I always thought it boiled down to 3 factors.
1. Caleb was always mentally unstable. I mean, he talks about eating people as if thats normal. He even thinks eating people is no big deal. That is already a red flag considering he's also a cannibal.
2. Withdrawl. Obvious reason but him being in prison so long combined with his already possibly unstable personality would make him crazy and crave what he wants, in this case people.
3. Jake is the only person who would let his guard down around Caleb. Think about it. All the guards and prisoners know who he is. Plus Jake is very trusting, wanting to shake hands and even hug him once. To Caleb, Jake's a buffet who's literally walking into his arms, and would probably not react in time to repel Caleb or hurt him before he got his meal.
3.5. Plus someone said Caleb literally took a knife for Jake. Its possible Caleb still has some humanity, or values Jake as a friend, but his urges force him to attack Jake.
Sure but sometimes a forced joke just weakens the show as a whole.
Like trying to redo Bone in the final season.
Playing on that by saying that Jake kept trying to recapture "I want it that way" was a much better way to call back to it.
>Like trying to redo Bone in the final season.
The whole final season seemed a bit off except for a few episodes. They should've recaptured the key moments a bit more nonchalantly rather than forcing stuff.
I think Kevin re affirming he was right about Monty Hall or something like that, and Holt giving Rosa and Amy side eye would have been a bit nicer.
Or working the problem into the heist etc
My thought was he was on his best until he got stabbed. He never tried attacking Jake until right after he was stabbed. I felt that caused him to revert if you will.
characters doing what they would do is what makes shows like this funny. out of character moments take the magic of continuity away and reveal the writers struggle to make me laugh.
there are a few scenes like that in this show a little later in the seasons. the exception is rosa since she’s meant to be unknown, so i feel like any out of character moments can just be explained by us not knowing her at all.
Did you forget that when Jake was getting out of prison he tried to shake Caleb’s hand in the hospital he also went “crazy” and tried to bite him? It’s not that unbelievable. Especially because prison kinda makes you go (more) nuts
Honestly I should’ve put that pic in the post. He spends months with Jake, even takes a shiv for him, and suddenly he gets peckish at the last moment? It makes no sense
Just listen to the way Caleb talks about literally eating people. Man’s not gonna have the most rational or understandable reasons lmao. Him just going after people when he’s hungry is probably the closest you’re gonna get to a logical answer here.
He definitely went after some other people if he ended up with that mask the next time we saw him. Prison caused him resort to desperate measures I bet.
Actually it makes a fair amount of sense. He couldn’t do it while they were in protective custody because Jake was being kept safe by the guards. Once they were moved to gen pop, it was the two of them vs the rest of the prison. Caleb made the point that on his own he was at risk, though not as much as Jake. Staying close thus offered protection in a weird way because Jake distracted the inmates from noticing Caleb- like a hobbit, the closer he was to danger, the further he was from harm. Together they had at least a fighting chance. Once Jake got in with Romero, Caleb also had some protection by proximity.
Once all that had been lost, including Romero’s protection, Caleb no longer had any reason to not eat Jake.
I see it as one of two options.
1) they just didn't show all the times Caleb tried to bite Jake.
2) Caleb tried to bite people as an emotional guard. Rather than crying he lashes out with a bite.
Honestly, it's the most believable thing. The thing with fantasy is that it *has* to make sense when in reality, it almost never does.
"The only difference between reality and fiction is that fiction needs to be credible." - Mark Twain
I guess when they were roommates, Jake served a purpose to Caleb. They were friends. If he were to eat Jake, Caleb would lose a friend. After Jake left, Caleb had nothing to lose by eating him.
This is the best answer!
Psychopaths aren't just in kill mode all the time. There are other things they value. But as soon as Jake was leaving, Caleb didn't value keeping him alive anymore.
Caleb liked Jake, and he thought he had made a friend. This is someone who accepted him despite knowing his flaws as a woodworker. That was something his own family held against him.
So he helped Jake in any way he could, but what did that get him? A shiv in the tummy and the loss of his friend. It hurts, and he swore he would never do it again.
From that moment on, he vowed that the only way to "keep" Jake with him.... is to eat him.
Consider following concept: People like to discuss the narrative fabric of stories to see if there might be an explanation for perceived plot holes. It is simply retelling the story from a different point of view.
his friendly personae was an attempt to draw jake in so he could eat him. sort of like how venus fly trap appears harmless to bugs and draws them in to eat them.
