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Jeremy Belpois
|  |  | "What's up with you? You've lost a decimal point somewhere?"
#04 Lady Einstein |
Big glasses, vintage shirt, altar boy hair... Jeremy is the living incarnation and allegory of the nerd...which goes perfectly well with his geekiness. But Jeremy is much more than just a simple geek. Above all, he is a highly gifted year 10 student, overwhelmingly further ahead than his classmates... Jeremy is the youngest of the group, which doesn't make him less mature... In the past, this has allowed him to be the leader of the Lyoko Warriors, at the controls of the Supercomputer during a virtual war against the artificial intelligence XANA. More gifted than anyone in computing, the experience acquired during the first conflict against XANA clearly sets Jeremy apart from the other geniuses his age.
In school, he is obviously first in his class... Except in sport, where everyone gets ahead of him. | | |
| | "Yumi...I lost my parents. You're the only family I've got. But Jeremy... Well, Jeremy's different: he turned the Supercomputer back on...he rematerialised me. I can always trust him. He saved my life. And up 'til now, he's always been there for me! Always!"
#18 Resolve |  |
Jeremy, despite his young age, has the disposition of a leader. This is particularly explained by his great maturity and high intelligence. Even his role in the team as the group operator while the others are on Lyoko positions him as a leader.
And so Jeremy often takes the controls...and with them, the decisions. He's the one who decides on who pilots the vehicles (episode 04 “Lady Einstein”) or on which members of the team have the necessary diplomatic skills to hold a video-conference with Tyron (episode 16 “Confusion”). Most of the time, he also makes the decision to send people on missions or leave them on the sidelines. Like this, he fulfils the role of team manager.
Jeremy thinks on his feet. In episode 17 “A Bright Career Ahead”, Jeremy immediately unmasks Graven, Tyron's agent, and adapts his behaviour accordingly to avoid getting caught.
He also keeps his cool. However, we don't often notice because Jeremy frequently panics. But we must be objective. This teenager has a heavy weight on his shoulders. The lives of his classmates are in his hands when they are in the virtual world. And the fate of the universe depends on the fight against XANA. His regular losses of composure are logical, because Jeremy is always facing crisis situations.
During these cases, Jeremy can panic and go to pieces, to the extent of making huge mistakes (episode 23 “Jeremy's Blues”). In some other cases, the adversity stimulates him to find solutions.
Jeremy is a relentless worker and a determined person. He never backed down from the idea of spending many consecutive hours on a problem. It's not uncommon to see him spenidng a whole night working on creating a virus to destroy Tyron's supercomputer (episode 18 “Resolve”).
Jeremy does not work out in the field. This is lucky: not carrying XANA's source codes, he is safe from spectre attacks. He is only confronted by one once (episode 11 “Rendezvous”) and acts bravely.
The young geek is nevertheless a little cut off from the reality of the field and combat. He worries when the fighters take a beating on Lyoko.
The genius boy is also a little competitive. He doesn't take well to the fact that he had a mental block on a simple exercise and was shown up by Laura (episode 04 “Lady Einstein”).
When it comes to human relations, Jeremy clearly has hang-ups. This is where his extremely rational side leaves him hanging. Of course, he is more familiar with friendship and love than Laura is. Yet, the little Belpois remains a relatively cold and stiff person.
Firstly, Jeremy is no good at quarrelling. His decisions being rational, he has difficulty reacting to “emotional” situations. We feel he is very ill-at-ease, for example, when he has to tell William that he currently has no place in the group (episode 02 “The Cortex”). He is also completely powerless in front of Laura's father, when he arrives at the laboratory (episode 12 “Chaos at Kadic”). The man certainly representing an authority in Jeremy's eyes, he doesn't know what to say.
We also remark that Jeremy remains very neutral about Laura's case. Though Aelita clearly indicates her hostility for the newcomer, Jeremy retains a neutral opinion in the negotiations about her joining the group. Excluding the blonde girl's final episodes, when the situation gets out of hand, Jeremy even becomes open with Laura, who he surely considers (from a purely professional point of view) to be a valuable ally.
When it comes to friends, Jeremy has some contact with Ulrich and Odd, who are more like go-getters than intellectuals. He sometimes has clear difficulties putting up with Odd and his irresponsible behaviour (episode 02 “The Cortex”). He seems closer to the girls of the group, all of whom are more thoughtful.
When it comes to love, Jeremy is in love with Aelita. They have an ambiguous relationship. They don't show their love physically, their relationship being purely platonic. Nevertheless, nobody bats an eyelid when William labels Aelita as Jeremy's girlfriend. Jeremy never expresses his feelings for Aelita, but the girl does confess her emotions for Jeremy.
