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Generally, he seems to enjoy his family's wealth while noticing and casually disparaging some of its absurdities. His family's wealth and power was a source of tension between him and Daria during their relationship, sometimes from his unnoticed privilege and sometimes because she automatically assumed the worst because of his class.
==Tom's importance in canon==
==The "Love Triangle" Story Arc==
[[Image:Tom_DyeDye.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Tom tries to head off Jane's verbal onslaught]] ▼
In the episode "[[Jane's Addition]]," Tom was introduced and began dating [[Jane Lane]] in very short order. They met at a [[Mystik Spiral]] gig while Daria was briefly absent. The amount of time Jane spent with Tom was a source of tension between Daria and Jane for many episodes afterward, much as Jane's dates with [[Evan]] had been ("[[See Jane Run]]").
''See [[Tomgate]]''
Daria and Tom, however, had a lot in common. Though Jane was never portrayed as stupid, she was definitely not as "book-smart" as Daria or Tom. By the episode "[[I Loathe a Parade]]," however, it was clear that the tension between Daria and Tom had blossomed into something else. Meanwhile, Tom and Jane's relationship began to deteriorate, with increasing clashes between the two; Tom made several big romantic gestures to Jane, ones that were out of character for him, to try and revive the relationship ("[[Sappy Anniversary]]"). After the end, Tom admitted they'd just been getting bored of each other. (Notably, he didn't blame Jane for this and said this is something that just happens in relationships.)
===Why?===
Meanwhile, Daria and Tom began a strange flirtation in "[[Fire!]]", which did not go unnoticed by Jane. ("When," she asks bitterly, "did I become a third wheel in my own relationship?") While Tom and Daria hadn't been shown doing anything before then, Jane appeared to have been worried already that he was becoming interested in her friend.
▲[[Image:Tom_DyeDye.jpg|thumb| leftright|250px|Tom tries to head off Jane's verbal onslaught]]
In "[[Dye! Dye! My Darling]]", Tom tried to talk to an unwilling Daria about their situation, leading to a moment known as [[The Kiss]] in Tom's car. This betrayal nearly ended Daria and Jane's friendship. Daria's relationships with both Jane and Tom were not fully resolved until ''[[Is it Fall Yet?]]''. At the end of that movie, Daria and Jane's friendship was revealed to be stronger than the boy-drama, and Daria decided to pursue a romance with Tom. Sometimes the characters would joke about how Daria was dating her friend's boyfriend ("[[Life in the Past Lane]]", "Is It College Yet?").
In the [[off-canon canon]] [[Is_It_Fall_Yet%3F#On_Is_It_Fall_Yet.3F|IIFY Post-Movie Chat]], when asked which of the girls was a better kisser, Tom covered himself by claiming he had "no memory of ever kissing Jane" - Jane responded with "Tom who?".
In a [http://www.the-wildone.com/dvdaria/glenninterviewsfull.html 2006 interview with Kara Wild], [[Glenn Eichler]] said Tom was created as "I thought it was really pushing credibility for Daria to have only had one or two dates during her whole high school career - I thought it was time in the evolution of her personality for a boyfriend to enter the picture. And of course it would provide us with some fresh storylines, always welcome after 39 episodes." The reason Tom started as Jane's boyfriend was both because Glenn felt Daria would need to grow on a high school boy for him to ask her out, meaning "he would need to spend a fair amount of time in her company BEFORE they started dating", and because "I thought the situation would allow us to explore and test Daria and Jane's friendship". He admits this "may have backfired" as a chunk of the audience didn't buy Jane would forgive Daria for that.
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