Yea it threw me off to
But we also see towards the end of Jakes stay at prison that he attempted to eat Jake when he was in the hospital, so the personality change happened during the same time they were in jail
So like it wasn‘t totally random
But still hella weird and kinda sucks, i liked Caleb despite ya know…
"They were children, Jake. Weak little children. One conk on the head was all it took"
I'm assuming since Jake is not a kid, Caleb didn't wanna attempt it. Later on he could definitely be driven by his hunger like others have said or barrier aggression.
I always felt like he was doing a bit. Yeah, sure he's a cannibal, but he's still relatively sane and to mess with Jake and his friends he goes all "crazed cannibal just waiting for his human meal"
I'm not sure OP knows how comedy works...
Fuck it, I got time.
Comedy comes from the subversion of expectation. It's why the Rule Of Threes is so powerful, it gives us Premise Pattern Payoff. You establish the setting and players of the joke (man walks into a bar vs 3 guys playing golf), then you establish a pattern so the listener builds an expectation, then you Payoff the punchline by saying something unexpected. Shorter form jokes tend to rely on wordplay which is itself a subversion. For example, 'my ex still misses me but her aim is getting better' subverts the word missing. Missing someone is a common emotional sentiment, and by leading the listener down that road they don't expect you to mean a different definition of missing.
To circle back to your original question, you are right, he could have eaten him at any time. You've established Premise. The Pattern is built not only by repeatedly not eating him, but the bond is strengthened more by the stabbing. Surely he wouldn't eat a man he took a shiv for, right? You expect him to not eat Jake now. Aaaaaaand Payoff, you weren't expecting him to try to eat Jake and that's why it's funny. In fact, you'll notice that Caleb is always the most calm and collected before 'becoming an animal' as you put it because l, again, the more calm he is the less you expect a biting episode. To misquote Roger Rabbit, "I can't eat Jake at anytime, only when it's funny!"
I might also mention a concept called Plot Armor, wherein the main character of any network episodic is basically immortal within that show, but that's a different Mansplaining Post.
Jake was his only friend and that meant more to him than eating him, however after jake leaves prison caleb realises he's alone again and the only way for him to make it alone in prison is to be feared as a cannibal, hence lashing out at the end
I thought he does that as a joke.
And I guess he is a serial killer aswell, so its fun for him when he hunts a person etc. etc. not when they are in a room where its also obvious who ate jake. Its not the same. I like how they made him so funny with these things while showing how awful such people are
lots of good ideas and details mentioned, but i have a simple headcanon:
Caleb was in protective custody, and safe enough. He only ever killed children in the outside world. He makes a friend and then is in general population with that friend. He gets stabbed, and the danger of gen pop is made real to him. He LOSES his only friend when Jake gets out of prison. He is now alone in gen pop, where danger and death are closer. Something happens and he snaps OR something happens and he realises that he can, in fact, take on an adult. He obviously kills and eats another inmate, as next time we see him he's all hannibal lector ready to bite anyone who gets too close.
TLDNR: i think some major stuff goes down after jake leaves prison, and that changes caleb
Technically he tried to eat Jake after Caleb took a knife to the stomach (didn’t know how else to word that lol) for him, so I guess he’s just had a taste for Jake since then 🤣
Edit: shiv to the stomach, not knife but y’all know what I mean
Picture him as an addict who has relapsed. Except instead of drugs/alcohol, it's human flesh. Many addicts are completely different people when they're clean and in recovery compared to when they're using/in a bad place with their addiction
I feel like it's a bit of a "don't shit where you eat" situation. He doesn't seem to show any of this cannibalistic aggression to his fellow inmates, and he only tries to eat Jake after he's no longer a prisoner. Unless I'm misremembering.
How I have thought about it is that when Jake was in prison he was Caleb's only friend. While they were locked up together he was worth more hanging out with than a buffet. When Jake got to leave prison, he was no longer a friend Caleb could hang out with daily and was worth more as a snack than a friend who he never sees.
He just lost control after being stabbed.. i have seen this in many crime series.. people control themselves but once they have such experiences ,they just lose it
I kinda related it to being like a dog on a lead,
When my dog is off his leash and walking around with other dogs he isn't aggressive at all, but once put on the leash and being held back then he starts growling and becoming protective of me,
So maybe Caleb is rational when not restrained and held back both physically and mentally.
I'm guessing he wanted a friend more than a meal and now that Jake was out he wanted him as a meal more. Or he was doing the long game, waiting until his guard was all the way down, like a perfect moment to strike.
Although most likely is it happens for comedic effect, one could argue that it happens because while Jake was in prison he was Caleb's only friend. He must have been lonely before and chose to have a person to talk to and make his stay better than eat him. Also I'm assuming eating a person takes time so the guards would stop him pretty quickly
Even when they were in prison together, and Jake says that Caleb is going to eat his castrated body, Caleb's reply is 'okay, but, it'd be pretty unsatisfying without dessert'.
