What are your Jane/Jaime headcanons?
What do you guys think Jane and Jaime went through in the past? I'm hoping for some inspiration for some fic stuff. And a warning--this is long. :shrugs: Though feel free to just read the questions in bold and say what you think below.
Some questions:
1. What exactly was the relationship between Jaime and Jane? I think this is the most important one really, as if defines Jane's relationship with the person she's seemed to have spent the ZA with the longest. She says she picked on Jaime, but there was regret there. Strangely, Jane said she preferred to have Jaime as a friend rather than as a sister:
"Every summer we'd go to this amusement park in Virginia. But the best part wasn't the rides...it was that nobody knew us there and I'd...I'd pretend we weren't sisters. Just...friends." She says this with a fond smile, as if she really enjoyed those amusement park trips.
What do you think this means? Personally I believe that their parents pushed the responsibilities of taking care of her younger sister heavily upon Jane, and there wasn't much time for the two to actually do fun things together. Jane felt she had to take the role of a caring "sister," which had a negative connotation for her. She felt she couldn't be Jaime's "friend" at the same time when there were other people around who knew them, and it seemed those people expected Jane to be the older "sister" and not a friend. It seems that, when they went to the amusement park, Jane enjoyed just being able to hang out with her sister, and not just worry about having to take care of her all the time.
Also, I believe that Jaime looked up to Jane and thought--wrongly--that her sister could do no wrong and that Jane was her "best friend," as Jane says. Obviously she was incorrect, at least partly. But how wrong was she?
2. How old do you think Jaime was, and how big was the age difference between the two? Jane said at one point that she used to "hide Jaime's toys," meaning there could have been quite a big age difference between the sisters. For some reason I think Jaime may have been around Sarah's age, but I don't think Jane said that in the game lol. But I doubt they were very close in age.
3. What do you think Jaime was like? Personality-wise, it sounds like Jaime had given up towards the end of her days with Jane. Jane said she never wanted to wake up, and she basically had to drag the girl around. Seems like she was quite depressed to me. But was she always like this? To have thought, in the past, that Jane was Jaime's "best friend," Jaime must have been quite naively optimistic, not quite grasping the harsher realities of life yet. So when the ZA struck, I'm guessing it hit Jaime rather hard, especially if she lost her parents. Perhaps at first she clung to Jane, her "best friend," and as time went on and people committed sins to survive in the ZA, Jaime realized Jane wasn't as perfect as she originally thought her to be. Thus losing her last rock, Jaime started slipping away. Honestly Jaime reminds me more of Nick than Sarah, when he was in the whiskey cellar in the beginning of episode 2, and he kept saying, "What's the point? Why are we even going anymore?" Jane probably did her best to get Jaime going, but Jane obviously wasn't that great at being so empathetic and kind. To try her best to have the two of them survive, when Jaime may have been non-respondent to most words and actions? Jane must have been very frustrated with Jaime, when she should've tried to be more understanding. I think it'd also hurt Jane to realize that Jaime couldn't find it in herself to keep going, even if only for Jane.
4. Do you think Jaime could be alive? Jaime did die an off-screen death technically--Jane can't even confirm Jaime is indeed dead, and we all know what an off-screen death means in TWD. I think it'd just change the game so much if it turned out Jane had reached through to her sister and Jaime had escaped, unbeknownst to Jane. It wouldn't just add more to the story, but to Jaime's character too. Would some of Jane's survivor-mentality have rubbed off on Jaime? I bet Jane had taught--or at least tried to teach--Jaime the same skills she had taught Clem--killing zombies, checking to see they were dead, which ones to plunder. Would Jaime harden up after Jane had left, becoming more bitter than the optimistic girl she once was, hateful towards the sister she thought would always protect her? Or would Jaime be more forgiving? Would Jaime ever seek out Jane after they became separated? It could explain why Jane was so quick to dismiss helping Sarah and dismiss sticking around for Clem (in ep 4 at least). Jane had tried her best with Jaime, and she hadn't succeeded (even though she had, if we assume Jaime is still alive.) So why would Jane try again, if only for the same to happen?
5. Who were Jane's/Jaime's parents? If there was a big age difference between the two, I sometimes wonder if Jane's original parents were divorced, and she's actually Jaime's step-sister? Might explain why Jane isn't so close to her. Were their parents loving and treated the two sisters equally, or was there some favoritism? Were they good parents, or did Jane have to take care of Jaime more-so than it's fair for any girl her age should be expected to? Where did the family live? When relating the glass-story, if Clem says, "Sounds like a mess," Jane says, "Every couple years someone would step on a piece of glass that hadn't gotten swept up and everyone'd get angry at me all over again." Obviously that's fair, but it doesn't sound like a very supportive family environment. I'm guessing they weren't the most well-off financially, and Jane obviously acted out a lot. Jane started drinking very early too, so why would she get in to that in the first place? It obviously sounds like she was a "bad kid" and she was so "stupid back then." But what else did Jane do as a kid, and why? Was Jaime the "good one" who obeyed her parents and did all the right things?
