Directed by James A Contner
Written by Rebecca Kirshner & Drew Z Greenberg
Rona and Violet walk alone in the cemetery until Spike knocks Rona out of the way, grabs Vi and leans in for the kill. Buffy and the other Potential Slayers watch and learn from this example and Buffy lectures the girls on how to deal with vampire attacks. Buffy has Spike attack her to continue, but she easily gets the upper hand and pins Spike to the ground. When she worries she hurt him, the girls notice some intimacy between them.
Back in the Summers' basement, the Potentials argue about petty things until Buffy gets their attention focused again with a strict reminder about the seriousness of death. They believe the First Evil is taking a brief break from them, but it will come back stronger and better than before. While Dawn watches silently from the stairs, Buffy tries to give the girls another pep talk.
At work, Buffy talks with Xander on the phone until a student, Amanda, comes in for counseling. The girl asks about liking a boy who picks on her and seeks Buffy's advice, but Buffy gets a bit distracted with her own similar situation with Spike and rambles about how she's not going to let that problem happen again. Buffy returns home to bickering among the Potentials and news from Willow that another Potential has been found, already in Sunnydale. The Potentials examine weapons and Dawn tries to fit into the group's conversation, but it's a struggle. Spike arrives and then leaves with Buffy and the other girls for some training. Andrew pouts because he's not invited and although silent, Dawn feels left out as well.
Willow prepares the ingredients for a spell that will locate the Potential Slayer and surround her with a glowing aura. The spell is performed at the fireplace, but at first it doesn't succeed, just creates a horrible smell. Dawn tries to open a door to air out the room, but the light follows her, knocking her into the door and surrounding her. Dawn starts to freak out at the news that she's the latest Potential. She's worried that her becoming a Slayer would mean her sister would have to die first. Dawn doesn't want to tell Buffy what's going on and goes upstairs to think alone while the rest of the gang debate the pros and cons of the situation and telling Buffy. Dawn overhears the conversation and feeling the weight of their concerns and her potential fate of death, she sneaks out the window.
Buffy and Spike take the girls to a demon bar to explain the art of getting information out of the demonic patrons there. They run into Clem and, after a brief happy exchange with him, Buffy asks him to scare the overly confident Potentials. His face expands into a mass of snakelike limbs and such, making the girls scream and Spike laugh.
While walking alone outside, Dawn runs into Amanda who has a scratch on her head and claims to have been attacked by a vampire. The girl explains that she managed to get away and lock the vampire in one of the classrooms. Having heard rumors about Buffy, Amanda was going to ask for her help, but Dawn volunteers to take care of the problem. They break back into the school, but when they reach the classroom, they find the door unlocked and don't see the vampire hiding wedged against the ceiling. The vampire falls as the girls try to leave and it chases them out into the halls until they reach locked doors. Trapped, Dawn turns to a fire extinguisher and when she can't get it to work, she knocks the vampire around with it instead then bolts with Amanda.
Buffy and Spike show the girls a crypt and teach them about the living quarters of vampires. While investigating the area, the girls find a dead body, but Buffy shows them that it's a vampire. At the school, Dawn and Amanda hide in a classroom and push a set of drawers against the door while Dawn tries to come up with an escape plan. Buffy tosses the vampire around while lecturing the girls about successful fighting and keeping a straight head during battle. Meanwhile, Dawn puts Buffy's lessons to use and acts resourcefully until the vampire pins her to the ground and goes in for the bite. The Bringers then suddenly break in through the windows and grab Amanda instead of Dawn. After beating up the vampire a bit, Buffy drops her stake on the floor and, along with Spike, leaves the girls trapped alone with the vampire. Back at the house, Willow, Xander, and Anya find that Dawn has bolted and Willow rushes to do a spell to find her before it's too late.
