Hank Summers is the father of Buffy and Dawn Summers, and ex-husband of Joyce Summers.
Biography
Hank met Joyce Summers during a homecoming in her freshmen year at college.[1] They married, and had their daughters Buffy and Dawn in Los Angeles. He took Buffy trick-or-treating until she was twelve.[2] At the end of 1996, he and Joyce divorced. Their fights and separation happened around the time Buffy was called as a Slayer,[3][4] making her believe her troubles caused their disagreements.[4] Joyce, Buffy, and Dawn then moved to Sunnydale.[5]
During the first year after the separation, Hank still visited Buffy and Dawn on some weekends,[4] and Buffy spent a summer vacation with him in Los Angeles, when he noticed she was distant and disconnected (due to her death fighting the Master,[1]) and he overcompensated, “spoiling" Buffy with shopping, since “at least when she was burning stuff down [he] knew what to say.”[6] On her eighteenth birthday, Hank cancelled an ice show with Buffy, a previous yearly tradition, promising he would make it up to her.[7] Later in the same year, Buffy went to Los Angeles to see her father.[8]
During Joyce's sickness and following death, Buffy tried to contact Hank leaving “messages all over the place,” with no response; at the time, the last she'd heard from him was that he was in Spain with his secretary.[9][10] During Buffy's death, though, Dawn indicated she had spoken with him, but hid her sister's absence in fear that she'd be taken away. Buffy defined Hank a “shiftless and absentee father.”[11]
When Buffy was stabbed with a demon skewer, it gave her visions of being a patient in a mental asylum, in which her last years as a Slayer in Sunnydale were part of her delusion. In Asylum Buffy's world, Hank and Joyce were together and deeply caring for their sole daughter.[12]
Years later, Hank had started working at the Silicon Valley, and reunited with his daughters in San Francisco. He has left Francesca and was then engaged to Paige, who was also the mother of two teenagers and has moved with him. In one of his monthly reunions with Buffy and Dawn, he announced he and Paige have decided to exclude Buffy from their wedding ceremony “for safety reasons,” based on her public reputation as a Slayer, which enraged Dawn and saddened Buffy.[13]
When Buffy left to the Safe Zone, she asked Dawn to “fill dad in on everything,”[14] implying they still maintained contact.
Behind the Scenes
- He was portrayed by Dean Butler.
Appearances
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Angel
Novels
Buffy the Vampire Slayer comics
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