6. Who was the D.C. group? A few people were mentioned from the D.C. group. First, there was a "douchebag" in Jane's words who used to call her "Mary Jane" and who got stuck underneath a car on a crosswalk. How did he get stuck under there when it sounds like everyone else was perfectly safe, until they went to get him? Perhaps he was foolishly out and about in the area designated as "unsafe," maybe looking for something to impress Jane or the other girls in their group with (this is just a shot in the dark. Who knows for sure really.) If he was bitten and chose not to say anything (unless he passed out while they were trying to get to him), then he was a coward too. The group lost four people, one at a time to trying to save this man. So either these people were very willing to go help out this supposed "douchebag," or perhaps he was an extremely well-liked fellow (though obviously Jane didn't like him) who people wanted to save. Finally, there was the old woman who died when the bitten man turned and tore the neck right out of her. Why was this old woman so close in proximity when this man was close to dying?
From the sounds of it, it seems this whole fiasco could've been handled much better. Perhaps the leadership of the D.C. group wasn't the best either. This is probably the group Jane was talking about when she was saying that groups can fall apart: "I've seen it before." Probably after the man under the car, the four people, and the old woman were killed, fingers were pointed, and the group indeed did start to fall apart.
It's also of my personal opinion that Jane did like this group, and perhaps she even thought of some of them as family, and was later betrayed by them. I think she and Jaime (probably Jaime was still alive) had finally found a safe haven here, and they were happy to find it. This is probably before Jane had her, "It's better to be alone" philosophy. But maybe after all those deaths with the man under the car, the group fell apart or there was a change in leadership, and Jane and Jaime could've been accused of not helping enough (especially if Jaime couldn't get herself to get up every day) or of being too negative or something. This could've led to their being banished by the D.C. group, and perhaps this led to Jane and Jaime's being surrounded by walkers, and Jaime's eventual "death." So Jane would've felt betrayed by this group she'd started to think of as family. She said at one point, "You don't owe them anything. They'll make you feel like you do. Like it's all one happy family. But when push comes to shove...You'll see." Seems to me she's speaking about the people she's known before--about the D.C. group, and how she could've been betrayed by them.
Well that's it for now, though there's plenty more to wonder on. What do you guys think? Even if you completely disagree with me, I'd love to hear some original ideas from ya'll!
Comments
Yeah, I agree that their parents made Jane take care of her more often than not. Every sibling relationship has it's ups and downs, but with so many downs, there had to be some sort of resentment. Like maybe their parents treated them differently. Like Jane was the bad kid, and Jaime was the good kid. Kids like that seem to have more downs than ups.
I think she was younger than Jane. Maybe a good 8-10 years. Maybe that's where the resentment comes from. Kids that are around 8-10, and are used to being the only child, are probably taken by surprise by the lack of attention given.
I agree. She most likely gave up after seeing so many people die. It's hard to accept the fact that no matter what you do, someone is going to die.
I don't. The way Jane describes it. It seems as though the walkers were behind them and they had to jump for it. If she didn't jump, she most likely got eaten.
That's what I'm thinking. It would explain why Jane is more comfortable in the za, and why Jaime couldn't cope.
I think you nailed it. Also maybe the guy under the car was their leader. It would explain why so many people would go after him, after seeing people who tried, die. Also would explain why nobody said stop, forget him, there's nothing else we can do. Or why people wouldn't listen if someone had.
Hey GiantKiller good to see ya! Hope you've been well!
Glad to see someone agree. I appreciate it! But hm, you don't think Jaime could be alive? I have to admit I believed she was dead the first time through, but it just struck me as really odd story-wise that Jane never checked, and we never find out for sure. And just like you said, all she had to do was jump to safety, and she'd be fine. Probably Jane had really tried to get Jaime to move in those final moments, maybe trying her best to say some stirring words from the bottom of her heart, but they didn't seem like enough, and Jane left...but the absence of Jaime's ever-present sister was finally felt and she was awakened and jumped to safety? Idk, I think it would be nice.
And hmm the guy under the car was their leader? Then I really wonder what on earth he was doing there in the first place lol. Perhaps he was doing some scavenging for gas maybe, though it would've been pretty irresponsible to be doing it alone. There could've been a million reasons why he was out there, but sounds like he was being irresponsible regardless if so many people died trying to get him. For some reason, if he wasn't the leader, I imagine this dude checking out this sweet Mustang from the '60's on the crosswalk and trying to see if he could fix it up to impress chicks, and then out of nowhere comes a small herd or something and bam! Bitten. It could also be that, you know, the people who saved him were just generally good people (this was earlier in the apocalypse, so there could've still been more virtuous people then just doing what they thought was the right thing) and they didn't care if the guy was a douchebag--he was still a human being worth saving.
Thanks, good to see you as well.
You make some good points. But I think that if Jaime wasn't going to jump for Jane, she wouldn't have at all. Like Jane said, she put Jaime on a forced march through hell, so I doubt this was the first time she had to really push her to stay alive. I'm thinking that Jane just had no choice that last time. That Jaime would've died if Jane pushed her, and Jane would've died if she stayed. I agree that it'd be nice if she made it, but I don't think it was in her to finally accept her circumstances. Especially w/o Jane there, the person that had been there with her, since the turn.