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D.W. Read

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D.W. Read
DW S8E06.png
Age 4 (s2[1]-s3[2], s17[3])

(promotional)[4]
5 (s3,[5] "Beastly Birthday"[6])

Grade Preschool
Gender Female
Animal Aardvark[7]
Birthday Six months after Arthur's birthday[8]
March 1st[9]
Eye color Blue (books only)[10] Black (TV show only)
Hair color Light brown
Complexion Peach
Favorite color Pink[4]
Residence Arthur's House
Family Jane Read (mother)
David Read (father)
Arthur Read (older brother)
Kate Read (younger sister)
Thora Read (paternal grandmother)
Dave (maternal grandfather)
Gustav (maternal great-great-grandfather)
Bonnie (paternal aunt)
Sean (paternal uncle)
George (paternal cousin)
Ryder (cousin)
Bud (paternal uncle)
Loretta (paternal aunt)
Monique (paternal cousin)
Ricky (paternal cousin)
Loretta's daughter (paternal cousin)
Jessica (maternal aunt)
Richard (maternal uncle)
Cora (maternal cousin)
Lucy (maternal aunt)
Lucy's husband (maternal uncle)
Fred (maternal uncle)
David's brother (paternal uncle)
Claudia (aunt)
Hilary (aunt)
Ruthie (aunt)
Theo (great-grand uncle)
Jane's great-grandfather (maternal great-great-grandfather)
Jane's great-grandmother (maternal great-great-grandmother)
Matthew (maternal great-great-great-uncle)
Thora's Brother 1 (paternal great-uncle)
Thora's Brother 2 (paternal great-uncle)
Thora's Brother 3 (paternal great-uncle)
Thora's father (paternal great-grandfather)
Thora's mother (paternal great-grandmother)
Thora's mother's great-uncle (paternal great-great-great-great-uncle)

Book debut Arthur's Nose
Cartoon debut "Arthur's Eyes"
Voiced by Kelly Greenley (LB: ATT; AB)
Elizabeth Telefus (LB: ACA; D.W., the Picky Eater (game))
Michael Caloz (s1 - s3)
Oliver Grainger (s4 - s6; APC)
Jason Szwimmer (s7 - s10; AIORnR; PfB s1)
Luciano Rauso (AMP)
Robert Naylor (s11 - s15; PfB s3)
Jake Beale (s16 - s17)
Andrew Dayton (s18 - s19)
Christian Distefano (s20 - s21)
Ethan Pugiotto (s22 - present)
Oh, everyone thinks that my brother stinks like a piece of yellow cheese! But me, I say, that he's okay, as long as there's a breeze!

—D.W., "Arthur and the Crunch Cereal Contest"

D.W. Winifred Read is a preschooler who is Arthur's younger sister and Kate's older sister.

Physical appearance

Like the rest of her family, D.W. is an anthropomorphic aardvark. She has short, light brown slightly curled/waved hair in the form of a bob cut, which is up to her cheeks; plus, she has bangs. She wears a white long-sleeved blouse, a frilly sleeveless knee-length magenta jumper dress, frilly cream-colored or white panties, light pink pantyhose and blue-and-cyan strapped Mary Jane shoes. D.W. Read is the second oldest of the aardvark family and the oldest of the daughters.

Alternate outfits

D.W. has many alternate outfits: Her footsie pajamas, pink frilly swimsuit, red polka dot dress (usually worn to formal occasions), her Arthur outfit, gymnastics suit, and much more. In some of the books, she wore pink overalls. In "D.W. Thinks Big," she wore a solid pink dress to Lucy's wedding. In "Double Tibble Trouble," she wore dark green overalls. In the summer, she either wears a light-brown jumper and a white short sleeved T-shirt, or shorts and a blue T-shirt, like in "D.W.'s Deer Friend" when she went camping and in "Best Enemies." She also wears her blue T-shirt with gray jeans. In the episode "D.W. All Fired Up," she wore an orange long-sleeved shirt under purple overalls, with light green pockets. In "D.W. Swims with the Fishes," she wore a one-piece ordinary pink swimsuit instead of her typical pink frilly swimsuit.

