Dawson's Creek: seasons 5 and 6
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Overview of seasons 5 and 6 of Dawson's Creek.
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[edit] Season 5: 2001-2002
(For episode details, see Dawson's Creek Season 5)
The fifth season moved the show to Boston where Joey was attending elite Worthington College (something akin to Harvard), while Jack and Jen were attending a more modest college, Boston Bay. Worthington College was filmed at Duke University. They still lived with Grams, however, she having sold her house in Capeside and moved to Boston as well. Jack joined a fraternity and spent all his time drinking and partying, leading to his nearly flunking out of school.
Pacey returned to Boston from the Caribbean, and got a job working in the kitchen of an upscale eatery, Civilization, under the tutelage of owner and chef Danny Brecher (Ian Kahn). Pacey soon became privy to an extramarital affair that Danny was having with one of the waitresses Karen (Lourdes Benedicto). Despite being told to mind his own business, Pacey consoled Karen when Danny refused to leave his wife, as a consequence of which Karen quit her job. Although Danny's wife apparently never found out of his infidelity, the guilt made Danny leave his wife and his job eventually, leaving Pacey as the full time chef. Later in the season when the restaurant was sold, the new owners appointed a martinet manager, Alex Pearl (Sherilyn Fenn), who so alienated the staff they walked out en masse at Pacey's instigation, leading to both Alex and Pacey's dismissal and the shuttering of the restaurant. Pacey and Joey reconnected as friends and he began dating Audrey Liddell (Busy Phillips), Joey's party-girl roommate at Worthington, with Joey's blessing.
Dawson began the season on his first day as a production assistant on a film directed by the nasty and mean-spirited Todd Carr (Hal Ozsan), who quickly fired him. Completely disillusioned, Dawson quit film school and returned to Capeside, where his parents were disappointed in him for giving up so easily. Dawson's father was killed in an automobile wreck after a big fight with his son. Dawson discovered a film school in Boston and enrolled. Dawson later directed a romance film with the cooperation of the overeager, oblivious, and obtuse fellow student Oliver Chirkchick (Jordan Bridges) that starred Charlie (Chad Michael Murray), Jen's latest former boyfriend, and Audrey. Meanwhile, Dawson pushed Joey away after his father's death and grew closer to Jen. Dawson and Jen became lovers. But Jen later broke it up after their relationship became unstable and uncertain.
Joey became close to Professor David Wilder (Ken Marino), her English teacher and a published novelist, and they nearly had an affair. They parted on good terms, with David deciding to try writing again. He told her when they parted that the greatest scene in literature was in the finale chapters of Flaubert's Sentimental Education, where two old friends reminisce about the things that never were.
In the season finale, Pacey and Joey had a conversation on the dock in Capeside that initiates a mad-dash tandem trip to the airport. Pacey went to stop Audrey and declare his feelings for her, and Joey went to catch Dawson at the gate to profess her own feelings. Pacey ended up going with Audrey to L. A. for the summer. Joey stayed in Capeside but let Dawson know she would always have feelings for him. Also, Jen decided to stay for the summer with her parents in New York while Jack decided to stay in Boston.
[edit] Season 6: 2002-2003
(For episode details, see Dawson's Creek Season 6)
The final season found Dawson in Boston shooting a horror film with the hack Todd Carr, and carrying on an affair with the leading lady, Natasha Kelly (Bianca Kajlich). When Todd quit, the producers hired Dawson to finish the film. He then pitched a film of his own, an autobiographical coming of age story, but the sleazy producer (Paul Gleason) was only interested in making it into a teen sex comedy in the vein of American Pie. Dawson, wanting to be true to himself, decided that was not for him.
After a night of reminiscing, Dawson and Joey finally had sex though its consequences were not what they expected. Dawson's relationship with Natasha surfaced the day after and during a surprise birthday party thrown by her friends in her dorm room, Joey initiated a final confrontation with Dawson that ended with them burying the proverbial romantic hatchet.
