I’ve seen a lot of people talking about this so I just wanted to add my two cents.
Jax, “The Funny One” vs Violence
Some people are noticing a dissonance between how Jax is trying to portray himself, as the funny one, versus his clear inclination toward violence. Even Pomni asks if he’s taking on being “the villain.”
This dichotomy was intentional.
Being “funny” is what works in a cartoon setting. It’s a safe role. But in a world without consequences, violence can equate to humor.
However, his encouragement of Pomni to let go of her humanity suggests that his harmful tendencies aren’t consciously a part of the role he plays.
Acting the comedian is a common real-life coping mechanism to stressful situations. Being a role he likely took on long before he joined the circus, it fit like a glove.
But along with this new mentality, that they are no longer even “human,” he starts falling into behaviors that dehumanize himself and others.
His behavior lacks humanity.
It was an intentional write — he lets go of his complex human personality for “the archetype” to survive. But he yearns for more, he can’t flatten himself into a character because he’s a person. He fills the empty depth by feeding deeper into the notion that they aren’t humans.
His taking on of the funny persona came from his need to let go his humanity. His relinquishment of his humanity made him violent. His aggression is a symptom of his attempted self-dehumanization.
He doesn’t TOTALLY lack his human side. There are attempts to separate himself from his humanity as much as possible, but it isn’t something you can easily rid yourself of without going insane.
He only seems perfect in his role before becoming friends with Pomni. In his success at distancing himself from the others, he lets his guard down. Pomni walks past his defenses easily.
You can SEE his humanity come back because of her. He instantly apologizes for shooting her. His facade breaks, his character breaks.
It’s instinct for him once he’s made a friend. He can be a good friend. It humanizes him, though. Thats why he tries to hard to distance himself from the others.
He realized he was getting too close with Pomni too late. He was allowing himself to feel human without even realizing it. It scared him.
He tried to yank himself back.
But he unintentionally subjected himself to the psychological torture that he knew made others abstract.
His friendship with Pomni was so real, that — paired with the absurd and terrifying circus setting — made clear to him a juxtaposition that highlighted the brutal fact that they are trapped in this circus. They can’t be fully human. No matter how badly they want to leave, no matter how human they are, no matter how wrong it is to be stuck here, they are forced to be characters in this environment.
He cannot be “just an archetype.” No matter how hard he tries, he cannot own that role. He doesn’t have a choice in this, none of them do. They are all humans forced to be characters in the digital circus. This disjunction breeds the hopelessness that causes abstraction.
The gap between their human selves and the circus feels like an unbearable distance. Them being so close to humanity that they’re aware of it, but so far that they know they’ll never truly reach it, they’re just being deprived of it.
He was brutally reminded of this when he befriended Pomni.
After everything, his bonding with Pomni and his efforts to sustain his own sanity, he ended up alone.
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