Pink stripes

In the books, her white blouse and pantyhose typically features pink stripes not seen on the television show, likely due to the budget/time constraints of television animation. The pink stripes were also present in the CGI film Arthur's Missing Pal. These are also often seen in promotional images, as well as most merchandise, such as stickers or plush toys.

Personality

Main personality

Despite her superficial appearance, D.W. is often annoying to Arthur (he considers her a pest and once warned Sue Ellen that her name stands for Disaster Warning, though D.W. would later adopt DisasterWarning99 as her username for Virtual Goose) and sometimes, she takes pleasure in getting him in trouble, but deep down, she truly loves her brother and gladly works with Arthur whenever their family is in trouble. D.W. gets along well with most of her friends but often becomes very dramatic when things don't go her way and has a tendency of being very bossy. She is known for her many short-lived obsessions and temper tantrums, two of her longest-lived obsessions being Mary Moo Cow and the song, "Crazy Bus", both of which annoy Arthur to no end. She also has an imaginary friend named Nadine, whom she plays with and confides her problems to when no one else is around. She hates her full name and prefers to have everyone call her "D.W." instead. However, after learning the family history behind her name in "The Rhythm and Roots of Arthur," she comes around to liking it, and in "D.W. and the Beastly Birthday" it is implied in Arthur's futuristic dream that she eventually goes by her first name "Dora" as she grows older. She is a drama queen and also seems to be very protective of Kate.


Being a preschooler, she often doesn't understand the definition of words and when she tries to use complex words for her age, such as "taxpaying" or "orphans", she accidentally turns them into words like "taxipaying" or "organs".[11] She also doesn't grasp important topics like where babies come from, in which she thought that they come from a large baby store.[12] She believed that teachers live at school and was rather stunned when Mr. Ratburn, temporarily staying at the Read household, told her that he has a home of his own. She expressed that the world seemed simple until then.[13] Despite all this, she's been shown to be pretty smart for a kid her age, such as in "Arthur's Spelling Trubble" when she catches on that her mom is bribing her with ice cream to leave Arthur alone to study.

D.W. has cephalophobia[14] (the fear of octopods and squids), and once she endured a short-lived fear of fire drills (and anything else related to fire).[15] She is a picky eater[16] and once, she had a profound hatred of spinach.[16] She also does not like tomatoes and in preschool, they are allowed as her one thing she doesn't have to eat when offered.[17] She once had a snowball from "D.W.'s Snow Mystery", which was stolen from the fridge (apparently by aliens) and she frequently blames Arthur for its disappearance, which is a running gag. She did this continually until Arthur tried to make her feel better by giving her what looked like her snowball, at which point D.W. admitted he couldn't have taken it from her.

Despite being pretty smart for a kid her age, D.W. can also gullible/easy to fool:

  • She believes that anything she sees on TV[18] that is enhanced to look good is good. This is suggested in "D.W. Goes to Washington," where Arthur brings up the story when they went to "Santa's Igloo", where you shared a sundae with "Santa" and you had to buy a sundae to share it with the guy in the Santa costume.
  • She is frequently tricked by the Tibble Twins into doing silly things that get her in trouble;[19] even though she has acknowledged many times that the Tibbles always lie.
  • Arthur and Buster were once able to fool D.W. into thinking that green potato chips were fatally poisonous (though she eventually discovered the truth).[20]

She possesses a fondness for unicorns. She has a toy winged unicorn named Uni from the My Fluffy Unicorn franchise[21] and once decorated her portion of the family Christmas tree with toy unicorns and troll dolls.[22] She would like to one day have a real unicorn and has a display of troll dolls in her room which appears throughout the series despite the fad peaking in the 1990s.[23] D.W., like many children her age, also has a fondness for plush toys in general. She wanted the toy Tina the Talking Tabby for Christmas, but ended up receiving Quackers the duck, instead.[22] She also owns a teddy bear[24] and a plush rabbit,[24] among other stuffed animals.

She is also known to host at least six episodes:

And, despite being gullible, there are many episodes where she gets exactly what she wants at the end of the episode, usually by tricking people such as Arthur:

There is some continuity with specific methods of this running gag. One example is the Bowling Ball that was used in an attempt to form the third grade only Parade Float Club which easily fell apart so she could take over. D.W. kept the Bowling Ball and placed it on her floor to keep Arthur from sneaking in after dark.

