Jake Morgendorffer: Difference between revisions

Jake Morgendorffer was the son of an emotionally abusive father, nicknamed [["Mad Dog" Morgendorffer]], who (as Jake remembers it) tormented his son mercilessly and ultimately shipped him off to [[Buxton Ridge Military Academy|military school]] the first chance he got (the very day after Jake stopped on his contact lens, according to "[[The Daria Hunter]]"). His father berated him for showing weakness ("Monster") and took him on camping trips to berate him about doing it wrong, then got drunk at night. Having "Mad Dog" for a father caused him to still wet the bed at age 15. ("[[The Teachings of Don Jake]]"). Despite all this, Jake's father went to the trouble of recording a lot of the boy's early life in home movies. ("Monster")

 

 

At some point before Buxton Ridge, Jake was in the Boy Scouts with [[Paul Meyerson]].

At Middleton, he joined the hippie counter-culture and met his future wife [[Helen Morgendorffer|Helen]] there. The counter-culture was a calming influence to the seething cauldron of repressed rage and hatred for the world around him and for his father, and he became an extremely cheery optimist with a firm belief in the counter-culture's ideals and rejecting the modern world. He and Helen were arrested in summer 1969 as a student and once protested outside the Pentagon, where he got enraged and kicked the building. ("[[That Was Then, This Is Dumb]]") He attended [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altamont_Free_Concert Altamont ''Free'' Concert] and somehow ''got his money back'' ("[[Road Worrier]]"). Hippie friends included [[Willow Yeager|Willow]] and [[Coyote Yeager|Coyote]]

 

 

[[Image:Jake s paper.png|left|thumb|300px|Jake and his favourite form of escape.]]

 

 

Jake and Helen ultimately had two daughters, [[Daria Morgendorffer|Daria]] (whom he often refers to as "[[kiddo]]") and [[Quinn Morgendorffer|Quinn]]. By this point the family was living in [[Highland]], Texas, (home of [[Beavis and Butt-head]]). The family stayed there for several years before moving to the suburb of [[Lawndale]]. Although it is unknown whether Helen or Jake instigated the move, it has been implied that the change spurred Jake to start his own freelance advertising consultant firm. Jake could now enjoy the freedom of being his own boss, far from the stress-filled environment in which he used to work.

 

<br><br><br><br><br>They celebrated their 23rd wedding anniversary around the time of season 2.

 

Jake and Helen are and always have been much in love, but there is a strong undercurrent of resentment between the two of them in their relationship. In the episode "[[Psycho Therapy]]," Helen describes Jake's behavior as "lost in a fog when [he's] not flying into a rage" to a counselor, and in "[[One J at a Time]]" she shows anger over his inability to get over his father. His general meekness often causes Helen to make a majority of the decisions. When Jake goes into a rage, Helen ranges from humoring him to pushing back. "[[Fire!]]" showed them in a loving, calm relationship once they were in a relaxed environment, though this ended once stress re-entered the scene.

 

In "Psycho Therapy," Jake accuses Helen of having control issues, allowing him no vices. Both are then asked to role-play as the other, leading Jake to portray Helen as a narcissistic career woman with an addiction to praise who does everything without empathy, while Helen portrays Jake as a self-pitying manic-depressive who doesn't try to fix his own problems and is adverse to responsibility. Jake's assessment of Helen really hits home for her and upsets her greatly, leading him to apologize afterward. It is unknown whether the role-play resulted in any lasting emotional scars.

 

There has never been any suggestion that Jake is cheating on Helen or would do, though he apparently phoned a sex chat line once ("Quinn the Brain"). When hit on by [[DeeDee]] in "[[Just Add Water]]", Jake was immediately nervous and ran away to inform Helen at the first bit of physical contact; when they got into an argument later, he blamed her for leaving him with DeeDee.

 

In "[[Sappy Anniversary]]", prolonged absences due to work causes Helen and Jake to spend less time together, and both of them miss the other.

 

Later on in "Sappy", Jake becomes worried Helen is bothered about being married to a loser - she reassures him she isn't bothered (quickly saying she doesn't think he's a loser), and reveals that she's still kept the badly-made, ugly hobbit candle he made for her back during their first anniversary, as it was something he created especially for her: it's a reminder of why she married him, that he's a "kind, decent, intelligent man I fell in love with all those years ago". (He didn't recognise the candle and reacted with horror at the misshapen thing)

 

===Darth Jake===

 

A fic that subverts this variation is "[[Chosin Fate]]," where Daria finds audio tapes of her grandfather before and after the wartime events that transformed him into the "Mad Dog." In the fic, listening to those tapes has a cathartic effect on Jake; he muses on how that was the first time he had ever heard his father say that he loved his son, and considers how his father was a damaged soul who wasn't trying to abuse him, but to toughen him up for the dangers of the world. We also see this in "[[It's All About Respect]]," where Jake and [[Lauriel de la Ribas]] speak about "Mad Dog's" service time, and how it affected Jake's father and the people around him.

[[Image:FailBonding.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Jake fails to make human contact in "[[The Lab Brat]]"]]

 

 

===Good Jake===