Joyce Summers is a fictional character in the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, played by Kristine Sutherland.
Joyce Summers, the mother of title character Buffy, first appeared in the episode "Welcome to the Hellmouth", bringing Buffy to Sunnydale after Buffy burns down the gym at her old school.
She made appearances from season one to season seven, appearing in each season at least once, being one of few non-cast member characters to do so. Joyce got involved with a number of men, including Ted, a robot played by John Ritter, in the episode "Ted ".
She flirted with Xander Harris under a spell in "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered'", and had sex with Buffy's Watcher Rupert Giles twice on top of a police car, while under another spell in the episode "Band Candy ".
Joyce Summers eventually went to her death, starting with what seemed to be a small sickness in "Out of My Mind ". After she has surgery in "Listening to Fear ", the Scooby Gang thinks that Joyce is okay. But to the shock of many, Buffy finds her mother dead on the couch in "I Was Made to Love You ", after dying of an aneurism.
She returns in the season six episode "Normal Again " in an alternate reality where Buffy was a mental patient and was just dreaming up vampires and demons and the Slayer. She made her second to last appearance in the season seven episode "Conversations with Dead People ", where she came to Dawn Summers as a ghost. Her final appearance is in "Bring on the Night " where Joyce comes to Buffy in a dream.
Joyce made 58 guest appearances on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, from season one to season seven.