The genius betrays himself in only one element: the worry and overprotection he displays for anything relating to Aelita. He constantly cautions her and worries for her. While he always reasons these things in a very rational way, Jeremy is ready to make concessions for Aelita, when questions such as Anthea Hopper are on the table. As a general rule, we couldn't be more devoted to Aelita than Jeremy is.
In episode 11 “Rendezvous”, Jeremy even lets Laura take the controls so that he can go and save Aelita. He also bears with her mood swings, feeling empathetic towards her.
In short, let us make no mistake: Jeremy and Aelita love each other. | | |
| |  | "OK. Now, listen up. I'm sending portable mini-scanners. They'll have only a limited range, but if you move around the Sectors, we should be able to make do."
#12 Chaos at Kadic |
Jeremy is the operator. He guides his friends through the virtual universe and its dangers. Jeremy has been virtualised in the past, on numerous occasions. We won't have the opportunity to repeat the experience during this new fight against XANA...and anyway, he didn't really want to.
Jeremy is an outstanding computer expert. He's able to create very complicated programs very quickly, like the famous Megapod that allows the heroes to cross the outer ring of the Cortex (episode 04 “Lady Einstein”). Like how his friends progress fighting on Lyoko and the Cortex, Jeremy progresses. Towards the end of the second conflict, he manages to reprogram the Skidbladnir extremely quickly (episode 23 “Jeremy's Blues”) while it should have taken him weeks.
As a general rule, Jeremy is the best. He is often assisted by Aelita. However, he does get stuck on some problems. This is when he decides to call Laura for help (episode 08 “Virus”). Laura isn't much more gifted than Jeremy...nevertheless, as we sometimes say, two heads are better than one. Laura is an expert with viruses in particular...a field of computing that Jeremy hasn't yet explored. So, although the blonde girl surpasses our hero in this respect, we see she is unable to virtualise the Megapod (episode 22 “Mutiny!”). The two geniuses have their areas of expertise.
In the virtual conflict, Jeremy is present on all fronts. Jeremy pushes the heroes towards the truth by discovering the link between XANA, the spectres and the heroes: the famous source codes. He also discloses Tyron's identity.
At the same time he eludes possible bugs in the Superscan by creating portable mini-scanners (episode 12 “Chaos at Kadic”) and XANA's traps (analysis of the Blok Wall structure in episode 07 “Countdown”; the glow that reveals the doppelgänger in episode 21 “Imposters”). He beats XANA at its own game two times: in episode 09 “The Bait”, he injects false codes in Ulrich to destroy a spectre and weaken XANA. In episode 19 “The Trap”, he lures a spectre into a trap and steals its codes.
He also analyses Tyron's virtual phenomena in order to thwart them (like the time distortion in episode 24 “Time Warp”). He always finds a solution to crisis situations. For example, in episode 17 “A Bright Career Ahead”, he gets rid of Tyron's transmitted by returning it to the sender.
He also deals with urgent problems, like generating a clone of Aelita to replace her at Kadic (episode 20 “Espionage”).
Jeremy also manages simpler protocols such as hacking, stealing data and spying on Tyron's supercomputer (episodes 06, 18, 20...). He recovers an important archived video with which he discovered Tyron's identity thanks to digital deinterlacing (episode 07 “Countdown”).
But nobody is infallible. Jeremy is also tricked now and then. Tyron allows him to steal fake data to fool Jeremy's vigilance (episode 14 “Stowaway”). XANA entices him to a hub on the Network and destroys the Skidbladnir when it falls into the trap (episode 23 “Jeremy's Blues”). | | |
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"I'm sure your dad didn't bring back XANA. It's that guy who sold him out for his own schemes. That..."
"Tyron. His name's Tyron.
#07 Countdown |  |
Jeremy and Aelita's story is a little of Code Lyoko Evolution's story. It would be tenuous to summarise it. For more information, the easiest way is to consult the Code Lyoko Evolution Story page.
After shutting the Supercomputer down himself, Jeremy became a normal teenager again: particularly brilliant, and appreciating the classes, aside from the ones taught by his tyrannical sports teacher, Jim Morales.
Also, when strange phenomena began to assail Kadic, Jeremy remained dubious until Aelita began to sound alarm bells and mention XANA's return. Quickly convinced by his lady-love, the little genius rapidly proposed to his friends that they turn the Supercomputer back on again to check if this really was the case... After a short mission on Lyoko and a spectre attack at Kadic, Jeremie learns that XANA is back. It survived by injecting source codes into the heroes before it was destroyed...and now, it sends spectres to take its codes back from Aelita, Odd, Ulrich and Yumi, in order to recover its power and conquer the Network once again (episode 01 “XANA 2.0”).
