Jake Berenson

Template:Infobox Animorph

"I'm a sixteen-year-old kid named Jake Berenson, and I am the leader of the Animorphs. In the past it's been hard for me to say that, to take on the title of leader. In the past I've questioned myself. Wondered whether I was right, wondered whether what I did was good, wondered whether I had any right to make life-and-death decisions. I've felt sorry for myself at times. Maybe anyone would, in my spot. But I had to put all that aside now. I had put it all aside. Not because I was suddenly convinced that I deserved the power, was worthy of it. That wasn't it. I knew better than to get too caught up in the myth of Mighty Jake the Yeerk Killer. I had given up soul-searching because I realized now that it was simply too late. Way past too late. The battle had become a war. And I was, for better or worse, the only leader we had."

―Jake Berenson

Jake Berenson was the leader of the Animorphs, an author and a morphing professor for the United States Department of Defense. Revered as a global and national hero, he is heralded as the individual responsible for ending the decades-long Andalite-Yeerk War.

History

Leading the Animorphs

"I'm the unofficial leader of the Animorphs. I send us into battle. When things go wrong, when we get hurt or have to run for our lives, that's on me, too. I'm not complaining. Has to be done. You know? Someone has to make the calls. A good leader has to make tough, informed decisions. Recognize his soldiers' special strengths and use them accordingly. Fight to win with the knowledge that he may die trying. But most important, a leader won't ask anyone to do anything he wouldn't do himself."

―Jake

This section requires expansion

To be added

Losing his Family

"This was not your fault, Prince Jake. You could not have known what Tom was planning. You could not have stopped him."
"Yeah, Ax. I could have. What's wrong with me? Why didn't I get them out last night? When I need to wait, plan, gather more information, what do I do? Charge in. Go for the surprise. Screw things up permanently. But when I need to charge in, to save the people I love most, I wait. I say, "Go home. Get some rest. Sleep on it." Great plan. I get sleep. My parents get Yeerks."

―Ax and Jake

To be added

Endgame

"Look, if we lose this battle it's over, you understand me?! If we lose it's over. This is the battle. This is the last stand. We lose and here's what happens: The Yeerk fleet fights the Andalite fleet. If the Yeerks win they'll be free to enslave every living human being and kill the ones they don't want. If the Andalites win there's a very good chance they'll sterilize Earth: kill everything in order to end the Yeerk menace once and for all. So, you don't like me telling you what to do, you don't like your job, you don't like me, period? I don't really care. Before this night is over the casualties will be piled high and some of you standing here right now will be dead and I don't care because we are going to win. Is that clear? We're taking that Pool ship and before this night is over we'll have Visser One right here."

―Jake to James and the other Animorphs

To be added

Post-War

2000

"We Animorphs and the newly minted Prince Aximili, with our prisoner, landed Ax's official liaison ship, a sleek Fast-Courier, right in the middle of the Mall in Washington. Not a mall, the Mall, a sort of open green space with the Capitol Building at one end, the Smithsonian Institution and various government buildings on both sides, and the obelisk of the Washington Monument at the far end. We called ahead, not wanting to terrify anyone. There were roughly a thousand cops and twice that many newspeople waiting for us. It was, as Marco said, a "shiver-my-spine moment." A sea of microphones and video cameras and flashbulbs. Ax and Jake, and to a lesser extent Marco and I, gave a sort of brief explanation of what had been happening, and where things stood now. Needless to say, it was kind of a big news day."