Being a small preschool child, as well as the middle child, she feels oppressed, and will stand up for herself as best she knows how. She often cites what she remembers about civil liberties when she wants to tell on Arthur or when Arthur gets something that she initially did not get to be a part of. ("Dad's Dessert Dilemma" and "The Chips are Down")

Past life

Baby D.W. wearing Mr. Read's cowboy hat

When D.W. was a baby, she originally had just clumps of hair, but in later seasons, it depicted her with a similar, but shorter, hairstyle. While D.W. was a baby; she was wearing a pink shirt, white disposable diapers, and pink socks. As such, she also had the same crib that had eventually become Kate's crib.

Future life

An imagined older D.W. eating potato chips at Arthur's concert

Not much is shown about her future life, though in "D.W.'s Time Trouble," she and Nadine looked older in one scene during D.W.'s dream where she wished that she was older than Arthur. A fantasy sequence in "D.W.'s Name Game" depicts an older version of her attending a concert of Arthur's and disrupting it by loudly eating potato chips. Her appearance is a taller version of her present self.

Dora.jpg

During Arthur's dream in "D.W. and the Beastly Birthday", D.W. is shown at age 9. She goes by Dora instead of D.W. ever since she turned 6. She wears a yellow sweater with a purple jacket, blue jeans and purple sneakers. "Dora" is written in Japanese across her sweater. She now wears orange frame glasses and a maroon headband. Her future look is reminiscent of the traditional Arthur outfit.

Other media

In the Living Books computer games, she had a brown complexion and orange hair in Arthur's Teacher Trouble and then had a pale complexion and dark brown hair in Arthur's Birthday, and she wore a purple shirt instead of a white one while wearing a jumper dress with white pantyhose or overalls. It was likely because of color and tone restrictions during the 16-bit era of computers and software. In these two games, she was voiced by Kelly Greenley, who has been one of only three women to voice D.W. in any form over the course of the Arthur-franchise. The other two are Elizabeth Telefus and the late Mary Kay Bergman, who voiced D.W. in the later games during the 32-bit era of computers and software (such as Arthur's Thinking Games).

Over the course of the long-running TV-series, D.W. has (so far) had six different voice actors:

  • Michael Caloz voiced her in the first three seasons.
  • Oliver Grainger voiced her in the fourth, fifth and sixth seasons.
  • Jason Szwimmer voiced her in the seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth seasons.
  • Robert Naylor voiced her in the eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth seasons. Naylor is currently D.W.'s longest-serving voice actor, having voiced the character for a total of five seasons.
  • Jake Beale voiced her in the sixteenth and seventh seasons.
  • Andrew Dayton has been D.W.'s voice actor since the eighteenth season.

Relationships

Family

D.W. lives with her family which consists of her father (David Read), her mother (Jane Read), her older and only brother (Arthur Read), and her baby sister (Baby Kate).

