YMMV / Jack Rackam

• Friendly Fandoms:
  • With Overly Sarcastic Productions, another animated edutainment channel with a focus on humour. It helps that Jack has collabed with the OSP gang on a few occasions, too.
  • Also with Oversimplified, whose comedic style of storytelling is very similar to Jack's. Some of Oversimplified's jokes have even found their way into Jack's comment section, particularly the ones about The French Revolution and the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte.
• Heartwarming Moments:
  • Wojtek being rescued by the Polish army and being adopted into their ranks as a fellow soldier. His bond with his caretakers proved to be a lasting one, as even years after the war, his comrades would visit him in his retirement residence at the zoo to give him cigarettes and hugs.
  • Emperor Xuan's relationship with his foster father Warden Bing is very sweet. Bing took pity on the young prince and looked out for him while he was imprisoned on the orders of Emperor Wu. When Xuan was eventually released and later ascended to the throne, he repaid Bing's kindness and gave him a fabulous estate on the palace grounds.
    • Xuan's granduncle Emperor Zhao is surprisingly cordial with young Xuan, welcoming him into the royal palace and sincerely apologizing for his father's treatment of the young prince.
  • When Joanna Southcott realized she was not pregnant with the Messiah and was in fact dying, she insisted on returning all the expensive baby shower gifts to her followers who'd given them to her.
  • Yoshitsune initially views his retainer Benkei as a mild annoyance, denying the warrior's claims to be his brother. However, he clearly grows to appreciate Benkei, and when he's later betrayed by his actual brother Yoritomo, Yoshitsune responds by throwing his arm around Benkei and declaring "I only have one brother."
• He Really Can Act:
  • Jack's portrayal of Robespierre's increasingly manic behavior and slow descent into tyranny is incredibly well done, particularly the moments in which Robespierre rapidly switches from calm and reserved to maniacal raving.
  • In the Halloween special on Elizabeth Bathory, Jack and the extended cast give a stellar performance as the episode plays out in true crime drama fashion, with Jack himself bringing his more serious side to the forefront.
  • "He Really Can Sing" in the case of the Arthur Sullivan episode. Jack takes a moment to show off his singing skills with an impromptu musical number in the style of The Pirates of Penzance, effortlessly flowing from his traditional narration style to a impressively complex tongue-twister song.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Caligula was most certifiably a poor ruler who allowed his paranoia to get the better of him, but his behavior was almost certainly moulded by his troubled upbringing (ie. his mother and brothers being executed for "treason" and growing up in constant fear of his grandfather), not to mention possibly being poisoned just a few months into his reign.
  • Tsar Nicholas II was an incompetent ruler who made blunder after blunder during his reign, and was an obstructive autocrat like his father before him. Despite all this, he was also a kind family man who was well aware of his failings and desperately tried to salvage his reputation, but his disastrous reign eventually ended in tragedy, with the Romanov dynasty deposed and Nicholas and his family meeting their end in a basement at the hands of drunken soldiers.
• Squick:
  • Confucius' mother being forcibly married to a much, much older man in order for him to have a legitimate male heir, which Jack is all too happy to skip past, and understandably so.
  • The ways in which Chris Burden chose to portray his art can be very uncomfortable to some people, especially since a lot of them involved increasingly dangerous methods of Self-Harm. Jack wisely decides to put a Content Warning at the beginning of the video for this very reason.
  • Embellishment or not, it's still incredibly uncomfortable to watch Elizabeth Báthory bathe in the blood of a murdered servant girl.
  • Jack is clearly and understandably disgusted when King Francis I watches his under-aged son and daughter-in-law consummate their marriage. They were fourteen years old.
• Tear Jerker: Jack can occasionally drop the shtick and make some sad observations.
  • When talking about the reign of Pedro II, Jack laments that Brazil had a serious chance at becoming a superpower under its imperial government. Still, with Pedro choosing not to preserve his throne and to go into exile after being overthrown, Brazil would instead face decades of rule by inept republics and military dictatorships. Pedro himself would die poor and alone in a small Parisian hotel.
  • While King Louis XVI was an inept and borderline traitorous king, his execution is still portrayed with a degree of pathos.
  • Frederick the Great's childhood was a thoroughly unpleasant experience, between dealing with an emotionally and physically abusive father, being forced into a loveless Arranged Marriage by said abusive father, and being forced to watch his best friend and lover be executed before his own eyes.
  • Constantine XI, the last Roman/Byzantine Emperor, has to watch his city fall to the Ottomans. His final moments, him charging into battle with what's left of his army, is played for genuine sorrow.