Spoilers for the second part of Chapter 1 of Jcc
I’ve ranted about this before in one of my fics, but Black Jack was totally rigged right? I think most people have come to that conclusion, but I’ve seen some say it was against Vick, so I’m going to say why I think it was actually against Eddie.
So, if you don’t know, there’s an option to pair up with Cobyn before Rook and Cecilia go up. As we know, when Maneki hits next round, HES the one that goes up. I know that isn’t much for evidence, since it’s optional, but look at the next round when BENNY gets chosen by hit despite there only being a 17% chance. 17%. I know twice isn’t a pattern, but it’s still suspicious.
And, again if you don’t know, there’s a death where Vick forces Eddie to go up with him and the dealer gets 20, making them lose. This is more crazy when you remember that in non-deaths with Benny, Bones, and Poppy, the dealer went bust in a way that would make them fine with 13. I think if this signified rigging against Vick then Eddie would have been the one called up when they hit and they would have gone bust, since as much as I love Poppy, I don’t think she’s canonically interesting enough for the show runners to keep when she’s with a person they’re rigging against.
Now why would they be doing this? Because Eddie’s boring! He didn’t give them anything during the interview, he doesn’t willingly play into his role, and his interactions among the cast are lacking. From a show perspective, the worst thing a character can be is boring. Even Benny, who was booed off stage, will inspire people to hate watch for his death! Sure, Eddie did have outbursts that could be used, but that wasn’t enough! (This probably wasn’t helped by the fact that he was visibly close with Benny, who was booed off stage)
In the death with Vick, they weren’t going to hit, which meant six characters more interesting than him would be left behind, and their round wasn’t engaging enough to make up for that. There was no shock factor like with Rook and Cecilia, it didn’t have the same drama that Maneki, Cobyn, and Elise had, it would have been a total waste if they let them go!
So that’s why Black Jack was rigged, to make him interesting. It took away his safe options (Cobyn/Benny) and forced him to make a choice that would spark interest towards his character.