Joey Potter

Joey Potter
Dawson's Creek character
Katie Holmes as Josephine Potter
First appearance	"Pilot" (episode 1.01)
Last appearance	"...Must Come to an End" (episode 6.24)
Created by	Kevin Williamson
Portrayed by	Katie Holmes
In-universe information
Full name	Josephine Lynn Potter
Nickname	Joey (by everyone) Jo, Potter
Occupation	Professional : Junior book editor in New York City (currently) Secretary for the Liddell's stockbroker company in Boston (formerly) Waitress at the Hell's Kitchen bar in Boston (formerly) Waitress at the Capeside Yacht Club (formerly) Employee at the Potter Bed & Breakfast (formerly) Sailor at Logan's Marina (formerly) Waitress at the Ice House restaurant (formerly)
Family	Mike Potter (father) Lillian Potter (mother; deceased) Bessie Potter (sister) Alexander Potter Wells (nephew)
Significant other	Love interests : Pacey John Witter (husband) Christopher (ex-boyfriend) Eddie Doling (ex-boyfriend) Dawson Leery (ex-boyfriend) Professor David Wilder (former fling) Charlie Todd (former fling) Arthur "A.J." Moller Junior (ex-boyfriend) Jack McPhee (ex-boyfriend) Anderson Crawford (former fling) Friendships : Dawson Wade Leery (best friend) Jennifer Lindley (former best friend, deceased) Andrea McPhee (best friend) Jack McPhee (best friend) Audrey Liddell (best friend) Pacey Witter (best friend)
Relatives	Bodie Wells (brother-in-law)
Hometown	Capeside, Massachusetts
Residence	New York City, New York Formerly: Boston, Massachusetts

Josephine Lynn "Joey" Potter (born 13 May 1983) is a fictional character and de facto lead role from the WB television drama Dawson's Creek, portrayed by Katie Holmes. Joey appeared in all episodes of the series, which ran from 1998–2003.

Fictional biography

Background

Joey has been friends with Dawson Leery since they were very young. She has also known Pacey Witter her whole life, though they had a bickering relationship until they fall in love as teens. She lives with her older sister, Bessie, Bessie's son Alexander and (sometimes) boyfriend, Bodie. Her father, Mike, is in and out of prison for drug trafficking. Her mother, Lillian, died of breast cancer when Joey was thirteen. Joey is also the only character to appear in every episode of the series.

Season 1

In season one, Joey is the "girl next door." She is confused by her growth into a teenager and her developing feelings for her longtime best friend Dawson, who she also admitted is her soulmate. She immediately becomes jealous when Jen Lindley arrives and steals Dawson away from her. She is intimidated by Jen, who grew up in New York and does not know how to compete. She lives with her pregnant sister Bessie, and she works for her at the Ice House, the Potter family restaurant. She is frustrated with having to deal with work and taking care of her sister along with significant helpings of teenage angst. Nonetheless, Joey manages to be helpful with the birth of Bessie's son, Alexander, as does their critical neighbor, Evelyn Ryan. One day she is convinced to compete in the beauty pageant, which she does so that she can win the cash prize. But instead of winning the contest, she wins Dawson's heart, as he finally sees past his best friend image, and realizes that he has strong romantic feelings towards her. At the end of the season, she finds herself with the opportunity of going to Paris for a year, but rejects it in favor of staying in Capeside with Dawson after she and Dawson kiss.

Season 2

At the start of the season, she and Dawson are a couple and things start out well, but Joey begins to think that she is losing her identity, as she can't see where Dawson ends and she begins. During a full moon, the new guy in town, Jack McPhee, kisses her. Dawson finds out during a school dance. After a huge argument, Joey decides to break up with him, even though for the first time they both say that they love each other. She says that she wants to "find herself," and so she breaks up with him.

