Buffy and Dawn
Jul. 20th, 2003 11:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakYesterday I brought up only a few things I enjoyed about seasons 4-7 (and I still can't believe I left out the musical when talking about the experimental episodes, as both Superplin and Butterfly pointed out). One major element, however, which I didn't address yet because it deserves a separate post, was Dawn and the Buffy-Dawn relationship.
Now admittedly I've got a soft spot for sibling relationships anyway. But I still think inventing Dawn, and casting Michelle Trachtenberg, was one of Joss' best ideas. He took a soap opera cliché - the relation nobody ever heard about before turns up - and used it not just as a major plot point of the season 5 arc which made sense within the Buffyverse, but as an exploration of his main character which, imo, later was only rivalled by the Connor arc and the Angel-Connor relationship. (Proving it's possible to strike gold twice, if you do it inventively enough. At some point, somebody has to write a parallels-and-differences essay about Buffy/Dawn and Angel/Connor.)
Note that it's not "best of Buffy" or "best of Dawn" (hence, for example, no scenes like Dawn's chat with Xander in "Potential", which rocks but belongs in a different category):
1.) "I'm telling Mom you slayed in front of me": Dawn's entire introduction in "Real Me" is great, and "Real Me" belongs firmly among my favourite season 5 episodes. I remember one could see in the reaction online afterwards who had been a younger sibling, and who had been an older one. (For the record, I was an older sister. Hence could identify with Buffy's rant in Riley's presence a bit more.) Buffy and Dawn were instantly believable as sisters, both with the squabbling and with the coming through for each other in a tight spot, and the scene where Buffy rescues Dawn epitomizes both.
2.) Dawn brings up kittenish Riley. The mortification in Buffy's face. Ouch. And grin.
3.) Buffy, after learning the truth about the Key from the dying monk - about whom HonorH has written a fabulous story here - tries to make up with Dawn in the final scene of "No Place like Home". Buffy's not used to apologizing, Dawn is great at sulking, but they end up being closer. Also, Buffy's gesture of stroking Dawn's hair turns up for the first time.
4.) Dawn's single scene in "Fool for Love", covering for Buffy's injuries in front of Joyce, trying immediately afterwards to use this as leverage and Buffy's reply. One of the best things about Dawn was that she was never a spotless, saint-like cherub - of course she'd try. And of course Buffy would say no.
5.) Dawn has found out the truth and cut herself, Buffy and Joyce react, in "Blood Ties". (Excellent debut for Steven DeKnight, btw.) Michelle Trachtenberg is just awesome here. Ties with the "Summers Blood" scene in which Buffy convinces Dawn they ARE sisters, no matter their origin.
6.) Buffy and Dawn tease Joyce about shedding the bathrobe. It's one of the last moments when all is right chez Summers, and the two of them ganging up on Joyce is just perfect.
7.) Buffy tells Dawn Joyce has died in "The Body". The camera withdraws, and we never hear just what Dawn says, we just watch the two sisters through the window with the rest of the class, and it's heartrendering.
8.) As is the great climax of "Forever", with Dawn accusing Buffy of not caring, Buffy starting to break down, those ominous shuffling steps towards the door, Buffy against all her convictions rushing out with such hope, Dawn realizing what this would do to Buffy, tearing up Joyce's picture, and the two of them crying in each others' arms. I maintain "Forever" is not just one of Marti's best efforts but one of the best episodes of the show.
9.) Buffy and Dawn in "Tough Love". Hard to single out just one scene, but there is something about the two of them standing in the Summers living room which always puts a lump in my throat. This is when Buffy gives up her hopes for some semblance of a normal life, and she does it for Dawn. It's a foreshadowing of the more literal sacrifice to come.
10.) "The hardest thing in this world is to live in it", take one. Their goodbye in "The Gift". Pure Magic.
11.) Dawn lying next to the Buffybot in "Bargaining I". Eerie and touching and summing up how she misses her sister.
12.) Dawn talks Buffy away from the edge, in "Bargaining II". It's fitting that Dawn is the first impetus for Buffy to start her long, painful crawl out of the metaphorical grave, after having escaped the literal one.
13.) Dawn takes care of Buffy at the start of "After Life". It's a scene full of exquisite tenderness and pain, both because Dawn tries so hard, and because it's our first indication that while Dawn might be reason enough for Buffy not to commit suicide, she, by herself, is not enough to heal Buffy and bring her out of post-mortem trauma. (Incidentally, I still think if Buffy had been given some weeks or even two months or so to recover instead of being expected by everyone save Dawn and Spike to immediately function both as the old Buffy and the Slayer AND to take care of the money problems, she might have dealt with it all better. At the time, she reminded me very much of a shell-shocked WW I soldier, and even then one let them recover instead of expecting them to pick up where they left off immediately.)