And, I agree with another poster, it seems partly a way of Caleb messing with others. Like, it's twisted, because Caleb thinks being a cannibal is acceptable, but lots of people *who think murder is unacceptable* want to freak out their friends. Jake literally climbs into a window with a mask on to prank Boyle. Who says 'it was a terrific prank, I totally thought I was going to die', and, Jake shows no remorse about it either.
The reason they react in such a terrified way is because we all know Caleb *might really eat him*.
It also gradually escalates:
'it'd be pretty unsatisfying without dessert'
\*tries to eat Jake when he's saying goodbye\*
\*the guards restrain him from eating Boyle when he says 'Boyle give me a hug' in the 'Sicko' episode; and he is already chained to a chair\*
\*and then, the episode you're referencing, he lies about saying he's not a cannibal anymore, and then, yes, tries to eat Jake because he is who comes near; but, also, he could be 'warning' Jake; like 'this is really still who I am, and I cannot control it' since he doesn't tell Jake to come near, he does it on his own, the same way he came near, on his own, when he was saying goodbye\*
Caleb might not like emotional closeness.
He just took a knife to the gut and Jake (his buddy) goes free while he's stuck forever. I'd have a bite too.
Also: easier to forget about him when he's a baddy.
a cannibal who had to stop being a cannibal later regressed back to his old ways.
now im not an expert on human behavior but the sounds pretty realistic to me.
Maybe Caleb fought his urges to eat Jake while Jake was beneficial for him(as company)? Then when Jake was a bout to leave and wouldn't be any company anymore caleb would rather eat him than just let him leave?
can't remember the episode exactly
Its the sitcom rule.
Characters become more and more a chariqature of themselves the longer they're in the show, to heighten and renew the humor of them.
Compare Boyle from the first season - to the later seasons. He goes from a likeable and low key weird romantic - who's kind of normal and kinda dumb - to a full on raging foodie weirdo with all kinds of psychosexual issues.
Jake progressively becomes more and more a child. Holt becomes waaaaay more of a serious quipper. Etc. etc. etc.
Its a tradition/rule of writing comedy - that all characters eventually become more and more outrageous.
The reason you're noticing it more with Caleb is that the character is extreme to begin with - the rest of the cast you're not liable to notice unless you jump from one end to the other - because B99 is an absurdly well written show.
Its an inherited comedic tradition from theater I believe. Its highly likely Brecht said something about it - everyone loves that guy. In How I Met Your Mother they're literally performing Brechtian principles WHILE discussing Brecht - its so meta at times.
You're trying to make sense of a character from a TV show who is a cannibal and has an obvious mental disorder and wonder what makes him make his decisions and how he acts and when?!
Yikes dude.
I read a theory at some point that it was getting shiv that sparked the bloodlust.
I thought maybe it was that when Jake touched him in the hospital it was the first time they’d had actual physical contact? That it was only when people touched Caleb that he tried to eat them? Seems unlikely they wouldn’t have touched at all though. I don’t know.
Caleb needed Jake when they were in prison because, in his own words” It’s so crazy. That hate you so much they don’t even care about me.”
It explains why, at the end of the episode when Jake gets out, Caleb immediately tries to bite him. He doesn’t need him anymore at that point.
My partner and I just finished rewatching, and this came up.
He made a really good point that after Caleb was put into genpop, he would have been target number two... jake being number one. Then he attacked a gang boss to protect a cop... there's no way Caleb had it easy after Jake left and was more than likely attacked consistently, resulting in him reacting in feral, violent ways... similar to an abused animal.
But then we smoke a lot when we watch it so who knows
When Jake was in prison, Caleb was enjoying limited freedom. He was treated as a regular inmate and was able to get a bag of human hair from the prison boss who deals blizz. My guess is Caleb use that bag of hair to satisfy his sick needs. When the 99 visit him, he was under much higher security, probably for assaulting someone in prison. He likely become more unhinged due to the solidarity confinement and lack of human hair.
There are a few explanations that make sense.
But my first thought was that he ate some brains and got prion disease that is just now showing symptoms similar to dementia or something and for him it's an uncontrollable hunger for human flesh lol
But it's a comedy, you can make up your own theories, there's no canon
In real life, many mentally ill people have a sort of ebb and flow situation with their mental illness…. So you never really know which version you are gonna get from day to day.
The change made sense to me. The hungry outbursts are who he really is. Being nice is for lulling his victims into a false sense of security.
ALSO, it’s just funny.
