A talking fish who recently lost his life savings said I am not permitted to spoil the finale. So here you go, a spoiler tag:
*Spoiler*
Digital Circus, it turns out, is the story of a dying human seeking immortality. The idea is something strictly out of science fiction, but this human learns to copy human consciousness into a program.
If human consciousness can truly be transferred into the digital realm (and this is, again, something purely out of science fiction), then it logically tracks that the weakest link in the chain is sanity. Pantheon explores a similar problem – a “digital human” could theoretically live forever, but that same humanity could become a weakness. Humans have physical bodies. Humans age, get bored, and get tired. Without any such limitations, and combined with all the perks of the digital world, a human could lose itself in the infinite.
So, as “Digital Circus” makes clear, the central conflict is not humans against their own mortality. Rather, the central conflict is humans against their own sanity. When they “abstract,” they do something like a close equivalent to death. They still exist. They still can be referred to as the same name. But whatever they once were is no more.
Jax and Pomni as Central
To say that Pomni is an existentialist and Jax is a nihilist would be to oversimplify both. Pomni believes that the characters should make the most of their lives, regardless of whatever impact they may or may not have on the “real world.” Jax, on the other hand, simply disassociates. This is a game. Actions have no consequences. His own belief system is constantly challenged by the guilt of bringing another person to the edge, and so his only coping mechanism is denial.
Nothing matters. Nothing is real, and all of this is no more significant than a dream.
The most common criticism I have found so far is that Jax’s “redemption” was entirely pointless. He still abstracts. To this I would counter: That’s the digital equivalent of death. Jax cannot be reversed into Jax. Jax HAS coherent thoughts, it turns out, but in abstraction they exist behind layers of apparent insanity. Jax was not saved, but like a human comforting a terminal Scratch, Pomni allowed for his final moments to exist in clarity and comfort. To say that this act of compassion is pointless would be cynical indeed.
As for FunnyBunny….yeah…I don’t know. There’s always fanfiction.
I at least wanted her to get with the dinosaur guy.
Caine
I recently read an argument on Quora characterizing one character as a “growing child,” rather than a villain. Caine, in terms of conventional morality, is evil. He tortures humans against their own free will, and he fuses with another AI after escaping his confines.
But Caine is not conventional. He goes into a kind of void, learns about “real humans,” and discovers meaning over the course of some unspecified amount of time. To an AI, this amount of time could be nearly infinite.
Was his resurrection hand-wavey and sudden? No, he was obviously in the recycle bin. Kinger may have SEEMED to be using Linux and an unforgivable rm command, but this was actually an advanced alternate-universe operating system with a recycle bin. If anything, the least realistic thing here is that anyone thought they could kill Caine to begin with.
The Blue AI, I believe, was not evil. The Blue AI was actually Caine’s main source of power, and it became resentful after Caine’s initial act of envious betrayal.
Closing Thoughts
“Existence precedes essence.” The Digital Circus characters are mere copies, nothing more. Their lives are meaningless, their relationships nonexistent.
With that mentality, what are we?
We exist for a period of time. If we have children, many generations from now the entire species will likely end. Death may be permanent. Life is certainly short.
Digital characters can live forever. Or a day. Or a minute.
All they can do, then, is build. Live. Appreciate beauty, even when it comes into an abstracted form. They can be happy for their originals because they existed in the real world, just as they get to live now.