  • Arthur Read: Usually, Arthur and D.W. are seen fighting with each other,[25] especially over their television time and when she annoys him. Despite this, they truly love and care for each other. (Grandma Thora Appreciation Day, Grandpa Dave's Old Country Farm, Clarissa is Cracked, Just Desserts, Dad's Dessert Dilemma, Arthur's Mystery Envelope (episode), The Big Dig, Arthur's Knee, Mom and Dad Have a Great Big Fight, Arthur's Family Feud, Is There a Doctor in the House?.) In the episode "Lost!", D.W. is very concerned over Arthur's well being after she learned he was lost, and crawls in his bed at night to make sure he will not get lost again. A usual theme with Arthur and D.W., is Arthur usually forgets to play with D.W. the games he promised her. It was noted that Arthur used to play with D.W. all the time until Arthur thought she liked "baby stuff". She is naturally better than Arthur in many activities such as fishing,[26] storytelling, and coming up with a tune for music,[27] which made him quite jealous of her for such a young age. In most of her brother's fantasies, D.W. was often cast as an antagonist. Arthur had once angrily punched her in the arm for breaking his model plane in "Arthur's Big Hit." Sometimes, D.W. casts Arthur as an antagonist in her fantasies, such as in the story she told to the Tibbles in "I'd Rather Read It Myself."
  • Kate Read: Baby Kate is D.W.'s younger sister who looks up to D.W. and does favors for her regularly with Pal, e.g. finding her lost sock.[28] In the time she was born, D.W. was displeased when she had to share her room with Kate, and was planning various ways to get rid of her, or else she wants to move away. At one time, D.W. threatened to pinch Kate for taking away her toys and was sent to her room as a punishment for ten minutes.[29] Despite her initial disfavor of Kate, D.W. has come to deeply love and care for her little sister, and takes an active interest in her development.[30]
  • Pal: Arthur's dog Pal likes D.W. and D.W. regularly dislikes him and thinks he is dumb.[31] However, she sometimes treats him nicely as they can be seen playing together in the theme song.
  • Spanky: Spanky was a pet parakeet that was briefly owned by D.W. She was deeply attached to him and held a funeral following his death in "So Long, Spanky."
  • David Read: D.W. has a great relationship with her father. David seems to favor D.W. more than Arthur; for example, in "Cast Away," he brings D.W. on a trip that is supposed to be for him and Arthur, and in "The Pageant Pickle," he takes Arthur to see D.W.'s play despite them both knowing that it will be boring.
  • Jane Read: D.W. has a good relationship with her mother, but it seems as though she is a bit more strict than her father. When D.W. misbehaves at a restaurant (Arthur's Family Vacation (episode), D.W., the Picky Eater), is mean to Kate (Go to Your Room, D.W.), or demands other people, especially her mom to give her more allowance (More!), these can lead D.W. into trouble with her mom.

Friends

D.W. has many preschool friends such as Emily, the Tibbles and James.