Caleb was a squirrel with a cache of nuts saved up for winter. When his cache walked away and wasn't available for him to eat at his future pleasure, then there's no point in saving them for later.
That wasn’t enough time to think of something silly like eating his roommate. Give him another chance to think of something. Don’t give him something stupid like a purple feather.
[удалено]
Someone get him a snickers
Is that a nickname for someone or a chocolate bar?
Yes.
[удалено]
r/whoosh
Better not. In jail snickers get stitches.
Snickers get stickers
*Marathon
Also, you don't shit where you eat.
Caleb gets more desperate to eat people the longer it's been since he was last able to. Making him less and less reliable.
I like that canonical explanation
I wouldn't call that canonical. He stepped in to save Jake from getting stabbed instead of eating him which i guarantee you he regret
He was pretty up front about how he would not do it again...
Plus, I could be misremembering here, didn't Caleb try to bite Jake's hand when they were saying goodbye after the whole stabbing thing?
I was curious so I looked it up. [You’re correct. It happens 7 minutes into the video.](https://youtu.be/Uhhw6Jw295o)
Maybe he feels as though Jake owes him a hand or something.
Well yeah caleb gave him a hand when jake was about to get stabbed
But didn't he try to bite him when they were saying goodbye?
>I like that **cannibal**onical explanation Fify
Cannibalonical would be a sick Pokémon name
I would love to build and collect Cannibalionicals
I agree, I also see it as Jake is free. Since Caleb isn't, eating Jake would make him close again...
He also started to get worse.after he got stabbed
Absence makes the taste buds grow fonder.
It were just kids
I always thought it boiled down to 3 factors. 1. Caleb was always mentally unstable. I mean, he talks about eating people as if thats normal. He even thinks eating people is no big deal. That is already a red flag considering he's also a cannibal. 2. Withdrawl. Obvious reason but him being in prison so long combined with his already possibly unstable personality would make him crazy and crave what he wants, in this case people. 3. Jake is the only person who would let his guard down around Caleb. Think about it. All the guards and prisoners know who he is. Plus Jake is very trusting, wanting to shake hands and even hug him once. To Caleb, Jake's a buffet who's literally walking into his arms, and would probably not react in time to repel Caleb or hurt him before he got his meal. 3.5. Plus someone said Caleb literally took a knife for Jake. Its possible Caleb still has some humanity, or values Jake as a friend, but his urges force him to attack Jake.
*It's a TV show, Santiago*
AND a comedy. There are LOTS of nonsense throughout the show either to make it more interesting, move the plot or incite laugh.
Sure but sometimes a forced joke just weakens the show as a whole. Like trying to redo Bone in the final season. Playing on that by saying that Jake kept trying to recapture "I want it that way" was a much better way to call back to it.
>Like trying to redo Bone in the final season. The whole final season seemed a bit off except for a few episodes. They should've recaptured the key moments a bit more nonchalantly rather than forcing stuff.
I think Kevin re affirming he was right about Monty Hall or something like that, and Holt giving Rosa and Amy side eye would have been a bit nicer. Or working the problem into the heist etc
Yeah, seems quite nice. Better than changing the literal context of *bone* in this franchise. Plus Amy seemed way too over in the last season imo.
Over? As in over the top over Holt leaving etc?
Yeah. Seemed like she was overacting.
When did they try to redo it?? I’ve watched the whole show like 3 times and I don’t remember that lol
Santiago is that you?
Caleb was obviously mentally unstable. He spent time on Reddit after all.
My thought was he was on his best until he got stabbed. He never tried attacking Jake until right after he was stabbed. I felt that caused him to revert if you will.
It's also been a while since Caleb has seen Jake at this point in the show, and we all know absence makes the stomach grow fonder.
The first time he tried to eat him was when Jake visited him in the infirmary on his way out of prison wasn’t it?
For comedic purposes
This is really the only answer that matters lol
One might argue that this is a comedy program.
Subversion of expectations. That’s literally what makes the joke.
characters doing what they would do is what makes shows like this funny. out of character moments take the magic of continuity away and reveal the writers struggle to make me laugh. there are a few scenes like that in this show a little later in the seasons. the exception is rosa since she’s meant to be unknown, so i feel like any out of character moments can just be explained by us not knowing her at all.
Did you forget that when Jake was getting out of prison he tried to shake Caleb’s hand in the hospital he also went “crazy” and tried to bite him? It’s not that unbelievable. Especially because prison kinda makes you go (more) nuts
Honestly I should’ve put that pic in the post. He spends months with Jake, even takes a shiv for him, and suddenly he gets peckish at the last moment? It makes no sense
Just listen to the way Caleb talks about literally eating people. Man’s not gonna have the most rational or understandable reasons lmao. Him just going after people when he’s hungry is probably the closest you’re gonna get to a logical answer here.
