kick his ass.” Although Buffy is (supposedly) ignorant of both the spell and Angel’s blood as the “key” that unlocks/locks the big swirly demon vortex, she quickly dispenses with Angel and saves the day, with Spike and Dru high-tailing it out of Sunnydale and upholding Spike’s part of the bargain. This begs the question as to why Buffy would continue the Slayage in the first place and sets the stage for her leaving Sunnydale. But also, when compounded with Xander’s misleading omission, and Buffy’s consigning a re-souled Angel to Hell, “Becoming” seems to leave a much more interesting detail until some future season to be uncovered.

My friends, we’re about to make history…end.

He said:

One of Joss Whedon’s many talents as writer and director, as seen in this two-part finale to Season Two, is the ability to weave several disparate, nuanced moments together to form an immensely satisfying whole. Whedon’s storytelling appears effortless, unforced, and completely captures the imagination of the viewer. Re-watching Buffy, what’s frustrating about this is that the conclusion is often so good it makes you wonder why you had to wait a third of a season to get here. That one moment of gritted teeth aside, the first part of “Becoming” proves to be well worth the wait, with its glimpses into the historical origins of Angelus and Dru, the emotional high point of the argument in the library, and, alas, the sad fate of Kendra, the Vampire Slayer. But, perhaps my favorite moment is the cliff hanger that closes this part of the finale - with all the talk of demons and supernatural vortexes dragging the whole of humanity into Hell, the one question that Whedon seems to anticipate would be on the minds of viewers nearly two seasons into the show is finally explored: where are all the police in Sunnydale while this crazy vampire/demon/magic stuff is going on? It’s a nice, grounding moment for two reasons: the first being that it sets up neatly resolvable “real-life” conflict (in the midst of all the mythos) to be dealt with in Part Two, and the second, perhaps most important, is that the scene continues the slow-burn introduction of the Mayor and the supernaturally-influenced corruption at the heart of all the important authority figures (Principal Snyder, the cops) in Sunnydale. It’s a move so lacking in over-the-top-ness, one can’t help but be impressed.  

She said:

Here we go, finally, with the action. Next time I watch Buffy from the beginning, I’m going to skip all the human-fish episodes and just go straight to these.

I’m kind of surprised that John didn’t take this opportunity to enthuse about the appearance of Max Perlich as the demon/meddler, one of my favorite characters from one of our other favorite shows, Homicide: Life on the Street. He’s playing to type here as a wise-cracking, fast-talking, hat-wearing wacko, but that’s always welcome in my book. 

Poor Kendra. You know when you see her show up that she can only be back for a brief time, but it’s nice to see her and Buffy have a few tender moments (Mr. Pointy!) before her demise. 

I think we better find the rest of the swim team and lock them up before they get in touch with their inner halibut.

She said:

The less said about this episode the better. I enjoyed the trip to the beach though, even if it did involve employing the trope of “sad girl sits alone, staring wistfully while the party goes on behind her” - which is always a little more annoying when it happens in real life.

He said:

Well, it was bound to happen. If Season 2 has a low point, we have arrived. And, in fact, this episode is a likely candidate for one of the worst of the series. But, if I can meekly defend it for a second, it’s not crappy for its source material (1954’s pulp-tastic Creature from the Black Lagoon) or the lameness of the acting (as the episode is actually pretty well-stocked in the guest star department, but ends up making little or no use of both Shane West and Wentworth Miller as studly swimmers). The humor, irony, and knowing self-deprecation are also all here in spades, and the Scoobies seem to be loving some scenery-chewing one-liners and the skewering of everything from The Blue Lagoon to the pop hits of Lionel Richie. Where the episode fails is, strangely, in trying to do too much. The oddly Cold War-inspired genetic manipulation exposition, Xander’s infiltration of the swim team, and the heavy-handed implication of the Principal, the Swim Coach, and the kindly School Nurse in the conspiracy (to do what exactly…have a winning swim team? Really? All this for the swim team?) just obliterates the modicum of credulity required by the Buffyverse and sends the episode careening off the deep end into a confusing and messy void faster than you can scream for a lifeguard.

I’m dead as hell, and I’m not gonna take it anymore.

He said:

This is one of the early Buffy stand-alone stories that remains stuck in my memory, notably for the writing of Marti Noxon, who takes what could have been a hackneyed narrative (considering that the episode leans heavily, in both plot and special effects, on films like Ghost, Poltergeist, and Kenneth Branagh’s excellent Dead Again) and transforms it into a unique meditation on lost love and jealousy, without hammering home the parallels to Giles’ grief over Miss Calender and the Spike-Angelus-Dru angle too hard. While the subtlety should be praised, this being a Noxon-penned script, the cultural references abound, with everything from The Exorcist to The Merchant of Venice getting the Scooby treatment. The dramatic acting is particularly good in this episode, and, again, it’s a credit to the script for keeping it genuine and reining in the urge to go over-the-top. The only criticism I have, and a rare one to make for the Buffyverse, is with the music. The version of the song that gives the episode its title most likely to have been popular in 1955 would have been Peggy Lee’s 1950 version, or, possibly, the Al Jolson version from 1946, though that would make for a pretty musically erudite high school student. The version heard in the episode, a hit for the Flamingos, was not released until 1959, making this a significant misstep in an otherwise wonderful episode.

