Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Recap/S7/E06 Him

"Welcome to the Hellmouth, where even outerwear isn't safe."

The Scoobie girls fall for Dawn's classmate RJ, thanks to his magical letterman jacket.

"Buffy: You shredded my outfit.
 * All Guys Want Cheerleaders / All Men Are Perverts: RJ's friend hears about the cheerleader tryouts and asks if the girls are going to be jumping up and down a lot. And later...

Dawn: I'll buy you a new one.

Buffy: That's not the point. I don't want a new cheerleading outfit.

Xander: Now, now, let's not be hasty..."

"Willow: Damn love spell. I have tried every anti-love spell spell I could find.
 * An Axe to Grind: Buffy vs. the demon that D'Hoffryn sent to kill Anya.
 * Bare Your Midriff: Dawn, the Pushy Queen of Slut Town.
 * Blatant Lies: Anya claiming she wrote an epic poem for BJ, when actually she robbed several banks to get him money.
 * Buffy Speak: Soul-having. Rant Girl. No more with the talky.
 * Xander re Spike: "Crazy-Basement-Guy is better than Stalking-Buffy-Guy."
 * Breather Episode
 * Call Back
 * Dawn asks Buffy if she loves Spike, just as Tara did in "Dead Things". This time Buffy is able to answer the question -- no, but she does have feelings for him.
 * Dawn fears she can't compete with her cooler, more assertive, and sexually-experienced sister, just as teenaged Buffy once worried about losing Angel to girls like Cordelia or Faith.
 * Xander walking in on Buffy straddling RJ is like when he came across the Buffybot straddling Spike in "Intervention".
 * Spike turning the angel statuettes so they couldn't face him, like Drusilla bandaging the eyes of her dolls.
 * Spike moving in with Xander, and Lance living in his mother's basement and working dead-end jobs, is a call back to Xander in Season 4.
 * Willow trying to sort out a relationship problem by immediately resorting to magic.
 * Cat Fight: Dawn and another of RJ's paramours get into a hair-pulling contest outside the Bronze.
 * Chekhovs's Bazooka: The rocket launcher Buffy used to dust The Judge is used again to try and kill Wood.
 * Also the cheerleader outfit that Buffy last wore in Season One ("The Wish").
 * Coincidental Broadcast: Quickly turned off by Anya when the radio starts talking about the masked gunman who held up a number of businesses--
 * Continuity Nod
 * Buffy follows up on her insistence that Spike move out of the Sunnydale High basement, making him room with a reluctant Xander.
 * Buffy startles when Spike touches her unexpectedly; his attempted rape still leaves its scars.
 * Buffy's poor driving skills in her mother's SUV, as seen in "Band Candy".
 * Buffy insisting everyone but her is affected by the spell, as she did in "Somthing Blue".
 * Dawn brings up Buffy's taste for rough sex -- according to a deleted line on the shooting script, she found this out from Anya who would have got the information during her drinking session with Spike in "Entropy".
 * Xander identifying the effects of a love spell is due to his experiences in "Something Blue" and "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" -- the latter also showed how the spell can affect a person's sense of right and wrong, with the affected girls all trying to murder Xander as shown in the flashback.
 * Dawson Casting: Thad Luckinbill, who portrays RJ is actually TEN years older than Michelle Trachtenberg and two years older than Sarah Michelle Gellar.
 * Department of Redundancy Department

Anya: Even if you find the right one, the guy would probably just do an anti-anti-love spell spell... spell. (Willow looks confused)"

"Anya: His physical form has a penis!
 * Distracted By the Sexy: Dawn slides along the bleachers to keep RJ in sight until she falls off the end.
 * Foreshadowing: Anya discusses the feelings a gay Willow has for RJ.

Willow: I can work around that."

"Xander: Good times..."
 * Don't Sneak Up On Me Like That: After saying Spike is OK now he's got a soul, Buffy jumps a mile when he touches her unexpectedly.
 * Driven to Suicide: Dawn lies across the railway tracks, and is only saved at the last minute by her sister.
 * Eating the Eye Candy: Xander and Willow checking out Dawn, before they realise who she is.
 * Flashback Echo: To "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered".

"RJ: (after Buffy's Shut Up Kiss) You're like a teacher.
 * Funny Background Event: Buffy trying to kill Wood with a rocket launcher, and Spike stopping her, is turned into a Crowning Moment of Funny due to taking place entirely in the background while Wood remains oblivious.
 * Gender Bender: Willow's solution to RJ is to turn him into a girl, thus eliminating her competition so she can him...err, her all to herself. It's the less extreme of the bids for his attention.
 * Hot for Teacher

Buffy: Not really. (sweetly) But, I mean, does it bother you?

