I can evoke a specific image in your mind with four words: “Guys wearing nail polish.” Somehow, I doubt that you’re picturing a bearded, chainsaw-wielding lumberjack right now. Nail polish itself is genderless paint, but in today’s America’s construction of gender (unlike in 3200 BC Babylon), only women have free reign to sport it. Thus, male polish (the same pigmented lacquer that women wear, only on a dude’s nails instead) signals a firm rejection of masculine norms. In the cult-classic show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Oz the werewolf and Spike the vampire each represent this dismissal of masculine norms by donning nail polish, but the similarities begin and end with their supernatural nature and colorful sense of style. While all men wearing nail polish in some way are alike in that they cross constructed gender lines, a staggering amount of diversity exists within this group.

Male polish stands for how Oz and Spike seek to escape their subhuman (or superhuman?) nature. They each possess an unwanted, vicious dark side that represents hegemonic masculinity in its purest form. For Oz, the distinction is quite literal. Every day and most nights, he’s your everyday fleshy human (and a kind-hearted one at that), but the full moon turns him into a primal, predatory, eat-everything-in-sight-and-then-some beast. For Spike, the picture is a tad blurry. In spurts, he lives up to his “William the Bloody” moniker as his vampire instincts drive him blindly towards fresh blood. Yet in other moments he displays a penchant for romance unlike any other vampire we see in Sunnydale, exhibiting decidedly human desires that override his natural bloodlust. In fact, he originally earned his nickname for his “bloody awful” poetry, not his murderous tendencies.

Most importantly, neither of them are too happy about this scary other half of them. Oz chains himself up every full moon to prevent himself from going on a killing spree, and he eventually leaves Sunnydale for good, fearing accidentally hurting his beloved Willow. Likewise, Spike begins to hate himself for the evil deeds he commits. His attempted rape of Buffy is the last straw, prompting him to endure brutal trials to win back his soul and restore himself to who he was before the vamp instincts took over. Unfortunately for both characters, as long as they possess those primitive impulses to hunt, they can never truly be free.

The way these characters wrestle with the the darkness inside them reflects how men must reconcile masculine expectations with who they want to be. Oz and Spike’s dangerous sides represent the cold facades that guys are supposed to cultivate. Real men don’t cry, don’t feel, and ultimately don’t care about anything. Like wolf-mode Oz and bloodthirsty Spike, masculinity, as our culture has constructed it, bases itself on Neanderthalic warrior urges more than modern-day human emotion. Oz and Spike’s compassionate sides, restricted by their darker halves, symbolize the empathetic, freely expressing people that many men want to but can’t be thanks to gender norms. In this way, the use of nail polish stands for guys’ desire (Oz and Spike included) to define themselves instead of letting outside forces do it for them. Obviously, Oz and Spike as people aren’t consciously wearing nail polish to separate themselves from their inhuman forms, but the fashion choice exhibits how they embrace their humanity in spite of their undesirable parts. It acts as a metaphor for men giving the painted middle finger to restrictive gender expectations.

While, at an overarching level, male polish in today’s society spurns hegemonic masculinity, there isn’t one particular type of guy drawn to this stylistic choice. Disregarding the fact that they’re both creatures of the night who wear nail polish by day, Oz and Spike are wholly unique, which their conflicting approaches to romance evidence clearly. Oz, ignoring Willow’s insistence to hurry up, waits for the right moment for them to have their first kiss and, later, their first sexual experience together. Meanwhile, Spike screws anything (like a sexbot made in Buffy’s likeness) and anyone (emotionally vulnerable Buffy herself and similarly distraught Anya) he can. He’ll pursue even the smallest window of opportunity and, as he revealed in the later attempted rape, he’s willing to break that window open if he has to. The discrepancy between modesty and reckless hypersexuality is one of several examples that demonstrate how the reserved Oz has little in common with the more brash, wildly emotional Spike.

Though male polish in Buffy serves as a metaphor for the act of men rejecting dominant masculinity, there’s isn’t just one type of guy who wears it. Spike and Oz show that, on the largest scale, nail polish unites men looking to free themselves from hindering limits. That said, the two characters contrast in nearly every other way, proving how impossible it is to truly boil down “guys wearing nail polish” to one single image.