So Jeremy invents Transwatches to measure the heroes' remaining percentage of codes and XANA's total power.
Jeremy's mission is quickly cut into two axes. He must help his friends to deactivate the towers when spectres attack. To do this, he takes up his operator role again, leading the heroes and solving the computer problems as explained in the previous section. Jeremy isn't really concerned by the spectre attacks, because he doesn't have any source codes.
The second quest, on the other hand, will require his complete attention.
While searching for where XANA found refuge, Jeremy reprograms the Skidbladnir, sends the Lyoko Warriors into the Network and eventually find a new virtual world, the Cortex (episode 02 “The Cortex”). This world is generated by a supercomputer that is visibly linked to professor Hopper. The genius programs a vehicle for his friends to use to traverse this dangerous moving Sector: the Megapod (episode 04 “Lady Einstein”). Entering the Central Dome of the Cortex, and with the help of VMA cards that the virtual fighters insert in the Cortex interface, Jeremy steals data.
He discovers that this supercomputer is the property of Lowel Tyron, an old colleague of professor Hopper. Tyron would have betrayed Hopper by stealing the plans for his Supercomputer and building a similar one (episode 07 “Countdown”). Jeremy doesn't have any particular grudge against Tyron himself, but since his supercomputer is XANA's shelter, it must be destroyed. Jeremy and Aelita start to build a virus. Struck by various problems, he decides to acquire help from Laura, a new student at Kadic who is also a gifted student and an expert on viruses.
Jeremy only wanted her help temporarily. Unfortunately, Laura hacks the Supercomputer and the Return to the Past. She makes herself immune to its effects and becomes a de facto member of the team.
While the spectres struggle and glean source codes little by little, Jeremy exceeds himself. After a failed first attempt, Tyron develops Ninjas to protect the Cortex interface: dreaded virtual fighters that complicate the gang's investigations in the Cortex.
Moreover, the genius is stuck between Aelita and Laura, who are waging a very fierce cold war. Laura reveals herself to be a worthy asset. She replaces Jeremy at the drop of a hat to solve a problem concerning activated towers (episode 11 “Rendezvous”) when the operator must rescue Aelita. He also calls for her help when XANA attacks the Skidbladnir with a virus (episode 13 “Betting on Odd”) and almost virtualises her...but Aelita fixes the problem just in time.
On the other hand, Laura makes some big blunders that damage the group's trust for her.
Things go a lot worse with Aelita. The troubling link between Tyron and her father reminds her of the difficulty of life as an orphan. Jeremy does everything he can to support her...while being very busy developing the virus with Laura...
While they investigate the Cortex, the unthinkable happens. While spying on Tyron's laboratory, Aelita discovers that her mother, Anthea Hopper, is alive and working with their enemy. Jeremy thus delays the destruction of the Cortex. He suggests to Aelita that she wait until XANA has reached 95% of its power, leaving her time to investigate her mother's fate (episode 18 “Resolve”). The clock is ticking all the more as Tyron attempts to locate the heroes (episodes 14, 17, 24...).
Laura, exasperated by this decision, drags William into a duo mission to destroy the Cortex. The mission fails and ran huge risks. Following this, Jeremy and his friends expel Laura from the group. By working on the Return to the Past, Jeremy makes it so it will work on Laura again, causing her to forget everything.
Unfortunately, XANA's fateful power threshold of 95% is soon reached. Aelita rejects her friends' proposition to wait even longer. The mission to destroy the Cortex is finally commences (episode 26 “The Final Mission”). After many obstacles for Aelita, confronted by Tyron when he comes to Kadic, Jeremy sets the virus on the Cortex.
Unfortunately, Tyron turns off his supercomputer. The virus is implanted in the machine, but it didn't get activated. The supercomputer is off, and only if Tyron turns it on will the virus will destroy it... And so the second conflict with XANA ends on a standby situation.
Jeremy turns the Supercomputer off again. Yet, he knows that his work is not over. Anthea is still alive, somewhere in Switzerland at Tyron's side, with whom she has an ambiguous relationship. Jeremy will have to support Aelita in her quest to find her mother, and the path will be a long one. | | |
| |  | The actor portraying Jeremy Belpois in Code Lyoko Evolution is Marin Lafitte. Click on the picture to access his page! |
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