Jake may seem like just a laid-back, goofy canine,
[Bacon Pancakes, Making Bacon Pancakes]
but this silly dog is the moral center of Adventure Time.
Without Jake the dog, Finn the human would be lost
in a sea of moral quandaries.
And that’s because -- in our ongoing series
comparing each Adventure Time character to a piece of the mind --
Jake is the superego.
In the Freudian model of the psyche,
the superego internalizes social ideas of right and wrong.
[Hey, back off, you gnomes!
That kid just saved you guys!]
[You should thank'em!]
It forms a conscience to keep the ego’s bad behavior in check,
and sets an ideal standard for the ego to aspire to.
[Jake was here.]
[Jake would be running.]
[That's Jake's secret, too.]
[What?]
[Jake!]
Jake is a pretty lax version of the superego.
[It's fine.
She'll be fine.]
but he keeps Finn the ego on track,
gently guiding him towards self-betterment.
[This place is designed to mess you up.
To mess with your head.]
[None of this is real.
It's all just trials to test
your heroic attributes.]
[You’re the smartest dog I know, man.]
Jake shows the characters and the audience what it means
to be a good person in the Land of Ooo.
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[You're sort of like...a violation.]
In Ooo, morality looks a little bit warped
compared to our sense of right and wrong.
[Cause you're gonna hurt everybody.]
[Nooooooo!]
[Everybody who is evil, Jake.]
[Oh, well I’m over it then.]
And we can see that morality of Ooo most clearly in Jake.
The superego embodies the rules of what’s acceptable
in a certain culture.
So as the superego, Jake reflects the land's
slightly wonky code of ethics.
[We'll be vigilantes!]
[Nah, we’re more like cops.
Crooked cops!]
The Adventure Time version of the superego
has more room to be relaxed, fun and goofy.
[Ah...I lost focus.]
Being a moral person in Ooo means something a little different
than what it means on the earth we know.
For one thing, this isn’t a show that teaches kids
that violence is always unacceptable.
[Like a true hero, you were born to punch evil creatures.]
Characters in Adventure Time exist almost exclusively
in a moral grey area.
[Vandalism is wrong, Marcy.]
Jake himself has a past life of crime.
But that doesn’t preclude him from being the moral authority
in this morally ambiguous world --
in fact, his being a mix of good and bad makes him
more reflective of the Ooo philosophy.
People aren’t good or bad, they just make good or bad choices.
[I choose...sandwich.]
Jake understands this, and that makes him fully equipped
to shepard Finn on his coming-of-age story.
The superego strives for perfection.
In our world, we often think our perfection as
proactively preventing mistakes before they happen.
Meanwhile, the average person makes mistakes all the time,
but tries to learns from them, and be better then next time.
But in Ooo society, citizens aren’t capable of learning
from their mistakes.
[I win again!
Just like always!]
So their version of “perfect” is basically
our version of “average” --
being able to learn from mistakes and improve,
seems as hard for them as avoiding all mistakes seems to us.
So their standards for perfection are a little lower.
[I'm not technically a doctor.]
The ideal that Ooo citizens strive for
is more of a state of contentment and satiation.
They’re one step behind us in morality, which is why
Jake is a softer version of the superego.
[I wanna help you out of this, man, but she scares
the filling outta my doughnut.]
He can be the height of moral achievement in this world
while also being occasionally lazy,
[I may wake up in any moment...Nah.]
or selfish, and just generally fallible.
The people of Ooo don’t typically feel guilt in any real sense.
For example, Princess Bubblegum uses her godlike ability
to create life fairly recklessly.
[I would like to honor James...]
[...with this new James I whipped up in the lab!]
And she’s rarely, if ever, held responsible
for the horrific things she’s often complicit in.
These characters don’t tend to worry too much
about the consequences of their actions.
And this makes sense if you look at each character
as an isolated part of the human mind, as we have been.
Most distinct parts of our psyche aren’t capable
of processing morality on their own --
that’s the superego’s job.
In many of our societies morality is implemented
through shame or guilt --
which are tools of the superego.
[You should be ashamed of yourself!]
But in the Land of Ooo morality has to be
enforced physically by Finn and Jake.
[l'm going to beat my purity into them!]
Unlike the other characters, Finn as the ego is capable of processing guilt,
[That's a really, really messed-up thing to do, and...
I'm truly sorry.]
[I forgive you.]
[Awesome.]
and he can incorporate Jake’s moral lessons into his life.
[What's more important?
Your love for that screwball dame,]
[or being a hero and savin' the lives of innocent goblin folks?]
[Rrrrhh..
Being a hero.]
It’s the ego’s job to take the guidelines of the superego
and incorporate them into behavior.
So as a bonded pair, Finn and Jake together represent
the only way to spread a moral code throughout Ooo.
[You should apologize to the farmers and make amends.]
[Really?]
[Yeah, that’ll work.]