14.) "Like you never did". Dawn follows Buffy's footsteps in the dating vampires category and Buffy is mortified to find out in "All The Way". Meanwhile, the vampires can't understand why they're treated to a sibling (with shades of mother and daughter) squabble instead of a fight and dinner.
15.) "The hardest thing in this world is to live in it", take two. Dawn is the only one of the friends/family group to talk to Buffy after the big heaven revelation.
16.) Joan and Umad figure out they have to be sisters in "Tabula Rasa". They're much like Buffy and Dawn in "Real Me", and it's funny and poignant at the same time because of the difference to reality.
17.) Buffy tells Dawn about Katrina, in "Dead Things". Both the frustrated love and the hurt between the sisters are epitomized in this scene as Dawn goes from trying to comfort Buffy to running angrily away from her, and Buffy tries to reach out to Dawn but can't convince her of her love anymore.
18.) Buffy closes the door and smiles at Dawn in "Older and Far Away". At last, the comfort part in h/c starts where the Summers sisters are concerned.
19.) Not so fast, though. First we get "Normal Again". The scene where a stone-faced Buffy hunts down Dawn is absolutely chilling and utterly compelling precisely because we know it's such a perversion of their relationship.
20.) Repentant Buffy goes shopping with Dawn in "Entropy". Funny and touching at the same time as Dawn is secure enough now to tease Buffy. Ties with Dawn figuring out the Buffy and Spike thing from watching her sister and going after her, and the two of them talking about it.
21.) "You think I didn't watch you?" Dawn starts to come into her own in "Grave", and Buffy finds her joy of life again together with Dawn.
22.) Poor Dawn being mortified by having her older sister at High School in "Lessons". But Dawnie, she meant well.
23.) Dawn teases Counsellor Buffy in "Help". Brief but delightful.
24.) Buffy and Dawn talk about Spike and the confusing men and women thing in the teaser of "Him". Showcases how more grown-up their relationship is now since Buffy does not take the easy way out by using the excuse Dawn offers her - i.e. she doesn't claim pity is the reason why she helps Spike, which she easily could have done - but tries to be absolutely honest with Dawn, telling her about her own mixed feelings.
25.) Dawn teases Buffy about homework, and they find themselves abruptly cut short by the discovery of the dead Potential in "Get it Done".
26.) Buffy sits next to a sleeping Dawn in the tag scene of "Lies My Parents Told Me", tenderly stroking her face. Earlier in the episode, Giles asks her whether she would be ready to kill Dawn now if she had to to save the world, and Buffy replies in the positive, but Buffy's medium has always been action over words, and this scene belies her resolve. Of course it's arguable, but my interpretation of this scene and Buffy closing the door to Giles immediately afterwards has always been that while Buffy tried to become the Slayer completely and suppress the Buffy part of herself so she could save everyone, she ultimately can't go through with it and with this scene starts to reject the General Giles wanted her to be.
27.) Dawn asks Buffy to leave the house in "Empty Places". I've read complaints there wasn't enough justification for Dawn to do this, but for me, this incredibly painful scene worked. The preceding argument has gotten out of hand and has gotten worse and worse, especially for Buffy, and the First was having a field day. What Dawn - who did internalise Buffy's "it's about the mission" doctrine - does, nobody else could have done; Buffy wouldn't have taken it from anyone else, and Dawn knew it. This way, the argument ended at once. Mind you, my heart broke for Buffy there, and I think Dawn's did to. But I could see why Dawn did it.
28.) Upon seeing Buffy again in "Chosen" after the Xander-napping, Dawn kicks her in the shins. And we got our last "I'm so telling". Works so much better than a lengthy talk about why Dawn should have a right to choose fighting the fight, or not to.
29.) The not-goodbye in the High School. Again, perfect note.
30.) Dawn watching for Buffy after the bus had started to drive away. It's fitting that they did drive and didn't wait any longer, and it's fitting that Dawn was the one who kept looking back and ultimately discovering Buffy making a run for it.
31.) Last Buffy and Dawn hug on the show. They're alive, and, to quote the motto of Graduation Day, the future is theirs.
Now admittedly I've got a soft spot for sibling relationships anyway. But I still think inventing Dawn, and casting Michelle Trachtenberg, was one of Joss' best ideas. He took a soap opera cliché - the relation nobody ever heard about before turns up - and used it not just as a major plot point of the season 5 arc which made sense within the Buffyverse, but as an exploration of his main character which, imo, later was only rivalled by the Connor arc and the Angel-Connor relationship. (Proving it's possible to strike gold twice, if you do it inventively enough. At some point, somebody has to write a parallels-and-differences essay about Buffy/Dawn and Angel/Connor.)