  • Emily: Emily is D.W.'s best friend, but D.W. is often trying to compete with her.
  • Tommy Tibble and Timmy Tibble: The Tibbles are D.W's friends, but they often try to compete with her and pester her. They are also known to lie to D.W., often misleading her into doing foolish things for their own amusement. D.W. often finds herself at odds with them, but they usually make up later.
  • James MacDonald: James is a friend of D.W.'s who is rather shy at times. D.W. tries to get him to kiss her in "Kiss and Tell," thinking she would become a princess. He eventually did kiss her, but not much came of it, other than D.W. being slightly shocked.
  • Vicita Molina: Vicita and D.W. are next-door neighbors and occasionally play together. They are able to relate to each other easily because Vicita is only half a year younger than D.W. They generally get along, and Vicita often looks up to D.W., but D.W. can occasionally be bossy and dislikes it when Vicita excels at games.[32] In "Tales from the Crib," D.W. helps Vicita cope with moving out of her crib.
  • Binky Barnes: D.W. is friends with Arthur's classmate Binky. They become friends after D.W. eats a green potato chip and gets tricked by Arthur into thinking they are poisoned in "The Chips are Down", and they continue being friends in "Revenge of the Chip".[20] She tells Binky this and they become friends after they decided to spend the last of their days together, only to learn later that their poisoning was nothing more than a prank. They remain friends and they have even done ballet together in "D.W., Dancing Queen," and have remained on good terms since. In "Arthur's Big Hit," Binky is in complete shock after hearing that Arthur hit her.
  • Nadine Flumberghast: D.W.'s imaginary friend. They talk to each other a lot and go on adventures with each other.
  • Francine Frensky: D.W. takes Francine's side in "Locked in the Library!" and gets invited to Francine's party after Lisa doesn't invite her in "D.W.'s Very Bad Mood." In "Arthur's Big Hit," Francine feels sorry for D.W. after Arthur punches her in the arm.
  • Bud Compson: D.W. has been friends with Bud since the Compson family moved in to Elwood City. The two often spend time together, such as plotting to try to find a way to ride a rollercoaster together that they are told they're not tall enough to ride in "D.W. & Bud's Higher Purpose." In "The Lost Dinosaur," D.W. gives Bud advice on where to find Rapty.
  • Muffy Crosswire: D.W. and Muffy don't really interact, but when D.W. climbs the tree in "D.W. Blows the Whistle," Muffy finds help getting her down. In "D.W. Unties the Knot," Muffy helps D.W. plan her wedding. In "The Friend Who Wasn't There," Muffy walks up to D.W. and asks her who she's talking to. Muffy considers D.W. as a replacement for Francine in "Muffy's New Best Friend" but they do argue over the Mutant Muck Monster, it even shows that they're both bossy to each other, D.W. is trying to bargain with Muffy of how much money she wants from her in order to get it in "Arthur's Toy Trouble". Muffy calls D.W. an adorable little girl, she also tells her that she's doing great and that she can wear whatever she wants during George's movie in "The Director's Cut". In "The Great MacGrady", D.W., Muffy, and Arthur all work together in helping Mrs. MacGrady get well cleaning her house up a little since she's sick.
  • Sue Ellen Armstrong: D.W. and Sue Ellen do not interact much, but they do get along in "Sue Ellen Gets Her Goose Cooked." In "The Shore Thing," Sue Ellen explains what kelp is to D.W. and helps her calm down, they also trying getting along and together in "Sue Ellen's Little Sister" but D.W. gets kind of bossy with Sue Ellen while she's babysitting, in "Sue Ellen Moves In" during an alien flashback where Sue Ellen can be found evil in some ways, a flying saucer lands on a farm with 3 aliens disguised as Sue Ellen, 3rd grade Male Rat, and D.W. exiting the flying saucer on an escalator laughing crazy, which kind of looks like D.W. and Sue Ellen bonding a little.
  • Cheikh: D.W. and Cheikh are good friends. D.W. meets Cheikh in Africa in the episode "In My Africa."
  • Alan Powers: D.W. and Brain don't interact often, but they're still good friends. They sing In My Africa in the episode of the same name together.
  • Ladonna Compson: D.W. and Ladonna aren't really each other's type, except when D.W. accidentally loses Larry in "Bunny Trouble", Ladonna helps her look for him, D.W. offers Ladonna one of her mom's sweaters after she took off her Halloween spider costume, she also blends in with D.W. and Bud on the Halloween pranks in "Arthur and the Haunted Tree House", they even first met in "Based on a True Story" when both her and Bud first moved to Elwood City, D.W. is actually friends with Ladonna's brother Bud, but both D.W. and Ladonna are good friends too.
  • W.D. Merkle: D.W. and W.D. are good friends. They attempt to trick their parents into going home and think they do not like each other, only to become friends in the process.
  • Buster Baxter: D.W. and Buster don't have much in common, but Buster asks D.W. a few questions in "Arthur Accused!", D.W. sometimes mispronounces Buster's name a lot, she calls him Bus Stop, and him calling her P.W. in "Buster's Back", he's also being nice to her letting her have a peanut butter and jam sandwich even though he was with Arthur into tricking her about it having spinach in it, they make her throw up in "D.W., the Picky Eater" Arthur and Buster trick D.W. into thinking the green chip she ate is poison in "The Chips are Down", they can be found friends in a few ways.

D.W. Books

In addition to the Arthur Adventure titles, D.W. has appeared in a number of titles in her own series, including:

Many of these titles were adapted for the television series, while some were initially aired as television stories and later adapted as books.

