clark & chloe — 2020 VISION: Dawson’s Creek thru 2020’s lens

PHOTO NOT OWNED BY CLARK & CHLOE. ALL PHOTO CREDIT GIVEN TO ITS RIGHTFUL OWNER.

BY: CHERYL CHO

For many, the yearlong quarantine has given us:

Time.

Time with family.

Time with ourselves.

And most importantly, time to binge watch movies and shows like it was an Olympic sport.

After conquering all that the media platforms have to offer, I’ve had the pleasure of delving back into some childhood favorites but this time with a 20/20 lens, refined with life experiences, a matured brain programmed to capture subtle and not so subtle sexual innuendos, and an acute sense of nostalgia.

All while the world was quarantining from COVID-19, I bravely traveled back to Capeside, MA and found myself paddling down memory lane, a.k.a. Dawson’s Creek – a hit television show from the 90’s exploding with high intensities of teenage angst expressed solely through erudite verbiage that was sure to increase your score on the English section of the SATs.

Each episode was an emotional rollercoaster ride that would either inflame your own parallel teenage drama experience or make you depressed because your standard for men had been completely obliterated thanks to Pacey Witter (portrayed by Joshua Jackson). “Pace” set a bar so unattainably high that any man could only stand at a distant second place in our hearts. Everyone deserves a Pacey in their life… maybe sans the senior prom scene on a boat but I digress. Let’s reminisce about how we didn’t want to wait for our lives to be over.

Speaking of which, that famous theme song “I don’t wanna wait” by Paul Cole failed to make it with the show into the world of syndication.

What?!

Exactly.

The very song that single-handedly defined the show and set the tone for teenage life in the 90’s is nowhere to be found on the reruns. I seriously hope someone got fired for this. This is a flagrant travesty. You might as well just erase Britney’s Hit Me Baby One More Time from the 90’s musicology while you’re at it.

The theme song has been heartbreakingly replaced by Jane Arden’s “Run like mad” which will have you ready to press “Skip Intro” faster than leaving that dude you’re not interested in on read. No offense to Arden, the song itself is fine, but it just doesn’t fit with the show. For those who grew up waqtching the show when it aired every Wednesday night at 8pm on the WB/CW network (*cough* pre-GenZ and pre-smartphones), we understand the gravity of this error. Arden’s replacement fails to lull us into ponderment of what issues await us in the upcoming episode like Cole’s original theme song was successfully able to do. If you fell asleep in the middle of the last episode at 3am, be prepared for a rude awakening by Arden’s theme song at the start of the next episode. In contrast to Cole’s song, Arden’s song strikes a sense of uncomfortable urgency as the clashing cymbals kick off the theme. It’s irritating. In a frantic attempt to shut down the loud song, you will be dramatically searching for the remote control only to find it burrito’d in the sheets as the song is nearing a yodeling end.

Yeah.

Yodeling.

There’s nothing wrong with yodeling. We just weren’t prepared for that.

In the year 2020, watching Dawson’s Creek on smartphones is like opening up a time capsule filled with nostalgia that had been delicately preserved waiting to breathe air again.

Each episode built up to whether or not Joey and Dawson (portrayed by Katie Holmes and James Van Der Beek, respectively) would ultimately fulfill their destiny as soulmates. By the end of Season 3, any self-respecting girl with a romantic streak would forget about Dawson completely. Instead we wondered if a man like Pacey, a man who is never afraid to revere his woman, actually existed in reality. And then there was Jenn Lindley (portrayed by Michelle Williams) who was just “the roadkill on the Dawson and Joey highway.”

One thing that became crystal clear while watching this show with a mature set of 20/20 eyes is that I’ve come to realize just how self-centered and narcissistic Dawson Leery is. He became lamer and lamer and then different degrees of annoying as the seasons progressed. I felt sorry for his character. I also recognize the injustice that was done unto Dawson as the writers made his character make some [er… a lot of] poor life choices. I mean, he’s the namesake of the show and he really got the short end of the stick. Granted, by the end of the series, he achieved his dream of becoming a Hollywood director and meeting his childhood idol, Steven Spielberg, but the road that took him there was an awfully long, boring, and desperate journey filled with uninteresting plots and lots of whining.

For whatever odd reason, his plotline significantly paled in comparison to what was happening to everyone else, so much so that I found myself fast forwarding through all of his parts. Of course, I’ve seen all the episodes before, at least thrice over, so I knew the plot well. I just didn’t need to re-live Dawson’s agony.

*DISCLAIMER: SPOILER ALERTS BELOW

SEASONS 1 & 2

Dawson spends the entire season cluelessly blind to Joey’s pining for him. His infatuation with the new girl next door, Jenn, puts him on a[n unsuccessful] mission to be her “boy adventure”. [Rolls eyes]. It’s not until a beauty pageant that Dawson sees Joey as a woman. That and Jenn basically friend zones Dawson. The rest of Season 2 is dedicated to Dawson and Joey’s exploration of their newfound romantic dynamic. Dawson is so into his new relationship that he forgets about Pacey’s 16th birthday. I mean, what even is the point of having a best friend? After Dawson’s constant clinginess gives Joey [good] reason to go find herself and become the independent woman she is meant to be, she ditches Dawson. But even through Season 2, I was rooting for him. I got trapped into the whole, ‘will these soulmates end up or not end up together in this lifetime’ drama.

