“I’m scared of you already, and I’m not even real.”
This quote from Brain Ghost Dirk never did get much follow-up, I think. Many of us certainly don’t think of Jake English as one of the scarier characters in Homestuck do we? One of the sillier ones maybe, or one of the more tragic ones.
So, for a change of pace I’m taking this opportunity to voice ideas about how Jake could be portrayed as someone to be respected and even feared in fanworks, someone who wields the kind of power that makes people think twice about getting into his bad books. And why not? The seeds for it are there, even if undeveloped. In canon alone we’ve seen him do the following at full power:
Destroy a sizeable section of Derse as angels coalesce out of the raw Hope he’s putting out uncontrollably
No-sell grimbark Jade’s Witch of Space / First Guardian powers
Make his mental image of Dirk real, complete with corny movie references the real Dirk would never use
(Possibly) copy Prince of Heart powers for said imaginary friend to use. [Inconclusive, might just be a Dirk-splinter thing.]
No-sell godtier Caliborn’s clockwork majyyks — the rainbow flashing aura so associated with god tier resurrections, mating cherubs, and especially Lord English
It isn’t much to go off of, but the sheer destructive power of Jake’s Hopesplosion, as well as how his power is able to hold its own with (and handily dunk on) the rawest energies associated with Space and Time themselves, seems to indicate there’s a wonderful, terrible, blazingly bright abyss at the core of the Page of Hope if you dig far down enough. The only catch seen so far is in how much control Jake had over his powers on both known occasions — none in the arc leading up to Game Over, and up for debate during the Masterpiece showdown against Caliborn. That only raises a question fanwork is free to explore: what happens when Jake finally gets a grip on this awe-inspiring power?
Post-canon furnishes something else interesting regarding Jake, in HS:BC’s second May 2024 upd8. In a fit of righteous rage where candy Jake finally gets to go off on candy Jane, he mentions that Tavvy Crocker has been free of his peanut allergy since he was 13, and the panel and pesterlog where he explains how it happened strongly suggests Jake’s desperate wish for his son to be cured of it came true. This is an unconscious use of his Aspect’s power just like the time he started glowing while dancing with candy John, but this one is long-lasting, and possibly permanent. Far from being mere illusion with solidity (as some might propose by citing Brain Ghost Dirk faltering in existence as Jake’s Hope field dissipated in the pre-Game Over arc), the implication is that Jake English has the potential to be a full-fledged reality warper just by believing hard enough in what he wants.
This is why I want to see the scope of Jake’s powers — the very potential that scared Brain Ghost Dirk months before Jake ever reached the godtiers — explored in fanwork. How does someone like Jake grapple with that kind of power, whether within his active grasp or eluding his reach in unconscious use?
Give me a Jake that has shades of Haruhi Suzumiya to him, able to change reality without him realizing it just by wanting something so hard that paradox space obliges.
Give me a Jake conscious and fearful of the danger he poses with his powers, fleeing into solitude on instinct because he’s scared of hurting others if he lashes out — because after all hasn’t he done it before? Couldn’t he do it again?
Give me a Jake who treats the awesome power of Hope as a godly nuclear deterrent, who keeps the peace on Earth C with the threat of unleashing all the terrible things his movie-and-comics-saturated imagination could conjure up.
Give me a Jake who revels in newfound nigh-unlimited power after so long feeling powerless, and who sets about remaking his corner of the world — or perhaps the entire world — in his image. And why not stop at just one planet? Why not go further beyond? Won’t it be a grand adventure, perhaps even The Ultimate Adventure?
Fittingly for one of his aspect, there’s endless possibilities to work with, so many ways things could play out.