I was recently rewatching Men In Black, the original and best film of the whole dang series (sorry Tessa Thompson and Chris Hemsworth), and one scene really stuck out to me.

Watch below:

Midway through the film, K and J figure out there’s a bug on Earth. The bug, which is basically a giant cockroach, is hellbent on destroying a group of aliens called the Arquillians and likely the rest of the universe.

In order to neutralize this threat, K arms J with a weapon, but not any weapon — he’s given the Noisy Cricket.

While the gun is played off initially as a gag (i.e. size matter jokes), I think K handing J this weapon really speaks to how much he trusts his new partner. Then, of course, J shoots it and is then sent careening through the air like a rag doll.

While this does serve as a bit of a setback for K and J’s relationship, the initial giving of this mega weapon says a lot about how K feels about J. He sees in him a young man, not unlike himself when he first joined the MIB, who has a strong, independent mind. He brings him into the organization despite him being compared to probably more qualified individuals and gives him a shot.

Also, K isn’t the kind of person to mess with a new agent like J, so there’s no way in hell he’d give him this gun knowing what’s at stake. He wanted to arm J with the best weapon possible because he’s a good shot.

So why doesn’t J use the Noisy Cricket against the big bad guy later in the movie? That’s a bit of a plot hole.

Anyway, this isn’t the only time the gun shows up in the films.

In Men In Black II, K is somehow able to use it without all the kickback (I guess he was laying down). It’s a good callback because J gives it to K as a bit of a joke and a callback to their first days together as partners. In the animated series, J ends up putting a silencer on the gun in order to make it more manageable.

Just a little something I noticed in the first film and it’s nice to see how well developed their relationship is even though they spend only two or three days together in the first film. K doesn’t just give up the throne, he prepares his partner, arms him with knowledge (and a pretty cool gun), and probably gave a lot of handover notes.