Campus quad: Buffys' running, running.  There's a vamp chasing her. They run past several oblivious students, into a deserted area behind a building.  The vamp's got a shorter version of Angel's hair, s1.  Buffy stakes him, and then bemoans the fact that the forces of darkness don't seem to even be trying anymore.  She wanders off, mumbling to herself, and we pan back to see Spike watching from the shadows.  He starts to go off on a little tirade about how the big-bad is back, but then he gets shot up with electricity from the same kind of taser thingy that got the vamp at the end of "The Freshman", and after he falls to the ground he's hauled away by some of those commando guys.  At the Bronze, Giles surprises the gang by joining them at their table just in time for that night's entertainment:  Veruca's band, again.  Buffy notices Willow's discomfort when Oz seems to yet again be oddly transfixed by Veruca, and tries to change the subject.  Oz answers her question relatively quickly, and goes back to watching Veruca.  Willow compliments the band, but Oz says they're not even that good.  This doesn't stop him from watching Veruca, however, and Buffy notices that Giles and Xander also seem oddly drawn to her.  The next morning, Oz wakes up to Willow talking in her sleep.  It's actually a really sweet moment between them, and Willow asks if they can do something that night before remembering that it's the first of the three nights of the full moon, and Oz will be in werewolf mode, all locked up.  Willow leaves for class, after mentioning a Wicca group that she wants to check out that night.  At the end of Psych class, Professor Walsh hands Buffy her paper back with a good grade, and wants Buffy to lead a discussion group next class.  Willow expresses jealousy over Buffy's academic achievement, and then gets excited that Buffy's doing so well.  Willow tells her that she and Oz are meeting at the café, where Buffy agrees to meet them once she gets the information she needs from the TA for the discussion group.  At the outside café, Oz sits down at the only available table, right next to Veruca.  They start talking music, until Willow arrives and joins them, after which there is an uncomfortable silence.  Willow tries to join in, but her lack of knowledge in the area is apparent, and she ends up making herself feel stupid.  Oz senses the discomfort of the arrangement, and leaves.  Veruca leaves shortly thereafter, just as Buffy walks up.  Buffy sits down and Willow tells Buffy that Oz is attracted to Veruca, and it makes her feel bad because she "doesn't want to be the kind of girl who freaks" every time her boyfriend notices someone else.  Buffy reassures her, saying that Oz just isn't the type to stray.  Willow says especially tonight, because he'll be locked in a cage.  Cut to Oz, locking himself in said cage.  Hours later, we see the werewolf jumping at the cage door repeatedly, eventually breaking it off its hinges.  Werewolf Oz escapes out into the night.  Cut to Professor Walsh walking home (?) at night, when she's startled by WereOz, who jumps out of the bushes at her.  She throws her briefcase at him and runs, only to run into another Werewolf.  The werewolves end up attacking each other, and Walsh gets away.  Night wans, and morning comes upon Oz waking up in the woods with Veruca.  They're both naked, and have scratches all over their bodies.  Oz realizes that Veruca is also a werewolf, and she says that he knew from the first moment he saw her.  She says she knows he doesn't remember "last night"; that it's like that at first.  But eventually he'll start remembering being the wolf.  Oz is obviously uncomfortable and kinda freaked, and Veruca tells him to relax, which Oz says is "not a possibility". Back in town, Oz and Veruca raid someone's laundry at the campus laundry mat.  Oz says they have to get back to his place and figure out how they got out of their cages.  Veruca reveals that she doesn't cage herself, and can't believe that Oz does.  He says he doesn't want to hurt anyone, and Veruca replies that he's just pretending that he's a regular guy.  He claims that he is, that he's only the wolf three nights a month, but Veruca says he's always the wolf, and the human skin he wears is just a disguise.  She comes on to him again, and obviously something in Oz responds to her, but he can't buy into letting himself kill people, and he backs off, going back to his place.  