Penny Lane

Disambiguation: The fanfic author nicknamed Penny Lane is described here.

Penny Lane is a daughter of Vicent and Amanda Lane and on of Jane's older sisters.

Character Overview


Penny is the middle-born child of the five Lane family siblings, the offspring of Vicent and Amanda Lane. Trent and Jane Lane are younger, and Summer and Wind are older. Penny is seen in only one episode, “Lane Miserables”, which gives a good introduction to her wayfarer appearance, abrasive personality and self-serving nature. She openly dislikes Wind and Summer, and Summer views her work abroad with contempt.

Penny is mentioned by Ms. Morris in "See Jane Run", when she describes Penny as not wanting to participate in PE class and that she had (sic) "taught her a thing or two about the American competitive spirit". Jane retorts that this was the reason that Penny had spent the last ten years outside the country.

Penny still has a room at La Casa Lane, which she apparently inhabits on the infrequent occasions she comes home. Her room is depicted in detail in the episode “Fire!”.

She is portrayed as living in various Latin American countries, and is described by other characters of thinking that her selling native-made goods can save the economies of the Third World. However, Lane Miserables makes it painfully obvious that she neither speaks Spanish nor particularly cares about the Third World, as she talks to the Costa Rican Finance Minister in English with random (bad) Spanish dropped in to punctuate while demanding compensation for a lost crafts stall during a volcanic disaster.

The old MTV Daria website has Penny refer to some of her work abroad: "my time setting up a coconut-husk sandal cooperative was fruitful, although I didn't want to impose my imperialist idea of proper foot measurement and now I'm stuck with a whole lot of size twos".

Penny has a pet parrot named Chiquito.

Penny Lane on Daria

 * “The Lane Family” on Outpost Daria
 * “Lane Miserables” (transcript) on Outpost Daria
 * “Lane Miserables” (summary) on Outpost Daria
 * Penny Lane has her say on MTV’s ‘’Daria’’ website

Essays and Commentary on Penny Lane

 * "Jane and the Lanes", an essay by The Angst Guy, which includes much information on Penny

Penny Lane in Fanfic
Only major appearances are listed here.
 * "African Queen" by The Angst Guy
 * "Like Angels’ Visits, Short and Bright" by The Angst Guy
 * "Smoking Mirror" by The Angst Guy
 * "There Beneath the Blue Suburban Skies" by The Angst Guy
 * “Penny for Your Virus” scriptfic by Bingo Hanis
 * “Penny for Your Thoughts” scriptfic by Canadibrit, an episode in The Look-Alike Series
 * “Beneath the Blue Suburban Skies” scriptfic by Jill Friedman

Penny Lane in Fan art and comics

 * Penny appears in several artworks by Liliane Grenier where she's depicted as a main influence on Jane's behavior showing them [running together] and [Penny looking bemused] as Jane unsuccessfully tries her hand at putting on lipstick. Penny also appears alongside her brother Wind as they play [mother and Father] with Penny [filing for divorce] Penny is also seen on The Lane Sisters and the Lane Family portrait by Grenier.
 * Penny and Summer Lane appear in page 4 of Wouter Jaegers' Dariarotica comic Growing pains where the two of them refused the hand-me-down clothing offered by their mother on different occasions.