―Cassie

To be added

2001

"Jake was on his way to becoming this icon, this national hero figure. He had that whole tragic-hero thing going on. People knew about him sending his cousin to take out his brother and they ate it up. I am not kidding when I say that some congressperson actually suggested carving his face onto Mount Rushmore. Nothing came of that, fortunately. So, anyway, everyone acted like they wanted Jake to do their show, but Jake wasn't really into that game and the bookers for the shows knew it. Jake did not do good panel. He wouldn't sit there and trade jokes with Dave. There was too much he didn't want to talk about. Jake was still carrying the world on his shoulders, and it showed. [...] Jake carried Tom and Rachel and those seventeen thousand Yeerks around his neck like the Ancient Mariner and his albatross. Being Jake he didn't lose it. He didn't go off and become some kind of drug addict or have some big breakdown or whatever. He was still Jake. But he was a different Jake. Smaller and bigger at the same time, if that makes any sense. He was closed off, inward. He would sound almost like the old Jake sometimes but you just got this sense that he was out of phase with everyone else. Like he was a half step ahead or behind. Of course this just made him into the strong and silent type and he always was a big, good-looking guy, so he got marriage proposals (and other proposals) from girls as young as twelve and women old enough to be his grandmother. No interest. He loved Cassie, of course, but I don't know what happened there. I know when I talk to Cassie I ask her if she's seen him and the answer is always no. The same when I talk to Jake, although he always says he's just about to call her, just about to. Write a book? No thanks. Endorsements? No thanks. Every college on the planet tried to recruit him. No thanks. West Point offered him a gig as an instructor in the Tactical Application of Emerging Technologies and Xeno-Warfare. No thanks. If he'd been old enough he could have run for president as the candidate of Democrats and Republicans both. Jake was the biggest hero the world had ever seen because he was a hero for all humans, not one nation. He had saved the lives and freedom of the entire human race. I mean, he could have snapped his fingers and had anything he wanted. The problem was, he didn't want anything. Except for Tobias to come back. For Rachel and Tom to be alive. For the chance to unlive one fateful moment when he gave the order that doomed seventeen thousand defenseless Yeerks."

―Marco

To be added

Trial of Visser One

"Your honor, this witness should himself be under indictment as a war criminal. If the alleged war crimes of the Yeerk military officer, Visser One, are to be tried in this court, it must be in the pursuit of impartial justice. Truly impartial justice cannot be applied only against one side in a conflict. If my client is to be tried for his actions in the human-Yeerk war, then so must the actions of this witness. With all due respect to this court, this witness is a mass murderer. A war criminal."

―Visser One's Lawyer

To be added

2003

"I needed a job. I needed to do something useful. And I was the reigning expert on using animal morphs for infiltration, surveillance, and combat. They called me Professor. A joke, obviously, I still hadn't formally graduated from high school. But they had to call me something, these amazingly fit, smart, disciplined men and women, some of whom were twice my age. Classes were terribly Top Secret, naturally. The "school" was a squat cinder block building in a forgotten corner of the Twenty-nine Palms Marine Corps base. Way out in the California desert. Nothing around. I lived in Santa Barbara, now. After the trial of Visser One, and endless nagging from Marco (and his agent and manager and assorted Hollywood friends), I finally wrote a book. It was an autobiography, of course. I hated doing it. But it was a way for me to tell people more about Rachel and Tobias, the Forgotten Animorphs, as people called them. The book made way more money than I needed. I bought a house for my folks and finally moved out on my own. Tom was gone. My hanging around my parents' house till I was thirty wasn't going to bring him back. Marco lived half a mile from me, in a house about seven times bigger than mine. We'd started hanging out again. And after awhile he'd given up arranging dates for me with whatever starlet happened to be willing. The Defense Department was my official employer and they flew me in a private military jet from Santa Barbara to Twenty-nine every day of class. Flew me back in the evening. I would sit there pretending to work on lesson plans, stare out the window at the sun setting over the Pacific, and watch the birds below. I had seen red-tailed hawks at times. But there was no way to know. [...] My ride was waiting outside the building. They drove me back and forth in a Humvee with all kinds of security — a courtesy befitting my status as an official hero. I had been given the Presidential Medal of Freedom and a similarly exalted medal from pretty much every nation on Earth. Some before the trial, some more afterward. If I'd suffered anything tangible from having the title of "war criminal" applied to me, I never noticed it. And I'd gotten so I almost didn't notice the security that followed me everywhere since I'd become terrorist target number one."

―Jake

To be added

A New Mission

"Look, for better or worse, this is what I do. This is what I am, not what you are."
"I'm still pretty good in a fight."
"Pretty good? Cassie, you're a one-woman army. But you're the soldier who has fought her war and moved on. That's good. It's not me, though. Come on, Cassie, we both know this is a lifeline for me."

―Jake and Cassie

This section requires expansion

Jake developed a personality similar to Rachel by this point, becoming reckless, ruthless and enjoying war and the subsequent violence, a trait noticed by both Cassie and Marco. When Jake discovers that Ax has been kidnapped, Jake relishes the idea of entering another war, citing it as a lifeline for him, with Cassie surprised that she did not notice how much Jake's demeanor resembles Rachel's. After more than six months captaining the Rachel, a state-of-the-art Yeerk ship named by Tobias, Jake encounters a Blade ship—one containing the last fugitives from the Yeerk empire. Ax's captor, a monstrous being of unknown origin known only as "The One", makes its unsettling appearance through a communication channel between the Blade ship and the Rachel. Undaunted, Jake gives his final order, instructing the pilot to power up their engines and ram the larger ship.

