Thoughts on Tara's family...

[Dazey]

mariacomet wrote: I only see two scenarios here.

1. Tara's mother also believed that she was a demon, hence she married Maclay and allowed her daughter to be told the 'demon story.'

2. The demon story is new, and Tara's mother was unable to refute it when it started because of her 'condition.'

My theory would be 2.

Assuming that she had a mental illness...Did Maclay marry her before the age of 20 and when the symptoms began, come up with what he deemed the be the most logical conclusion? ...IF Tara's mother did have a condition, then it seems reasonable to think that Maclay might have actually believed the demon story. I don't think so, since Maclay reacts at the end of Family like a man that has just been exposed as a fraud.

Oh, I don't think so either...in fact it's pretty clear both he and Donny knew the demon thing was bogus.

As noted above, I don't know that he is the type of heart strong individual that would marry someone with such a conditions. If the symtoms did manifest themselves when she was 20, and she didn't die till Tara was 17 - we can guess that Maclay and Tara's mom had quite a long marriage. The other question then is - does Maclay REALLY have what it takes to STAY and CARE FOR someone with such a condition for that long?

I don't know about that, but one thing should be noted about Mr. Maclay--he's a right bastard, but he's not a monster. In the shooting script Joss indicated that one of his lines should be delivered in a tone that was "strict, but not bullying," and I've kind of taken my view of the character from that. In his own twisted way I believe Mr. Maclay loves Tara, though he has odd ideas about what loving someone entails. I think he may really have been convinced that everything he did to Tara was in her best interest.

I know that the age of 20 is mentioned as the age where the demon takes hold. I wonder if this age isn't a number that Tara's father picked pout out of the proverbial hat. ...It is an age...where a young woman might have the urge to try and use her independence to leave her family - unless, as Tara's dad asserts, she is a demon.

Definitely a possibility, I would say.

xita wrote: Tara was 18 when she got to college, she turned 19 that november. ...Which I have explained before wouldn't be the case under California public school laws, she would have had to flunk a grade in order for that to be true. ...it just means not careful enough writing.

Of course, we don't know for sure that Tara grew up in California, and the laws of other states are different. But even assuming she did, there's another possibility--in the shooting script Donny says, probably hyperbolically, that he doesn't think Tara spoke till she was 8. Even if that is an exaggeration, it seems Tara was morbidly shy as a child--and with her stutter as well, she may have been thought to have a developmental disability. This could have affected her entrance into or progress through school.

The biggest problem I have with speculating about Tara's past is that a lot of what was explained was an afterthought...we have to make things fit in where they weren't meant to originally be about the same thing.

Mmmm...I see your point, but really not much was revealed about Tara before "Family" except that she was a witch, her mom was a witch, and she had a secret. Oh, and she was a Great Big Lesbo. So there really isn't much that has to be made to fit. Plus, it's fun.

Biggest problem with Family, "The Women in our Family have demon in them." What family is he talking about?

That is a problem. It would have been easier if he'd said "her mother's family," but he didn't. Perhaps more evidence that he himself made the whole thing up? Though he'd still have to have a well-thought-out explanation, or Tara wouldn't have bought it.

So because Tara got her crystal from grandmother, I am going to assume she is the one who taught her magic...Though it bothers me that Grandma wasn't able to knock some sense into mom.

Tara didn't get the crystal directly from her grandmother, she found it in her attic. Her grandmother may even have been dead by that time.

Rosenberg wrote: I thought Tara mentioned to Willow that she'd been practicing magic all her life. So, I don't think she would have been practicing it covertly.

I think it would have to have been covert in that household. In fact Mr. Maclay alludes to as much: "You don't even try to hide it anymore."

Willow mentioned in Tough Love that Tara had been out way longer than she had. That could tie in with the comment Tara made about how after her mother died, she started staying out late and lying to her family about things. Maybe she was lying and staying out late because she was developing a relationship with another girl (or maybe just hoping to develop a relationship). I wouldn't be surprised if Tara showed up at the Lesbian Alliance meetings, in spite of her shyness.

Yeah, the "out longer" comment is very very interesting. A lot of people have assumed it means Tara had a relationship prior to Willow, but I don't think so (although it's possible, with the whole "lying and staying out all night" thing). I think the Lesbian Alliance is a good bet, though. I can just see Tara getting to college and being so excited (albeit extremely nervous) about spreading her wings, and looking at a campus events flyer and thinking, "Wicca group, joining that, Lesbian Alliance, joining that...."

It's interesting that we've pretty much assumed that Tara always knew she was gay--I certainly assumed it--but didn't really have any proof...until "Tabula Rasa." Just as, in real life, it took Willow a while to figure out she was gay, Tara seemed to know it instinctively.

Am I hogging this thread? I feel like I'm hogging this thread.

[xita]

Well see that's what I took by the out longer statement.

Tara seems to be neither the type to have had a relationship before Willow or to have gone the gay alliance meeting.

