Thanks for the explanation! I can just pass $_[0] in this situation, which should make it work. However, if there would be multiple parameters and I wanted to pass @_ as a whole, there'd be a problem :(.
Comment on Re: Scalar context changes bareword value?
Well, not a problem but you'd have to call it as sub2( $_[0] => @_[1..$#_] ). Then again, you play with prototypes you're going to get burned. Or was that matches . . .