Personality

"He was a good guy, my dad. Not just because he was my dad. Because he was a good person. Because he did his work as well as he knew how and wasn't a jerk to the people around him. That doesn't make you a saint or anything, but I guess when I think about it, that's what I hope I'll do when I’m older: treat my family right, do my job well, not be a jerk to the people I meet. Maybe that's not a huge, ambitious goal, but it would be enough for me. I've done the hero thing. You can have the hero thing. Me, I wanted a day when all I'd have to do was be a decent human being."

―Jake

At the beginning of the Animorphs series, Tobias announces to the team that he thinks that Jake should be their leader. The other Animorphs quickly agree, and Jake reluctantly accepts the position. Few would disagree that he is naturally fit for the job, as he is brave, responsible, cool under pressure, and able to take charge during a crisis. He is described by his cousin Rachel as a person who can give orders without sounding overly bossy. At first, Jake doesn't view himself as a leader, and thus isn't willing to accept the role, but when he learns that his older brother Tom is a Controller, his desire to save his brother serves as the fuel to his unyielding determination in his fight against the Yeerks.

In the first book, Jake is the only character with pre-existing ties to each of the other Animorphs; Rachel is his cousin; there was a mutual attraction between him and Cassie; Marco is his best friend; Tobias was rescued by him from bullies sometime before the series began and had a mild case of hero-worship towards Jake. While Ax didn't appear until the fourth volume, The Message, Ax quickly accepts Jake as his "Prince" ("Prince" being a rank in the Andalite military hierarchy) and is deeply loyal to him. Jake's status as Ax's Prince led to a recurring joke between them:

One of Jake's more harrowing experiences occurs when he is infested by a Yeerk, Temrash 114. Fortunately Ax realizes something was wrong (because Jake's face momentarily twists into an expression of disgust when he sees Ax), and the Animorphs tie Jake up for three days until Temrash dies of Kandrona starvation. Jake gets his first glimpse of Crayak when Temrash died. He is also left with partial memory imprints of Temrash and his former hosts: a Gedd, a Hork-Bajir, and his brother Tom (who is now host to another Yeerk).

As the leader of the small band of guerrilla warriors, his leadership, his choices and mistakes, and the responsibility he assumes are recurring themes in the Animorphs series. Despite his best efforts, Jake never attains his main goal for joining the fight: saving his brother from Yeerk infestation. After he fails to save Tom from the Yeerks, he is left emotionally damaged and unable to lead. Before the final battle, Cassie manages to lift him out of it, but her success is short-lived. Eventually, Jake's personality becomes very much like his cousin Rachel's, to the point where he employs ruthless and reckless decisions and smiles amidst the carnage, unable to live without a war, with the similarity noted by both Cassie and Marco.

Relationships with the other Animorphs

Marco

"Marco is one of those people who jumps right to the conclusion, without a lot of wondering and guessing. You could say he's smart. Or efficient. Or I guess you could say he's ruthless. He's not mean or cruel. He just gets from point A to point Z faster than most people."

―Jake

Jake and Marco had been best friends for years before the war, and generally maintained a close relationship throughout the series, despite several tests of their friendship. Towards the end of the war, Jake and Marco's friendship suffers. In the post-war period, Marco is concerned for his friend and makes a plan with Cassie to try to get through to him.

Cassie

"You know I love you."
"I love you, too, Jake."
"I guess if we win, if we survive, maybe we should, you know, get married and all. I mean, eventually. I know we're young, but man, we've been through enough that it should count for a few extra years, shouldn't it? [...] Look, Cassie, when this is over I'll be done with it forever. I'll go back to school, get an education, go to basketball games, get a driver's license, go to college, figure out what it is I really want to do. And be with you. You and me."