Note that it's not "best of Buffy" or "best of Dawn" (hence, for example, no scenes like Dawn's chat with Xander in "Potential", which rocks but belongs in a different category):
1.) "I'm telling Mom you slayed in front of me": Dawn's entire introduction in "Real Me" is great, and "Real Me" belongs firmly among my favourite season 5 episodes. I remember one could see in the reaction online afterwards who had been a younger sibling, and who had been an older one. (For the record, I was an older sister. Hence could identify with Buffy's rant in Riley's presence a bit more.
2.) Dawn brings up kittenish Riley. The mortification in Buffy's face. Ouch. And grin.
3.) Buffy, after learning the truth about the Key from the dying monk - about whom HonorH has written a fabulous story here - tries to make up with Dawn in the final scene of "No Place like Home". Buffy's not used to apologizing, Dawn is great at sulking, but they end up being closer. Also, Buffy's gesture of stroking Dawn's hair turns up for the first time.
4.) Dawn's single scene in "Fool for Love", covering for Buffy's injuries in front of Joyce, trying immediately afterwards to use this as leverage and Buffy's reply. One of the best things about Dawn was that she was never a spotless, saint-like cherub - of course she'd try. And of course Buffy would say no.
5.) Dawn has found out the truth and cut herself, Buffy and Joyce react, in "Blood Ties". (Excellent debut for Steven DeKnight, btw.) Michelle Trachtenberg is just awesome here. Ties with the "Summers Blood" scene in which Buffy convinces Dawn they ARE sisters, no matter their origin.
6.) Buffy and Dawn tease Joyce about shedding the bathrobe. It's one of the last moments when all is right chez Summers, and the two of them ganging up on Joyce is just perfect.
7.) Buffy tells Dawn Joyce has died in "The Body". The camera withdraws, and we never hear just what Dawn says, we just watch the two sisters through the window with the rest of the class, and it's heartrendering.
8.) As is the great climax of "Forever", with Dawn accusing Buffy of not caring, Buffy starting to break down, those ominous shuffling steps towards the door, Buffy against all her convictions rushing out with such hope, Dawn realizing what this would do to Buffy, tearing up Joyce's picture, and the two of them crying in each others' arms. I maintain "Forever" is not just one of Marti's best efforts but one of the best episodes of the show.
9.) Buffy and Dawn in "Tough Love". Hard to single out just one scene, but there is something about the two of them standing in the Summers living room which always puts a lump in my throat. This is when Buffy gives up her hopes for some semblance of a normal life, and she does it for Dawn. It's a foreshadowing of the more literal sacrifice to come.
10.) "The hardest thing in this world is to live in it", take one. Their goodbye in "The Gift". Pure Magic.
11.) Dawn lying next to the Buffybot in "Bargaining I". Eerie and touching and summing up how she misses her sister.
12.) Dawn talks Buffy away from the edge, in "Bargaining II". It's fitting that Dawn is the first impetus for Buffy to start her long, painful crawl out of the metaphorical grave, after having escaped the literal one.
13.) Dawn takes care of Buffy at the start of "After Life". It's a scene full of exquisite tenderness and pain, both because Dawn tries so hard, and because it's our first indication that while Dawn might be reason enough for Buffy not to commit suicide, she, by herself, is not enough to heal Buffy and bring her out of post-mortem trauma. (Incidentally, I still think if Buffy had been given some weeks or even two months or so to recover instead of being expected by everyone save Dawn and Spike to immediately function both as the old Buffy and the Slayer AND to take care of the money problems, she might have dealt with it all better. At the time, she reminded me very much of a shell-shocked WW I soldier, and even then one let them recover instead of expecting them to pick up where they left off immediately.)
14.) "Like you never did". Dawn follows Buffy's footsteps in the dating vampires category and Buffy is mortified to find out in "All The Way". Meanwhile, the vampires can't understand why they're treated to a sibling (with shades of mother and daughter) squabble instead of a fight and dinner.
15.) "The hardest thing in this world is to live in it", take two. Dawn is the only one of the friends/family group to talk to Buffy after the big heaven revelation.
16.) Joan and Umad figure out they have to be sisters in "Tabula Rasa". They're much like Buffy and Dawn in "Real Me", and it's funny and poignant at the same time because of the difference to reality.
