We open with Buffy meditating in a white room as Giles circles around her, leading her meditation with guided imagery.  Buffy shifts and goes into a seemingly effortless handstand on top of a wooden vertical block.  Giles stands still and watches, apparently stunned.  Suddenly the crystals that had been on the table in front of Buffy fall down, and Buffy falls, too.  Dawn leans into her field of vision and asks if they can go now.  In her room, Dawn writes in her journal that no one understands who she is; the real her.  The entry quickly turns to envy over Buffy, and how everyone fawns all over her just because she's the slayer.  Her voiceover continues as the Summers women all fix their individual breakfasts in the kitchen, which Dawn manages to ruin by first stealing the bowl Buffy sets out, and then using the rest of the milk.  Joyce asks Buffy to take Dawn that day to get some school supplies, which Buffy doesn't want to do because she's supposed to be doing this whole big new training thing with Giles.  Dawn's not to keen about going to hang out at the Magic shop, either, which she'd have to do first if she went with Buffy.  Joyce basically says "tough", and answers the door to admit Riley.  Dawn voiceovers that Buffy and Riley are always kissing and groping, and then leaves.  Riley asks Buffy if they're still hanging today, but she tells him she's got some training to do with Giles, and he leaves.  Cut to Giles driving Buffy and Dawn around in his brand new red sports car.  He reassures Buffy that he's sure Riley wouldn't begrudge her training, and then yells for Dawn to stop fiddling with the radio.  Dawn voiceovers again that she doesn't think "Buffy's Watcher" likes her very much; possibly because he's so old.  Giles has trouble with the automatic transmission, he's used to manual, and when Buffy kind of makes fun of him he tells her that now that he's her Watcher again, he should be afforded a modicum of respect, and that there will be less time for flights of fancy.  Just then they spot Willow and Tara, and Giles smiles, saying "Oh, they haven't seen my new car.", and pulls over.  Willow and Tara greet them and admire his new car, and Dawn voiceovers again about how Willow is the "ultimate person", and how much cooler she is than Buffy, because she's the only person Dawn knows who likes school as much as she (Dawn) does. She also comments on how Willow and Tara do witchcraft together.  She doesn't seem to know that Willow and Tara are a couple.  Everyone arrives at the Magic Box, but when they go in they discover the place a mess, and all the lights are off.  Willow trips over the magic shop owner's body, and Buffy immediately escorts Dawn outside to keep her from seeing the body.  Dawn peers in through the window, trying to see, but some crazy guy comes up and starts talking to her.  He tells her he knows who she is, and that she doesn't belong there.  Later, Tara comes out the back entrance to find Dawn sitting on the ground against the wall.  Dawn asks if the magic shop owner is dead, and Tara confirms it.  Then they thumb wrestle.  Inside, Giles thinks it was more than one vampire who attacked the owner, and Buffy remarks that someone's put together a new "fang club".  Willow reports that some stuff is missing, including some books on slayer mythology. Giles realizes that whoever's leading this pack of vampires must be interested in learning more about Buffy.  He then takes an interest in the shop's profit margins and starts looking around, eyeing it from a prospective business standpoint.  Giles finds a case smashed in and  notes that something is missing.  Willow looks at a book and says it was a little ceramic unicorn.  Giles wonders what kind of vampire would steal a worthless piece of statuery.  Cut to Harmony, in a lair, giving a pep talk to her new bunch of minions.  She thanks her newest fledgling for picking her up the ceramic unicorn.  One of the "minions" wants to know when they're going to "do it", and Harmony says they're going to kill the slayer that night.  Back at casa de Summers, Joyce is pissed because Buffy A) didn't get the school supplies, B) took Dawn to a murder scene, and C) is now trying to unload Dawn off on her so that she and Riley can go patrol.  Buffy says she'll find a babysitter, then, and Dawn yells from her room that she doesn't need a babysitter.  Joyce asks who she could possibly get on such short notice, and Buffy comes up with Xander.  