I say I have known I was gay since I was 12 or I have been out to myself since I was 12, because that's the time I figured out that I liked girls in a "gay" way. I didn't have a relationship or go to a lesbian meeting till I was 18. I think that's what Willow meant. Someone should write a fic of Tara telling Willow of her first crush or the first gay books she snuck out of the library. So cute, anyway, Willow didn't figure out the nature of her feelings for women till Tara. That's what I think is meant by out longer.

Anyway for those interested in Tara interpretation, this will change your view maybe, This is from the writer's first draft of intervention! This is the answer to what one writer at least thought Tara was doing out all night:

quote:

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Tara: Everyone, before you jump all over her, listen. People do strange things when they've had a loss. Buffy's mother died and it's going to take her a long time to get over it. When I lost my mother, I turned into... like, this wild thing, heading into the woods, staying out all night in these caves I found... the whole family thought I'd lost my mind...

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quote:

[AutumnT]

Thanks for posting that Intervention bit Xita. It does give more concrete information. The context of those lines had always puzzled me.

Autumn

[tommo]

That's a whole different idea there, with that little bit from the writer's first draft. Interesting. I'm really interested in the early years of Tara's life. Especially with that phrase from Mr Maclay "The women in our family have demon in them." It's almost as if the family encompasses one huge tribe or something; and I think this is where we get the idea from that he's some kind of hick. I honestly don't think he is.

But if Tara had demonstrated some kind of 'wildness' when her mother died, I suppose this would give credence to the demonic possession theory. Her grief transposed into some kind of madness. That's a shame.

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"Bitter, party of one. Bitter, party of one." she muttered... ~ Four Months After by Capt. Murdock

[Hemiola]

"...this wild thing, heading into the woods..."

Since this is specifically described as an "early draft", it seems likely to me that this is a reference to the original "Tara is part Woodsprite" idea that Joss had .

[Rosenberg]

No Dazey, you're not hogging the thread. I find your ideas interesting.

Thanks for the shooting script calrification. Running into the woods and hiding out in caves? I guess that would be as good a place as any to practice spells.

I've always wondered though if Tara has ever told Willow the complete story of her family, her background and her adolescence. Maybe there are some details she's kept to herself. No hard evidence of this to go on. Just speculating. BTW, I know the time travel angle is overdone, but I would like to see what would have happened if Willow and Tara would have met in high school. Geek Willow and shy Tara - interesting to think about.

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I'm very seldom naughty

[Dazey]

quote:

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Originally posted by Hemiola:
Since this is specifically described as an "early draft", it seems likely to me that this is a reference to the original "Tara is part Woodsprite" idea that Joss had

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But it's a draft of "Intervention." Way after the writing of "Family." All that woodsprite stuff had long since seen the bottom of a wastebasket.

Thanks a lot for posting that, xita...somehow I never stumbled across it. I like the idea...it makes heaps more sense than Tara going out and partying with the local rednecks. It's also more romantic...I picture her like Cathy in Wuthering Heights, running wild across the moors...sigh.quote:

[Cipher]

I think it's possible Tara checked out the Lesbian Alliance, but I think she would have been just as shy as she was at the wicca group (maybe too shy to even go?). It doesn't seem likely that she met anyone in college before Willow.

It almost doesn't seem as if Tara had any relationship before Willow. I wonder if she'd had any girlfriends in high school; I expect she was attracted to girls and had one or more crushes, but my guess is that her repressive family and her innate shyness prevented her from ever pursuing anyone. She felt like her place in the world was to be forever unnoticed. Having been "noticed" back in high school wouldn't seem to be consistent with that.

I think when her mom died it triggered her need for independence from her family and may have been the beginning of what set her up attending UC-Sunnydale away from her family's control. But until she turned 18 and could get away she may have started to secretly rebel. Perhaps some pursuit of other girls occurred as part of that (being "out", if not to her family necessarily) but no serious relationships seem likely. Note that I'm not suggesting she's gay to rebel, rather that pursuing it instead of repressing it could be part of rebelling against her restrictive family (though we don't know whether they knew or how they'd have felt about it anyway; they didn't particularly bat an eye when Willow talked to Tara about their relationship in the confrontation in Family).

It's hard to imagine Tara going out and being wild or anything--and that may not be at all what her sneaking out was like, perhaps it was just sneaking out to practice magic, presumably on her own--but if she was a bit wild in the aftermath of her mother's death, Tara might have convinced herself (perhaps with "help" from her family if they found out about it) such behavior was evidence of her "inner demon". She may have turned away from such wildness in an effort to keep the "demon" bottled up (or to prove to herself that it wasn't evil or didn't control her).

As for how she pays for college, maybe her grandmother left her a trust fund that she got either when her mother died or when she turned 18. My recollection of the doll's eye crystal suggests that her grandmother had died some time before and Tara may not have known her that well (died when Tara was young, or even before she was born--in which case the trust fund might have been left to her mother and passed to her when her mother died).

Anyway, just some speculative ramblings for further discussion.