#also noone harass these fic writers just vaguepost about your least favorite mischaracterizations of characters like a normal person /lh

[piningpebbles]

I've been seeing some fics rewriting the finale where Jack's motivations are more leaning towards wanting to be the hero or being remembered for the nukes, do you think this is accurate? Because I thought his motivations would be going back to how it was before (minus Tommy if they're not gonna add in the nukeduo arguement).

i think i know at least one of the fics you're talking about- i check the c!jack tags every other day- if i don't consume c!jack content i will simply explode.

as for the idea itself that jack wanted to be seen as a hero, it's something i completely disagree with. him wanting to be remembered for the nukes is a bit closer to his actual character but still misses a huge aspect of why he interfered with the nuke at all.

tommy.

he didn't try to kill tommy for the "good of the server" or to be a hero. he did it because he was hurt by tommy and wanted to (quote) "mak[e] him understand the pain he put [jack] through [and] the lack of remorse he showed [jack]" and he wanted to protect tubbo from tommy because he sees a lot of himself in tubbo.

also i know it's easy to point to him saying that "the server will be more peaceful with tommy not around" and say that proves he thinks he's a hero, but he's just projecting in an effort to be listened to, which he's done a lot in the past.

jack's motivation is not power, he doesn't want to be seen as a hero. jack's largest motivation here is closure. he wants to get closure and be able to move on and be happy again.

beforehand, i would argue that his biggest motivation was to be acknowledged/recognized, as all of his actions kept becoming more and more extreme in an attempt to get people to notice and care about him in any way (which is why the idea of being remembered for the nukes is closer to his actual mindset but still not wholly true). but in the finale, that's paired with his ultimate goal of closure.

jack's been doing all of these things to try and get closure. if he tommy dies he can be happy, if he isolates and people come to visit him he'll know he's cared about and be happy, if he drinks he won't have to think about no one coming to visit and be happy, etc. and it all just culminates in the finale where he realizes how much of his pain stems from a lack of recognition of his trauma-- tommy never apologized, let alone acknowledged what he'd put jack through.

his mindset switching from the the c!rocketduo era of "tommy needs to die" to the current "i need to kill tommy" is incredibly important because the focus shifts on getting tommy to recognize the level of hurt he'd caused, which would bring jack closure.