Joey and Jack begin dating afterward but the relationship ends just as quickly when Jack realizes that he's gay. Joey's father is released from prison and comes back into her life. At first this change is uneasy, but they heal the rift between them and she gets back together with Dawson. However, Dawson finds out that Joey's father is dealing cocaine. After a fire at the restaurant which was started by rivals of Joey's father, Dawson tells his parents who advise him he needs to go to the police. He tells Joey instead. He convinces her to wear a wire, and get a confession from her father so that nothing like the fire will happen again. She gets the confession from her father and shows him the wire. Knowing that she had betrayed her father, she is understandably heartbroken and angry with Dawson. She breaks up with him and tells him she doesn't even want to know him and that she will never forgive him.

Season 3

After Dawson returns from visiting his mom over the summer, Joey offers herself to him but Dawson rejects her. Joey flees and Dawson asks Pacey Witter to keep an eye on her. As the season progresses, it becomes obvious that Pacey and Joey's friendship evolves into something deeper. Joey has a brief relationship with a college student, A.J. Moller (Robin Dunne). This relationship makes Pacey jealous and forces him to confront his true feelings for Joey. After months of build up, Pacey finally kisses Joey after she confides in him that he and Dawson are the only ones to "have ever known her in a way that no one else does." Joey initially is angry when Pacey kisses her; however, later she comes to realize that she may also have feelings for him, as well.

Joey took a job at a Logan's Marina, where she received unwanted sexual advances from her supervisor, Rob Logan.

During a trip to the home of Dawson's aunt, Gwen (Gail's sister), Joey and Pacey confront their feelings for one another. Joey confesses that being around Pacey makes her feel more alive resulting in Pacey kissing her again. Pacey tells Joey she needs to figure out what she wants and leaves. Joey stops him and pulls Pacey into a kiss, having made her choice, but Dawson's aunt Gwen sees this happen. After this realization, they begin a secret romantic relationship.

When Dawson finds out about Joey and Pacey's relationship, he is furious, and the friendship between the three is never the same again. Dawson gives Joey an ultimatum- him or Pacey. Joey pulls back from Pacey in an effort to mend his and her friendship with Dawson. Dawson, however, sees Pacey as his enemy and opponent in winning Joey's heart. Dawson tries his best to win Joey back, including throwing an alternative prom with Joey as his date. However, Dawson witnesses Joey and Pacey share a romantic dance before the night is over.

In the season finale, Joey comes to realize that while she's just fearful of losing her oldest friend, Dawson, she has fallen in love with Pacey. With Dawson's urging, Joey rushes off to tell Pacey that she loves him before he departs for a summer at sea on his boat. She joins Pacey on his boat, the True Love, and the two then sail off into the sunset.

Season 4

Pacey and Joey return from their summer at sea and are still madly in love. Joey is eager to mend fences, though Dawson is still hurt by what happened. Pacey's relationship with Dawson never quite recovers until the end of the series, though the two are civil and acknowledge a shared history and group of friends.

Also, Pacey has returned to academic probation while Joey dreams of admittance to the prestigious Worthington College in Boston. Throughout the majority of the season they re-affirm their commitment to one another and are chosen "Class Couple". On a ski trip with the senior class, Pacey and Joey finally sleep together for the first time. However, when Dawson questions her, she lies about losing her virginity. Pacey finds out about the lie and is unsettled, but they later discuss it. Joey accepts money from Dawson to attend Worthington.

After Joey returns from New York with Jen, she discovers from Gretchen that Pacey was arrested for public drunkenness and that she also believes she may be pregnant. Bessie soon finds out that Joey believes she may be pregnant at Gail's baby shower, and Bessie argues with her about not being ready to have a baby, and having an immature boyfriend who would never cope with a child. Joey later defends herself by saying that whatever happens in her life will be different. Joey does a test and finds out she is not pregnant, but the situation draws the sisters close together. When Joey finally reaches Pacey on the phone, she doesn’t tell him about the pregnancy scare and is disappointed that Pacey didn't tell her about his arrest.

Believing that he's holding Joey back and growing frustrated with himself and what he sees as his lack of prospects beyond high school, Pacey eventually breaks up with Joey at the Prom. Despite still being in love, both sadly go their separate ways. Before graduation, Pacey runs away as a crew member in a boat on the Caribbean.