―Jake and Cassie

Jake and Cassie were attracted to each other ever since the start of the series, and their relationship kept growing as the series progressed. They end up kissing in The Attack, and admit the depth of their feelings for each other. After they kiss, Rachel remarks, "It's about time.". However, they grow apart towards the end of the series due to Jake's depression and his distrust of Cassie after she allows Tom to escape with the Escafil device. They make up before the very end of the series, and Jake even asks Cassie to marry him in The Answer, but she declines, saying she wpuld marry him "a year after this is all over." At the time, Cassie correctly suspected that Jake had been changed by the war, and after it's over, he becomes too entrenched in depression and guilt to be able to pursue a romantic relationship.

Rachel

"I worry about you, Rachel. More than any of the others except Tobias. I feel like this war is to you like booze is to an alcoholic. Like I don't know what will happen to you if it all ends someday."

―Jake to Rachel

Despite being cousins, Jake and Rachel weren't particularly close until they became Animorphs, with both of them eventually loving the other. As the series progressed, Jake became worried about Rachel's violent nature, and Rachel occasionally found herself wishing to challenge Jake's leadership, despite respecting him as her leader. Overall though, the two got along very well and were mostly on the same side of arguments. After Rachel's death, Jake mourned her passing deeply, often visiting her grave late at night and spending hours there in silence. He eventually came to adopt Rachel's demeanor, craving war and employing reckless tactics.

Tobias

"If only we had Tobias. I missed my eyes in the sky. My air force."

―Jake

Before Jake became an Animorph, he helped Tobias escape from bullies, and because of this, Tobias looks up to Jake and has a deep respect for him, almost never questioning his decisions. But after the end of the series, Tobias is unable to forgive Jake for his part in Rachel's death, although they make amends, Tobias realizing he cannot muster the rage he believes he should harbor towards Jake and putting aside feelings of animosity in order to save Ax.

Ax

"Jake is the leader. He is my prince. I will trust his judgment."
"Thanks, Ax, That means a lot."

―Ax and Jake

Ax deeply respects Jake, and calls him his "prince." This is a running joke between the two, as Jake is biologically younger than Ax, and holds no real rank. However, Ax does respect Jake's position as leader, and at times, Jake uses his "rank" to overrule Ax's objections. While Jake keeps a certain distance from Ax, as he is Ax's commander, there is a strong bond between the two. Jake is protective of Ax, believing him to be a soldier under his command, and therefore Jake's responsibility (when Ax is kidnapped in the final book, Jake describes him as "one of mine").

David

"I'd gone into lots of battles against Hork-Bajir, Taxxons, Visser Three himself. I'd always gone in hoping to win. But I'd never gone in consciously hoping to kill. This was different. I didn't want to escape. I wanted to destroy David. I wanted revenge."

―Jake

To be added

Morphs

Book Morphs

Morph	Book Acquired
Golden Retriever (Homer)	The Invasion
Green Anole Lizard
Siberian Tiger
Peregrine Falcon	The Visitor
Flea
Wolf	The Encounter
Trout
Bottlenose Dolphin	The Message
Seagull
American Lobster	The Predator
Black Garden Ant
Cockroach	The Capture
Housefly
Termite (acquired but never used)	The Secret
Great Horned Owl
Skunk
Brown Bat	The Android
Spider Monkey (unusable; Sario Rip morph)	The Forgotten
Jaguar (unusable; Sario Rip morph)
Racehorse	The Unknown
Parrot (white)	The Escape
Hammerhead Shark
Rhinoceros	The Warning
Mole	The Underground
Mosquito	The Decision
Leeran
Tyrannosaurs Rex (unusable; Sario Rip morph)	In the Time of Dinosaurs
Dragonfly	The Threat
Human (adult male Controller)
Giant Anteater	The Suspicion
Baby Ringed Seal	The Extreme
Polar Bear (Nanook)
Howler	The Attack
Giant Squid	The Exposed
Chimpanzee	The Experiment
Eel	The Sickness
War Horse (unusable; timeline erased)	Elfangor's Secret
Hork-Bajir	The Prophecy
Squirrel	The Proposal
Cockatiel
Orca (Swoosh)	The Mutation
North American Beaver	The Resistance
Anaconda	The Answer

Television Show Morphs

Morph	Episode Acquired
Golden Retriever (Homer)	My Name is Jake, Part 1
Skink	The Underground
White Tiger
Iguana	On the Run
Butterfly	The Message
Cockroach	The Escape
Ferret
Horse (off-screen)	The Leader, Part 1
Dog	The Release
Human (Tom)	Face Off, Part 2
Mouse	My Name is Erek
White-headed Capuchin	Changes, Part 1
Gecko	Changes, Part 2
Hawk (off-screen)	The Front
Bat

Jake has a total of 15 morphs in the TV show.

