Abbiejean Malory Kane Archer, also known as "A.J.", is the daughter of Lana Kane and Sterling Archer.
Character History[]
When Lana Kane becomes fixated on having a baby she secretly visits the sperm bank, examining many specimens before choosing a frozen vial provided by Sterling Archer. In Sea Tunt: Part II, Lana reveals her resultant pregnancy, much to everyone's shock. Cyril Figgis, who recently resumed dating Lana after their break-up though under strict rules, asked Lana when she was planning to tell him but Lana lets Cyril know he isn't the father. She tries to explain to a seemingly-cuckolded and enraged Cyril that the biological father is a donor but is cut off when he escapes through the sea vents and Archer saves Lana and the baby's life by giving her the last diving suit available. Lana's pregnancy effectively ended her relationship with Cyril, and he remained angry with her for months but eventually changed his mind and, in an unsuccessful attempt to rekindle their relationship, offered Lana a check as a baby shower present.
In the fifth season premiere, Archer became upset after professing his love for Lana and stating his willingness to help raise her baby, only to be told that she would rather lose the baby than marry him. For most of the fifth season, Lana is pregnant and she fosters her maternal instincts during this time by "mothering" her friends, including Archer, who despises it. In each episode, she finds her patience being pushed to it's limit by their crazy antics and begins regretting her decision to become pregnant. In the Season 5 finale, Lana's baby girl is born in a Central American airport. Archer sought certification as a doula and tried to help deliver the baby, even though Lana screamed at him because she thought he was responsible for buying the cocaine. She even tried to shoot him in the face, but her gun was empty. When push came to shove, it was Pam and Malory to the rescue, as Archer provided little support.
During the flight home, Lana was finally able to pull Archer aside to recount the story of her visit to the sperm bank. However, Archer tuned her out, fixating on the baby instead, and noticing she had begun to exhibit some of his mannerisms such as holding up a finger while nursing when Archer tried to talk to the baby. Snapping to focus, Archer asked Lana what she was talking about, and she calmly introduced him to his daughter; Abbiejean, whom Lana named after her own grandmother.
Archer was absent for the first six weeks of Abbiejean's life because he was on a bender and ended up drunk in a South East Asian country with a small deer in his motel and possible ladyboys in the shower, he eventually comes back to his daughter and helps raise her. Archer and Malory both voiced a dislike for Abbiejean's name, and at least twice, they asked Lana if she was sure she wanted to keep it, and she said she did.
Abbiejean, later nicknamed "A.J.", was largely protected from the antics and insanity of the other members, although she was sometimes roped into those antics anyway since Lana often took A.J. with her to work. An example of this is when Krieger kidnapped A.J. for his experiments in growing cyborg teddy bears, which made her grandmother so angry she threatened to shoot Krieger in the groin and warned her employees not to tell Lana about the incident.
Lana told Archer that he is Abbiejean's father and she has both of her parents' last names and even though Archer wants to help raise her, Lana seems to think A.J. belongs to her alone as Lana has always gone out of her way to make the decisions regarding A.J.'s upbringing, without allowing Archer to have a say in anything, but she still expected him to help care for Abbiejean during her infancy yet she only allowed him to do certain things such as holding her, play with her and helping change diapers. Whenever Lana was busy at work and had to bring A.J. to the office she usually stayed with Malory at her office or at home with her Polish nanny.
When Archer agrees to be Pam's "date" for her sister's wedding in "Edie's Wedding", Lana asks everybody at work to babysit A.J. so she can attend an upstate survival camp but everyone refuses except Cyril, who volunteers to do so along with driving Lana to her camp and staying with A.J. in a hotel near the camp, in hopes of getting Lana to take him back eventually.