Suddenly, Dawn's okay with the idea.  Crush, anyone?  ;) Dawn voiceovers about how great Xander is, and how he treats everyone like an equal, as he shows up at the front door with pizza.  Dawn's all happy until Anya comes in, too, loaded down with board games.  Cut to Willow and Tara's place, where Tara says it must be hard for Dawn, being an outsider; not really part of the scooby gang.  Willow realizes she's speaking from first hand experience, and reassures her that they're both part of the group.  She says Tara's "one of the good guys", and Tara looks kinda guilty for  a moment.  Tara says she still worries about Dawn, and Willow says not to, because she's got big sister Buffy happily looking after her.  Cut to Buffy and Riley patrolling, and Buffy's going on and on about Dawn, and ranting about the double standard her mom holds her to.  Riley says she seems tense, and that she's on Dawn's case a lot.  Buffy says she knows that things have "always been this way", because Dawn's the baby.  But lately it's just been really getting to her.  We the viewers realize that the "always been this way" is some kind of false memory, and the "lately getting on my nerves" is Buffy's slayer-sense realizing that something's changed, but it's all very sub-text.  Riley says Dawn just follows her around because Buffy's her idol.  Buffy doesn't think Dawn looks up to her that way, and expresses jealousy that Dawn's the one who gets protected, and doesn't have to deal with this whole "chosen one" destiny, yet still acts like being a regular kid is the biggest responsibility in the world.  Back at the Summers house, Dawn's complaining about Buffy in a similar fashion, saying she's the one who gets all the attention.  She and Xander and Anya are all playing "Life", until a rock comes crashing through the window with a note tied around it, which says "Slayer, come out and die."  Outside, Harmony and her little gang of minions wait not-so-patiently.  Xander opens the front door and tells Harmony that Buffy's not there.  Harmony's annoyed, and Xander has fun laughing at her and her "minions" for a little while, until they get into a name-calling contest.  Dawn stupidly shouts "Oh yeah, why don't you come inside and say that?" to her, and Harmony's got her invitation.  She tackles Xander, and Dawn screams; running upstairs.  The rest of the gang tries to get in, but can't.  Anya runs around looking for a stake, but, not finding one, grabs a lamp to hit Harmony over the head with.  Harmony sees her coming, however, and knocks Anya up against the wall.  Using the distraction, Xander kicks Harmony outside, bowling over all her minions in the process.  Xander locks the door, remarking that Buffy is not going to be happy about this.  Cut to Buffy laughing in the kitchen at hearing about how Harmony has minions.  Her laughter quickly fades, however, when Anya blurts out that she can now come into Buffy's house whenever she wants to.  Buffy realizes that Dawn must have invited her, as only the people living in a house can do the invite.  She takes off to go confront her.  In the cemetery, Harmony whines that her first plan didn't work out.  They come across Spike, who's planning to thrash them all for fun until he sees Harmony.  He says it's been a long time, and Harmony tells him she's been growing as a person, and doesn't need him anymore.  She says she's going to kill the slayer, and Spike mocks her.  Harmony's all, you just wait, and when Spike leaves she rounds up her minions to use the idea Spike spouted in jest to kill the slayer.  Up in Buffy's room, Buffy gathers up all her weapons to go kill Harmony, still all agitated that Dawn invited her into their house.  Xander says not to sweat it; that he called Willow already, who can come over and do the reverse-entry spell, since she's still got all the stuff left over from when she did it on Dracula last week.  Buffy says that's not the point.  That the number one rule has always been not to invite blood-sucking killers into the house.  Xander points out that Joyce just invited Dracula in the week before, but Buffy says that was different; she hadn't known he was a vampire.  Xander defends Dawn some more, saying she's just a kid, but Buffy says she's sick of hearing that argument.  Dawn listens outside the room, and gets upset.  She runs downstairs and past Anya to the back porch.  