Dawn's surrogate parents: Who is and who isn't?

[Inappropriate Starches]

Sept 27, 2010 13:35:57 GMT -5 tkts said:

Poor Dawn has been abandoned at one time or another by just about every important adult in her life. She's also had a lot of people who filled parental roles of one kind or another. But some seem more parental than others, and I was interested in trying to sort out who plays what role.

I'm particularly interested in the Willow question, since that seems the hardest to sort out ... more on that later.

So here's how I see it.

Buffy: The easiest one ... she's Dawn's surrogate mother both emotionally and in the eyes of the law.

Giles: Not a surrogate father to Dawn, even though he is to Buffy. In fact, he consciously rejects the role of father to Dawn, most notably in "Tough Love" and in Season 6, when he's trying to convince Buffy to shoulder her own parental responsibilities. There does, however, seem to be an undeniable familial connection, seen particularly in "All the Way," when he does reluctantly assume the role of disciplinarian. He's probably most analogous to the grandfather of a child who was born to a young, unprepared mother.

Tara: Apart from Buffy, she seems to fulfill the maternal role in Dawn's life most closely. In the beginning, she and Willow both fill the role of "the cool aunt," but it seems like over time, Tara's bond with Dawn strengthens and Willow's bond with Dawn loosens. This probably comes across most strongly in "Smashed" and "Wrecked."

Willow: For some reason, I really have trouble seeing her as a mother figure, even though she and Tara were Dawn's primary caregivers while Buffy was dead. Maybe it's because of what happened in subsequent episodes, where Willow became more and more reckless, leaving Tara as the responsible one who was actually looking out for Dawn.

(As an aside, I wonder if Tara ever found out about Willow crashing the car with Dawn in "Wrecked." I think she would have been furious.)

Xander and Anya: No parental-type roles at all.

Any thoughts?

In agreeance with all these people at one time or another. Xander occationally played what I thought was an older brother role, hence my Dawn/Xander apprehention, but in general everyone on your list has played a parental role.

Giles as the father figure, as hers abondoned her and Buffy. With Dawn he does take more a disciplinary role more often, but I still think there is something there. Not as strongly as for Buffy though.

Buffy and Spike as Brother/Sister and Mom/Dad roles at certain times, and of course Willow and Tara. They helped raise Dawn especially when Buffy was dead, and were of course so important in that role that when they break up Tara takes Dawn out for a fun day that reads very much like a seperated parent having the kid for the day.

[joxerlives]

It's interesting when you see Giles with Faith and Dawn at the end of season 7, Giles acting as Watcher to Faith and Dawn acting as junior Watcher for him. Also interesting to see Giles return at the end of season 6, Anya and Buffy flocking to him like a pair of little girls seeing their daddy home

[buffyfan21]

Sept 27, 2010 13:55:55 GMT -5 sosa lola said:

Another point that made them feel like a family was when Willow came home she felt like out of place a little. Xander/Buffy/Dawn were this little family unit and were living life with out her and she felt misplaced. Here's a screen cap showing the "Family Numbers" And has Buffy, Xander, and Dawn's number written down. Not Giles, not willow, not even her father's number, just B/X/D.

Great finds here, sosalola. I think Willow finding the address book was a deliberate move by the writers to highlight Willow's sense of isolation from the group. She had been gone for a while and came back wondering what her place was and where she fit in with the group.

Sept 27, 2010 13:35:57 GMT -5 tkts said:

Willow: For some reason, I really have trouble seeing her as a mother figure, even though she and Tara were Dawn's primary caregivers while Buffy was dead. Maybe it's because of what happened in subsequent episodes, where Willow became more and more reckless, leaving Tara as the responsible one who was actually looking out for Dawn.

I share your feelings in regards to Willow. If anything, it seems that Tara was more the mother figure for Dawn. But if you recall, earlier in S8 Dawn confides to Buffy that Willow is like a mom to her, so it's obvious that this is how Dawn sees Willow. I would agree that out of everyone, Buffy is arguably the one who is the most motherly to Dawn, having stepped in and filled that role when Joyce died. She then became both sister and mother to Dawn. As for Xander, I never really saw him in the father role, but definitely the older-brother type role. Of course, given recent events in S8, even that is disturbing.

[tkts]

Regarding Giles as a father to Dawn, I just don't see it.

For Buffy, there's no question he fills that role and feels honored to do so. He's clearly offended when Maggie Walsh comments on Buffy lacking a father figure in "A New Man." You can tell how pleased he is in "Something Blue" when Buffy asks him to give her away at her wedding, so much so that he even momentarily forgets the absurdity of the fact that she's talking about marrying Spike. And he appears at least a little flattered when Buffy compares him to her mother at the end of "Life Serial."