And then came Season 3 and Pacey Witter. Talk about ‘game over’.

SEASON 3

Before we go on, can someone please explain to me what the point of Eve was? It literally was a dead plot. It started out with potential and then just stopped. She disappeared into the summer night never to appear on another episode or even a milk carton.

Back to Pacey…

As Joey resorts to throwing herself at Dawson to get back together with him, he basically rejects her cold and kicks her to the curb like an empty soda can since he wants to repeat Season 1 all over again. He’s so infatuated with another blonde, Eve, that he pushes Joey into the sidelines. Again. The best part, he asks Pacey to ‘watch over her’… you know… just while he tries to get it on with Eve. Well, Pacey Witter is apparently no fool when it comes to spotting quality opportunities and thank god for that. By the end of Season 3, we get to see what level of stupid Dawson plummets to. What did you think was going to happen when you push your girl away and then have your best friend, whose birthday you gave 2 hoots about, take care of her?! Of course, any female with half a brain is going to gravitate towards the guy that sees her for the queen she is and treats her accordingly. We end season 3 with Dawson who is angry at Pacey for doing what he asked him to do. To which I’d like to insert: “What did you think was going to happen, Dawson?!” Yet, he ends up sending Joey to go with Pacey on a 3 month sailing trip for the summer. As Joey runs off to be with a real man, Dawson is left crying on his dock, giving birth to the viral meme that still circulates on social media to this day.

SEASON 4

As if having to give up his potential soulmate wasn’t pathetic enough, the writers really take Dawson into the land of ho-hum boredom in Season 4.

And what happened to his hair?

I thought Season 1 was awkward. I stand corrected.

This entire season was about Pacey and Joey’s newfound relationship that took center stage. Even, Jack McPhee (portrayed by Kerr Smith) explores his life as an out of closet gay man in Capeside and Jenn delves deeper into her history pre-Capeside. Dawson, on the other hand, watched ice melt with an old man who once used to be a Hollywood film director. This coupled with his pursuit of Pacey’s older sister, Gretchen, who is back from college. Dawson spends the majority of season pursuing Gretchen, whilst recovering over Joey. Just as it appears he finally gets the girl, the romance is only to be contained within this season as she leaves him, come summer.

Dawson’s character was annihilated with no remorse. Joey and Pacey were off on a school ski trip discovering each other in the biblical sense for the first time ever and even Jenn and Jack were getting hot and heavy in their cabin. All very exciting. Where was Dawson? He was back in Capeside deciding whether or not to take Mr. Brooks off life support.

In the end, he loses Mr. Brooks and he loses Gretchen. We should be glad the writers didn’t have the poor guy lose his mind.

By season’s end, his line sums it up best:

“I’m the only one who has not had sex. I didn’t plan on graduating a virgin. What happened?”

— Dawson Leery.

Exactly.

What happened, Dawson?

SEASON 5

Things don’t get any better for Dawson as he again falls victim to his poor life choices. Dude is just lost in this season. He ends up getting fired off his first Hollywood movie which now gives him time to take a trip to Boston and turn to Joey in hopes of rekindling their romance. The possibility of being close to Joey further compels him to drop out of USC film school and entertain the possibility of moving to Boston. When he tells his parents of his decision to drop out of school, his father is vehemently against the idea. After an argument with Dawson about poor life choices, he gets into a car accident and dies.

An emotionally messed up Dawson ditches Joey (again), runs off with Jenn (again) and decides to swipe his V-card (that’s new), and then breaks up with Jenn and goes back to pursuing Joey (again).

Bruh.

Did I say poor life choices or what?

SEASON 6

Dawson and Joey finally give the audience what they’ve been waiting for all these years! They finally get together. However, our thrill is to be short lived. We find out at the same time Joey finds out that Dawson had a girlfriend when he slept with Joey!

Poor life choices indeed.

And then he chooses to break up with this other girl via her voicemail. This information is revealed during Joey’s surprise birthday party by the gang. To no one’s surprise, Joey and Dawson decide not to pursue a romantic relationship.

Jen summed it up best when she stated: “This is a very unhappy birthday.”

Ironically, Dawson ends up back together with the actress he broke up with for Joey only to have said actress leave him over the holidays. The rest of the season is spent with Dawson figuring out his career path in the film industry. Meanwhile, everyone is diverted to a far more interesting plot about whether or not Joey and Pacey finally get together as we near the show’s end.

All in all, Dawson ultimately ends up with his first true love, film. Joey ends up with Pacey and the fans are at peace. As I rewatch all 6 seasons 20 years later, I feel bad for Dawson for the lack of an exciting storyline, the lack of true development of his character, and how he became increasingly annoying. He never grows up and evolves as a man. Things happen to him to give him the opportunity to grow but he just ends up back at square one: his love for directing and no Joey. He’s afraid to grow up and let go of what he knows. And on a more profound level, I believe he hates Joey and never quite forgives her for being brave enough to separate from him and go do her own thing. She grew up independent from him.

I wanted to root for Dawson because he was the name of the show. But I ended up growing tired of his whining. But as an adult, I feel sorry for him and hope that he’s out there hanging out with Steven Spielberg and not just standing alone on his canoe in the creek paused in deep contemplation about how he left Joey slip right through his fingers.