Dawn uses the room's chemistry supplies to set the Bringers on fire and escape with Amanda. She realizes that Amanda is the true Potential Slayer and willingly hands over the right and her weapon to Amanda. The frightened teen has a hard time grasping these strange realities Dawn explains, but she doesn't have much time to think about it. Xander arrives at the school with Buffy and Spike as the Bringers attack full force. Amanda keeps the Bringers at bay and stakes the vampire that attacked her earlier while Buffy and Spike finish off the Bringers. As Amanda rambles to Buffy about the strangeness she's dealing with, Dawn reveals that Amanda was standing outside the front door when she was hit by the aura cloud from Willow's spell.
Amanda and the other Potentials talk and bond about their successes with fighting the forces of darkness while Dawn secretly watches from the other room. Buffy checks in with Dawn, but she doesn't pick up on Dawn's real problem. While Buffy takes the other girls down to the basement for training, Amanda and Dawn trading a friendly smile, Xander catches on to Dawn's disappointment about not being a Potential. Xander confides in her how hard it is for him to be the normal member of the gang and he relates to Dawn's place. He tells her he's been fighting along side super powered people for years with no powers of his own, and that he saw her giving her power to Amanda and working hard today. Kissing her on the forehead, Xander tells Dawn she's not special, she's extraordinary. In return, Dawn suggests that he does have a power, his ability to notice things. He leaves, and Dawn resumes her work.
Tropes featured
- Analogy Backfire: Anya shows her usual Brutal Honesty.Dawn: Everything's different for me now.Anya: That's because you're a part of something larger. Like being swallowed. By something larger.[Dawn flees upstairs]Xander: Nice job with the "getting swallowed" analogy.Anya: Well, it is a mixed bag, you know. If she gets to be the Slayer, then her life is short and brutal. And if she doesn't, then it smells of unfulfilled potential. My swallowed analogy looks pretty sweet right now, doesn't it?
- ...And That Would Be Wrong:Kennedy: You don't drink?Buffy: Sure I do... I mean, no. That would be wrong.
- Bad Guy Bar: Willy's. As Vi says, it's a demon bar. It's like a gay bar. But with demons.
- Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work / Big Damn Heroes: The Bringers crash through the window in time to interrupt Dawn's oncoming death at the fangs of a vampire. Then the Scoobies turn up in time to stop Dawn and Amanda being killed by both parties.
- Bad News in a Good Way:Anya: One moment you're this klutzy teenager with fake memories and a history of kleptomania. Then suddenly you're a hero. A hero with a much abbreviated lifespan.
- Bait-and-Switch: Done as an episode-long Red Herring—Willow's glowy spell shoots towards Dawn, but was actually heading through her to Amanda, who was standing outside the door having come to see Buffy.
- Battle Discretion Shot: The Potentials fighting the vampire.
- Belligerent Sexual Tension: Amanda asks Counselor!Buffy if it's weird to be attracted to a boy you're always fighting with.Buffy: Well, it depends. Sometimes that's how people relate. Being mean to each other. Even mortal enemies... (increasingly emphatic) Then with the-- And that leads to no good, absolutely no good. And much confusion. A-and then it's over. Absolutely, seriously, definitely over. And that's confusing too. The over part. Which it is. Over! (catches herself, calms a bit) So, maybe.
- Black Dude Dies First:Spike: OK, these two [Potentials] are dead. Why?
Rona: 'Cause the black chick always gets it first? - Buffy Speak: Firsty Circus. Womany Power.
- Call-Back: Locking someone without superpowers in a room with a vampire sounds a lot like the Cruciamentum Test.
- Casual Danger Dialogue: Buffy lecturing the Potentials while fighting a vampire.
- Cat Scare: The window slamming down after Dawn and Amanda climb through it.
- Ceiling Cling: Dawn and Amanda open the door to the classroom to find it empty; the vampire has apparently escaped. Cue Reveal Shot showing the vampire is holding itself between a couple of air ducts, waiting to ambush them when they walk in.
- Chekhov's Lecture: Buffy's lecture to the Potentials on how to fight a vampire is intercut with Dawn doing the same things Buffy is talking about.
- Continuity Nod:
- "Death is what a Slayer dreams about when she sleeps." Buffy has had Prophetic Dreams of apocalyptic events.