Anya runs out and tries to get her to come back inside, but then Harmony's minions show up and knock Anya out, and kidnap Harmony.  Xander, Riley and Buffy come downstairs and find Anya lying on the floor.  She mumbles that Dawn got taken by vampires, and Buffy leaves Riley and Xander there to get Anya to a hospital, as she takes off after Dawn.  Back at the lair, Dawn's chained to a wall, and Harmony goes over the plan again.  The minions want to eat Dawn now, but Harmony tells them they can't, because they need her for bait.    In the crypt, Spike's trying to get a decent reception on his television when Buffy barges in and beats him up a little, wanting to know where Harmony's lair is.  He tells her, and she punches him one more time before walking out without a backward glance.  In the lair, Harmony complains to Dawn that none of them (her minions) listen to her.  She says they treat her like  she doesn't even matter, and Dawn empathizes.  Just then her minions come in and have decided they don't like her plan.  They're going to eat Dawn, and kill Harmony.  Just then Buffy shows up and starts fighting, and Harmony escapes.  She kills all the vamps, staking the last one with a big wooden unicorn horn.  She then tells Dawn (as she frees her from the chains) that she's gonna be in so much trouble when they get home.  Dawn says Buffy will be in more trouble, for having slain in front of her.  Buffy reminds her of the part where she got kidnapped after running out of the house in the middle of the night, and where she invited a vampire into their home, etc.  Back home, Joyce returns only moments after Buffy and Dawn enter the house.  She asks how everything went, and Buffy doesn't say anything about what really happened.  Dawn voiceovers the next day as she writes in her journal at the magic box that Buffy probably would have gotten in more trouble than her anyway, but that it was cool of her not to say anything to Joyce.  Over by the register, Giles unpacks boxes and Buffy asks him if he's sure he wants to be the next magic shop owner, remarking that they have the life expectancy of a Spinal Tap drummer.  Giles is all, yeah yeah, but he's looking forward to being the new owner of the Magic Box.  Dawn continues to journal that Buffy really hasn't changed, though; she still thinks Dawn is her "dumb little sister".  "Boy," she writes, "Is she in for a surprise." FLAWS:                    I point out for the record, yet again, that Spike shouldn't have electricity in his crypt.  He even said as much when he moved out of Xander's basement in season 4.  I suppose there could be a reasonable explanation, but it kinda bugs me that they never gave us one.  The magic shop is a set we've seen quite a bit of, over the past few years, ("Passion" and "Lover's Walk", for instance) and we all know the basic floor plan.  Yet when they go into it in this episode, it's suddenly a lot bigger than it ever was before.  I know that they basically re-did it so that Giles could take over the shop, and the gang could all have a place to meet, etc.  But it still annoys me.  And they can't even say "Ooh, it's just a different shop", or something, because it's in the same location, and they even talk about how the shop's owners don't last long in Sunnydale.  It's the same shop.  They just went and changed the set on us and hoped we wouldn't notice. And I won't even go into how unrealistic it is for Willow to have discovered specifically what was missing from the magic shop by looking at the inventory list.  How would she know what was missing unless she spot-checked every single item in the store?  THOUGHTS ON THE EPISODE:             Eh.  Mostly filler and set up.  The only real point of the episode was to introduce the character Dawn, who is Buffy's "little sister" that until last week, never existed.  At this point we don't have any idea where she came from, what she's doing there, or even if she knows she's not really what she appears to be, though her final thought would seem to indicate that she does.  We also learn that Buffy's still interested in learning more about her slayer heritage, and that Giles has taken over the Magic Box.  BEST LINE: Buffy:  "Giles, are you breaking up with your car?" Giles:  "Well it did seduce me.  All red and sporty." Buffy:  "Two door tramp." and: Buffy:  "Wow, you've really thought this all out.  How bored were you last year?" Giles:  "I watched Passions with Spike.  Let us never speak of it."

"The Real Me"