Buffy The Vampire Slayer, “Phases" Review (2x15)

Brief Synopsis: “Buffy and the gang track down a suspected werewolf roaming in the woods while trying to stay out of the way of a bloodthirsty hunter who is after the same beast. Meanwhile, Willow worries when Oz doesn’t appear enthusiastic to take their relationship to the next level.”


"Innocence" (2x14) quick link here                                                       "Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered" (2x16) quick link here


Two quick notes before we get started...

1)    I will be reviewing the episodes in bullet point form. This is because it makes the reviews simple to read, and helps break up the text.
2)    If you are watching the show for the first time along with these reviews, please be warned that there may be a few spoilers for things that haven’t happened yet.

With that being said, let’s get started, shall we?



• This episode revolves around the newest of the Scooby Gang members, Oz, finding out that he is a werewolf. After Oz was introduced earlier in the season, I was wondering how they were going to integrate Oz into the show other than “Willow’s boyfriend”. This episode delivers that. By the end of this episode, Oz is a fully fledged Scooby, he’s officially in a relationship with Willow, and he has a tie to the supernatural world. It’s not an easy feat to accomplish all of this in one episode.
• I like “Phases”, however, it never really stands out to me as more than average. I think the problem is that it sits between “Surprise”, “Innocence”, “Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered” and “Passion”, all of which are amazing.
• Catherine Madison statue throw-back! I like that. It’s a nice little piece of continuity, and a cool shout-out to the fans who’ve been watching since the inception of the show.
• The opening scene between Willow and Oz is so incredibly cute and awkward. It reminds me of Buffy’s explanation about her and Riley in season four...“I get nervous and I start babbling, and he starts babbling, and it’s a babblefest.” Willow and Oz do have very good chemistry. Perhaps it’s because Alyson and Seth are good friends and have been working together since they were little kids.
• Willow: “1-800-I’m-Dating-A-Skanky-Ho.”

Cordy should have used that as her number on the Angel Investigations business cards a few years later. It’s so rare to see Willow that bitchy...I like it.

• Oz: “Don’t worry. I mean, they might not look it, but bunnies can really take care of themselves.”

Another reason why Anya hates them, I’m sure. Any character that makes Willow smile instantly gets my seal of approval...unless they’re Kennedy.

• Giles’ enthusiasm about researching werewolves is also a plus for this episode.
• The theme of this episode is clearly sexism and misogynistic men. The vast majority of this is explored through Larry and Cain. Larry starts off the episode being your typical douchebag jock. He’s rude to Teresa, he’s constantly trying to act ‘manly’ around his friendship group, and he’s over-sexualising almost everything for the first half of this episode. Good on Buffy for launching him into the air after he grabbed her ass. I do get a lot of satisfaction from watching Buffy pummel misogynistic men. However, in Larry’s case, he’s doing all this to try to mask the fact that he’s gay. There’s a reason why Larry is acting the way he is. It’s still not an excuse for him being such an ass, but there is at least an explanation for his behaviour. The funny thing is, guys actually do act like this to cover that they’re gay or insecure about their masculinity. We see it time and time again with Xander during the high school years. Xander isn’t gay (although Joss was entertaining this thought, before ultimately making Willow a lesbian instead), but he clearly has insecurities about his masculinity whilst at high school.
• The highlight of the episode for me is Giles’ hilarious laughing at Xander’s moon-pie joke. It warmed my heart so much! It’s so out of character for Giles to giggle like a school girl at something. Especially something that (let’s face it) isn’t even that funny.
• I adore Jack Conley a great deal, but Cain is an ass. He’s so dislikeable for a character that is only around for half of one episode. Jack later returns to the Buffyverse to play Sahjhan on Angel, who is a much more important character.

• “and you...you’re a girl”. UGH. Here’s what’s at the top of the list of things that Shangel hates: Homophobia, racism, sexism, stereotypes, and liars. Why would the fact that Buffy’s a girl have ANYTHING TO DO WITH HER ABILITY TO HUNT A WEREWOLF? I have to listen to sexist, racist, homophobic people surrounding me on a daily basis, and I’ve been in more arguments than I can count over these issues (the most recent of which being a 4-hour argument over gay marriage being legal in England now). I’ve been to protests to support gay rights, three of my closest male friends are gay, and two of my closest female friends are lesbians. What difference does it make if someone is attracted to someone of the same gender? What difference does it make if someone is male or female? What difference does it make if someone is Muslim or Christian? Luckily, I’ve never met a single Buffyverse fan who is any of those things. All Buffyverse fans seem to be very open-minded. Plus, Joss’ shows are all about making your own family and being who you are, so I think it would be hard to be a fan of Joss Whedon’s work and be closed-minded.
• Speaking of sexism, it works both ways. Buffy’s “In other words, your typical male” has always annoyed me too. I understand that Buffy’s been having a very rough time and is definitely anti-male after Angel lost his soul, but you can’t say that all males have no conscience and are all aggressive just because one or two are. The sad thing is, this isn’t the only time that this happens in the Buffyverse. Angel season three’s “Billy” is all about how every male has a deep-rooted misogynistic streak in them. What a load of crap that is! “Billy” is fantastic, but the message behind it is pure garbage. In the same vein, what is the ultimate message of this episode? That all men have beast in them (as Faith says next season)? That every male goes through a ‘phase’ of being aggressive and sexualising women? I think that’s a big part as to why I can’t rate this episode higher than ‘average’. The theme seems to contradict itself.
• Do my eyes deceive me or are Willow and Cordy bonding? When did this happen? Willow hated Cordy one episode previously. However, it’s so nice to see these two characters getting on for once. This might be the first bonding scene that they’ve had in the show thus far. I get a great deal of joy from watching them sat at The Bronze complaining about men.
• The werewolf costume officially joins Machida from “Reptile Boy” as the worst costumes on “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”. It’s so unconvincing! Seriously, how did this get approved? It looks so friendly! Is Oz trying to kill them or nuzzle them to death?

