Hot Take : Jinx is a DICKHEAD actually~
Before you grab your pitchforks, let me state I'm a big fan of the girl and believe she's the heroine of the tragedy that is Arcane season 1. I hope my works and other meta prove that. She's definitely a poor mew mew and one of my blorbos. That being said, there's a tendency in the fandom to really treat her as a victim, mostly due to her age, her mental illness, and alarmingly, her relationship with Silco.
I was discussing with some fandom friends how much the Silco&Jinx relationship can get skewed, and @book--wyrm pointed out he's a real pushover when it comes to her. It's really the best term, but it doesn't even begin to establish how terrible a person Jinx is.
So let's take a closer look at things...
First off, Jinx has the most insane body count in the show :
I'm censoring the last picture for obvious reasons.
22 people confirmed on screen. 23 if you count Silco. In the space of like 72h. Add to that the one henchman she shoots in ep. 4, who we never see again and can presume dead, the crow she shoots in cold blood (before collecting its feathers and using them as furniture decor and bookmarks), and arguably Mek, who, although not dead, was a loyal member of the gang since prior act 1 and is now in Stillwater.
At no point in Arcane is Jinx shown to feel or express remorse over any of her killings. The only time she says she's sorry is after shooting Silco, which hardly counts as it was done in a haze, etc etc. Even when Silco screams at her for killing enforcers in ep. 4 and potentially ruining his plans all over again, she nods at him happily and laughs it off. She's extremely casual with human life.
The first Firelight deaths are the only ones that count as "on the job" but it's debatable if killing was part of the assignment, as Sevika is extremely pissed and says "you were supposed to protect the cargo", which IMO implies that she wasn't supposed to go and "kill everyone". This wasn't a bait operation designed to kill them. Silco defends Jinx's action because he's weak for her.
All subsequent kills (I'm excluding Silco going forward) are for her own gain or her own vicious pleasure. And she is vicious, and even sadistic.
In the ship she uses her monkey sign to stress out her victims and the "BOOM" on the swing is basically just a joke between herself and her prey.
Likewise when she blows up the enforcers : a fire would be a fine distraction. She could sneak in and out again and steal the gemstone. But no, she wants time to deface the workshop to be dramatic and extra. So she kills a bunch of people in an explosion.
Not just any explosion, but one with again her signature monkey calling card, and on top of that a recording, faking the voice of a little girl to make sure she'll bring in as many do-gooders inside the building as possible.
Then she turns it into an in-joke. A joke between herself and a bunch of soon-to-be-dead people, referencing her own past. As self-centred as it is cruel.
You have to close your eyes and picture her sitting at her workbench in her lair, setting all these bombs on "record" and faking being a little girl... This isn't an in-moment thing. Jinx almost never improvises. Like everything in Jinx's life bar her first meeting with Vi, it is coldly planned and calculated and utterly fucked up. Again, afterwards she shows no remorse and is amused at Silco's ire. Clearly stealing the gem makes everything worth it, because it'll show him she's "not weak". She isn't computing further than that.
Hence this particular episode also shows a pretty strong disregard for Silco as a person. His entire life's work is this long con against Piltover. She doesn't ask or suggest doing this heist, she just does it. Not because she believes it'll be helpful for Silco's plans, but simply to prove herself after freaking out for having "shown weakness". She could have ruined everything, and though she gifts Silco the gem and hugs him, she doesn't apologise. Silco certainly bends in a pretzel to brush the consequences off of her afterwards though, pushing Marcus to blame the Firelights.
Her disregard for life/collaterals/consequences even extends far enough that she nearly shoots her own sister.
I was originally a little mean to Vi as right after this we're shown Jinx truly defending her life and Vi is all like "Powder, no!" As if she's horrified to see the change she just told Jinx she accepts and understands. Vi felt hypocritical.
Although some of the hypocrisy remains, I think Vi's shock is more directed towards Jinx's clear enjoyment of herself as she gets so into this killing biz that she nearly hits her.
