Guest Starring: 
     
 DB Woodside: 
 (Robin Wood) 
   
 Thad Luckinbill: 
 (RJ) 
   
 Bradon Keener: 
 (Lance) 
   
 
 
  6. Him.  
   
  Dawn, then Buffy, Willow and Anya fall under the spell of a high school stud.  
   
  Great quotes:  
   
 
RJ; high school stud.
  • Dawn asks Buffy if her and Spike are back together: "No! A thousand gallons of no." she responds.
  • Anya: "Willow's not very good with the practical strategising, except when she's evil."
  • Dawn is jealous of Buffy: "You're older and hotter and have sex that's rough and kill people." She really has a strange perspective on her sister doesn't she?
  • Anya: "His 'physical presence' has a penis." Willow: "I can work around it!"
  • Dawn: "I feel so stupid, all over a spell." Buffy: "Be prepared to feel even worse when there's no spell."
  
  Fantastic moments:  
   
 
  • The pre-credit sequence - in which Dawn bemoans the obviously stupidly of love and crushes before falling head-over-heels for a boy she has never talked to - is a great opening.
  • Buffy, Xander and Willow spot a barely-clothed Dawn in the Bronze gyrating with RJ. Of course they don't realise it's Dawn until long after Xander and Willow have both perved over her. Buffy then collars Dawn asking her if her outfit is "... made out of paint?" She then tells her younger sister that "Anna-Nicole Smith thinks you look tacky." and asks her "So, d'ya have plans for later on or are you just gonna go down to the docks and wait for the fleet to come in?" A hugely telegraphed scene, but still hilarious.
  • Xander and Spike end the spell by unceremoniously stealing the magical jacket off of RJ's back. A suitably naff and hammy way to end the episode.
  
  Duff Bits:  
   
 
  • There isn't a huge amount of explanation as to why or how RJ and his fore-fathers have possession of a mystical jacket that attracts the attention of all women. But then in an episode this cheesy it isn't really needed is it?
  
  Dean's comments:  
   
 
The Scoobies look on as Dawn gyrates in the Bronze.
BtVS goes back to its roots with a wonderfully cheesy and unashamedly goofy episode that actually makes a very interesting point about love. Despite the fact that Dawn is under a spell, it isn't clear that this is what is going on even after Buffy falls head-over-heels for RJ. Perhaps because love is so mis-understood that we struggle to tell the difference between it, a crush and something supernatural. No-one does fantasy metaphor better than BtVS. But enough with the meaning of love and relationships, this episode is all about the cheese. From the 70s cop drama parody to the ludicrousness of Buffy's 'coming on' to RJ ("I'm basically the same age as you... but with the sexual experience and stuff."), from Willow and Anya's conversations about who would do the most for RJ to the endless use of the classic tune "Theme from a summer place", 'Him' is just so silly that it's difficult to make any complaints.
Dawn - falling under RJ's spell.
With all the self-important seriousness of the 'end of the world' arc in season 7, it's refreshing to have an episode that's about simple people and their unimportant problems that seem like the end of the world. Plus the episode gives all the Scoobies something interesting to do, characters like Anya and Dawn will be somewhat ostracised from the dialogue over the second half of season 7.		 
   
 8/10 
 
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