- Andrew: "Killing pigs is just so wrong. And also hard."
- Buffy notes that not all vampires live in dank crypts, as seen in Season 2, as well as "Buffy vs. Dracula" and Angel.
- Buffy being regarded as a schizophrenic by the students, no doubt due to dissonant behaviour like intimidating students, then having sex with them on tables.
- Deadly Dodging: Buffy tells Spike to charge at her, stepping aside (with her back to him) and letting him crash into a tombstone.
- Distinction Without a Difference:Amanda: Do people ever think you're weird?Buffy: Well, I guess, sure, in a charming, endearing, lovable... yes.
- The Evils of Free Will: Andrew whines because Buffy won't let him join in with the training. "Spike's killed more people than I have, and he gets to come along." Buffy points out that Andrew committed his murder of his own free will.Andrew: (sulkily) I hate my free will.
- Fake Action Prologue: The Potentials being stalked by Spike in The Teaser.
- Faux Symbolism: In-Universe:Andrew: It's like...well, it's almost like this metaphor for womanhood, isn't it? The sort of flowering that happens when a girl realizes that she's part of a fertile heritage stretching back to Eve, and—Xander: (covers his face with his hands) I'll pay you to talk about Star Wars again.
- Foreshadowing:
- Dawn says to Xander "seeing" may be his super power. This will appear again in "Dirty Girls", when Caleb will note that Xander was "the one who sees everything."
- Giles is in Shanghai getting a new Potential — this turns out to be Chao-Ahn, who appears in "First Date".
- Hero with Bad Publicity: After being attacked by a vampire, Amanda goes to see Buffy.Dawn: You know something about my sister?Amanda: Well, I've heard people talking. A lot of 'em think she's some kind of high-functioning schizophrenic. But I also heard that maybe...like, maybe she could help with this kind of thing.
- I Just Want to Be Special: Dawn. To her credit when she realises she's not, she helps the person who is.
- I Need a Freaking Drink: When Buffy is showing the Potentials the demon bar, Clem plays a particularly frightening joke on them, causing Vi to say, "I could use a shot of that yak urine right about now."
- Idiot Ball: Going to take on a vampire because you think you're a Potential is one thing, but Dawn doesn't even have a stake!
- Improv Fu: Dawn uses a fire extinguisher, flasks of acid, a gas burner, and a flagpole to fend off the vampire.Buffy: Know your environment. Know what's around you, and know how to use it. In the hands of a Slayer, everything is a potential weapon.
- Insane Troll Logic: Amanda's idea of siccing the vampire onto the school marching band.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Anya's off-handed comment about the Buffy/Dawn blood connection (in "The Gift") never really making any sense, mirroring fan confusion on the subject.
- Malaproper: The Chaka-Khan...Turok-Han.
- Meaningful Echo: The amount of times the word 'potential' is used, outside of referring to a Potential.
- Mentor Archetype: Buffy/Spike as Watcher to the Potentials, and (less obviously) Dawn as Watcher to Amanda.
- Neck Snap: Buffy to a Bringer about to stab Amanda In the Back.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Dawn hears the Scoobies talking about her.Xander: Hey, something out there says she can handle this and a hell of a lot more. Something out there chose her.Willow: Sure, she can handle it. Is that why she's hiding out in her room right now?cue Dawn climbing out of the window.
- Nightmare Face: Mild-mannered demon Clem is capable of showing one, while we only see the back of his head, in an obvious Shout-Out to Beetlejuice.
- Nothing Is Scarier: The Potentials are introduced to the pleasant, friendly, thoroughly non-evil demon Clem, who looks like a bald human with rather too much skin. Then he shows them his other face. All we see is various bits that fly out to the sides, from the back, and the girls all screaming, very much like a scene in Beetlejuice.
- Not Helping Your Case: Buffy is talking about there's not a single demon in the Bad Guy Bar who wouldn't rip their throats out, when Clem walks up and gives Buffy a hug.Kennedy: You think she dated him too?