Books narrated by Jake

• The Invasion
• The Capture
• The Andalite's Gift
• The Forgotten
• The Warning
• In the Time of Dinosaurs
• The Departure
• The Threat
• The Attack
• Elfangor's Secret
• The Conspiracy
• The Mutation
• Back to Before
• The Familiar
• The Resistance
• The Answer
• The Beginning

Trivia

• Jake's real WAA username is close to being Bball24. It is a reference to his best basketball game, where he scored 24 points.
• In The Answer, Jake finally breaks the "I can't tell you my last name or where I live" tradition, and reveals that his last name is Berenson and that the Animorphs have been fighting the Yeerks in California for a total of 3 years. Marco reveals that Jake is 16, meaning that the Animorphs began the war at the age of 13.
• In the original idea for the series, Jake's name was going to be Matt and he was going to have a little brother named Joseph.
• Jake narrates a small portion of Cassie's book (The Departure) because Cassie was stuck in a chrysalis in butterfly morph.
• Jake has the most books in the series. He gets a part in narrating 17 books in total.
• A running gag between him and Ax involves Ax calling him "Prince," and him objecting to the title. Amusingly inverted in the beginning in Elfangor's Secret, where he objects to Ax calling him "Prince" to instead demand he be called "Supreme Leader."
• In the Anibase, K.A. Applegate had this to say about a very memorable scene in The Attack:
  • "The Jake and Cassie kiss was not only something Ani-Fans had wanted for a long time, it was our small homage to the first interracial kiss on TV, the famous Captain Kirk, Lieutenant Uhura moment. That long-ago kiss ignited a storm of angry response. For us, we always got lots of fan mail, and not a single letter that we ever saw complained about the kiss between a black character and a white character. Mostly what readers said was, 'It's about time!'"

Gallery

Books

Jake (inside cover of In the Time of Dinosaurs)

2011 reprint Jake full body shot

Jake as he appears on the cover of The Andalite's Gift

Jake on the cover of Elfangor's Secret

The inside cover of The Andalite Chronicles

JakeMM4.jpg

Jake in Back to Before

Jake from one of the Animorphs Sanctuary Screensavers

Jake on the inside cover of The Beginning.

Jake on the back cover of the Animorphs Student Planner

Jake on the Anibase

Jake's Antioch ID card

Jake's trading card (from the UK edition of The Forgotten).

Jake's Animorphs Alliance Handbook bio

Jake morphing green anole lizard

Jake morphing housefly

Jake morphing jaguar

Jake morphing Rhino

The Animorphs morphing into dinosaurs

Jake morphing into Homer, his pet golden retriever

Jake morphing a Siberian tiger

Jake morphing into a peregrine falcon

Jake morphing into an orca (Swoosh)

Jake morphing into his older self

Jake morphing a beaver

Jake morphing an anaconda

Jake on the cover of The Beginning

Jake from the cover of The Mutation

Jake from the cover of The Conspiracy

Jake from the cover of The Answer.

Jake's part of the Animorphs Alliance poster

Jake's Personal Message from Animorphs Alliance Flash Issue 1.

A headshot of Jake from the 2011 Reprint

Jake within the cover of the Ellimist Chronicles

Jake morphing housefly (2011 reprint)

TV series

Shawn Ashmore as Jake

Jake in Meet the Stars of Animorphs

Jake in the TV show's intro

Jake's bio from an Australian VHS limited edition poster

Shots of Jake from the show

Jake and Marco from the episode "On the Run"

Cassie, Jake, Ax, Rachel, and Tobias

Marco and Jake

Rachel, Jake, Tobias, Cassie, and Marco from the episode "My Name is Jake"

Jake and the rest of the group

A promotional image featuring Jake, Rachel, Tobias, Marco, and Cassie

Rachel, Jake, and Tobias

Ax, Jake, and Marco

Jake and Marco

Jake acquiring a white tiger in the episode "Underground"

Jake, Rachel, and Marco from the episode "The Release"

Merchandising

Hasbro Bear Transformer Toy

Hasbro Stingray Transformer Toy

Hasbro Tiger Transformer Toy

Jake licensee illustration

Jake from Animorphs: Know the Secret

Jake's bio from Animorphs gameboy game booklet