Kai

Grief: Kai and Jay

I chose to focus on those two because of one sole reason: the IMMENSE contrast between the ways Jay and Kai handle grief. Complete opposites.

before i Start i wanna say I don’t have anything against jay, I love him too guys

Jay, time and time again, shows self centeredness in times of grief (again, not saying it’s his fault that’s just how he copes) He leads himself to believe that only he ever loved this person, and that no on else feels the same way. jay is also very expressive- he cries, he mourns, he is verbal throughout his grief. for example, he talks to water in order to feel some grasp of nya close to him- it shows how expressive he his with his longing for her. furthermore, two more examples:

the widely known one: Kai and Jays fight. JAY is the one who suggested they shouldn’t be a team anymore, he is the one who started the fight, and he’s the one who said no one loved/missed nya BUT him.

now, one might say

“But Kai was inconsiderate! He knocked down Jay’s water glass!”

lemme tell you buddy. jay shouldn’t be talking to water glasses in the FIRST place. secondly, this was kai’s way of showing concern, and allow me to remind you that kai still bothered to show concern for jay, when even before the fight jay was saying things like “only I miss nya” “I love her” “we are nothing without her”

secondly, did u guys notice the immense regret and sadness when kai knocked his glass over?

LOOK AT KAI’S EXPRESSION. he is DEVASTATED. he didn’t MEAN to. and on top of that, he is closing his eyes. if you’re a total kai observer, like I am, you’ve noticed that he looks away or dissociates if situations are too emotionally overbearing for him (nyas death, both times, when chen tells him about the fact that his parents might be evil and left them on purpose, etc etc). kai even said sorry, in a heartbreaking tone. he UNDOUBTEDLY would have apologized more profusely if jay didn’t attack immediately.

the other example is Season four, episode two. The ninja were in chens place discussing Zane’s death. jay says “I moved on. I feel guilt. These are not good feelings!” again, kai feels like he is being indirectly attacked, due to jay subtly suggesting that only he feels guilt. kai then says, “You think you feel bad? Imagine how I feel!”

and you might think oh but Kai is being self centered now. no. He’s not. Because remember what Lloyd told him before? Lloyd said Kai was selfish, for wanting to die instead of Zane. Kai felt suppressed and used jays words as a chance in desperation to vocalize some of his pain because he had no other chance to. And every time kai stated ANYTHING related to Grief, it’s automatically considered selfish whereas when jay does it it’s totally fine. kai’s feelings are ALWAYS being dismissed.

Kai handles grief destructively. He drinks, blames himself, mentally tortures himself. He literally has never cried in front of the others and silences his grief because he is criticized for it, especially by jay. It’s not that he isn’t vocal, it’s the fact that he CANT be. He’s SCARED to be.

both were in immense pain, but, and I literally don’t even know how many times I’ve said this, but the show needs to properly address this problem. kai being portrayed as selfish during grief is UNFAIR, and does not make sense AT ALL, when everything he says or does contrasts ‘selfishness’.

I know a lot of people are saying that Kai and Nya had a babysitter and whatever, but guess what.. who cares? Allow me to explain:

A Babysitter is someone who comes for a short amount of time to take care of kids. A babysitter needs money. This ‘babysitter’ definitely had her own family and I don’t think a random stranger or even if the babysitter was a good neighbor would raise someone else’s kids and provide for them and support them and love them for free. She most likely came in only to feed them, and left. Or left the minute Kai turned ten. Maybe she gave up when no more money was coming her way, and she only came to feed them for a year and that’s it. We don’t even have enough information to conclude any of this, especially not if she was a good, loving babysitter, which she was likely not. Because if she was, Kai and Nya would be mentally healthier.

When kids are growing, they look up to their parents, because they are emotionally connected with them. Kids mimic emotions from their parents, and look up at them for validation of their own. Nya was really young when Maya and Ray were captured. Kai was very young too, but old enough to know what love is because he most likely remembered his parents loving him. Now on the other hand Nya probably had little to no memory recall of her parents at all, much less the idea of what ‘love’ is.