The next day on campus Professor Walsh recounts her experience the night before to Buffy and Riley, and Willow shows up at Oz's place in leather pants and a filmy shirt.  She apologizes for her spazziness the day before about him and Veruca, and alludes to spending some alone time with him.  She starts to kiss him, but, feeling guilty, Oz pulls back, pleading fatigue.  Willow, feeling rebuffed, leaves, and Oz feels even worse.  Buffy goes to Giles with the story about the "two wild dogs" that attacked Professor Walsh the night before, and he's overly anxious to tackle the new case.  Giles is finding himself with nothing to do, apparently.  Buffy leaves to go check with Oz. At Xander's, Willow tells Xander about how Oz and Veruca have been noticing each other, and how Oz seems to be pulling away from her (Willow).  Xander advises Willow to talk it out with Oz. Down in the masoleum, or whatever, where Oz's cage is, Oz is welding the door back on to the cage.  Buffy comes down and tells him that two werewolves were spotted together the night before, and asks Oz if he remembers anything about the other one.  Oz says no, that when he wolfs out he blanks on everything that happens afterward.  Buffy starts to leave, but senses that Oz is disturbed and asks if he's okay.  He reassures her, and she leaves.  Montage.  Veruca rehearses at the Bronze, Oz sits alone in his room thinking, Willow is distracted at her Wicca group, Oz is troubled.  Veruca sings.  Intercut between the three of them.  Then it's sunset, and Oz is down in his cage, standing at the open door when Veruca comes in, responding to Oz's phone call.  Oz tells her to come into the cage with him, but Veruca doesn't want to.  Oz says it won't be safe out there, with people hunting her.  Veruca still doesn't come in, though, until Oz pulls her inside into a rough kiss.  They wolf-out. The next morning Willow bounds into the masoleum with breakfast and coffee, which she drops upon seeing Oz and Veruca, naked, curled up together on the floor inside the cage.  They wake up and Oz pulls on his pants before opening the cage.  He says he had to lock Veruca in the cage with her because she's a wolf, like him.  Willow is crying and upset, and Oz says he didn't have a choice because Veruca would have hurt someone.  Willow says he did have a choice; he could have told someone.  Willow cries that she knew, she knew what was going on, but he lied to her and told her everything was fine.  Oz says he knows how she feels; he remembers.   Willow says this doesn't even compare to the kiss that she had with Xander.  Oz says he doesn't remember what happened with Veruca, because he blanks out when he's the wolf, but Willow confronts him with the truth that he was attracted to Veruca even before, when he was just regular Oz.  That he wanted her more than Willow.  Oz has nothing to say to that, and Willow runs out. Out on the street, Willow almost gets hit by a car when she walks out into the street without looking. Buffy sees from across the street and is running toward her, but it's actually Riley who saves her.  Buffy takes her back to the dorm room, where Willow tells Buffy what happened offscreen.  Buffy vows to go find Oz and Veruca and stop this before anyone can get hurt, and leaves after telling to put the blame where it belongs, and not hurt herself over it.  She leaves, and Willow says it again to herself.  "Put the blame where it belongs", and then goes to open her magic supplies chest.  At Oz's, Buffy enters and asks where Veruca is.  He says he doesn't know; he's been trying to find her, but he'll try finding her by tracking her scent.  He tries to explain what happened to Buffy, but she doesn't want to hear it, and they leave to go find Veruca. Cut to a lab on campus, where Willow has started performing a spell on Oz and Veruca, intercut with Buffy and Oz searching for Veruca in the woods.  Willow lights a fire in a bowl, and some objects levitate.  Buffy and Oz come across some of Veruca's clothes in the woods, where she'd left them to distract Oz.  Oz realizes that means she's after Willow, and he and Buffy turn around and run back toward campus.   Oz actually outdistances Buffy pretty quickly, and Buffy loses more time when she runs into another commando, out in the woods toting a rifle.  They knock each other onto the ground, and each one picks up his / her own weapon and takes off in different directions; both too much in a hurry to stop the other for questioning.  