longer.blue

cw: spoilers for tadc ep 9 i want to talk about jax. i think people ultimately are missing the point of the character in favor of taking the piss out of trans femme created art and it's, quite frankly, revolting. caveat, i am willing to be proven completely wrong if, for some reason, gooseworx does straight up confirm jax to be a trans woman, but, as i alluded to in my previous post, she is under ZERO obligation to do so and to say otherwise is incredibly selfish and entitled. tadc will be a case study in how an audience that lacks media literacy will behave when you give them enough ambiguity. that's really the concept with jax: ambiguity. they constantly shift between genuine and farce. at the end of the day, are they not just a silly little guy? jax is actually complex. gender is not their only motivation. jax has been described by the author as a self-insert. would you think it okay to say gender is gooseworx's only motivation? i found jax to be a more adequate rendition of the hedgehog's dilemma than shinji ikari, who is literally described as such in evangelion. characters who suffer such a dilemma seek closeness, but often in a self perpetuating cycle of intimacy and rejection. where shinji ikari handles this in a much more timid and shy manner, i find jax's bristly persona switching in to not only be a more compelling depiction of the trope, but also a more relatable one for myself. note how this analysis has very little to do with gender identity. now note how jax literally responds to subversion of gendered expectations. they openly ridicule zooble, whose early character arc revolves around a struggle to come to terms with personal self image, for having such a struggle with identity. they have very clear feelings about being dressed effeminately and very clear unresolved issues of inadequacy as a man. look, gender is clearly a part of this, but it isn't the whole part. jax is an incredibly complex character with a lot of emotional baggage and trauma to pick through. this isn't even mentioning the abuse they suffered from their parents or their very real existential angst over the reality of events (believing their mother was killed by their hand, believing events in the digital circus are fictionalized for television and that the residents play character tropes, etc.) there is an analysis of the character that actually delves into the full breadth of emotions and thoughts that gooseworx is attempting to convey to us through this self-insert. there is plenty of analysis being done through the myopic and often bigoted lenses of "well this character is only subtextually trans and not explicitly trans" or "well this character is too problematic to be trans". people are complex. even trans women are complex. if jax really is intended to be a trans woman, i accept that identity in spite of the horrible things they do in the series. if you have even an ounce of integrity, you should as well. let characters make mistakes. people make mistakes too. a lot of tadc is about the consequences and aftermath of mistakes. look at caine's character arc particularly in the last two episodes of the series. why is caine allowed a second chance after allowing multiple circus members to "die" and flagrantly ignoring the wants and needs of and manipulating the remaining residents, but not jax? if your only answer is that jax MIGHT be trans, you need to step away from the discourse and seriously considering your own personal bigotry. if you care so much about jax being trans that you miss the forest for the trees regarding his character, i think you need to seriously reconsider how you view media. if you think gooseworx has to personally answer for any of this, you need to grow the fuck up. anyway, this was scatter brained af. my full thoughts on the series are that it was pretty damn good. my only real complaint is that i would have liked more of zooble and jax together in scenes because i feel like those two are, no joke intended, really good mirror images of each other. if gender musing was really and truly on the menu, i think it would be interesting to explore further dynamics with these two. i completely understand if that wasn't the direction that was intended though. the art and animation of the finale was genuinely really beautiful. outside of the jax stuff, the scene where the moon told caine "i love you" was just such an incredibly touching and sincere moment for a creative soul. his own art loved him back. ;-; beautiful stuff. thank you, gooseworx. you've made something that genuinely really resonated with me and a lot of others. i hope i see more from you in the future.