My peeled lady in all stages of her transition. I want her outer layer to be removable at will so im probably gunna change up the start of the story to incorporate it, thankfully I havent wrote much yet =:p
I've got a good bit of writing down for her story too, a big thing being having her feel comfortable peeled, have her feel safe without her protective layer
The reaction to Jax after the finale has revealed some of y'all's internalized belief in punitive justice and how uncomfortable people can get when presented with the idea that a bad person is still a person.
A bad person doesn't need to suffer in order to 'earn' empathy, someone doesn't need to be punished in order to be more than just one thing, compassion isn't a transactional process.
A story that asks you to see someone's humanity and pain isn't the same as condoning the behavior, there is no punishment quota that needs to be met before someone can be empathized with.
Jax wasn't a good person but that doesn't automatically make her experience as an abuse survivor null and void. She perpetuated that cycle and was awful to those around her, but she was still victim to that cycle, and those two concepts are not mutually exclusive.
Why does Jax need to gain empathy through suffering? Isn't being a a person in pain enough? Do you actually want accountability or want retribution under the mask of accountability?
I want to talk about the different "Jaxes" that we see in Jax’s mindscape. Many people seem to think that they are all actually Jax and that that means she is a terrible person through and through. But that is not actually what they are.
They are all of Jax's masks that we see her wear throughout the show to keep people away from finding out the real Jax. Except they are all pushed up to a 100 (Pomni had to ask them where the real Jax is and they were all protecting the door from "visitors") so let's go through them and when we've seen them in the past and why! (Warning, I'm writing this before the finale comes out on youtube after watching it once in the cinemas, sorry if I don't remember everything perfectly ahah) :
Long post so! Rest under the cut 🐿✨️ :
Cartoony funny Jax : "The funny one" the one she's forced herself into the most. Everything is a joke, nothing is that deep, don't worry about it ! You wouldn't ask a circus clown how they're doing when they're performing, you wouldn't dig deeper than that, so why ask Jax? Simple defense mechanism, being the class clown that's obviously doing the best out of anyone and isn't affected by anything.
Violent Jax : This one I believe stems from what her family expected from her growing up more or less, a strong man. She is fulfilling her role, being manly, plus the violence keeps people away. Who would want to be friends with someone that would take any opportunity to shoot them in the face, even if they come back to life right after. We've seen this one only during adventures, when she believes she's playing a game. During the candy kingdom adventure she craved violence, she shot the rhino gangle, had a bomb explode during President Pomni, was so into shooting each other with guns... This is clearly a mask, when Pomni actually does try get her to fight back and be violent with her, Jax can't actually do it. This mask falls when the violence actually becomes real and isn't part of an adventure anymore.
This one appears to Pomni in the mindscape, knowing that it was the real Pomni as a last effort to get Pomni to leave, to stop looking. If Jax does something this unforgivable, this awful (choking Pomni) then surely she'll leave, right ? Wrong, Pomni you crazy gal, you
Misogynistic, homophobic, overtly sexual Jax : This one pushes away forcefully everything Jax both hates and wants more than anything. Queerness and femininity. And if they are forced into those roles (wearing the maid dress) it's all just a big fat joke because Jax obviously Hates those things so there's no way hes actually a girl right? This one is all a big shitstorm of internalised transphobia, repression, jealousy, defense mechanism... It makes the very people she wants to be like and who would undertand so deeply uncomfortable that there's no way these very people would ever want to get close to Jax.
That one is why they mock Zooble whenever they mention doing anything typically queer (bartending, tattooing), this is why she goes extra hard on Ragatha and Gangle (cute girls), it's because Jax wants that so badly but hates that about herself and doesn't want others to find out, so she pretends to hate all of it so others have no suspicions of anything.
Piano playing Jax : I don't believe this one is part of the masks. She's the part of Jax that I believe erases herself and does agree to play along with the masks, but wants so deeply for others to find out the real her but is terrified. I believe this one is the trauma, a sort of fawn response to everything. Would only tell someone at the end of everything. And she does, despite the trauma, she wants to be seen. She wants people to know she was here.