Though it was all an act, in "Sitting", Lana does unintentionally put her daughter in harm's way by hiring an actor who used a real gun to test Archer's abilities as a father and protector of A.J. Although Archer succeeded in protecting her, he became angry over the fact that he got shot. While Archer was fighting the actor, he ordered Pam to take A.J. away and keep her safe. In the meantime, Pam tried to feed A.J. Vienna sausages by pre-chewing them and spitting them into her mouth like a bird until Lana and Malory intervened when they went to pick up A.J..
In the episode "Nellis", everyone besides Lana goes on a mission and Malory used this opportunity to offer Lana $100,000 to change A.J.'s name to Malory. When Lana refused, Malory resorted to fake crying until Lana reluctantly offered to compromise by giving A.J. the name Malory but as her middle name. Malory immediately stopped "crying" and declared that a middle name wasn't worth $100,000 dollars so Lana suggested $50,000 but Malory offered $22,500 instead and demanded a notarized copy of the revised birth certificate on her desk by Friday. She also offered Lana an extra $5,000 to have A.J. christened at a white church, although it is not known whether Lana agreed to this or not.
In "The Kanes", A.J. finally got to meet her maternal grandparents, Lemuel and Claudette Kane. They instantly adored her, giving Lana all the credit for A.J.'s upbringing and barely tolerating Archer. This was because Archer made a fool of himself by showing up drunk on the day he was due to meet Lana's parents. The family gathering is ruined when Slater stages a burglary, without knowing Archer, Lana and her family would be there. Archer and Lana both became upset when gunfire erupted while A.J. was still in the house. Lana's parents also revealed to Archer that they wanted to invite him to the Kane Family Reunion, since due to him being the father of their granddaughter he was now considered part of their family.
During the next few episodes, A.J. is judged constantly by Malory, who believes she is getting too fat by baby standards. Despite both parents' disagreement and the fact that A.J.'s weight was normal, Malory tried to force A.J. on a diet, even though she was an average-size baby. In "Reignition Sequence", Archer threatened to have Malory arrested if she tried to give A.J. diet pills. Lana also angrily reminded her to feed her, afraid that Malory was trying to enforce a diet in her own. Their suspicions were proven right when Malory was shown trying to feed A.J. ice chips instead of her milk.
Even though Malory believed that she would become A.J.'s legal guardian if anything happened to both her parents, Lana eventually reveals to Archer that if anything happened to her, custody of A.J. would transfer to either Lana's parents or her sister, completely leaving Archer out of the equation. At first, Archer argued that Malory and Woodhouse should raise her, even though the former is too irresponsible with A.J.'s care and the latter is too old. However after recalling his childhood, he agreed that Lana's arrangement would ultimately be the best for their daughter.
A.J. appeared in "Drastic Voyage: Part I" and "Drastic Voyage: Part II", under Malory's care while Lana and Archer did a job. Due to the danger of the mission, Lana reminded Archer that her parents would be A.J.'s guardians. Archer felt hurt by her statement and claimed that he wasn't the worst guardian A.J. could end up with. To which the scene points to A.J. nearly getting an ashtray from a general. Though he apologizes to Malory, she shrugs it off and says "she is used to it". Later flashing back, A.J. got to enjoy some time with her step-grandfather, Ron, who read her "Goldilocks and the Three Bears"; but he was also smoking in front of the baby. Malory snapped at him, not for smoking in front of A.J., but because she just cleaned the drapes instead. Then she told him to take A.J. out onto the patio.
Malory has stated that she hopes A.J. starts smoking to help with her "battle of the bulge". In the abscence of her parents, A.J. is still subjected to Malory's diet tactics, and Agent Holly had to feed her when Malory refused. After the mission got botched, A.J. was seen being fed by Lana, who became instantly suspicious of Malory again. When asked why A.J. was still hungry even after being fed, Malory instantly brushed Lana off and said: "Who knows with her. A tapeworm?".
A.J. doesn't appear right away in season 7, she is mentioned several times. To discourage Shapiro from hitting on her, Lana brings up A.J. as evidence that she and Archer are in a relationship. His reaction upon learning of a baby was saying "ewww", indicating that he was not fond of children or at least babies.
