- "But what if we told the truth with like wicked cinematography? Like, ahh, we could start with a slow pan of one of these base walls, and there you are on top and then BOOM! Snap-zoom to a whip-pan- You're over there now! No, smash-cut, dutch angle! Reverse zoom! "
- —Jax Jonez in The Chronicle
"Jax Jonez", a stage name he refers to himself as, is a cameraman intern for Interstellar Daily, first appearing in the Season 15 episode The Chronicle. He takes over the duties as the cameraman for Dylan Andrews after her previous cameraman Frank quit. He is the deuteragonist of Season 15 and later goes on to direct his own Red vs. Blue movie in The Shisno Paradox.
Role in Plot[]
Internship[]
Jax is hired by his uncle, Interstellar Daily station boss Carlos Trabka, to act as an intern for reporter Dylan Andrews on her investigation of the Reds and Blues. During Jax's first encounter with Dylan at Blood Gulch, he expresses his dreams of a future career in cinema and makes suggestions for cool cinematography, annoying Dylan. After interviewing Sister and V.I.C., the two head to Sidewinder, where Jax further annoys Dylan with his incompetence. After she sends Jax off to a nearby mountain for some "establishing shots", Jax spots the Reds and Blues at the mountain's summit and tries to inform Dylan, but the two are spotted, forcing them to take cover.
As the crew attacks, Dylan tries to get Jax to film them while she draws their fire, but Jax's constant attempts to use cool cinematography ruin all the shots. After the crew retreat, Dylan and Jax follow and try to get them to agree to an interview, but they refuse. Upon hearing their voices, Dylan realizes that they are impostors. Jax and Dylan are then saved by a mysterious soldier who has been trailing them since Blood Gulch. After he leaves, the two head to Chorus, only to find that the UNSC First Fleet has formed a blockade around the planet.
In order get a meeting with President Kimball, Dylan shoots Jax in the rear, sending him to the hospital where he is attended to by Dr. Grey. With Grey's help, Dylan manages to speak with Kimbal and finds out where the real Reds and Blues are. After Jax is released from the hospital, Dylan apologizes to him for her actions and prepares to leave. However, Jax praises her dedication and agrees to accompany her, despite the consequences. With that, the two head for a mysterious ocean planet where they find Caboose, who promptly falls off a cliff.
Jax and Dylan soon meet the rest of the Reds and Blues, who inform them what they've been up to since Chorus. Dylan then reveals a distress message of Church, which she got from Kimball, prompting the crew to take action. Jax, however, witnesses Grif angrily walk off into a nearby cave and informs Dylan about it when the Reds and Blues begin searching for him. After Dylan fails to ease Grif, the latter quit the crew and refuses to go on another adventure. As a result, Jax and Dylan join the Reds and Blues, bar Grif, search for the message's source while Wash and Carolina search for their missing comrades.
Confronting the Imposters[]
Jax and the others travel to an abandoned city where they find a relay. As Dylan works to find the signal's source, Jax tries to sneak up on Tucker, The Evil Dead style, only for Tucker to hear him and promptly knock him down. The group is then confronted by the mysterious soldier, Spencer Porkensenson, a process server from Chorus who serves Tucker a class action lawsuit. After Spencer flees, Jax creates a spec promo for a show about Spencer, as the crew flies to the source of the relay signal: Armada 8.
Upon arriving at Armada 8, the group enter a canyon resembling Blood Gulch and encounter the imposters: the Blues and Reds. The group's leader, Temple, explains that they were Simulation Troopers for Project Freelancer and reveal that the UNSC are hunting and killing all Freelancer personnel. Suddenly, UNSC aircraft appear and attack the sim troopers but they manage to defeat them. The Blues and Reds then take the Reds and Blues to their underwater base, where Dylan begins to grow suspicious of them.
Because of this, the Blues and Reds shake the Blood Gulch Crew's trust towards the reporters, who begin to resent them. In order get Dylan to investigate the base, Jax distracts Sarge by having him do a screen test for one of his scripts, but he and Dylan ultimately get captured by the Blues and Reds. Temple then tells the two about his early days at Desert Gulch and how Project Freelancer caused the death of his friend Biff. When Jax criticizes his story, Temple shoots him and ties him and Dylan up in the basement.
Luckily, Sarge, having sided back with the Reds and Blues, frees the two reporters. The three then encounter Locus and together, free the remaining Reds and Blues. Upon regrouping, the crew is forced into a firefight with an army of Zealots, where Wash gets injured. After defeating the Zealots, Locus flies Wash to the hospital, while the rest of the crew prepare to stop Temple's campaign against the UNSC. Jax, having shot b-roll footage while wandering around in the underwater base, reveals footage of a room filled with Temple's battle plans. This helps the crew devise a plan to stop Temple, as they fly to Earth.