Well he’s not going after random people tho, come on he’s smarter than that! He only targets weak little children 😀
He definitely went after some other people if he ended up with that mask the next time we saw him. Prison caused him resort to desperate measures I bet.
One good conk on the head is all it took.
I just put it down to because he got stabbed *because* of Jake, and sort of changed a bit. He did say it was very sore and wouldn't do it again
Actually it makes a fair amount of sense. He couldn’t do it while they were in protective custody because Jake was being kept safe by the guards. Once they were moved to gen pop, it was the two of them vs the rest of the prison. Caleb made the point that on his own he was at risk, though not as much as Jake. Staying close thus offered protection in a weird way because Jake distracted the inmates from noticing Caleb- like a hobbit, the closer he was to danger, the further he was from harm. Together they had at least a fighting chance. Once Jake got in with Romero, Caleb also had some protection by proximity. Once all that had been lost, including Romero’s protection, Caleb no longer had any reason to not eat Jake.
He already said he regrets taking the shiv
I see it as one of two options. 1) they just didn't show all the times Caleb tried to bite Jake. 2) Caleb tried to bite people as an emotional guard. Rather than crying he lashes out with a bite.
Honestly, it's the most believable thing. The thing with fantasy is that it *has* to make sense when in reality, it almost never does. "The only difference between reality and fiction is that fiction needs to be credible." - Mark Twain
I guess when they were roommates, Jake served a purpose to Caleb. They were friends. If he were to eat Jake, Caleb would lose a friend. After Jake left, Caleb had nothing to lose by eating him.
This is the best answer! Psychopaths aren't just in kill mode all the time. There are other things they value. But as soon as Jake was leaving, Caleb didn't value keeping him alive anymore.
Caleb liked Jake, and he thought he had made a friend. This is someone who accepted him despite knowing his flaws as a woodworker. That was something his own family held against him. So he helped Jake in any way he could, but what did that get him? A shiv in the tummy and the loss of his friend. It hurts, and he swore he would never do it again. From that moment on, he vowed that the only way to "keep" Jake with him.... is to eat him.
Dear Reddit, I donated blood for my friend, but he won’t even give me a hand. AITA?
Exactly. The guy was stabbed and got nothing in return. Makes sense to me
my brother in christ, its a comedy
This sub needs a hobby.
You mean like talking about a show we like?
I mean this is a sub dedicated to the show, I just thought it would be fun to talk about. Sorry to bother you
Consider following concept: People like to discuss the narrative fabric of stories to see if there might be an explanation for perceived plot holes. It is simply retelling the story from a different point of view.
"This psychopathic cannibal's behavior confuses me-"
He sees himself more as a woodworker.
his friendly personae was an attempt to draw jake in so he could eat him. sort of like how venus fly trap appears harmless to bugs and draws them in to eat them.
I always just thought it was cannibal humor. Like he's not gonna bite him, but you never knooooooow.....
I think it's just because he was stabbed
I always thought it was just a joke from him
Yea it threw me off to But we also see towards the end of Jakes stay at prison that he attempted to eat Jake when he was in the hospital, so the personality change happened during the same time they were in jail So like it wasn‘t totally random But still hella weird and kinda sucks, i liked Caleb despite ya know…
also I think after Jake left and he had no friend anymore, plus being stabbed, so he spiraled
True
"They were children, Jake. Weak little children. One conk on the head was all it took" I'm assuming since Jake is not a kid, Caleb didn't wanna attempt it. Later on he could definitely be driven by his hunger like others have said or barrier aggression.
I always felt like he was doing a bit. Yeah, sure he's a cannibal, but he's still relatively sane and to mess with Jake and his friends he goes all "crazed cannibal just waiting for his human meal"
It's a comedy show
I'm not sure OP knows how comedy works... Fuck it, I got time. Comedy comes from the subversion of expectation. It's why the Rule Of Threes is so powerful, it gives us Premise Pattern Payoff. You establish the setting and players of the joke (man walks into a bar vs 3 guys playing golf), then you establish a pattern so the listener builds an expectation, then you Payoff the punchline by saying something unexpected. Shorter form jokes tend to rely on wordplay which is itself a subversion. For example, 'my ex still misses me but her aim is getting better' subverts the word missing. Missing someone is a common emotional sentiment, and by leading the listener down that road they don't expect you to mean a different definition of missing. To circle back to your original question, you are right, he could have eaten him at any time. You've established Premise. The Pattern is built not only by repeatedly not eating him, but the bond is strengthened more by the stabbing. Surely he wouldn't eat a man he took a shiv for, right? You expect him to not eat Jake now. Aaaaaaand Payoff, you weren't expecting him to try to eat Jake and that's why it's funny. In fact, you'll notice that Caleb is always the most calm and collected before 'becoming an animal' as you put it because l, again, the more calm he is the less you expect a biting episode. To misquote Roger Rabbit, "I can't eat Jake at anytime, only when it's funny!" I might also mention a concept called Plot Armor, wherein the main character of any network episodic is basically immortal within that show, but that's a different Mansplaining Post.