But for Dawn, Giles makes a point of avoiding the role of father. Yes, he's more active in Dawn's upbringing than most grandfathers would be, but I see him as more analogous to the parent of a girl who becomes pregnant at a young age. Buffy, who is 19 when Joyce gets sick and 20 when she dies, is essentially a young single mother. It's not uncommon for grandparents in situations like that to be more involved and active, but it's usually still clear who Mom is. Giles clearly feels it is Buffy's responsibility to be the parent, and assumes that role only when Buffy maneuvers him into it. And when he's counseling Buffy about how to deal with Dawn, even though he's addressing Buffy as her elder, it's also very clear that he views Buffy as an adult who needs to assume adult responsibilities for the child in her care.

Essentially, I think Giles and Joyce represent the oldest generation of the gang; Buffy, Willow and Xander represent the second generation; and Dawn represents a third generation.

[Scarygothgirl]

Sept 29, 2010 6:13:09 GMT -5 joxerlives said:

It's interesting when you see Giles with Faith and Dawn at the end of season 7, Giles acting as Watcher to Faith and Dawn acting as junior Watcher for him. Also interesting to see Giles return at the end of season 6, Anya and Buffy flocking to him like a pair of little girls seeing their daddy home

I really love the whole thing with Anya feeling like the less favoured child. She definately adopts Giles as a father figure, and he sees her more as an insolent child clamouring for affection than Buffy.

[midwesternwatcher]

Tara has a talent for mothering. I've mentioned that elsewhere on this board.

A thought I just thought of. After Joyce dies, Buffy is in effect a "single mother." She has to be the father, too. She has to be the disciplinarian, the bad guy when that's needed. Tara functioned as a mother to Dawn. Remember, in season 6, I think the first one, Giles gets on his airplane the first time he goes to England. As the Scoobies walk out the airport, who is holding Dawn's arm, and not Willow's? Three guesses.

[tkts]

Sept 30, 2010 21:04:09 GMT -5 midwesternwatcher said:

Tara has a talent for mothering. I've mentioned that elsewhere on this board.

A thought I just thought of. After Joyce dies, Buffy is in effect a "single mother." She has to be the father, too. She has to be the disciplinarian, the bad guy when that's needed. Tara functioned as a mother to Dawn. Remember, in season 6, I think the first one, Giles gets on his airplane the first time he goes to England. As the Scoobies walk out the airport, who is holding Dawn's arm, and not Willow's? Three guesses.

I love the bond between Tara and Dawn, going all the way back to the thumb wrestling scene outside the magic shop in Dawn's first full episode. There was just always something special about it.

You raise something interesting about Buffy's perception of the role of disciplinarian, too. My first reaction was to protest that Buffy, as the child of a single mother, was unlikely to see a dichotomy between mother and father roles, and would more likely see motherhood as a disciplinary role too. But actually, you're right. I went back and looked at the flashback in "Becoming, Part 1" where Hank and Joyce argue about Buffy. Joyce tells Hank he's overreacting, and Hank yells "Just because you can't discipline her, I have to be the ogre!" And in the early seasons, we do see Joyce struggling to develop a more discipline-oriented parenting style. In the beginning, it's clear she's not comfortable with it, and when she does assert herself as a disciplinarian, it's often with an uneven and erratic quality that suggests that even though she's able to be strict, she struggles with figuring out just how strongly to react. So it is entirely possible that, even though she's the child of a single mother for the entire time we know her, Buffy would have some trouble equating motherhood with discipline, and might instinctively turn to someone she perceives as a father for backup in that area.

[joxerlives]

Sept 30, 2010 16:40:08 GMT -5 Scarygothgirl said:

Sept 29, 2010 6:13:09 GMT -5 joxerlives said:

It's interesting when you see Giles with Faith and Dawn at the end of season 7, Giles acting as Watcher to Faith and Dawn acting as junior Watcher for him. Also interesting to see Giles return at the end of season 6, Anya and Buffy flocking to him like a pair of little girls seeing their daddy home

I really love the whole thing with Anya feeling like the less favoured child. She definately adopts Giles as a father figure, and he sees her more as an insolent child clamouring for affection than Buffy.

Tabula Rusa is very interesting, everyone figures out their love, Dawn/Buffy, Tara/Willow. Buffy/Spike except Xander/Anya, if anything Xander seems attracted to Willow and Anya hooks up with Giles

[Silver]

I could never see Xander as a parental role for Dawn, he was too immature even when he started to grow up. I know we guys take longer to grow than girls but he took the slow train to adulthood.

Willow was okay till she went all dopped up on wacky magicks which nearly got Dawn killed, now that is not role modal material.