Again later on the bridge Jinx is shown to shoot directly at Vi (even if you use the argument that she's trying to divide Cait & Vi, nobody sane uses heavy weaponry for that, and they barely avoided being shot).
It's also pretty symbolic that she shoots an enforcer point blank, without even looking at him. She's come full circle, and is now basically the Zaunite version of this enforcer.
She's become what she hates, and a beautiful example of violence breeding violence.
Her actions against Ekko deserve their own meta analysis, but it's still pretty harrowing that after Vi leaves her once more (you know, after Jinx blew her gf up and shot at them), her reaction is to blow Ekko (the only other person she has from "back then") and herself up.
Next up, Jinx shows a constant disregard for people's boundaries, including the people close to her.
See how Thieram gets forced into that hug? Here's a still of him as he cringes away. He also flinches when she comes reaching for her drink. Clearly this isn't the first time she's crossed his boundaries, or else he's seen her do some serious shit to others. Of course he's given excellent justifications for his worries.
But then you've got Sevika. Oh, Sevika! Jinx rigs her father's office with toxic gas, and isn't it lucky that the next person to step in is Sevika, and not Silco (lol imagine!)
Then she straps her to a chair, stabs her in her prosthetic, and when she comes around, slaps her and drags her hand across her face before threatening to maim her. Look at Sevika hating being touched and Jinx leaning into it precisely because of it. Look at her grin! Ah, enjoying assault!!
All of this drama, violation of personal space, straight up physical abuse, etc, just because Jinx wants an answer to a QUESTION. And it's a question Sevika would looove to answer! "No need," she says against the threats to her arm, but honestly there was "no need" to do any of this to her either.
Then Jinx proceeds to deface her father's property (his map, but more importantly Vander's knife, which we presume is dear to him), and hang his second in command to the ceiling, labelling her a liar. And like... Seriously, what if this had been the last straw for Sevika?
She's bound to Silco by the show's writing, but who in their right mind would tolerate to be knocked out twice by their boss' kid, besides the other abuse? Knowing the kid will face no repercussions? What if Sevika had left and taken some loyal people with her? Another occasion where Jinx acted with total disregard for Silco's plans and operation. Worse, what if Sevika had taken Finn up on his betrayal idea and killed Silco to replace him herself and be rid of Jinx? There's just no good justification for treating Sevika like this (in world. In the story it's to set up Sevika's potential betrayal and Jinx's characterisation, ofc).
Then for more distrust and violation of personal space, let's move to Jinx straddling Silco, trapping his hands under her, and using his medical equipment to torture him as punishment for a lie. In this situation there's a real lie (of omission), and a perceived lie (about knowing Vi was alive).
It's the biggest case of pushover good dad Silco bar the final scene [Nobody tell me he's a bad dad when after everything she puts him through, the moment she rips the gag off of him his first reaction is to turn on Vi and scream at her to STOP DEADNAMING MY DAUGHTER. Nobody is more team-Jinx than Silco]
Anyway, first she scares him, manhandles him, and he's like "Where have you been" not "WTF are you doing" or "WTF did you do to Sevika" or any of the more... reasonable things to ask her. He treats her like his stray kitten.
Then things get ominous as she traps his hands, grabs him by the jaw... And this tough crime lord lets it all happen without much protest. When Jinx alludes to Vi not being dead, things go like this :
"I can explain" — stab — "Don't move silly, I might hurt you" (classic Jinx playing with her prey) — [explanation] — stab — "but when you found out she came back, you lied" — stab
She stabs him THREE (3) TIMES instead of listening to his willing explanations! Another pretty dire example of Jinx using violence on the closest thing she has to a "loved" one, to get an answer to a question Silco would most likely answer happily if SHE WOULD ONLY ASK.
Think what you will of Silco's little speech to her, but when he frees his hand, he grabs her arm, and gently moves up to her wrist, but he never even pulls her hand from its grip on him. He just touches her and serves her his "pls recall I'm daddy" talk, which finally calms her down some, though I doubt it worked as well as it should have.