At the end of the season, Joey is confused and heartbroken about the fact Pacey never sent her a letter. Her anxiety grows about the future and leaving Capeside for the first time. During this moment she gets closer to Dawson, who supports her. While he is preparing to leave Capeside for Los Angeles, in a scene reminiscent of Season One's ending, Dawson and Joey share a kiss.

Season 5

In season five, Joey attends Worthington University in Boston, where she meets and befriends her roommate Audrey Liddell. Joey is studying English Literature, and for a time starts seeing her college professor, David Wilder. Pacey settles in Boston and takes a job working as a chef in a fancy restaurant, Civilization. When Jen discovers that he's in town Pacey asks her not to tell the others, but Joey sees him at the restaurant. They share a sweet reunion on Pacey's boat, as friends.

Throwing everyone for a loop, Mitch is killed in a car accident leaving Gail, Dawson and baby Lily behind. Having been a witness to her mother's painful last days, Joey thinks that she can help Dawson through the process of grieving for his father. She attends Mitch's funeral, but is rejected when she tries to help Dawson deal with his whirl of emotions. Upon returning to her dorm room in Boston, a crying Joey is comforted by Audrey. While Jen convinces Dawson to go to counseling, Joey catches Jack in a 'bid' to get one of his frat brothers in bed with Audrey during the fraternity's Winter Formal.

Joey later joins the band, Aggressive Mediocrity, as lead singer with Jen's cheating ex, Charlie Todd (Chad Michael Murray). They embark on a whirlwind romance before she tells him to leave to pursue his dream of being a touring musician. She has an unforgettable run-in with a mugger, who luckily for her, gets hit by a car shortly after robbing her at gunpoint. However, when she is requested to be at his side in the hospital, Joey discovers that the mugger is also a drug addict, and has a young daughter, Sammie, with his wife, Grace. When the mugger dies with Joey at his side, she returns to the waiting room, all of her belongings returned, including the money. Thinking of Sammie, whose situation reminds her of the relationship she has with her own father, Joey leaves all the money hidden in Grace's backpack.

At the end of the season she returns to Capeside, and Dawson confesses to her that he wants to be with her. She rejects him saying that all those feelings were in the past, but in the last episode she rushes to the airport, to declare her true feelings for Dawson. She catches him, and they kiss. Joey tells Dawson to go to Los Angeles as that is his destiny, and that they'll meet up after the summer. As she goes to get a refund, she is offered the chance to go to Paris, and the audience is left hanging.

Season 6

In the beginning of the sixth season, it is revealed that Joey didn't end up going to Paris, but went home to Capeside. After not talking all summer, she and Dawson meet up and have a one-night stand in her dorm room. The next day it is revealed that Dawson has a girlfriend in California. Joey breaks things off with him. She takes a job as a waitress at Hell's Kitchen, with the help of aspiring drummer, Emma Jones. Joey eventually falls for the bartender, Eddie Doling (Oliver Hudson). They both have a love for writing and literature, but it turns out that he is not officially a student at Worthington, as his family was too poor to afford the tuition.

After Christmas, Eddie disappears without telling Joey, going back to Worcester to live with his parents. In trying to find him, Joey gets some help from Harley Hetson—the 15-year-old, alienated, headstrong daughter of her snobbish and somewhat misogynist English professor, Greg Hetson (Roger Howarth), whom Joey clashes with several times during the entire season. Harley lies, telling Eddie that Joey was pregnant with his child in order to lure him back to Boston.

Joey and Pacey share a kiss at his apartment during a party. After being locked overnight in a K-Mart together, they discuss their past and current relationship. How they feel uncomfortable talking about sex with each other or how they never discuss their past and how the fact they never had closure impacts them. In an intimate moment Joey shaves his beard. When they go to sleep she tells him a fantasy she had when she was a teenager. In the fantasy they would be castaways in an idyllic island, living their love away from everyone. They share a bittersweet kiss after her confession. Each admits that they miss the other. However, they don't stay together because Eddie comes back. She tells Pacey the timing doesn't feel right (ironically Pacey and Joey break up at another high school dance resembling the prom). Soon, she realizes things are not working with Eddie and the best thing for her is to spend sometime alone thinking about her life.

