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Episode 2.15: Phases | Episode 2.17: Passion
Characters:
| Buffy | Angel | Xander |
| Willow | Giles | Cordelia |
| Spike | Oz |
Overall (7/10)
Buffy:
Buffy gets to spend Valentine's Day sans Angel. She plans to spend the day with her mom, but is interrupted by an ominous warning from said vampire.
Then she goes into research mode into Angel's past to prepare herself for what may come next. Then she turns into a rat. All in all, not too much going on for her.
Angel:
Angel is making the moves on Dru and taunting Spike. This will become a regular occurrence until he gets his soul back. We find out that Angel is known for his gruesome displays of "affection". Indeed, he even attempts to abduct Buffy from her house, but settles for Xander at the end (until Dru stops him).
Xander:
What exactly is Xander's part in the crazy Cordy/Xander relationship? They still bicker. And Xander even comments to Buffy how dull it was to just spend time with her.
It seems that Xander is happy to have a girl who'll be with him. He isn't necessarily happy that it's Cordelia. But, being a guy, he'll take whatever he can get. It is nice to be liked, after all. When Cordy dumps him on V-Day, he's crushed. Not because he wants to be with her. But because he just wants to be with somebody.
Indeed, when he approaches Amy about the love spell, he doesn't want to get back together with Cordelia. He wants revenge. This is, perhaps, the reason the spell backfires.
This is a case of "be careful what you wish for". Xander just wants a girl who wants to be with him. Suddenly, every girl wants him. And Xander finds it unsatisfying because he knows that it just isn't real. In the end, he accepts Cordelia back.
However, Xander's motivations in this relationship do not bode well for the two of them. Unless Xander starts liking Cordelia as a person, it's obvious that it won't work out (and it doesn't).
To Xander's credit, he is able to resist temptation and reject Buffy's advances. That takes quite a bit of willpower.
Willow doesn't get much screentime in this episode. She's excited that she's dating Oz. Then she gets hit with the love spell and is all over Xander. We don't see her much besides that.
The most notable Giles-moment is when he, again, turns his back on Jenny for Buffy's sake. Despite his personal feelings on the matter, he's still willing to back his Slayer. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened between the two of them when Jenny confronts him in the library.
Also, we get Giles berating Xander for his frivolous use of magic. Even this early on, Giles gets angry over irresponsible magic-use. This will be echoed later, though it's almost always going to be directed towards Willow from here on out.
Cordelia actually manages to prove herself in this episode. At the beginning, she finds herself torn. On the one hand, she truly likes hanging out with Xander and wants to be with him. Unlike Xander, this is more than a case of her just wanting to be with someone. Cordelia can have pretty much any guy she wants. She wants Xander.
However, her girl groupies ostracize her for this. For Cordelia, the popular girl, this is devastating. She doesn't know what to do without her social status. So, in a panic, she calls things off with Xander, thinking that will make it better.
The couple times she sees him afterward, she seems genuinely sad and regretful. In fact, she's wearing the necklace he gave her around her neck.
One thing that puzzled me is that Cordelia seems somewhat flattered that Xander tried to put a spell on her. Obviously, she didn't know the true motivation behind the spell. She must have just been impressed that he would go to such lengths to try to get her back.
It is after this that she lashes out against her girl groupies. She decides to do what she wants, whether or not it meets with their approval. And in this case, what she wants is to date Xander. This is a very sweet and important moment for Cordelia and shows how much she has grown as a character this year.
Unfortunately, this disparity between Xander and Cordelia will only lead to the tragedy of S3. Of the two, only Cordelia is truly invested emotionally in the relationship.
Poor Spike. Go ahead and say it. Poor Spike. His girl is swiftly being taken away by Angel. And he's still stuck in a wheelchair. Things are not looking good for him.
And an interesting bit of foreshadowing here pays off in S5. I don't believe it was intentional, but Spike does make the comment that ripping Buffy's lungs out doesn't have to lack poetry. Then, rather sarcastically, he asks what rhymes with "lungs". We'll see in Fool for Love that Spike actually was a poet when he was a human, though a rather bad one who probably would not have been able to find a decent rhyme for "lungs".
Oz does his manly duty this week in punching Xander. He doesn't know exactly what happened, but he feels it necessary to do it for Willow's sake. However, once that task is accomplished, he helps Xander up and helps to find the Buffy rat. Oz is so cool.
Xander gets Amy to cast a love spell on Cordy, but, like most spells in the Buffyverse, it backfires. Wackiness ensues.
Oddly enough, there's no clear-cut baddie. Yes, the threat of Angel is lurking there. But other than that, this episode primarily deals with the effect of the love spell gone wrong.
Not an arc episode.
Okay, I very much enjoyed this episode. It's funny and does a lovely job of developing the character of Cordelia. I don't have many gripes about it, actually.
Special performance award goes to Sarah Michelle Gellar for her wonderful "bitch in heat" acting. Good job.
7 out of 10. Just plain fun.
The final scene where Cordelia tells off Harmony and goes to Xander. Big character moment played off in a funny and sweet way.
Episode 2.15: Phases | Episode 2.17: Passion
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