Good episode. Not among the best this far, but neither among the worst. Although it’s possibly the worst of the episodes directly connected to the seaon arc, but that may only be because it was so… partial. I began as a continuation of a previous episode, and ended like the beginning of another, kinda.

Not a particularly fun episode. Certainly, there were some amusing comments, but nothing of the stuff Whedon et al. are capable of at their best. Neither were there any particular character moments, although it was somewhat neat when Willow bullied Andrew after running into him at the butcher’s shop. Dawn kicking evil minion ass, even if it only was for a time, was also well worth seeing.

Principal Wood also had a couple of scenes, where he did some thing that made me curious about his alignment. His actions made me lean heavily towards him being a baddie, although I’m still open for alternative interpretations on this one. In the grey zone, this episode also included some decent Spike vs. Buffy scenes. Especially the one where he came through the wall was entertaining.

Now, this episode was too scary for me to watch more Buffy tonight (I scare pretty easily), but it’ll be fun to find out the following in the next episodes:
- What will be the consequences of what happened to the Watchers?
- What will the Scoobies be able to do with Buffy’s little epiphany (neat word; I watched the Scrubs episode with the “epiphany toilet” just the other day) near the end?
- What’ll happen to Spike?
- What’ll that Übervamp be up to?
- And what in the Ninth Circle of Hell has happened to Giles? Because I refuse to accept that cliffhanger scene as a final confirmation of his fate…

Nice, little cogwheel… :P