Back in the lab, Willow almost finishes the spell, but stops short of casting a hate spell on Oz and Veruca, and lets everything drop.  From the doorway, Veruca says she thought Willow was going to play dirty for a minute. She locks the door and advances upon Willow, noting that it's almost sundown.  She taunts Willow with what she and Oz have done, and when Willow tries to leave she knocks her down.  Just then, Oz runs into the room and tells Veruca not to touch Willow again.  Veruca dares him to stop her, and reminds him that she likes it rough.  Oz is guilt stricken, but continues to advance upon Veruca, who urges him to let go of his animal side.  To kill.  Oz says that she's right, animals kill, and then as they both wolf out he launches himself at Veruca.  They fight on the floor until Oz wins by ripping her throat out.  Fully a werewolf, now, Ozwolf turns on Willow.  But before he can get to attack her, Buffy comes in and shoots him with the tranq gun.  She then goes over to Willow, who is sobbing, and holds her. The next morning, a Giles', Buffy fills him in on the Willow / Oz situation, and also tells him about the commando she ran into in the woods.  She remembers that she saw some similarly dressed guys on Halloween.  She then expresses worry to Giles about Willow being able to get through this. At Oz's, Willow comes in to find Oz packing.  He's leaving Sunnydale to try to work through all of this.  He tells Willow that Veruca was right about the wolf being inside him all the time, and until he figures out where the line was between him and it is, he shouldn't be around her, or anyone.  So he's going away, and he doesn't know for how long.  Willow's crying, and she asks if Oz doesn't love her.  Oz says his whole life, he's never loved anything else, and he almost breaks down and cries himself as he touches her one last time and shoulders his bag, going outside. He gets in his van and stars the engine, then just sits there for a moment, looking back at his door, not wanting to leave, but ultimately he drives off, as Willow remains in his room crying.    FLAWS:                    In the lab, when Oz comes in to save Willow from Veruca, they both wolf out at the same time and then fall to the floor fighting.  The scene is shot so that one moment they're partially turned, but fully clothed.  They go into a roll, and the scene cuts quickly to them finishing the roll in full werewolf-mode.  But suddenly, they have no clothes on.  And there are no shredded (or otherwise) clothes on the floor. Also...I thought it took silver bullets to kill werewolves?  That guy Caine said as much in "Phases", season2.  So, should ripping Veruca's throat out really have killed her?  THOUGHTS ON THE EPISODE:        Oh man, this one always gets me.  Oz and Willow were like, my favourite couple after the whole B/A thing, and they were just so cute and perfect for each other that this episode was truly heart-wrenching.  Due in no small part, also, to the excellent writing  (by Marti Noxon, who also gave us the ATS episode "I Will Remember You".  I'll give her that, the girl can write angst  ;)   ), and amazing acting done by Alyson Hannigan and Seth Green.  I dare anyone with a heart to watch that final scene and not cry.  Anyways, while part of me wants to say that what Oz did was character assassination, because Oz would never have really done that, and it was just contrivance to get Seth Green off the show when he begged out of his contract, the way it was written makes it entirely plausible.  Oz was operating this whole time under the assumption (as were we) that he really was only a wolf three nights of the month.  To find out that he was wrong about that, and a lot of things, was as much a discovery to him as it was to us.  So I can accept his reasoning, and I can't really find too much fault with him.  The only thing I didn't really like about this episode (other than all the heartache) was that Oz didn't tell anyone about Veruca after that first night.  If it had been just then, I probably would have been able to forgive him (the character).  But it was that second night, willingly luring her into his cage with sex to keep HER safe, as well as the unwitting residents of Sunnydale, that made me hate him.  That was just plain wrong.  BEST LINE:    Willow:  "But Oz, don't you love me?" Oz:  "My whole life.. ... ..I've never loved anything else."  * sob *

"Wild at Heart"