RJ: (smiling) Not so much."

"RJ: I think I hear what you're saying."
 * I Believe That You Believe It: Buffy trying to convince Dawn that her crush on RJ isn't real.
 * Incest Is Relative: Willow and Xander ogling a girl, who turns out to be their surrogate little sister Dawn.
 * Insane Troll Logic: Plenty of this as each love-struck Scooby tries to explain why their love is the real deal.
 * Interrupted Intimacy: Xander walks in on a half-(un)dressed Buffy in a plaid skirt, making-out cowgirl-position with RJ on a school desk.
 * Kill It With Fire: The letterman jacket is burnt.
 * Lampshaded Double Entendre: Buffy tells RJ that she's pretty much the same age as him, "but with the sexual experience and stuff."

"Xander: Dawn? What's wrong? Is this... Did that guy in the jacket--
 * Leitmotif: "Theme From A Summer Place" by Percy Faith is heard every time someone falls in love with RJ.
 * Love Makes You Crazy: At the end Dawn is moaning how stupid she acted over a love spell. Buffy tells her to prepare to feel even stupider when it's the real thing.
 * Love Potion / Love At First Sight / Kissing Under the Influence
 * Love Makes You Evil: When another jock gets RJ's position on the football team, Dawn pushes him down the stairs.
 * Manipulative Bitch: Buffy tells Dawn that RJ likes her, but thought she was coming on too strong. Buffy The Vamp then swoops in on RJ while little sis is taking it slow.
 * Mating Dance: Dawn in her very tight jeans and painted-on shirt wildly gyrating with RJ on the Bronze dance floor.
 * Meaningful Echo: When Willow and Anya fall in love with RJ too, they start mimicing the words of the Dawn/Buffy spat.
 * Mood Whiplash: Buffy is Twerp Sweating RJ when he slips into his jacket -- suddenly it's The Return of Puppy Dog Eyes!
 * Mundane Solution: Xander and Spike's 'plan' consists of them running up to RJ, ripping off his letterman jacket and fleeing with it.
 * Never Say That Again: Dawn is crying after seeing RJ making out with her sister.

Dawn: I don't even want to hear his name anymore!

Xander: I just called him "that guy in the jacket".

Dawn: That's what I used to call him in my head before I knew his real name!"

"Dawn: Last night, you said you weren't helping Spike out of pity. What is it [if not that]?
 * Non Answer

Buffy: It's a good question. (sips her drink through a straw)

Dawn: Is sitting there drinking soda some kind of a Zen non-answer?"

"Xander: I refuse to answer that on the grounds that it didn't fit."
 * Oblivious Mockery: Spike gives Lance a dirty look when he starts ragging RJ's poetry-writing.
 * Putting a Hand Over His Mouth: Xander to Willow just as she's about to complete her spell.
 * Songs of Solace: After her tryout disaster Dawn lies on her bed listening to "School Blood" by King Black Acid.
 * Split Screen
 * Suspiciously Specific Denial
 * Anya: "It was a spell. We're not responsible for anything we did morally or, you know, legally..."
 * Buffy asks Xander if he thought of trying on the jacket.

"Buffy: (to Slut!Dawn) Where do I start with the bad? First, you told me you were going to the library. Second, you do not go out on a date without informing me first. Third, Anna Nicole Smith thinks you look tacky."
 * Relative Button: Dawn trying to kill herself shocks Buffy out of the effects of the spell. Mostly.
 * Riddle for The Ages: Where did RJ's father get the magic jacket?
 * Rule of Three / The Last of These Is Not Like the Others

"Willow: "Right there with ya"."
 * Running Gag: Buffy insisting she's just slightly older than RJ.
 * Slow Motion
 * Serious Business
 * She's All Grown Up: Xander became way too aware of this when they see Dawn dancing with RJ. Willow...well let's use her words.

"Lori: I'll never let you have him, bitch. R.J. is mine. I mean it! Stay away from him!
 * Tantrum Throwing: Dawn shredding the cheerleader outfit after her disastrous tryout.
 * This Is for Emphasis Bitch

Buffy: (to Dawn) Well, at least someone agrees you shouldn't be dating this guy."

"Buffy: You've been out of the basement for half an hour, and you've already stopped talking to invisible people.
 * Verbal Backspace

Spike: Bollocks.

Buffy: OK, so there was that one episode in the car..."