Pacey got a job as a stockbroker under the oleaginous and greedy Rich Rinaldi (Dana Ashbrook) and soon was sporting stylish clothes, driving a fancy car, and spending his new-found cash. Pacey and Jack moved in with Emma Jones (Megan Gray), a good-natured English barmaid who worked at a local bar/restaurant named Hell's Kitchen, and offered Joey a chance to return to waitressing. She took it and soon became involved romantically with Eddie Doling (Oliver Hudson), who was the bartender where Joey worked and was in Joey's literature class. The class was taught by the liberal, but stern and intimidating, Greg Hetson (Roger Howarth), the father of a headstrong teenage girl, named Harley (Mika Boorem), whom Joey began to tutor with her school work. Along with Todd Carr, Rich Rinaldi, and a few others, Professor Heston became one of the many villains and unlikable characters throughout the season. The somewhat misogynist and mean-spirited Professor Hetson became a burden to Joey and, through most of the season, never passed up a chance to single her out, or embarrass her in front of his class over her lack of knowledge with any given subject. Eddie kept Joey's sanity intact by persuading her, several times, to not let Hetson emotionally get to her. After a series of romantic stops and starts, Eddie eventually left town. When Joey tracked him down at his childhood home, she brought with her an opportunity for him to attend college in California to pursue his dreams of becoming a writer.
Meanwhile, Pacey and Audrey's relationship buckled beneath the strain of his obsessive work ethic and her growing addiction to alcohol while she was working as the lead singer for an all-girl rock band called 'Hells Belles' which Emma was also a part of in playing the drums. Eventually, they broke up and Audrey landed in rehab in Los Angeles, her hometown. Jack embarked on a brief relationship with David, a fellow classmate, before working through an awkward almost-liaison with an apparently married college lecturer. David's friend, C.J. (Jensen Ackles), after an ill-advised one-night stand with a drunk Audrey early on, later became Jen's boyfriend.
Late in the season, Mrs. Ryan informed Jen that she had breast cancer. Jen persuaded her to move to New York City and live with her and Jen's mother (Mimi Rogers), now divorced, to be close to the hospital and to try to reconcile their long-standing familial differences. Jack would come with them.
Pacey continued living the fast life of wheeling-dealing under the mentorship of the aggressive and amoral Rich Rinaldi. Pacey also had a brief affair late in the season with a certain Sadia Shaw (Sarah Shahi), a journalist investigating the shady stock brokerage deals Pacey became involved with. In one episode, Pacey came to a sort-of peace agreement with his estranged father after Mr. Witter suffered a heart attack due to his life-long alcoholism, while Pacey also dealt with his brother, Doug, over Pacey's new lifestyle. Although Mr. Witter survived the heart attack, he apparently became too sick to work anymore because of his heart, liver, and kidney problems caused by his constant drinking. Doug soon became the acting sheriff of Capeside, and ultimately full-time sheriff.
Pacey and Joey briefly rekindled the flame between them after getting locked in a K-mart store overnight, but after a short-lived attempt to reconcile completely, Eddie returned. Joey opted to explore her continuing feelings for Eddie, leaving Pacey broken-hearted, yet steadfast in his continuing friendship to her. The reconciliation with Eddie, however, was also brief, ending with him leaving again, taking a trip to Europe without Joey.
Dawson persuaded Pacey to invest all of his money in stocks in order to raise capital for his new film. After losing all the money to the vagaries of the stock market as well as his job after punching the cynical Rich Rinaldi for insulting him, Pacey returned to Capeside to break the news to Dawson about him losing all of their money. At this point, Dawson, Joey and Pacey came face-to-face with their past demons again, with a huge argument breaking out between Dawson and Pacey about past issues. Dawson brought up that for the past two years since graduation from high school, Pacey had turned their friendship into a competition to see who can succeed in life. Joey tried to intervene, but to no avail as both Dawson and Pacey continued lashing out at each other with Dawson, for the first time ever, calling Pacey a loser and screw-up who will never succeed at anything in life. Pacey lashed back, calling Dawson a daydreamer living in a fantasy world of the movies and chasing a dream he knows he can never have. The argument ended with both Dawson and Pacey walking away from each other, leaving Joey alone.
