BoM/TWS Message Forum

The title of "Jumping Jack"  already tells you who the victim is to be. Why him?

It starts with process of elimination. It's already been suggested above that Andrea Varnsworth would be a booby prize, someone who wouldn't bring the social contacts the part requires. Will/Kim wouldn't know that, but the author does, so dodges it.

Jelena or Laurent? Probably good choices, and Will/Kim could be talked into them, but I think that neither Will nor his current impersonation know those two very well, and so can't judge independently if they would be good choices. But Will, through Kim, would know that Catherine and Jack are excellent prospects.

So, it's between Catherine and Jack. I tipped my hat to what I knew would be the popular choice—Catherine—by having the other doppelgangers give her two votes. But here's where the author stepped in again. Catherine is not well developed in the story, and that needs to be done at some point. But it needs to be done from the inside (because I don't imagine her playing with the book) and so this storyline, is not the place to do it. Jack, on the other hand, is very well developed already.

And because he's developed as a happy, sincere, guileless friend-to-all, it makes him the creepier choice.