After Pacey and Dawson have another falling out after Pacey's stocks tank and Dawson loses his entire investment, Joey decides that it's time they worked things out for themselves without her in the middle because it "is not her fight" and that it never has been, and never will be. After a heart to heart with Pacey on the dock, Joey brings everyone together to help Dawson make his movie. Joey finally goes to Paris and the final episode of the season ends with her standing before the famous Eiffel Tower. In a moment reminiscent of season one, Joey finally chooses herself over a boy.

Series finale

The final two episodes are set approximately five years after the season finale. Joey is a junior editor living in New York with her writer boyfriend, Christopher (Jeremy Sisto). During this double episode, the five friends return to Capeside for Gail Leery's third wedding (but second husband). Although she had originally planned to spend the weekend with Christopher, Joey runs scared after finding an engagement ring hidden in the couple's dresser while she is packing for the trip.

The five friends reunite at Pacey's restaurant to reminisce about the past. Afterwards, Joey drops by Dawson's house, and the two reestablish their friendship. During Gail's wedding reception, Joey and Pacey kiss (reigniting lingering feelings between the two), but the moment is interrupted when Jen collapses. It is later discovered that Jen has a deadly heart condition.

At the same time, Joey ends her relationship with Christopher and chooses between Dawson and Pacey. Though she loves Dawson, she acknowledges that he is her soulmate who is tied to her childhood, a love that is pure and eternally innocent. She also cannot deny she is still in love with Pacey. After Jen's death, she decides to stop running and confront her feelings for Pacey.

In the midst of their romantic entanglements, Joey, Dawson, Jack, and Pacey are brought together at the Ice House, now owned by Pacey, to say goodbye to Jen, who dies from pulmonary congestion.

In the epilogue, Joey and Pacey watch Dawson's semi-autobiographical television series The Creek in their apartment before calling up Dawson together, where they discover he is going to meet his hero, Steven Spielberg. They have renewed their romantic relationship, and the series ends with them as a couple living together in New York.