Disguises and Aliases

Possessions

Appearances

Trivia

  • She is modeled after author Marc Brown's younger sisters,[33] Bonnie, Colleen, and especially Kim Brown.[34]
  • D.W. is similar to Lola Loud as they are both bratty and they are younger than the title character.
  • D.W. is unable to read and claims to not know time even though she knows when Mary Moo Cow comes on TV and whenever New Year's starts, but it's possible she's gained a built-in clock to these skills or she's reminded. She has also been shown in some episodes to be able to read a little bit, such as the "Moo" in "Mary Moo Cow" and in the book release Arthur's Reading Trick she is able to read the book Green Eggs and Ham.
  • She can only write her own name.[35]
  • It is clearly known that D.W hates Bionic Bunny, but in the episodes, "D.W. the Copycat" and "Arthur and the Crunch Cereal Contest", D.W. is watching and laughing. Though, in the former, she was most likely faking interest in the show as she was acting like Arthur in the episode. In the book Arthur's Promise, D.W. wears a Bionic Bunny costume and joins Arthur's Bionic Bunny Fan Club, though this possibly had more to do with wanting to spend time with her brother and his friends rather than an actual interest in Bionic Bunny.
  • In "Clarissa is Cracked", it is revealed that she closely resembles Grandma Thora as a young girl.
  • In the episode, "Postcards from Buster", it is revealed that she used to have an imaginary friend that was a pig named Snooter.
  • When Arthur says that D.W. doesn't like anything, in "D.W., the Picky Eater", D.W. defiantly states that she likes: peanut butter and jelly, strawberries, chocolate (without nuts), birthday cakes, and chocolate ice cream.
    • D.W. also likes spinach (or at least claims to after unwittingly eating it in a pot pie), and yaprak dolmasi, a Turkish dish.
    • D.W. also ate without complaint both the turkey dinner served by Mr. Read in Arthur's Perfect Christmas, as well as the "truly traditional" Christmas dinner that included such dishes as halva, puls, unleavened bread and roast lamb with turmeric.
    • In "That's MY Grandma!" she is delighted by Grandma Thora's kale cauliflower tart.
  • She knows how to whistle, as seen in "So Long, Spanky."
  • She has the first speaking role in the Arthur series: the line "come with me" in "Arthur's Eyes."
  • According to the lyrics of her performance of "The First Noel," she cannot count any higher than four. However, in "You Are Arthur" and "Arthur Weighs In" it is implied she can count up to twenty.
  • Michael Caloz is D.W.'s voice actor in the opening theme song.
  • She was born after her great grandaunt, Dora Winifred Read.

Gallery

:Main article: D.W. Read/Gallery

References

  1. "What does D.W. have to be upset about? She's only 4 years old!" Arthur Read to Francine Frensky, D.W.'s Very Bad Mood
  2. "I'm almost four and a half. I can take care of myself." - D.W. to Jane, "D.W. All Fired Up"
  3. "I can't believe it takes a 4-year-old girl to suggest picking straws." — D.W. Read to Arthur and his friends, "Just the Ticket"
  4. 4.0 4.1 http://pbskids.org/arthur/print/tradingcards/cards.html#pg-dw2
  5. "You know, turning five is a very big step."Emily to D.W. Read, "D.W.'s Perfect Wish"
  6. "5 year old, Dora Winifred Read eagerly gobbled up a green chip one afternoon, only to be informed by her practical joker brother, Arthur, that green chips were deadly." Arthur Read reading the newspaper, "Revenge of the Chip"
  7. http://www.pbs.org/parents/arthur/help/answers/faq_friends.html (archived page)
  8. "Your birthday isn't for six months!" Arthur Read to D.W. Read, Arthur's Birthday (episode).
  9. "D.W.'s Perfect Wish"
  10. See File:D.W.'s Guide to Preschool 3.JPG, for example.
  11. "More!"
  12. "D.W.'s Time Trouble"
  13. "The Rat Who Came to Dinner"
  14. "D.W. All Wet"
  15. "D.W., All Fired Up"
  16. 16.0 16.1 "D.W., the Picky Eater"
  17. D.W.'s Guide to Preschool
  18. "D.W. Unties the Knot"
  19. "Never, Never, Never"
  20. 20.0 20.1 "The Chips are Down"
  21. "D.W. Tricks the Tooth Fairy"
  22. 22.0 22.1 Arthur's Perfect Christmas
  23. "Staycation"
  24. 24.0 24.1 D.W. The Big Boss
  25. "Arthur's Family Feud"
  26. "Cast Away"
  27. "Arthur and the Crunch Cereal Contest"
  28. "The Great Sock Mystery"
  29. "Go to Your Room, D.W."
  30. "Baby Steps"
  31. "Arthur's Lost Dog"
  32. "Arthur and Los Vecinos"
  33. https://www.wgbh.org/programs/2019/12/27/marc-brown-arthur-and-the-real-mr-ratburn-the-rewind
  34. https://www.mccookgazette.com/story/1130520.html
  35. "D.W.'s Library Card"