#...and when Jade accidentally finished him off with a machete

[beauzos]

My Heart is a Chainsaw is a fucking mess, but i will say i actually am very compelled by what's going on with Jade now that i understand what Her Deal is. i think it's profoundly clever using third person limited from Jade's perspective, because the reader still doesn't know almost anything about her until the very end despite it. Jade sees herself as someone who exists in the margins of life, and even when the thing she always wanted (in a way) happens, all her slasher film knowledge becoming necessary when her town is besieged by what seems to be a real slasher, she still doesn't even let herself get involved.

instead, she prepares a random girl she latches onto to be the protagonist of Chainsaw. she doesn't even know this girl. they aren't even friends. but Jade cannot conceive of a world where she has enough value on her own to be the protagonist, or, in this case, the "final girl." she seems herself as fundamentally broken, dirty, and ruined, so she projects everything she wants onto Letha; the ideal protagonist, the ideal teenage girl, someone she can use an extension of the escapism she gets from slasher films.

Letha is just another way for Jade to escape everything wrong in her life, everything wrong about her, and it crushes her every time Letha doesn't do what she wants her to do. Letha can read her like a fucking book, and it leaves Jade on the defensive while still trying to cling to this false narrative of Letha as the final girl. and, in the end, she realizes that no one is going to save her but herself, though Letha is still there too. moreover, it's more about Jade accepting that her life has value in and of itself. she's more than her trauma, self harm, and the slasher films she has made her entire life.

there are people who genuinely love and care about her, and would do anything to help her. but she helps herself first, and it's kinda the first step. she can't accept anyone's help bcs she doesn't see why anybody would bother with a broken girl. i don't plan on reading the rest of the trilogy, but i hope Jade heals up from all the bad in her life. i mean, there's gonna be more serial killers n stuff but like aside from that, i hope Jones gives her a personal win KRJF.