Notable relationships

• Anderson Crawford
  • Fling
    • Beginning: "Kiss" (1.03)
    • Broke Up: "Kiss" (1.03)
      • Reason: They didn't continue because he went back to boarding school.
• Dawson Leery
  • Kiss
    • "Detention" (1.07)
      • Reason: They were dared to kiss each other despite him being with Jen.
  • Kiss
    • ‘’’”Boyfriend”’’’ (1.08)
      • Reason: Joey was drunk and laying down when she pulled Dawson in for a kiss while he was talking about their complicated relationship.
    • "Coda" (4.23)
      • Reason: They kiss to mark the beginning of the next phase of their lives.
    • "High Anxiety" (5.06)
      • Reason: Joey kiss him to show that she still believes they can find each other in the future.
  • Boyfriend
    • First Relationship:
      • Beginning: "Decisions" (1.13)
      • End: "The Dance" (2.06)
      • Reason: After Jack kisses her, she gets confused about who she really is and what she wants.
    • Second Relationship:
      • Beginning: "A Perfect Wedding" (2.18)
      • End: "Parental Discretion Advised" (2.22)
      • Reason: Dawson convinced her to get her father to confess to burning down the ice house and his drug use while she wore a wire.
    • Third Relationship:
      • Beginning: "The Kids Are Alright" (6.01)
      • End: "The Song Remains The Same" (6.02)
      • Reason: After they sleep together, she finds out he had a girlfriend.
• Jack McPhee
  • Kiss
    • "Full Moon Rising" (2.05)
      • Reason: She was still with Dawson.
  • Boyfriend
    • Beginning: "The Reluctant Hero" (2.08)
    • Broke Up: "...That Is The Question" (2.15)
      • Reason: He finds out after writing a poem that he's gay
• A.J. Moller
  • Boyfriend
    • Beginning: "Northern Lights" (3.13)
    • Broke Up: "Cinderella Story" (3.17)
      • Reason: Didn't continue to be a couple because she finds out his best friend loves him and he loves her but doesn't know it yet.
• Pacey Witter
  • Kissed
  • "Double Date" (1.10)
    • • Reason: Joey had never considered Pacey and was still obsessed with Dawson.
  • Kissed
  • "Cinderella Story" (3.17)
  • "Neverland" (3.18)
    • • Reason: She kisses him back but gets angry with the possible implications of the kiss.
  • Boyfriend
    • First Relationship:
      • Beginning: "Stolen Kisses" (3.19)
      • End: "The Longest Day" (3.20)
      • Reason: Dawson gives her an ultimatum and she feels coerced to break-up.
    • Second Relationship:
      • Beginning: "True Love" (3.23)
      • End: "Promicide" (4.20)
      • Reason: They're still in love but Pacey feels lost and that he doesn't deserve her.
    • Third Relationship:
      • Beginning: Castaways" (6.15)
      • End: "Love Bites" (6.18)
      • Reason: Joey's boyfriend comes back.
    • Fourth Relationship:
      • Beginning: ...Must Come To An End" (6.24)
      • Note: Jen tells Joey her final wish is for Joey to stop running away of who she really loves. Jen's death motivates Joey to declare her love to Pacey.
• Drue Valentine
  • Kissed
    • Beginning: "The Tao of Dawson" (4.11)
    • End: "The Tao of Dawson" (4.11)
      • note: they got locked in a storage locker together, he caught her when she fell and kissed her. She pushed him away immediately, and punched him. She was in love with Pacey.
• Charlie Todd
  • Kissed
    • Beginning: "Something wild" (5.11)
    • Broke Up: "Something wild" (5.11)
      • Reason: Because he cheated on Jen.
  • Fling
    • Beginning: "100 Light Years From Home" (5.19)
    • Broke Up: "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)" (5.20)
      • Reason: She tells him to go off and fulfill his dream of being a musician
• Elliot
  • Almost Fling but never kissed
    • Beginning: "Sleeping Arrangements" (5.12)
    • Broke Up: "Guerrilla Filmmaking" (5.14)
      • Reason: She met him when she wasn't over Dawson. Then she thought he slept with Audrey, and after finding out he never slept with her, she gives him another second chance. But she later bails on a date with him (by claiming she was sick) to go to a thing with Wilder who she later kissed and the next day tells him she can't go out with him off-screen.
• Professor David Wilder
  • Kissed/Almost Fling
    • Beginning: "Something Wilder" (5.13)
    • Broke Up: "In A Lonely Place" (5.16)
      • Reason: Joey inadvertently stands David up after getting mugged. This gives him the time to reflect upon the relationship and he realizes that he can't have an affair with a student.
• Eddie Doling
  • First Kiss:
    • "Instant Karma!" (6.04)
      • Eddie thinks she only kissed him to get back at Dawson; so it doesn't lead to anything until later episodes.
  • Boyfriend
    • First Relationship:
    • Beginning: "Ego Tripping At The Gates Of Hell" (6.07)
    • Broke Up: "Rock Bottom" (6.13)
      • Reason: He left without telling her
    • Second Relationship:
    • Beginning: "Love Bites" (6.18)
    • Broke Up: "Catch-22" (6.20)
      • Reason: They didn't see a future with each other
• Christopher
  • Boyfriend
    • Beginning: About a year or two before "All Good Things..." (6.23)
    • End: "...Must Come To An End" (6.24)
      • Reason: Joey breaks up with him over the phone after having found a ring in his drawer back in New York.

Holmes' thoughts on Joey Potter

"I'm a lot like Joey," said Holmes. "I think they saw that. I come from a small town. I was a tomboy. Joey tries to be articulate and deny that she doesn't have a lot of experience in life. Her life parallels mine, which is all about new everything—relationships, personal perceptions—and about being guarded." Holmes filmed the pilot of Dawson's Creek in Wilmington, North Carolina, during spring break of her senior year of high school in 1997. When the show was picked up by The WB, Holmes moved to Wilmington, where the show filmed.