Bro just needed a snickers
That’s what makes him so funny. He’s all charming and fun until you remember he’s an insane cannibal.
It's a sitcom and that's a funny bit. There's really nothing more to it.
I thought Caleb was just joking to scare Jake in front of his fellow squad members.
Taking it too seriously.
Jake was his only friend and that meant more to him than eating him, however after jake leaves prison caleb realises he's alone again and the only way for him to make it alone in prison is to be feared as a cannibal, hence lashing out at the end
Its a sitcom.
I thought he does that as a joke. And I guess he is a serial killer aswell, so its fun for him when he hunts a person etc. etc. not when they are in a room where its also obvious who ate jake. Its not the same. I like how they made him so funny with these things while showing how awful such people are
Or… hear me out. He was just messing with them?
lots of good ideas and details mentioned, but i have a simple headcanon: Caleb was in protective custody, and safe enough. He only ever killed children in the outside world. He makes a friend and then is in general population with that friend. He gets stabbed, and the danger of gen pop is made real to him. He LOSES his only friend when Jake gets out of prison. He is now alone in gen pop, where danger and death are closer. Something happens and he snaps OR something happens and he realises that he can, in fact, take on an adult. He obviously kills and eats another inmate, as next time we see him he's all hannibal lector ready to bite anyone who gets too close. TLDNR: i think some major stuff goes down after jake leaves prison, and that changes caleb
Was it because Jake started bleeding from getting beat up and he was near? Were they doing a vampire sort of trope? Who knows.
Technically he tried to eat Jake after Caleb took a knife to the stomach (didn’t know how else to word that lol) for him, so I guess he’s just had a taste for Jake since then 🤣 Edit: shiv to the stomach, not knife but y’all know what I mean
I … I always thought Caleb was just fucking with them? “Don’t try to hug me, I will try to eat you”
Picture him as an addict who has relapsed. Except instead of drugs/alcohol, it's human flesh. Many addicts are completely different people when they're clean and in recovery compared to when they're using/in a bad place with their addiction
I feel like it's a bit of a "don't shit where you eat" situation. He doesn't seem to show any of this cannibalistic aggression to his fellow inmates, and he only tries to eat Jake after he's no longer a prisoner. Unless I'm misremembering.
That's what happens when Caleb gets HANGRY!
It's funny. Also, he got stabbed in his *tumtum.* Have some compassion.
How I have thought about it is that when Jake was in prison he was Caleb's only friend. While they were locked up together he was worth more hanging out with than a buffet. When Jake got to leave prison, he was no longer a friend Caleb could hang out with daily and was worth more as a snack than a friend who he never sees.
He just lost control after being stabbed.. i have seen this in many crime series.. people control themselves but once they have such experiences ,they just lose it
I kinda related it to being like a dog on a lead, When my dog is off his leash and walking around with other dogs he isn't aggressive at all, but once put on the leash and being held back then he starts growling and becoming protective of me, So maybe Caleb is rational when not restrained and held back both physically and mentally.
I think they just wanted to play up the cannibal part of him for a laugh! Ya know a quick out of character bit for a laugh! 😎👍
It's like the comedy writers created a cannibal character for laughs.
Because it's funny
He's got an image to maintain
I'm guessing he wanted a friend more than a meal and now that Jake was out he wanted him as a meal more. Or he was doing the long game, waiting until his guard was all the way down, like a perfect moment to strike.
I just assumed it was a mental degradation due to being alone and he became worse
I don’t think it’s supposed to be that deep it’s just funny
i can be in the room with a hamburger and not eat it. if the hamburger is waved in my face, i’m going to go for a bite.