So, why do all of this ? As I mentioned in a previous post, Jax is deeply traumatised from her first and only coming out experience to her mother. In her mind, coming out means being ridiculed and insulted, and it means hurting the ones you love. She literally believes she killed her mother because of her coming out. That is also why, in every single scenario that plays out, Jax was responsible for making another character abstract. (If I remember well, Ragatha, Zooble, and Gangle, the two most feminine and the one queer characters again) because in these scenarios, the previously alive character must have found out Jax was a trans woman and abstracted as a result of it, these scenarios arent a fantasy, they're what Jax genuinely believe will happen, and how she plans on dealing with it if these scenarios do happen, these scenes were her planning her actions beforehand for the worst case scenario, the next time someone gets her to come out and dies as a result)
She planned to use the weaknesses of everyone against them in case their loved one were to abstract. For example, Zooble is, in Jax's mind, the serious, grumpy one, so taking nothing seriously to a cartoonish level would throw them off.
Anyways, the kind of trauma that Jax faced upon first coming out to her mom stays, it impacts all of your actions. That put her back in the closet immediately, because she believes coming out to anyone else will bear the same results. Ridicule and hurt.
But Ribbit, Ribbit guesses it so easily. The second Ribbit and Jax start getting close, Ribbit guesses, Ribbit knows. And in Jax's mind, that means the ridicule and the pain will come with it, because surely, Ribbit is going to tell everyone right? And everyone will turn on Jax.
It ended up being a self fulfilling prophecy, Ribbit abstracted because Jax made sure to keep them away from everyone in fear that Ribbit would share her secret. That only cemented Jax's theory further.
If anyone knows, they get hurt. But turns out, people are good at guessing if they get a bit close. So now Jax will never let anyone get close again. So the masks get stronger, worse, meaner, more offensive. Ragatha saw it getting worse until she couldn't bear to have a conversation with Jax anymore because of how much she'd changed. And the second Jax felt that she wanted to get close to Pomni in the gun episode, she made sure to squash that feeling down and ruin any chance they could have had at a friendship.
It's all self inflicted, it's untreated trauma turning someone into something unrecognisable and awful, it's not an excuse but my god is it deep, it puts this whole show into perspective, and it makes me love this character so much.
Her identity as a deeply closeted trans woman impacts everything so much, and I wish I could have seen her happy and recovered, but this show is a cautionary tale.
If only she could have seen the view from half way down.
All of my blorbs finally off my bed and together, with *some* kept far apart. I do think Witch would get along with Jax a great deal, both are filled with angst even tho they really dont look it
Hell Witch becomes Thorn after she kills you, and Thorn is peak angst and just as scared of connection for fear of more pain
Chris Christodoulou's once in a lullaby is perfect to me, and captures the just sorrow Jax and her loss brings, having been so close and seeing the light of the love she can have, that she deserves. I also very much adore the lyrics of Somewhere over the rainbow for being equally as somber, where dreams stay no more than dreams, no matter how much you wish.
Though even though they dont always, I want this to be something hopeful
Got inspired to actually choose something for Kinger by @truculentanarchy, and while a Valkyrie would be so much fun, kinda like Dash the sloth being in some crazy muscle car.
I feel old dad Kinger would *love* a Kombi/VW Bus, this one isnt anything to scoff at either, with a subaru engine swap that is pretty common on Beetles and busses and a roof rack to haul as much as possible with all the kids loaded up.
Itd also be Destinies as much as it is his, so we get a blue field of butterflies painted on it with their son tagging along
Ragatha has a 1986 F150 that used to be her families old farm truck they got about when she was born, i feel she would hold onto it at least until she moved away, but still kinda miss it after the fact
Gangle has a 1995 Honda Prelude, a serviceable reliable and spacious car she could get for cheap, i dont think she would love it quite like a NA Miata, but its practical.
Jax has a mildly tuned 2006 Nissan 350/Fairlady Z, fast enough to be fun while being pretty and not that stupid of a choice, and while yes any VQ engined car is the prime target to cause chaos, I doubt she would go overboard
And Pomni with a 2010 VW Golf, probably the most practical choice here as i dont feel she would care what she has as long as its cheap to maintain and easy to drive in a city.
Might figure the others cars out when I get their plushies
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