• Giles calling Cain a “pillock” is oddly accurate English slang. I’ve always loved the fact that the Buffy writers went out of their way to be so on-point with their English slang. It probably didn’t hurt having Anthony Head on the payroll. I was waiting for Spike to call someone a “bellend”.
• I was genuinely surprised by the reveal that Oz was the werewolf. There seemed to be no hints that it could be Oz at all except his flippant comment about his cousin biting his finger. Oz’s life is changed forever - ruined, you could say – due to his little cousin biting him. That strikes me as highly amusing...it probably shouldn’t. Oz isn’t really a member of the Scoobies at this point. He’s just an acquaintance. So it makes sense that he wouldn’t tell them he’s the werewolf; he’s worried about how they would react to that news. However, Oz not confiding in Willow makes Willow feel like Oz is no longer interested in her. She’s confused. Can’t one of the Scoobies ever date a regular human? At this point, Buffy has dated a vampire, Willow has dated a werewolf, and Xander is dating a Cordelia...I’m not sure if she counts as human at this point.
• After the reveal that Oz was the werewolf, I was counting down the minutes until he was killed off. I don’t know if it was because I was in such a nervous place after “Innocence”, but I was totally expecting Cain to kill Oz in front of Willow in this episode. It’s not like it would have been out of character for Joss to do something like that.
• I like Oz’s “New York City Yoga” t-shirt.
• Whoops. Xander, you just let slip that you remember everything from “The Pack”...and yet nobody calls Xander out on his actions in that episode! I know he wasn’t in control of his actions, but it was made apparent that everything he said was a heightened version of what he was feeling.

• After all my ranting earlier about the anti-men aspect of this episode, Larry coming out as gay to Xander was very well done. The reveal didn’t feel forced. It didn’t feel like it was just a way to twist the story. It was in character with how Larry had been acting during this episode. He was trying too hard to act manly and to act like the alpha male. Interestingly, this scene could potentially have been very foreshadowing to Xander being gay. By this point Joss knew that he was going to turn Xander gay or Willow lesbian, but he hadn’t decided which yet, so he experimented with a few scenes in seasons two and three before deciding (vampire Willow’s mannerisms in “Doppelgangland” were an example of this).
• This episode suffered from a lack of Angelus. I feel like the story did need to be broken up after the emotionally dramatic “Surprise” and “Innocence”, but the problem was that I found myself more interested in the Teresa-Angelus-Buffy aspect of this episode, rather than Oz and the ‘curious case of the misogynistic assholes’. Angelus turned Teresa into a vampire for no other reason than to mess with Buffy’s head. What a bastard...I love him! Angelus’ mind games are one of the strongest points of this incredible season.
• Willow’s ranting at Oz was fantastic. Anytime Willow rants is memorable (like ranting at Giles and Angel in “Reptile Boy”).
• Willow hit werewolf Oz WITH A BIN! Can we take a second to laugh at the fact that a powerful werewolf was just levelled by a bin-wielding Willow?
• Buffy bending Cain’s gun was cool. Who’s “just a girl” now, eh Cain?
• The ending scene between Willow and Oz is much like the opening one: cute and awkward. Now it’s for very different reasons though. They’re an official couple. Oz becoming a werewolf wasn’t just a plot device to keep him around (although that was certainly a big part of it). It served the purpose of bringing Willow and Oz closer together.
• Overall, like I said above, this episode falls a little bit flat for me. There’s nothing wrong with the episode, it’s just...underwhelming. With the exception of “Bad Eggs”, we’re coming off of a string of fantastic episodes, which makes “Phases” seem a tad mediocre in comparison to them.


Quote Of The Episode

Willow: “Well, I like you. You're nice and you're funny....and you don't smoke. Yeah, okay, werewolf, but that's not all the time. I mean, three days out of the month I'm not much fun to be around either.”

Oz: “You are quite the human.”

Willow: “So, I'd still if you'd still.”

Oz: “I'd still. I'd very still.”

Willow: “Okay. No biting, though.”

Oz:  “Agreed.”



That’s three episodes in a row where a Willow-Oz conversation has stolen the “Quote Of The Episode”. I think it’s safe to say, at this point in time, Willow and Oz are a highlight of “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”. The show is in such a dark place, and having Willow and Oz together brings some much needed light to Sunnydale. For a long time, this is Willow and Oz’s most important episode for their relationship.


FINAL SCORE: 4/10

So what are your thoughts on "Phases"? Did you enjoy this episode? Dislike it? Let me know all your thoughts in the comments section below!

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