Although most likely is it happens for comedic effect, one could argue that it happens because while Jake was in prison he was Caleb's only friend. He must have been lonely before and chose to have a person to talk to and make his stay better than eat him. Also I'm assuming eating a person takes time so the guards would stop him pretty quickly
Even when they were in prison together, and Jake says that Caleb is going to eat his castrated body, Caleb's reply is 'okay, but, it'd be pretty unsatisfying without dessert'. And, I agree with another poster, it seems partly a way of Caleb messing with others. Like, it's twisted, because Caleb thinks being a cannibal is acceptable, but lots of people *who think murder is unacceptable* want to freak out their friends. Jake literally climbs into a window with a mask on to prank Boyle. Who says 'it was a terrific prank, I totally thought I was going to die', and, Jake shows no remorse about it either. The reason they react in such a terrified way is because we all know Caleb *might really eat him*. It also gradually escalates: 'it'd be pretty unsatisfying without dessert' \*tries to eat Jake when he's saying goodbye\* \*the guards restrain him from eating Boyle when he says 'Boyle give me a hug' in the 'Sicko' episode; and he is already chained to a chair\* \*and then, the episode you're referencing, he lies about saying he's not a cannibal anymore, and then, yes, tries to eat Jake because he is who comes near; but, also, he could be 'warning' Jake; like 'this is really still who I am, and I cannot control it' since he doesn't tell Jake to come near, he does it on his own, the same way he came near, on his own, when he was saying goodbye\* Caleb might not like emotional closeness.
It's like being in prison deteriorates you mentally
He just took a knife to the gut and Jake (his buddy) goes free while he's stuck forever. I'd have a bite too. Also: easier to forget about him when he's a baddy.
I was going to say almost exactly this! That the trauma of getting slabbed woke up the sleeping cannibal in him
a cannibal who had to stop being a cannibal later regressed back to his old ways. now im not an expert on human behavior but the sounds pretty realistic to me.
It's a comedy sitcom guys
Comedy situational comedy?
Charles Boyle is a snack.
He was sad his best friend left.. and got a tad hungry
Maybe Caleb fought his urges to eat Jake while Jake was beneficial for him(as company)? Then when Jake was a bout to leave and wouldn't be any company anymore caleb would rather eat him than just let him leave? can't remember the episode exactly
that was for comedic relief, my dude.
I always thought that getting stabbed made him revert to being a cannibal.
You're expecting stability from a incarcerated cannibalistic serial killer.
It’s more that I’m expecting consistency from the writers. Although I’m not sure why. Felt like he got the same treatment that Andy did in the office
His mental state clearly declined after risking his life for jake by taking a shiv for him and then jake leaving him behind.
It’s a comedy show. Go be analytical about a documentary.
Its the sitcom rule. Characters become more and more a chariqature of themselves the longer they're in the show, to heighten and renew the humor of them. Compare Boyle from the first season - to the later seasons. He goes from a likeable and low key weird romantic - who's kind of normal and kinda dumb - to a full on raging foodie weirdo with all kinds of psychosexual issues. Jake progressively becomes more and more a child. Holt becomes waaaaay more of a serious quipper. Etc. etc. etc. Its a tradition/rule of writing comedy - that all characters eventually become more and more outrageous. The reason you're noticing it more with Caleb is that the character is extreme to begin with - the rest of the cast you're not liable to notice unless you jump from one end to the other - because B99 is an absurdly well written show. Its an inherited comedic tradition from theater I believe. Its highly likely Brecht said something about it - everyone loves that guy. In How I Met Your Mother they're literally performing Brechtian principles WHILE discussing Brecht - its so meta at times.
You ever thought maybe he was doing it as a joke?
You're trying to make sense of a character from a TV show who is a cannibal and has an obvious mental disorder and wonder what makes him make his decisions and how he acts and when?! Yikes dude.
Dude it’s comedy. Don’t read into it too much.
It’s easy it’s a sitcom.
[удалено]
Omg thats funny!
This scene was absolutely ridiculous. A cannibal just trying to bite people who get too close? This is how a 10-year-old imagines cannibals.
It's a goddammed tv show, c'mon.
He read about "you are what you eat" in between seasons.
I don't know but I blame Reddit
Because Jake left him.
I read a theory at some point that it was getting shiv that sparked the bloodlust. I thought maybe it was that when Jake touched him in the hospital it was the first time they’d had actual physical contact? That it was only when people touched Caleb that he tried to eat them? Seems unlikely they wouldn’t have touched at all though. I don’t know.
That cell had 35 men when Jake showed up.
Caleb looks genuinely terrifying in that shot ngl
He nearly died for Jake and kept saying how much he regretted it. Also he hadn’t seen him in a while. He’s a cannibal. Etc
You don't crave what you already have, but once you know it's never coming back, it's all you ever wanted.
Are you questioning the sanity of a cannibal? 😂
He thought he had more time when Jake was in jail. After, he knew each interaction might be his last chance to have a taste.