Dawson's Creek ran from 1998 to 2003, and Holmes was the only actor to appear in all 128 episodes. "It was very difficult for me to leave Wilmington, to have my little glass bubble burst and move on. I hate change. On the other hand it was refreshing to play someone else," she said in 2004. Holmes confirmed that, as often happens on soaps, the character was a caricature of the actor:

I miss her spirit, and her spunk, and I miss her anxiety. She always had these long speeches about her fears and her future and love. It was a great tool for me personally because I got to get it all out. I was able to psychoanalyze all of it everyday [sic?] with her and then I wouldn't have to do it on my own. So much of me is in Joey and it really felt like I grew up on television.

Reception

Katie Holmes received high acclaim during second season and has since been referred to as the series' central character by the media.

"Joey Potter is a headstrong, vibrant, wily, sultry, and determined go-getter. And yet, in a gloriously contradictory manner, in spite of her tough-as-nails exterior demeanor, Joey's also a frail, sometimes uncertain, emotionally sensitive, in-need-of-love person", said the show's official book. Joey, named for Jo in Little Women, for years had been climbing in Dawson's bedroom window and platonically sharing his bed. Joey's mother had died from cancer when Joey was thirteen and her father, Mike (Gareth Williams), was in prison for "conspiracy to traffic in marijuana in excess of 10,000 pounds." Her harried, unmarried, and very pregnant sister, Bessie (Nina Repeta), about ten years older than Joey, was raising her while running the Ice House restaurant, where Joey worked as a waitress. GQ described Joey as "kind of an uptight fussbudget—one who's always twisted up over doing the right thing and bungling-up ways to hook up with her crush and across the creek neighbor, Dawson."

The 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) tall brunette enchanted the press, writers of both sexes commenting how Holmes was the sort of girl one wants to bring home to meet the parents and to marry. "The Audrey Hepburn of her generation", was one typical comment. Time called her "impossibly lovely" and Entertainment Weekly said she was "next up for idolhood." Variety, reviewing the pilot, said Holmes "is a confident young performer who delivers her lines with slyness and conviction." Holmes made such an impression in Hollywood, The New York Times Magazine claimed everyone was seeking to cast a "Katie Holmes type", who, the reporter claimed, "is a throwback to the 1950s: she is a smart girl next door (as opposed to the babe-o-rama blondes)"—the sort represented by her Dawson's Creek co-star Michelle Williams. But her "type" was no less attractive, Arena magazine declaring her "the most coquettishly sexy woman on television. Anywhere."

Holmes was soon on the covers of magazines such as Seventeen, TV Guide, and Rolling Stone. Jancee Dunn, an editor at Rolling Stone said she was chosen for the cover because "every time you mention Dawson's Creek you tend to get a lot of dolphin-like shrieks from teenage girls. The fact that she is drop-dead gorgeous didn't hurt either."

Reviews were mixed. The Blade said the characters "just talk like they came from a planet ruled by Manhattan psychologists, one where small talk is punishable by death." Holmes herself needed help with the dialogue. "Sometimes before we read a script, I have to get my dictionary and call people to make sure I'm pronouncing some of the words correctly." The show brought her national attention and many fans back home; Toledo's Thanksgiving Day parade in November 1998 had record attendance when Holmes was named grand marshal.

"As Joey", said Life magazine, "Holmes has had seismic influences on teen life... Through it all, Joey has managed to hang on to her integrity... The show—and Katie's character in particular—has touched a nerve."

Her relationship with Pacey is usually listed as one of the best love stories in any show ever. Jezebel said "their screwball dynamic, coupled with actors Katie Holmes and Joshua Jackson’s untapped chemistry and an intricately plotted courtship subverted everything expected of the show. It unsurprisingly still resonates with so many millennial women who grew up watching the series. There was a time when we had come for the angst, but now we were staying for the romance.". They were included in TV Guide's list of "The Best TV Couples of All Time".. They are also in MsMojo's lists "Top 10 Cutest Teen Drama Couples" and "Top 10 Iconic TV Couples of the 2000s". And also featured on the Buzzfeed's "19 Friends-To-Lovers TV Couples That Stole Fans' Hearts" list.