After the finale, even with only specific focus on Jax, there are a plethora of scenes that can be recontextlised and looked back upon with fresh eyes, both from information revealed and suspicions confirmed. Jax’s breathless reappearance after she ran off when they discovered Kaufmo had abstracted, the stargazing adventure suggestion, her and Ragatha’s following reaction after Ragatha responded ‘Not anymore’ to Pomni asking Jax if she has any actual friends, Jax sadly circling her glass after Ragatha talked about her mother, multiple scenes where she has stared at her hand, most significantly after she shoved Pomni away after Pomni hugged her, but also notably after Zooble told her she is still one of them despite everything she has done. I could go on, though out of everything, there is one recontextlised detail that has had a noticeably powerful hold on me. It occurs during the torture sequence in episode eight.
I don’t believe it is a controversial statement to say that Jax’s section is one of the most rememberable moments of the torture sequence, with the imagery of her being peeled being striking to put to simply. When thinking back to this sequence, it is really a coin flip to whether her or Ragatha’s section comes to mind first. On first viewing, this scene further shows the insecurities and fears people have been pointing out back Jax from as far back as the pilot. Her fear of being vulnerable. Mocked. The joke that people are laughing at. Defenceless in the face of her peers, in the face of those she holds dear. Her mask violently ripped away to show who she is beneath. Though beyond that, as people have been pointing out since episode eight’s release, that fear of ridicule, jeer. The terror of being forced into the mercy others for her existence. That the shell she had been using to protect herself will be forcefully ripped away and her true self, her egg yolk coloured centre, will be exposed after doing everything to hide it away…and it being laughed at. Though the imagery of this scene with the confirmation of Jax being transfem isn’t what I wanted to talk about, though it is important. What has caught my eye here…is Ribbit.
Out of the three, it is Ribbit who pulls Jax’s skin off her body, while Pomni and Kaufmo only restrain her. For the time between episode eight’s release and first watching The Last Act in the cinema, I held no curiosity for this specific choice in imagery. No specific rationale to why suspicion should be held towards this decision. Not one nagging question in the back of my mind to why Ribbit. Only Ribbit. I didn’t believe I had a reason to. To me, the reasoning felt obvious. Though we were yet to know the specifics behind Ribbit’s abstraction and what happened to her and Jax’s relationship, Ribbit’s importance to Jax was clear. They were her friend. Quickly assumed to be the closest connection she formed in the circus. Swiftly pointed to as the possible catalyst to Jax’s slow downwards spiral and vile behaviour towards those around her. Someone who haunts her. While running through intermission time, she could not help but stop in her tracks to stare at Ribbit’s door. While Jax reacts with anger after looking at Kaufmo’s door, her eyes become wide and pin pointed when she looks at Ribbit’s. Right before she begins to abstract in episode seven, she sees a hallucination of Ribbit’s arms coming out from a hole in the wall and reaching out to her, with the abstraction sequence starting after Jax reaches back and touches the hallucination. Of course they would have a more pronounced role in Jax’s torture scene. Of course Ribbit would be the one chosen to peel away Jax’s skin. What more would there be to consider before going into The Last Act? It already seemed abundantly clear. And it is still a contributing factor. Of course so. But after The Lact Act, after Remeber…it is more than that. It is more the closeness between Jax and Ribbit. More than another manifestation of Jax’s guilt about what happened to Ribbit.
It is the reason Jax sabotaged their relationship and pushed Ribbit away.
Ribbit had given Jax the opportunity and a safe environment to open up more about her life before the circus, wanting to show that she trusts Jax and that Jax can trust them. An opportunity Jax actually accepted, and even though she didn’t say it directly, only saying how she regretted telling her mother something deep and personal, something that led to her mother laughing and insulting her, Ribbit was able to see her. Saw her and only looked at her with complete affection, carefully taking off her bowtie and putting it on Jax’s ear, promising her safety, that her secret would be safe with them. A blissful moment where Jax felt seen and safe and could exist.
And then came a knock, and Jax came bursting out of a bubble she thought had popped. All her fears immediately flooding back in, everything from her life before the circus suddenly piling back on her. And after everything we had learnt, after everything we have seen from Jax, is it a surprise what she thought after leaving Ribbit’s room and what came next?
Jax thought that Ribbit would use it against her. Thinking that she had stupidly, so stupidly, given Ribbit complete power her. Given Ribbit the opportunity to expose what she has quietly been suffocating at any time she would please. That Ribbit could one day, without warning, tear off her mask and join in with everyone as they laughed and laughed and laughed. Everything that would have been the last thing Ribbit would ever want to do to her friend…but Jax refused to see that, couldn’t see that.
So she pushed them away. Avoided her. Tried to pretend that everything had been fake. Pushing and pushing as she sabotaged the best thing you could have while living in the circus; someone who wanted and loved her. Someone that only wanted her to feel comfortable being vulnerable around her. That wanted her to know that she could trust her. And then she was gone.
Looking back at the torture sequence, seeing the shadows of Ribbit, Kaufmo and Pomni, watching as Ribbit peels away Jax’s skin by pulling on her ears, one of the things she described as being the ‘pinnacle of masculinity’, I can’t help but wonder about what exact thoughts were going through her head. Maybe she was too focused on what was going on around her to think of much. Or maybe the thoughts came too easily.
‘This is what it was all for, what you gave up to protect yourself. You killed your best friend to save yourself from this. You allowed what friends you had left to be dragged down with them to continue doing so. Has it been worth it? Has the continued drowning provided more comfort than what she tried to give to you?’