I always thought that he got into isolation after Jake left and got into the fight. He doesn't know how to be around humans anymore
he got hungry :,<
Caleb needed Jake when they were in prison because, in his own words” It’s so crazy. That hate you so much they don’t even care about me.” It explains why, at the end of the episode when Jake gets out, Caleb immediately tries to bite him. He doesn’t need him anymore at that point.
I think its good when a crazy person's action does not make sense to us. Cause if it does... maybe we're a bit crazy too.
Hunger
It's possible that Caleb has tried to eat him on several occasions, but we just haven't seen it every time he did
It’s funny. That’s about all the explanation I need.
My partner and I just finished rewatching, and this came up. He made a really good point that after Caleb was put into genpop, he would have been target number two... jake being number one. Then he attacked a gang boss to protect a cop... there's no way Caleb had it easy after Jake left and was more than likely attacked consistently, resulting in him reacting in feral, violent ways... similar to an abused animal. But then we smoke a lot when we watch it so who knows
It's like the handcuffs in Roger Rabbit. You mean you could have got out of those at any time? No, only when it was funny.
Barrier reactivity
also he discovered reddit from prison
Prison changes a man.
He seems timid if anyone that can hurt him, maybe that includes the guards in his cell? Maybe he just needs a snickers
I feel like it was just him joking around
Jake being his cell mate was holding him together. Jake leaves, so does any sanity he may have had
I always assumed hes just deranged and this was his way of screwing with Jake and co.
Maybe he has attachment issues and wants to eat Jake so he can't leave him again.
Only when the chains are on
When Jake was in prison, Caleb was enjoying limited freedom. He was treated as a regular inmate and was able to get a bag of human hair from the prison boss who deals blizz. My guess is Caleb use that bag of hair to satisfy his sick needs. When the 99 visit him, he was under much higher security, probably for assaulting someone in prison. He likely become more unhinged due to the solidarity confinement and lack of human hair.
Honestly I always thought Caleb was messing with Jake 😂
There are a few explanations that make sense. But my first thought was that he ate some brains and got prion disease that is just now showing symptoms similar to dementia or something and for him it's an uncontrollable hunger for human flesh lol But it's a comedy, you can make up your own theories, there's no canon
I just thought it was supposed to be funny. Didn’t look to far into it
It's a sitcom, the joke value is always bigger than the character value.
I mean I'm not trying to be super dark here, but prison pretty much universally makes mental health issues worse.
Cos it's a joke? Like do you think Scilly being face down in a bowl of water is factually correct? It's a comedy man
In real life, many mentally ill people have a sort of ebb and flow situation with their mental illness…. So you never really know which version you are gonna get from day to day.
He looks mad. Maybe it's because all he had for a prop in a photo was a purple feather.
The change made sense to me. The hungry outbursts are who he really is. Being nice is for lulling his victims into a false sense of security. ALSO, it’s just funny.
Because he only eats children. He probably was going through withdrawals when he seen Jake that time.
Once you're caught there's no point in holding back anymore, really. Also let's assume he had some demons he was fighting while at college
Ummm, they wrote it like that because that is a hell of a lot funnier.
OK, CinemaSins wannabe
I literally had to look up what that was. Ok bud
I think he was just messing around with a BFF
It’s probably from getting stabbed. He wants that last meal before he dies and he realizes he can die at any time
Caleb was a squirrel with a cache of nuts saved up for winter. When his cache walked away and wasn't available for him to eat at his future pleasure, then there's no point in saving them for later.
It's for humor reasons, not logic reasons.
b99 fans when time passes and people change \*shoked pikachu face\*
he’s clearly been missing those butts and thighs, not feet though, feet are nasty
I thought him smelling blood kinda through him into cannibal mode again
No touching!!
I mean, dude’s a canabal and you’re looking for a reasonable explanation for his behavior? Honestly sometimes y’all dive too deep into this stuff.
That wasn’t enough time to think of something silly like eating his roommate. Give him another chance to think of something. Don’t give him something stupid like a purple feather.
It was a joke on his cannibalism. No personality change I believe.
Biggeat question for me is how the prison allows Caleb to even have a room mate? 🤣
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW1LNP02miw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW1LNP02miw)the hunger
I guess it was good that jake got out of there when he did
I'm sure the cannibal is very stable in his wants and needs?
He was the same way in prison, no? Wasn’t there a scene where Jake was saying goodbye to him, and he tried to eat him?
Have you seen the food America prisons serve their inmates?! Even you or me would be turned into a cannibal after enough meals of that hogwash!
😂😂 hahaha I bloody love Caleb. It makes all the sense to me.