#you know at least one of Buffy's friends would be weirdly invested in their relationship

[inconsistentlywrittensoul]

Halloween:

"This Whole Episode Smacks Of Gender" I holler as I smash Janus' statue on the ground and turn Buffy back into an actual character

Xander's plotline seems to recognise the problem with his masculine insecurities, but resolves itself by satisfying those insecurities rather than overcoming them. Luckily, this is a problem that will never appear again in the series.

Willow dying and becoming a ghost really feels like it should be forshadowing for something later in the series. Like, if she died at some point, we'd look back at this episode and be like 'Ah, the seeds were being planted even back then.' But nope - it forshadows nothing, she's just a sexy ghost for the episode.

I have to interpret Giles' face when he hears the costume shop is Ethan's as less "Oh, fuck" and more "Oh, for fuck's sake." Like, he legitimately can't believe he's still dealing with this asshole.

Also, he really didn't need to beat Ethan up to find out how to end the curse. I mean, "smash the statue"? You always have to smash the statue! Or the staff, or maybe the orb. He really could have worked it out on his own - I think he just wanted to give Ethan a bit of a kicking.

I'm a little mixed on the Ripper retcon. It comes out of nowhere, 'this man of tweed was actually a cool badass with a mysterious past' feels like a cheap way to add darkness to the character, and Giles' more interesting moments of darkness always come more from his position as a Watcher than in conflict with it. However, the show never leans too hard on the whole 'Ripper' thing, so rather than overtaking his character it just adds texture to it, something that is very needed as we move out of Season 1 and characters are growing depth beyond their initial archetypes. So I do think it's a good thing, but I'm glad it isn't taken further and ultimately remains a fairly minor part of the character.

Buffy. you're really just going to let Spike just run away? Not even gonna try to chase after him? I know he's a recurring character who can't die here, but you need to at least pretend that you don't know that. Still, I do think it's interesting that Spike already seems to be defined by his willingness to just hit the bricks the moment things aren't going his way. As much as he's supposed to be the current Big Bad, he's already being presented as a bit pathetic - he can be dangerous, sure, but in a pragmatic, human way, rather that a terrifying intimidating force that Big Bads tend to represent.

Finally, Angel seduces Buffy by calling other women 'simpering morons', and insisting that she's Not Like them. It's not great from a feminist perspecive, but looking at it from a character perspective this really feels like Liam coming out - and that makes sense! He's spent most of his ensouled unlife avoiding people, not really growing as a person or learning how to be better. He's only started being a person again since he came to Sunnydale, and he's not good at it - so he falls back on old habits, as Liam or even as Angelus, especially when he's trying not to seem like the awkward, barely functional weirdo he actually is inside. I'm think I'm enjoying his character a lot more on this rewatch now I see through his cool badass loner exterior to the dear little rat boy underneath.

(It is weird how invested Willow is in their relationship though - it's like Xander is with Riley. And I'm pretty sure she's barely spent any time with him. Buffy's friends are just really weird about her love life.)