17.) Buffy tells Dawn about Katrina, in "Dead Things". Both the frustrated love and the hurt between the sisters are epitomized in this scene as Dawn goes from trying to comfort Buffy to running angrily away from her, and Buffy tries to reach out to Dawn but can't convince her of her love anymore.
18.) Buffy closes the door and smiles at Dawn in "Older and Far Away". At last, the comfort part in h/c starts where the Summers sisters are concerned.
19.) Not so fast, though. First we get "Normal Again". The scene where a stone-faced Buffy hunts down Dawn is absolutely chilling and utterly compelling precisely because we know it's such a perversion of their relationship.
20.) Repentant Buffy goes shopping with Dawn in "Entropy". Funny and touching at the same time as Dawn is secure enough now to tease Buffy. Ties with Dawn figuring out the Buffy and Spike thing from watching her sister and going after her, and the two of them talking about it.
21.) "You think I didn't watch you?" Dawn starts to come into her own in "Grave", and Buffy finds her joy of life again together with Dawn.
22.) Poor Dawn being mortified by having her older sister at High School in "Lessons". But Dawnie, she meant well.
23.) Dawn teases Counsellor Buffy in "Help". Brief but delightful.
24.) Buffy and Dawn talk about Spike and the confusing men and women thing in the teaser of "Him". Showcases how more grown-up their relationship is now since Buffy does not take the easy way out by using the excuse Dawn offers her - i.e. she doesn't claim pity is the reason why she helps Spike, which she easily could have done - but tries to be absolutely honest with Dawn, telling her about her own mixed feelings.
25.) Dawn teases Buffy about homework, and they find themselves abruptly cut short by the discovery of the dead Potential in "Get it Done".
26.) Buffy sits next to a sleeping Dawn in the tag scene of "Lies My Parents Told Me", tenderly stroking her face. Earlier in the episode, Giles asks her whether she would be ready to kill Dawn now if she had to to save the world, and Buffy replies in the positive, but Buffy's medium has always been action over words, and this scene belies her resolve. Of course it's arguable, but my interpretation of this scene and Buffy closing the door to Giles immediately afterwards has always been that while Buffy tried to become the Slayer completely and suppress the Buffy part of herself so she could save everyone, she ultimately can't go through with it and with this scene starts to reject the General Giles wanted her to be.
27.) Dawn asks Buffy to leave the house in "Empty Places". I've read complaints there wasn't enough justification for Dawn to do this, but for me, this incredibly painful scene worked. The preceding argument has gotten out of hand and has gotten worse and worse, especially for Buffy, and the First was having a field day. What Dawn - who did internalise Buffy's "it's about the mission" doctrine - does, nobody else could have done; Buffy wouldn't have taken it from anyone else, and Dawn knew it. This way, the argument ended at once. Mind you, my heart broke for Buffy there, and I think Dawn's did to. But I could see why Dawn did it.
28.) Upon seeing Buffy again in "Chosen" after the Xander-napping, Dawn kicks her in the shins. And we got our last "I'm so telling". Works so much better than a lengthy talk about why Dawn should have a right to choose fighting the fight, or not to.
29.) The not-goodbye in the High School. Again, perfect note.
30.) Dawn watching for Buffy after the bus had started to drive away. It's fitting that they did drive and didn't wait any longer, and it's fitting that Dawn was the one who kept looking back and ultimately discovering Buffy making a run for it.
31.) Last Buffy and Dawn hug on the show. They're alive, and, to quote the motto of Graduation Day, the future is theirs.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
another good one...
Date: 2003-07-20 09:55 am (UTC)I don't have strong feelings either way on the issue. But this reminded me of how some people pointed out last season that Dawn functioned as a reflection of Buffy's subsconcious. So either in that way or as a role reversal it seems to work. At least it worked OK for me. I was glad that Joss mentioned that he would have liked to see more done with this character but couldn't fit it in... too bad, there was some spec pre-season about DarkWillow's glowy remark and I was curious about where they might be able to go with that.
More Dawn exploration...
Date: 2003-07-21 05:55 am (UTC)Though I don't believe it will happen.
no subject
Date: 2003-07-20 11:43 am (UTC)No, I haven't seen it.
Date: 2003-07-20 12:05 pm (UTC)Re: No, I haven't seen it.
Date: 2003-07-20 12:46 pm (UTC)Thanks!
Date: 2003-07-20 10:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-07-21 03:27 am (UTC)You reminded me of something. That scene of Buffy coldly huntign Dawn was a lot like the scene of her coldly killing her in her mental loop in Weight of the World. Hm... now I want to go pull out my two tapes and compare.
Good point!
Date: 2003-07-21 05:24 am (UTC)