She said:

So, it’s like Ghost, but with Angel and Buffy making out instead of Demi and Whoopi, and to me, that is preferable. Actually a clever way to bring Buffy and Angel back together again and remind us of their chemistry, without having to come up with a “real” reason why they’d meet up. And I guess this aired around the time of the the whole Mary Kay Letourneau scandal, so it was topical, too. Anyway, I’m eager to see what Spike is up to, now that he’s returning to fighting form.

Boy, there’s a demon for everything.

She said:

Finally, an answer to the question, “What happens when Buffy gets sick?” I’ll be honest, I didn’t really watch this episode all that closely once she got to the hospital - too many things with a high likelihood to freak me out and keep me awake at night, such as the lovely picture my kind-hearted blog-mate has chosen to illustrate this entry. Suffice to say, if creepy things in the middle of the night scare you too, you can skip this one and not miss out on overarching plot lines.

He said:

I remember this as both a solid stand-alone story and as genuinely creepy, not without some obvious overtones of A Nightmare on Elm Street, but also sufficiently steeped in enough vaguely folklore-ish stuff to be authentic in its depiction of der Kindestod and its terrifying impact on the children. Kudos to the by-now-regular team of Batali and des Hotel for providing interesting twists and turns that downplay the Freddy-ness in lieu of the pretty novel idea of the monster as a metaphor for illness and death and keeping the majority of the action constrained to the hospital, (which, for me, provides a extra sense of creepiness as I’m not a fan of hospitals), while still involving the whole cast. This being Buffy, of course, this episode plants some small but not insignificant seeds for later in the series, and teases a Joyce-Giles relationship with pathos and subtlety.

If you ask me, I find myself preferring the old Buffy-whipped Angelus.

He said:

Me, too, Spike, but where the previous episode was Buffy at its brightest, it doesn’t get any darker than this, as we glimpse the flawed, futile, and, ultimately, fatalfinal plans of Jenny Calender and Angel’s descent into malevolence. The writing in this episode is as solid, albeit brooding, as Buffy has ever been. The return performance by writer Ty King (from “Some Assembly Required”, also dark and brooding, natch) is a welcome one, and marked by great performances by Gellar, Stewart Head, Boreanaz, and Robia LaMorte as the ill-fated computer science teacher. As tight and gripping as the narrative is, there are some blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moments of levity, including an appearance from Jonathan in the Library and a discourse on the relative safety of Cordelia’s car in case of vampire attack. Also of note is the great range of music in this episode, from Puccini’s La Bohème to “Never An Easy Way,” from Morcheeba’s brilliant debut album, Who Can You Trust?

She said:

I’ve been kind of mentally bracing myself for this story because I knew it was coming and wasn’t sure when. It’s a shame that Ms. Calendar had to wear such an unfortunate outfit in her last episode, but her chase scene is easily the scariest thus far in the show. Like, really scary and brutal. This whole episode really marks a turn to the dark and twisted, from Angel’s stalking to the rift between Giles and Buffy that develops when she prevents him from avenging Jenny’s death (or more likely, getting himself killed in the process).

I seem to be having a slight case of nudity here.

She said:

I freaking love this episode. Here is a story to remind you of what it was to be an over-hormonal, under-appreciated teenager. John protests that I can’t empathize with Xander’s nerdiness, that no one is as dorky as they remember themselves being in high school, but then I reminded him that I was in band and drama and mock trial. So. This episode ends up in just total mayhem, people running every which way. Buffy is a rat, Joyce is horny, the lunch lady is horny, Ms. Calendar gets to draw on some of her “Diamonds and Pearls” sexiness, then Angel and Dru show up. Still, here we have an opportunity for Willow to wear one of those terrible stretchy choker necklaces from the late 90s and turn on the sex appeal AND later exclaim, “I’d rather see you dead than end up with that bitch!” While wielding an ax, naturally. And yet, all’s well that ends quickly and conveniently with a well-timed spell.

He said:

In what will prove to be a string of expository meditations on secondary characters (both self-contained and connected to the larger story arc) that will last until the close of Season 2, Amy (wonderfully played by Elizabeth Anne Allen) returns to the Buffy fold in a delightfully goofy send up of both the occult teen films that, as today, were booming (see 1996’s The Craft for a sample) and a twist on typical rom-com fodder, a trope dating back to well before Shakespeare, though both A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo and Juliet are certainly touchstones here. Also great to see Mercedes McNab’s Harmony return as an also-ran for Cordelia-esque mean girlishness who finds herself unexpectedly promoted in the wake of the Xander-Cordy coupling. Standout scenes involve an ax-wielding Willow, a rolling-pin wielding lunch lady, and the look on Angel’s face as he tries to figure out just what the hell is going on. Priceless. Marti Noxon deserves a lot of credit for keeping the writing smart, funny, and, unlike much of Buffy’s contemporaneous programming, relevant to the characters and the setting.