All Jinx knows is how to set traps and ambush people, even the people close to her. Those who let her come near are rewarded with mean tricks. The only person she's showing any kindness to is Silco, yet she also routinely abuses him. It hints that such behaviours are probably common enough.
Silco on the other hand never even so much as pushes her off. His most brutal action against her was to grab a tool from her hand while yelling at her [after she killed 6 enforcers and potentially destroyed his lifelong struggle, might I remind you].
She doesn't trust anyone, not even Silco, but also not Vi. She barely trusts herself.
Jinx seems to have no goals besides gratifying her own needs. She strives for control, always being on top of all her relationships, using tricks when she can't make do with direct violence, pulling the intel she wants out of people like the smallest of interaction has to be a confrontation. She has to know, be ready, have a trick up her sleeve at all times. She also strives for a sense of respect, having to feel useful and "strong".
Yet she doesn't seem to be on board of Silco's Nation of Zaun cause. She is routinely acting against his plans and and against his benefit. Almost every action she takes in act II and III directly opposes Silco's progress, besides completing Fishbones (too late).
Going back to the bridge scene, if Jinx could just take a moment to think, and if a free Zaun was really on her mind, she'd realise that, well, her sister is ALIVE, and even if she retreats to Piltover for now, Jinx could just find her again once the tensions are resolved and Silco gets his free Zaun (which seems to be imminent).
Worse, when Ekko stops hitting her, she could use his hesitation. Could manipulate him. There's no way he'd kill her in cold blood after that moment. Heck, she could just throw him off and run away. She has the gem (and he doesn't know that). Silco has asked her to please complete the weapon, but again, getting the gem to him takes a backseat to a rushed emotional response in the face of rejection and hurt.
Doesn't it suck that Marcus was totally right, and that removing Jinx would be doing Silco a favour?
In conclusion I think it's fair to argue that Jinx is the more abusive of the two when it comes to her relationship with Silco, and her relationships in general.
She manipulates, plays mind games, leans into the terror and discomfort she inspires in others and seems to relish it, routinely displays cruelty, hurts animals and people without remorse.
She's as cold blooded as the enforcers who killed her parents and only ever tied to a higher cause out of her desire for gratification and Silco's approval and perceived respect.
While I'm sure she's not always that terrible (it was a stressful 72h tbf), you don't develop such traits overnight, and people don't cringe away from you if you don't have a history of being a turbo dickhead.
I understand the drive to "protecc" mew mew Jinx, but I wish she weren't so readily excused by fandom, or worse, that her behaviour wouldn't be so often pushed aside to accuse Silco of bad parenting. He was certainly faaaaaaaaar too lax with her, needing her as a buoy in an uncaring sea of betrayal and unresolved trauma, but I don't think she became who she is solely due to him or even her trauma. [insert rant against Piltover and its systemic oppression here]
Also, let's recall this is the face Powder makes when she really hopes her bomb filled with nails and shrapnel explodes and maims her pursuer.
Although she's consistently shown to hate the idea of being directly involved in violence, she's very pro fucking enforcers up and is being validated by her sister for MAKING BOMBS.
I guess I just wanted to rip off the rose-tinted glasses for a moment and really look at Jinx's dynamics without trying to excuse them. I feel like the Silco corner of the fandom has done a great job looking at his actions and his motivations before accepting him for who he is (a dickhead, but in different ways). The Jinx corner just... seems to have a tendency of being blinded by the cuteness, the mew mew factor, and the ready excuses of her psychosis and trauma. And we should definitely look at them and see how they impact her character and inform her actions but...
Unhinged mass murdering dickhead characters are deserving of our love and we don't need to excuse them to enjoy them. Jinx is worthy of being dotted on and being a blorbo. She's the heroine of a tragedy. She doesn't deserve what the show throws at her. But she deserves to be properly seen and understood (for the dickhead she is lol)
