Go Fish (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

Did You Know?

• Cordelia mistakenly refers to The Blue Lagoon, a 1980 movie starring Brooke Shields.
• Xander says of a monster attack, "This was no boating accident," a line from Jaws.
• Willow says Oreo cookies have "chocolately-goodness," an in-joke alluding to Alyson Hannigan's Oreo commercial.

Plot

At a night-time victory party for the swim team at Sunnydale State Beach, swimmer Cameron Walker approaches Buffy. Dodd McAlvy dunks Jonathan Levinson's head in water; Buffy intervenes but Jonathan rebuffs her. Gage Petronzi and Dodd go for a swim; Dodd lags behind, and a monster rises from his discarded skin and enters a storm drain. Willow, substituting for the computer class, is told by Principal Snyder to falsify Gage's failing grade because athletes deserve preferential treatment. Buffy arrives with Cameron, who makes unwelcome advances; she slams his head into the steering wheel. Snyder escorts them to the infirmary, where Coach Marin and Snyder blame Buffy's attire for Cameron's injury. Giles and the Scooby Gang investigate Dodd's death. Xander hears Cameron scream in the cafeteria and finds his skin and a gill monster. Cordelia sketches the creature. Buffy shadows Gage as the likely next target.

Themes

The episode presents negative consequences of drug use. It also continues the theme of Buffy's prospective boyfriends turning out to be monsters. Roger Pocock criticized the simplistic drugs-are-bad message. Theresa Basile addressed the problematic victim-blaming and slut-shaming in the scene where Cameron claims Buffy led him on and Coach Marin tells her to dress more appropriately. Justin Carreiro remarked that social media would have generated bad PR for the school over the incident.

Reception

Reviewers generally called the episode silly. Theresa Basile listed it among underrated episodes, noting its placement between more transformative stories. Vox ranked it at #139 out of 144 episodes, calling it dumb-but-fun. Billie Doux described it as a completely silly episode with a transparent condemnation of athletes using performance-enhancing drugs. Mike Loschiavo addressed the dated handling of drugs and sexual assault themes, while praising the season's real-life concerns, and noted the silliness of a high school coach also being a geneticist.