- Oblivious Mockery: Buffy's Rousing Speech to the Potentials doesn't make Dawn feel any better."Most people in this world have no idea why they're here or what they want to do. You do. You have a mission, a reason for being here. You're not here by chance. You're here because you are The Chosen Ones. (walks upstairs, commenting on the way) Dawn, you better hurry up and eat something so you're not late for school."
- Also her comment re vampires in front of Spike: "The animal inside, always the same."
- Off Screen Moment Of Awesome: The Potentials taking down the vampire Buffy locked in with them as training, while she was onscreen helping Dawn and Amanda at Sunnydale High.
- Perplexing Plurals: Willow assembling her ingredients for her spell."OK, I got my tumbleweed, my eggs...got my chrysalises...chrysali? My butterfly transformer pods."
- Reckless Gun Usage: Dawn enters the room where the Potentials have just received their weapons.Molly: (pointing crossbow at her) Halt!Dawn: OK, see, that's why we don't point the weapons in the kitchen.Vi: It's not loaded.Dawn: That's always the lead quote under the headline "Household Crossbow Accident Claims Teen".
- Rousing Speech: Buffy to the Potentials, Dawn to Amanda, Xander to Dawn.
- Saying Too Much: Buffy says that Spike's crypt was 'comfy'.Kennedy: Excuse me? When did you find it comfy?Buffy: Moving on... (Potentials smirk)
- Series Continuity Error: It would take Faith's death - not Buffy's - to activate the next Potential. This is one of the Headscratchers that was never disproved or anything.
- Ship Tease: Spuffy strides again!
- Shout-Out: When Clem shows the Potentials his Game Face, in the same manner that Beetlejuice showed the Maitland's when asked "Can you be scary?"
- Sink or Swim Mentor: Buffy and Spike take the Potential Slayers out for a night of instruction on vampire slaying. They watch in awe as Buffy dusts a nest of vamps, all the while passing on tips. The Potentials point out that one vampire is still undead, then turn to see Buffy and Spike walking out of the crypt and closing the doors, trapping them inside.
- Suggestive Collision: During her demonstration Buffy throws herself on top of Spike, stake poised to dust him. She then notices Spike grimacing in pain, but Spike removes her hand when she tries lifting his shirt to look at the damage — they end up Holding Hands and trying not to exchange Longing Looks.Rona: That's hot.Molly: (taking notes) So, we're, supposed to, like... make out with him or something?
- Super Window Jump: The Bringers crashing into the school lab.
- Take Up My Sword: When Dawn realises Amanda is the Potential, she hands over the sharp wooden pole she's carrying without hesitation. Xander notices and congratulates her on this afterwards.
- A Tankard of Moose Urine / I Do Not Drink Wine: The (underage) Potentials immediately beeline for the bar at Willy's, but change their minds when Buffy invites them to "Down all the yak urine shots or pig's blood spritzers you like." It's a demon bar.
- Tempting Fate / Twisted Echo Cut: Dawn and Amanda barricade themselves in the school lab.Amanda: Think we're safe?[Vampire starts to break in. Cut to Buffy lecturing the Potentials while facing off with a vampire]Buffy: No one's safe. Not here, not ever.
- Unresolved Sexual Tension: Between Buffy and Spike; obvious even to the Potentials.
- Visible Boom Mic: In the scene where Dawn talks with Xander, Anya, Andrew, and Willow about the possibility that she might be a Slayer, a boom mic is seen at the edge of the screen. More specifically, the shot of Xander and Willow after Anya says "That's because you're a part of something larger. Like being swallowed. By something larger." The mic can be seen at the middle right of the screen.
- Wasn't That Fun?: The day after, the Potentials talk excitedly about their defeat of the vampire.
- What You Are in the Dark: Xander and Dawn re the fact that they will never have special powers like Buffy or Willow.Xander: They'll never know how tough it is, Dawnie, to be the one who isn't chosen. To live so near to the spotlight and never step in it. But I know. I see more than anybody realizes, 'cause nobody's watching me. I saw you last night, I see you working here today... You're not special. You're extraordinary.