When Maya and Ray were captured Kai was the only person left who Nya was emotionally connected with. Kai was the only person who could fill the role of being a loving person in her life, someone she could relay on and trust with vulnerability. I don’t think some children would just suddenly trust a random adult in their life, especially not Kai (remember how hesitant and suspicious he was when he first saw Wu). 

If this babysitter was that awesome, dependable, or trustworthy, Kai would not have trust issues, Nya would not need to feel independent, etc etc. Again, Both siblings would have a little more healthier mindsets.

Kai, as a child, loved Nya since the beginning. When Maya and Ray disappeared, he did raise her. You could interpret this sentence in many ways- raised her by love, raised her emotionally, raised her by providing for them both, raised her by protecting her. I strongly believe in every one of these and more, but this furthers on to my point: babysitter or no babysitter, at the end of the day, Kai did raise Nya. And I think for a small child who was just as lost and scared, he did his very best.

A child forms their idea of love normally by looking at their parents relationship, and by observing how parents treat them. Kai had a slight foundation in this already, since he loved Nya since the beginning. Nya however, as I mentioned before, likely had little to no memories of her parents. So, everything Nya learned about love, how to love, etc was from Kai. And with this, Nya had understood and developed her own love languages, and proceeded to use what she learned from Kai and reciprocate it. This was undoubtedly Kai’s biggest mental support during his childhood. And with what she learned from Kai, she started to also love Jay.

guys this is it. THIS is IT. we got a second chance I repeat a second chance

nya falls alongside a burning part of the bounty (crystallized trailer two)

how will Kai react what is he gonna do?? this is where the writers CANNOT mess up like they did in seabound (we didn’t get to see the real extent to how Kai grieved and we didn’t get a SIBLING HUG/MOMENTS) this is where we smith sibling gangs will rise up and SHINE i am manifesting our epic sibling hug and epic sibling moments I want to see angst and bonding and finally everything will be perfect this will solve all my problems that have nothing to do with ninjago but can definitely be fixed by ninjago

Lloyd, Nya, and Zane vs Cole, Kai and Jay in an escape room:

Team #1:

Lloyd (the leader + idea maker ): nya you search that area and be on the lookout for map coordinates and zane can you please help me with these pots I think these designs are hinting something

also lloyd: *oni growls* at everything…

Nya (the theorizer + hint refuser): ok guys so according to my theory these coordinates should be the password to unlock the safe because the ID card numbers are proportional to the- NO LLOYD WE DONT NEED HINTS WE ARE BETTER THAN THAT.

also nya: smash smash frustration BASH

Zane (the analyzer + clue organizer): according to my database this is a long, forgotten language used by an ancient civilization decades ago. no one has ever deciphered it before. i shall translate it in a few seconds. apologies for the delay. allow me to organize the clues, I’ll section them in different categories and label them individually.

also zane : [grabs a detective hat and wears it, declares his newfound ownership over it] oh? what do you mean it’s the property of the escape room?

Team #2

Cole (the muncher+ the holy observer): guys look I found a trail of crumbs maybe if we follow it we can find something! [is staring at his own crumbs]

also cole: hmmm that painting MOVED. let’s check it out. yes it’s totally a color wheel it’s certainly hinting towards a certain art type we should investigate all the painting in that art type let’s go woo!! guys is that a THREAD of string on the floor? that’s the same fabric on the coat!!

Jay (the toucher of everything + the creative one ): what’s this what’s that hey guys check this out ew this is sticky don’t come here everyone I’m gonna touch everything

also jay: ok guys I made this mini electronical gps by myself with the limited materials we found! slay!

Kai ( secret passageway finder, the riddle solver): ooo is this a lever how about this maybe this is the lever oh man THIS IS DEFINITELY a SECRET passageway oh wait no it’s not oops sorry

also kai: so I solved all fifty riddles and found 68 secret passageways do u guys think that’s good enough?

guess which team always wins.

IF I HAD ONE HUNDRED AND FOUR DOLLARS I WOULD BUY

give me one reason why I shouldn’t

im  sure everyone and their dad have drawn this pic before but i dont care i love kai

rgb sibling doodles

the annoying kid and his cool siblings

brothers dump from the other day heheh (feat. lloyds dragon form)

kai doodles thanks to this brush i just found out abt