Overall Rating: 8.25 Matt: 8.5 Eric: 8.0 Written and Directed by: Joss Whedon Cast : Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers, Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris, Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg, Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase, Seth Green as Oz, Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles. Main guest stars : Kristine Sutherland as Joyce Summers, Eliza Dushku as Faith, Robia La Morte as Jenny Calendar, Saverio Guerra as Willy the Snitch, Shane Barach as Daniel, Cornelia Hayes O¹Herlihy as Margaret. Original broadcast date : December 15, 1998 In 1843 Dublin, Angelus kills Daniel, a young man who apparently owes him money. In 1998, Angel wakes up sweating from the memory. Unable to sleep, he wanders out in the streets of Sunnydale, where he encounters Buffy. As he exchanges a few uneasy words with her, he sees Daniel¹s ghost and freaks out. Buffy, also a bit freaked, tells her friends about her encounter the next day. Which of course leads to Xander, Willow and Buffy discussing their dismal Christmas plans ­ since they are now all single. Only Willow gets a Christmas ­ or Hannukah present: Oz shows up and tells Willow he wants them to get back together. Buffy and her mom are shopping for a Christmas tree in a lot, when Buffy spots a whole patch of dead trees, which she finds a bit strange. But she doesn¹t get the chance to investigate, since Joyce calls her back to reality by conferring upon her the uneasy task of inviting Faith to Christmas dinner. When Buffy suggests that Giles also join them, Joyce quickly rejects that idea. As quickly, in fact, as Faith rejects Buffy¹s invitation. Unable to deal with the multiplying nightmares, Angel goes to Giles for help. Giles understandably grabs a crossbow before inviting him in, and listens ­ quite coldly ­ to Angel as the vampire tells him about the nightmares and asks him how to find out why he came back from Hell. Suddenly, Jenny Calendar¹s ghost appears behind Giles ­ who doesn¹t see her ­ and an abjectly terrified Angel runs off. Back at the mansion, Angel has a dream about Margaret, a servant girl he killed in 1839. But in the dream, as he finishes off his victim, he sees Buffy standing there, stunned. He jerks awake, pantingŠ at the same moment Buffy¹s eyes shoot open, in her bedroom. Baffled by the fact that her and Angel are sharing dreams, Buffy goes to see Giles, who acknowledges that Angel came to see him the previous night. As they begin planning research, Xander shows up and nobly offers to help. At the mansion, Angel is tormented by the ghosts of his victims: Jenny, Daniel, Margaret, then Jenny again. She rejects his apologies, telling him that he¹s evil, that evil and cruelty are his destiny. Almost mad with pain, Angel begs for Jenny to stop, and she comforts him, telling him to rest. Angel falls asleep and starts dreaming againŠ at the same time that Buffy, at the library, also falls asleep. Both of them share a dream where they¹re making love; then Buffy sees behind them a creature with no eyes, just before Angel goes vampire face and bites her. Angel wakes up, terrified, but Jenny tells him this is what he needs to do to find peace, that he was brought back so he could make love to her, lose his soul and kill her. At the library, Buffy also wakes up and learns from Giles that the force driving Angel insane is the First Evil, a powerful and invincible entity. The only shot Buffy has at making Angel¹s torment stop is to kill the First¹s three priests, the eyeless creatures. Buffy and Xander learn from Willie the Snitch that the First may be underground. It¹s Christmas Eve and Willow has a big night planned for her and Oz. She has the cute red dress, the Al Greene music, the romantic atmosphereŠ She wants to show Oz that he comes first, in all the meanings of the word. But Oz explains to her that he¹s not ready to go that far yet, and they just kiss. At home, Buffy and her mom are preparing for a quiet Christmas Eve when Faith shows up, shyly bearing gifts. Buffy goes upstairs to her room to get Faith¹s gift, but finds Angel. Tormented to the edge of insanity, Angel is fighting Jenny¹s spirit, still exhorting him to kill Buffy. Crying for Jenny to leave him alone, he jumps out the window and runs off. Asking Faith to keep her mom company, Buffy goes to see Giles again. After some research, they discover that wherever the priest hide, nothing can grow above or below. Buffy remembers the patch of dead trees, goes back to the lot, digs a hole and jumps into the ground. She butchers the priests, then encounters the First, still in Jenny¹s likeness. The First tells Buffy that it is invincible and omnipresent; then it reveals that Angel, unable to kill her, has decided to commit suicide instead. Buffy finds him atop of a hill, awaiting the sunrise that will burn him to death. She tries to get him to go back inside, but he believes that he¹s evil and has to die. They yell at each other, fight, then have a tearful scene where they tell each other how much they love one another. As Buffy, growing desperate, tries a last-ditch speech to get him inside, snowflakes begin to fallŠ The two fall silent. At Willow¹s house, her and Oz and marvel at the snow falling; so do Faith and Joyce, on the front porch on the Summers home; Giles watches the snowfall from his apartment window, and Xander, sleeping outside in his backyard, wakes up to see the snow falling on his faceŠ Downtown, in the early hours, Angel and Buffy walk silently in the snow, hand in hand, as a TV weatherman announces Sunnydale residents shouldn¹t expect to see the sun at all on this Christmas dayŠ Summary by OttsFiveByFive.