Joey eventually came to the rescue by salvaging Dawson's movie by persuading various people to act for free in Dawson's movie project whom included Harley Hetson to play Joey and Harley's boyfriend, Patrick, to play Pacey, as well as Audrey to play the role of Miss Jacobs, and even Dawson's mother helped out with the work and had Todd Carr come to Capeside to assist Dawson. By the end of the episode, Dawson had completed his film, Pacey and Jack moved out of their apartment (after Emma Jones apparently left for her home in England), Jen and Jack transferred to NYU, Audrey had to stay behind at Worthington to attend summer classes for her many absences, a jobless and penniless Pacey returned to Capeside and shacking up with Doug to try to rebuild his life, and Joey finally made her life-long dream of traveling to Paris, France come true.
[edit] The finale
The two-part series finale, titled "All Good Things…Must Come to An End," was set in the year 2008, five years into the future. Joey was a book editor living in New York with her writer boyfriend Chris. She found an engagement ring and freaked out, fleeing to Capeside. Dawson was in Los Angeles as the creator and executive producer of a TV night time teen soap, The Creek, based on the Dawson-Joey-Pacey triangle which involved three characters. Colby was based on Dawson's character: a movie buff and philosopher on teenage alienation. Sam was based on Joey's character: an orphan tomboy with a barely disguised crush on Colby. Petey (not shown on camera) was based on Pacey's character: a clownish loser whom Sam also has feelings for.
Jen was working at an art gallery and currently a single mother with an infant daughter, still living in New York with a frail Grams. Jack had returned to Capeside and had a job teaching English at Capeside High School, and was now Doug's lover — though Sheriff Doug was still in the closet. Pacey was the proprietor of the reopened The Ice House, but was carrying on affairs with attractive, older women, some of whom were married. Audrey was reputed to be on a tour with a rock band as a backup singer. Andie McPhee (her scenes were cut from the original version) was a Harvard graduate, living in Boston and working as a resident doctor at a major hospital.
The gang (sans Audrey) reunited in Capeside to attend Gale's wedding, and at the reception, Jen collapsed. Her friends learned she had an incurable congenital heart defect. As they awaited her death, they all reminisced about their friendship and Jen arranged for Jack to adopt her baby. Jen died shortly thereafter when only Grams was present, uniquely when no background music was used to heighten the sense of emotion. The only words in the scene were "I'll see you soon, child....soon", which were uttered when Grams awoke to find that Jen had passed away. Doug agreed with Jack to have them raise Jen's infant daughter, and Doug also agreed to let more people know about his and Jack's romantic relationship.
As for the Dawson-Joey-Pacey triangle, Pacey declared that Joey was "off the hook" for any romantic obligations with him and told her that "the simple act of being in love with you is enough for me" as he resolved to move on "in this life" and be happy. At the heart of the Pacey/Joey matter was Dawson. Pacey explained that as much as Joey wanted, all her life, to get away from Capeside and see the world, he is forever destined to be stuck there like his alcoholic, loser father and grandfather before them. In the face of such honesty and unconditional love, Joey confessed she'd "always been running" from him and their love, "never ready for it", finally telling him, "I love you—you know that." Joey and Dawson reconciled to the fact that their love as soulmates was eternally "pure" and "innocent," and that they would always be linked, but as something deeper than simply friends or lovers. Dawson returned to California and his TV show, while Pacey and Joey renewed their relationship. At the end, Pacey and Joey snuggle on a couch together in NYC, gaily laughing and congratulating their best friend, Dawson, on the phone for finally getting his heart's desire—a meeting with Steven Spielberg.
[edit] See also
| Dawson's Creek |
|---|
| Characters |
| Dawson Leery | Jen Lindley | Joey Potter | Pacey Witter |
| Locations |
| Capeside | Capeside High | Worthington University |
| Other |
| Young Americans | List of Dawson's Creek episodes |
