Jimmy (Ed, Edd n Eddy)

Jimmy is an insecure child with a propensity to cry. He wishes to become famous, and is most often seen spending his time with Sarah. Jimmy is accident-prone, usually sporting many bandages, and is the weakest kid in the cul-de-sac (as evidenced in "Cry Ed", when he broke his foot when a clothes-peg bounced onto it). Though Jimmy has a cowardly and delicate personality, he truly wishes to be strong and muscular. He can be crafty when motivated, and twice has made scams that were very successful, even getting back at the Eds in one particularly cunning scheme. Jimmy has shown how deeply attached he is to Sarah when someone tries to take her away from him. Jimmy shows excellent cooking skills in some episodes, using his "Easy-Bake"-style oven to make soufflés and cookies that are shaped like sailors.

personality
Don't be fooled by his wimpy facade, penchant for unicorns & unrivaled skills at picking out curtain fabrics, for as a famous cul-de-sac superhero once said to Professor Scam, "There are two halves to every melon!"

Jimmy's not exactly a melon, but he is a bit of a dark horse. Over the show's many seasons he's evolved from being the drippy little kid who always gets duped, intimidated and trampled over by Eddy's scams, to the sneaky, somewhat Machiavellian little kid who is more than capable of running a scam of his own. Although admittedly, there's still a fair amount of duping, intimidation & trampling done to him! Through the early episodes, the lighter half of Jimmy seems to be on top, indeed he seems little more than a sidekick for his best friend Sarah. They can usually be found somewhere close to home playing the games that Sarah - who's definitely in charge of steering their relationship - wants to play. Most games consist of telling Jimmy what to do and how/when to do it, while simultaneously watching over him with fierce mother hen-like affection. Overall, this setup seems to work well for both of them. Jimmy is content to bake, garden, play with dolls, and generally be bossed around, since anyone wanting to get at him must first get past his vociferous redheaded protector. In addition to protecting him physically, Sarah compensates for the endless bossing around by boosting Jimmy's ego. Her compassion for his tender nature (compassion almost never directed at anyone else) helps bolster him up. Some nice examples of this come in Season 1's 'Pop Goes the Ed' when Rolf insults Jimmy's quiche by inferring you'd have to be deranged to eat it. Jimmy is reduced to tears, but Sarah consoles him, and better still, she eats it! Again in

Season 2's 'Cry Ed' it's Sarah who's constantly on hand to put the accident-prone Jimmy back together while drawing the other kids' sympathy away from attention-seeking Eddy. Despite being wimpy, unassuming, and passive on the surface, Jimmy does have his limits, and will show his fangs if he is pushed too far. In Season 1's 'An Ed Too Many', he takes out his frustration at Sarah's apparent infidelity first on a teddy bear, then poor Jonny, and finally on gloating Eddy. In Season 3's 'Wish you Were Ed', Sarah pushes him into a rage by constantly complaining about his driving skills. Obviously there is more to Jimmy than meets the eye, and upon closer inspection, it becomes apparent that Jimmy has a core of surprising resilience and even bravery. Season 2 seems to be the real turning point for him, perhaps as a direct result of being turned into Eddy's reluctant protege in 'Ed in a Half Shell'. A harder edge begins to develop in Jimmy throughout the season. He begins to display a sharper attitude, a sharper tongue, and reveals himself to be a natural when it comes to fleecing the masses, turning into a ruthless money-hungry businessman with a success rate that Eddy can only dream about. From this point on, though he is still most comfortable being passive, Jimmy continually proves that he can hold his own when he has to. In fact, he displays a rare and somewhat unnerving talent for it - recall his imaginative freezer popsicles moneyspinner (Season 4's 'Stuck in Ed') and his ruthless set-up and framing of the Eds for ruining "Friendship Day" (Season 3's 'If It Smells Like an Ed').

So clearly, Jimmy's "got it", though Eddy would much prefer that he "lost it" or kept it under wraps. The fact that a fragile, un-streetwise, much younger kid is better than Eddy at his own game is a never-ending source of chagrin, consternantion, envy, and even anger for Eddy, who is the self-proclaimed king of scams and scheming. In his mind, Jimmy has no right to be better than him at anything, never mind scamming; Eddy would probably do anything to retain his title and remain on the pedestal he has imagined for himself.