Jake shares his moral expertise with Finn,
and Finn puts that advice into action.
And thus they help save the citizens of Ooo from moral pitfalls.
[Your harrassment of the female gender makes me sick!]
Kids in the audience will be like Finn --
able to see these externalized lessons and internalize them,
even if most of the characters they're watching
can’t do the same.
Jake may represent unattainable moral perfection
for someone in Ooo,
but he’s a pretty realistic standard for us.
He teaches us to value our self-actualization
and deeper moral development over meeting the demands
of a strict prescribed code.
[But he's a criminal!]
[He's only trying to be what following how his dreams
make you want to be, man!]
[Whaaaaat?]
This may not be the path to our standard of perfection,
but it is a path to happiness.
[Love you forever, man, but your guilt's hurting
the team dynamics.]
The superego is there to be the voice of right and wrong
for the ego,
and Jake gives his share of excellent one-liner advice.
[Dude, suckin' at somethin' is the first step towards
bein' sorta good at somethin'.]
[You're thinking too much with those eyeballs,
and not enough with your mind-hole.]
[To live life, you need problems.]
[That’s stupid!]
But most of the time Jake’s not preaching --
he’s more interested in facilitating Finn’s growth.
He’ll often give Finn the advice he really needs
at the beginning of an adventure.
[Do not do tier 15!]
But then he’ll slog with Finn through
the moral ups and downs of his journey,
rather than chastising Finn for every wrong decision.
[I just wanna sit here and moan.]
[Then I’ll moan with you, buddy.]
Or Jake’ll give Finn his two cents and then just step back,
and give Finn the space to work through his issues on his own.
[I wonder what Finn’s up to.]
[Hey, buddy.
Feeling better already?]
The Superego develops in early childhood largely
through our parents’ punishment or approval,
so the superego is also an internalized parental figure.
Jake is a father figure for Finn, and he’s a really supportive one.
His goal is never to correct a negative behavior without addressing its root cause.
[Having a girlfriend is hard.]
[You're getting all hung up, all hung up on imaginary problems.]
[You gotta focus on what's real, man.]
So we can read Jake’s form of superego as a very positive model for parenting --
His style is almost the opposite of helicopter parenting
but is still very much about being present in the kid’s life.
He doesn’t follow the Jiminy Cricket model of the conscience,
hovering over Finn and doggedly telling him the right thing to do.
[You've got to go to school!]
Instead, he wants Finn to truly understand
why he needs to make certain changes in his life,
just as it’s probably more effective to show a child
why certain behaviors are better or worse,
rather than scold them into fearfully obeying rules
that are meaningless to them.
To have such a laid-back version of the superego
in Adventure Time,
sends the message that kids shouldn’t be overdisciplined,
and we shouldn’t get caught up in unattainable standards of behavior.
The superego that we impart to kids can be a more relaxed
and balanced part of the psyche
that helps us feel out how to truly understand morality
with depth,
instead just acting in fear.
For Jake, being a conscience isn’t about being a judicial force,
punishing or rewarding the ego.
He’s always there as a spiritual guide letting Finn know
what he thinks --
but he stays out of Finn’s way a lot of the time.
Finn’s the one who has to struggle through making
the difficult choices,
and incorporating Jake’s advice into his life.
So if we can learn something from Jake’s parenting,
it’s to let the child come to understanding on their own
without interfering too forcefully, but always to be present,
and there for them.
[Even if we're not changing on the outside,
we're changing on the inside constantly.]
Jake’s stretchy, shapeshifting powers are symbolic
of the fluid morality of Ooo.
[But I could get used to this.]
[What?
No!
You have to suffer.]
[Okay.]
And they also represent the virtue of flexibility.
For one thing, Jake’s stretchy powers allow him to display for Finn
the complex issues that Finn needs advice about.
And Jake’s literally flexible enough to adapt
to Finn’s needs in any given situation.
His physical flexibility symbolizes his flexible personality
and go-with-the-flow attitude.
[So we could've died horribly?]
[Yes.]
Jake's laid-back mindset actually makes him more equipped
to separate right from wrong.
He’s unclouded by the rampant, out-of-control emotions
that sometimes take over Finn.
[How do I know the good side from the bad?]
[You will know when you are calm.]
And when he gets into a bout of angst,
he wants to ruminate on his negative feelings
or repress them all together.
[Festering is always bad, man!]
[There's no good kind of festering!]
But Jake maintains a clear perspective,
because his adaptability makes him resilient,
things roll off his back.
We can also aspire to Jake’s laid-back flexibility --
the more we stretch, the easier it is to see
that many of our everyday stresses aren't really worth
getting so wound up over.
Jake the superego’s incredibly supportive, healthy attitude
makes us think that maybe we can learn a few things
from Ooo’s slightly sub-par code of ethics.
It is not traditional, but if it produces a conscience like Jake,
there may be more wisdom here than meets the eye.
[It's kinda nice up here, though.]
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