The best mother figure in the group was Buffy, she did her best to look after Dawn no matter what Dawn did. And when buffy sacrifed herself at the end of Season Six, it wasn't just to save the world, but also save Dawn who she by that loved as a sister.

[midwesternwatcher]

Reflecting on tkts last post, this is from the script to "Tough Love" --

DAWN: Yeah? Those monks put grades k-8 in my head, can't we just wait and see if they drop 9 in there too?

BUFFY: Damn it Dawn! This is serious!

DAWN: Why? Why should I care about *any* of this?

BUFFY: (yelling) Because they'll take you away!

DAWN: (long pause, then quietly) Take me away? What do you mean?

BUFFY: They'll take you away from me. That's what your principal told me while you weren't in the room. If I can't make you go to school, then I won't be found fit to be your legal guardian.

DAWN: Where would I go?

BUFFY: I don't know. Dad, maybe. Or foster care. I didn't really want to ask.

DAWN: You could of told me that.

BUFFY: I just did.

I am not quite sure how to understand this. If I think of Dawn first, I might say that Dawn doesn't see Buffy as an authority figure. If I focus on Buffy first, I might say that Buffy isn't accustomed to the "heavy" role and botches it.

I think I would guess that Joyce was not very good in the "ogre" role as she says, and so Buffy never learned from her example. In dealing with Dawn, she's improvising. For whatever reason, Buffy doesn't do well in that role. A question: does that shed light on her performance in the role of a military leader in seasons 7 and 8?

She tries to pass the buck to Giles, but he resists. He feels he would be doing a disservice to Buffy by taking from her a responsibility she should be taking on herself. Rightly or wrongly. Buffy wanted him to be a father figure for Dawn, maybe he could have done that, but he chose not to.

[tkts]

I think Buffy's reluctance to assume the role of parental authority, and her awkwardness with it, stems both from her age and from not being accustomed to seeing mothers as disciplinarians (because of Joyce's discomfort with it).

I think you'd be right to posit that Dawn doesn't really see Buffy as an authority figure. She loves Buffy, but doesn't see her as someone to obeyed simply because that's the way it is. Ultimately, Buffy only reaches her and gets her obedience because of the threat that an external authority will separate them. It's not "do what I say because I'm the authority" ... it's "do what I say because if you don't, a different authority will separate us from each other." In that episode at least, Dawn obeys Buffy not because Buffy is her mother, but because she's afraid that the state of California will say she can't be with her sister anymore.

I'm not sure if that's applicable to her role as a military leader, though. Buffy, for all her discomfort with being an authority figure in the personal realm as a mother to Dawn, has never seemed to have trouble exercising authority in her "work" life. From about Season 2 onward, she's the one in charge when it comes to battling demons, and even Giles takes cues from her most of the time. (See my previous thread "Leadership in the Scooby Gang" for the evolution of leadership in the series and Buffy's assumption of the authority role.)

[joxerlives]

Oct 7, 2010 19:43:40 GMT -5 midwesternwatcher said:

Reflecting on tkts last post, this is from the script to "Tough Love" --

DAWN: Yeah? Those monks put grades k-8 in my head, can't we just wait and see if they drop 9 in there too?

BUFFY: Damn it Dawn! This is serious!

DAWN: Why? Why should I care about *any* of this?

BUFFY: (yelling) Because they'll take you away!

DAWN: (long pause, then quietly) Take me away? What do you mean?

BUFFY: They'll take you away from me. That's what your principal told me while you weren't in the room. If I can't make you go to school, then I won't be found fit to be your legal guardian.

DAWN: Where would I go?

BUFFY: I don't know. Dad, maybe. Or foster care. I didn't really want to ask.

DAWN: You could of told me that.

BUFFY: I just did.

I am not quite sure how to understand this. If I think of Dawn first, I might say that Dawn doesn't see Buffy as an authority figure. If I focus on Buffy first, I might say that Buffy isn't accustomed to the "heavy" role and botches it.

I think I would guess that Joyce was not very good in the "ogre" role as she says, and so Buffy never learned from her example. In dealing with Dawn, she's improvising. For whatever reason, Buffy doesn't do well in that role. A question: does that shed light on her performance in the role of a military leader in seasons 7 and 8?

She tries to pass the buck to Giles, but he resists. He feels he would be doing a disservice to Buffy by taking from her a responsibility she should be taking on herself. Rightly or wrongly. Buffy wanted him to be a father figure for Dawn, maybe he could have done that, but he chose not to.

I don't think Joyce ever hesitated to spank Buffy and Dawn (and not in the manner you find in some of the dodgier slashfic) but I agree, Buffy loves being Dawn's sister and doesn't want to have to act as the mother in their relationship as it means they might lose that. By the end of the season they're more partners than anything else, fighting alongside one another and emerging into the light as equals