Ingenuous Jimmy doesn't really know what to make of the Eds and their scheming. He wants to trust them, and most of all, see good in them - which is why he falls prey to them time and again. You'd think Jimmy would learn his lesson after falling for each successive scam, but he never does. Worse, if Eddy caters to and strokes Jimmys's ego, it causes him to be tricked even more easily. This is Jimmy's greatest weakness, and Eddy's biggest advantage over him. Blinded by his quest for respect, fame and glory, in love with the concept of being loved, he's prepared to go to any length, even if it means ditching Sarah and her good advice. One episode that proves this is Season 4's 'One Size Fits Ed', where Jimmy, bent on becoming a world-famous sumo wrestler, allows Eddy to force-feed him megatons of peaches and cream.

Jimmy always has an eye on the future. With the exception of the ever-trendy Nazz, surely there's no cul-de-sac kid with a neater coiffure, or more au fait with haute couture. Very few are more in touch with what's hot than little Jimmy. As indicated by his interest in all things fashionable and in vogue, Jimmy is well in touch with his artistic side. Anything to do with the arts, be it painting, directing, or performing in front of an audience leaves him positively alight with anticipation. Throw in the sound of applause, and he's gone, riding high on cloud nine. No rough games or getting dirty here though, please, it's all about elegance, presentation & poise; it's about making a lasting impression; it's about showbiz.

Jimmy's highly evident artistic talent allows him further scope to gain attention (often, like Eddy, to the point of milking it.) He revels in his own extreme delicacy, for as we all know, nobody suffers like an artist suffers, and Jimmy positively makes a career out of it. This has mixed results, naturally. It's a wonderful thing that your artistic soul, burdened by the misery of trials such as waxy build up on fruit, and your cookies getting burned, means you're never short of sympathy from your friends. However, it can be taxing when your narcissism gets the better of you, and even your best mates are sick and tired of hearing you pontificate about nothing but yourself and your talent. Luckily, Jimmy seems to strike just the right balance most of the time.

Jimmy, in addition to being an artistic little soul, is also very accident-prone. While he is certainly most noted for his fluffy hairdo and that distinctive retainer, he's also likely to be seen sporting a myriad assortment of Band-aids, bandages, and plaster casts. Delicate and fragile to the extreme, it seems there's always something wrong with Jimmy, be it a bandaged nose, a splinted arm, or a simple bump on the head. He gets seasick, rubber tyres give him a rash, hopscotch makes him dizzy, he doesn't like being alone, gets jealous, doesn't like strange foods, get's freaked out by camera flashes (huh??), bad breath makes him faint, scary stories frighten the jujubes out of him, and Eddy makes him very nervous (as opposed to making everyone else very mad). And of course, when there isn't an actual physical ailment to whimper over, there's always our own neuroses & shortcomings. Sarah's crush on Edd leaves Jimmy lying on the couch like a wilted lettuce; he's upset inside, and it shows in his baking - even the poor boy's muffins are flat as pancakes … darn eggwhites!

Apart from falling afoul of the Eds, Jimmy gets on well with all the cul-de-sac kids. Although he's wary of loud-mouth Kevin, he knows nobody's really going to get him, because he has what none of the others do - a fiercely loyal bodyguard who will spring to his defence at the first whimper. He does join in with group games and Urban Rangers activities, but he's happiest (and safest) when he's with Sarah. Sarah may tell him what to do, but she doesn't tell him what to be, and so he's free to talk about tea sets, curtains, the latest fashions, or offer to style Sarah's hair without fear of rebuke or mockery. And there you have little Jimmy - delicate, artistic and naïve. The little guy who says he follows the rules and wouldn't dream of cheating, whose idea of being the baddest of the bad means pigging out on ice cream, the boy who's not afraid to wear shoulder pads and who bats his eyelashes and looks as if butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. He's safe, predictable, vulnerable, and definitely duplicitous, but what else would you expect from the boy with the snake on his face? Watch your back Eddy, his day will come. Victory, thy name is Jimmy!