Rescue of Earth[]
Upon arriving at Temple's lair, Jax helps Tucker defeat Cronut and Lorenzo by distracting them, allowing Tucker to destroy their tank. The group then infiltrate the Blues and Reds' lair and confront Temple, who has activated Loco's Machine. While the group subdues Temple, they are unable to shut down the machine, which quickly becomes unstable. Jax suggests they offer a sacrifice to stop it, prompting V.I.C. to give himself up to stabilize the machine.
After the machine disappears, the group have the surviving Blues and Reds arrested and are informed by the Chorus lieutenants of Wash's survival and recovery. Dylan and Jax then say their final goodbyes and thank each other for their help and experience, with Dylan showing interest in a script Jax is excited to develop. Later on, based on his adventures with the Reds and Blues, Jax pitches a 313 paged script entitled "Red vs Blue" to a Hollywood executive, who seems very interested in producing it.
Becoming a Movie Director[]
Immediately after the events of the previous season, Dylan and Jax remain on the island to clear the Reds and Blues name, as they are still wanted by the UNSC. A year later, a time traveling Sarge and Simmons travel to the set of Jax's Red vs Blue movie, where he is acting as a director, bringing along Alex, John, and George, a group of historical figures Sarge recruited to kill Temple. Sarge shoots the actor portraying Temple dead, but Jax, who has adopted the personality of a prima Donna, does not care, stating he would have had to fire him anyway due to controversy. He takes Sarge and Simmons on a tour of the film set, screaming at the crew along the way. Jax also hires John to portray Temple, enraging Sarge.
Jax then greets Carolina and Wash when they arrive on the set looking for Dylan's time travel expert, which is Jax. He explains time travel to them and Caboose and Lopez arrive. He reveals that he was using the time machine to recruit dead actors for his movie. Shortly afterwards, the remaining Reds and Blues also gather to the set of the movie with Jax. They then go off to meet with the Cosmic Powers when Jax gets a message saying the studio has cut the funding for the movie. Jax sticks his head through one of the still open portals the Reds and Blues left through to ask if he could use one of their Time-Portal Guns to get funding for his movie. His sudden arrival shocks Atlus causing him to throw his Gravity Hammer at his head. It is unknown whether Jax died from this, as his body flies back through the portal from the impact.
After the Reds and Blues reset time to after their defeat of the Blues and Reds, it can be assumed Jax is alive and pitching his movie as he was doing at the time.
Personality[]
Jax is a man largely out of touch with the world outside of the realm of film making. He tends to make constant references to classic filmmakers, such as Werner Herzog, Stanley Kubrick, and many others. His focus on cinematography above journalistic integrity serves as a constant source of frustration to Dylan Andrews. However, his knowledge of film making and literature serves as his primary source of contribution to his companions.
After becoming a director, Jax begins to exhibit the worst stereotypical traits typical of filmmakers, such as verbally and physically abusing his employees, putting his crew members into incredibly dangerous situations for the sake of realism, and threatening to throw visitors into trash compactors.
Since becoming a director, he has developed an increasingly temperamental and ruthless personality. His more violent demeanor towards his employees also causes him to regularly hold his underlings at gunpoint, threatening to shoot them if they don't make flatering commentary about him when they are being documented on camera. His dedication to his work has also caused him to take unnecessary risks to the timeline by using time travel to recast his entire film. This fanatical mindset of his demonstrates his questionable mental state, bordering on dissociation from reality, as he seldom takes into account the risks of his actions.
Trivia[]
- Jax's armor in Halo 5, like Frank's, consists of a full Argus (Arrestor skin) armor set.
- Jax's film references include, but are not limited to:
- Alien: Jax shouts the line "Game over, man! Game over!" during The Mother of Destruction.
- Citizen Kane: After getting shot by Dylan in Chorus Lessons, Jax meekly whispers the line "Rosebud..."
- Blade Runner: Jax sneaks up on Dylan and the Blue Team in Reacts by reciting Rutger Hauer's "tears in the rain" speech.
- Evil Dead: Jax tries to pull a prank on Tucker by rapidly running up to him in the style of Sam Raimi's motorcycle shot from the end of the original The Evil Dead, only for Tucker to punch him. Jax painfully whispers "Groovy..." the iconic catchphrase of Ash Williams.
- Jax got his start in entertainment shooting wedding videos, just like his voice actor.
- When asked if Jax died, Joe Nicolosi responded that he doesn't know and might bring him back if he has any other plans for the character, although he currently doesn't.[1]
- Coincidentally enough, when asked on Twitter what happened to Jax following being struck by Atlus' hammer, Joe states that Jax ended up in a coma, and his movie became a critical success after extensive reshoots, resulting in Jax to disown the movie, as it was not his creative vision. He sets out to make another movie, only to not be able to think of another movie idea. Jax tried to recreate the events that caused him to lose his ideas — To get hit by Atlus' hammer again. Along the way, he gets involved in "increasingly bizarre and amazing adventures." Jax later finds the hammer, only to realize he doesn't need it after all. So, Jax makes Moon Doom. [2]
- While he doesn't appear in Restoration, his personality was incorporated into Dylan Andrews in that film.