In "Deadly Prep", A.J. is two years old. Lana and Malory are insistent in putting her in a very prestigious "pre-pre" kindergarten school, believing it will jumpstart her academics. Even though Archer is thinks public school would be just as good, he goes along for A.J.'s sake. While there, he recognizes a member of the board was his former bully named Ivy. While it's clear Ivy is rude, obnoxious, and makes racist remarks at both Lana and A.J., Lana grins and bears it. She forces Archer to take a case for Ivy. It's clear that Archer is still uncomfortable, but Lana reminds him to think of A.J.'s future and not to ruin it for her. Out of love for his daughter, he does as he is told. Lana hopes to improve A.J.'s chance at getting into the school by meeting with the dean. A.J. is later seen playing with Pam. Unfortunately, both ideas blow up as Ivy was only trying to kill Archer and set him up for murder. Meanwhile, Lana gets arrested when she is mistaken for a stalker. The dean immediately puts a restraining order on her. Later, Archer visits the Lana in jail and tells her that he thinks prep school is a bad idea and A.J. would be just fine in public school, because no matter where she ends up going, she will excel. He doesn't want her to become a snob like other private school children. Plus, if he has to chauffeur her to and from school, he would rather it be a public school.
After Archer fell into a coma and Woodhouse was found dead, Lana attended Woodhouse's funeral with A.J. and even though she was too young to understand what was going on, she still had a sad expression on her face. This could be attributed to babies and toddlers being able to pick up on the tension and sadness around them, or just being tired.
As A.J. continued to grow, Lana periodically took her to the hospital to visit Archer. Lana met and married Robert about eight months after Archer's accident. Together, they raised A.J. for the next three years, while Lana allowed A.J. to think Robert was her father instead of Archer for unknown reasons.
At Robert's suggestion, Lana sent A.J. to a boarding school in Switzerland when she turned five, supposedly so that she could get a good education while Robert unsuccessfully tried to convince Lana to have a child of their own. A.J. being sent to study abroad upset Archer after he awoke and he found out. This was most likely due to his own childhood experiences and him possibly feeling like Lana took the same road his mother chose for her own selfish reasons but Lana simply stated that she sent A.J. away to ensure she got the best education. Despite having to grow up at boarding school and then having to attend numerous Summer Camps, A.J. doesn't seem negatively affected by this.
A.J. got kidnapped in "Caught Napping", and her rescue became the team's main motivation. Archer holds in his 'rampage' mode to be his most effective, whereas Lana unleashes fury at everyone in her path. During the mission, Lana briefly argues with Robert about him suggesting boarding school for A.J., and he retorts by reminding Lana that she agreed to it. Later, Lana reflects on whether she did actually sent her daughter to boarding school for the sake of her education or so that she could focus on her career.
After the ransom is paid, A.J.'s abductor, Peregrine, decides to keep both the money and A.J. in order to train her to be an assassin and have her murder both of her parents. In the climax, A.J. stomps on her abductor's foot in order to escape with Lana, and they jump off the crashing sleigh into Pam's 'human airbag' arms. Meanwhile, a distraught Malory worries aloud about A.J. and not having given her granddaughter a gun but then she remembers she did; a 'cute little ruger'. A.J. reunites with her "dad", who she believes is Robert, much to Archer's personal heartache since he longed for her to acknowledge him as her dad.
Once the ordel is over, A.J. spends some time with her mother, step-father, grandmother, and her parents' colleagues. Malory and Lana are civil towards each other until Malory subtly criticizes Lana over the fact that A.J. was eating pretzels (i.e. carbohydrates), showing that she is still obsessed with her granddaughter's weight. Archer stands across the room, far apart from everybody, still sad over the fact that everybody forgot about him, especially A.J.. Lana then introduces A.J. to an eager Archer, who patiently waits as A.J. finishes her apple juice while holding up a finger for Archer to wait. He tries to tell her about the things they went through when she was younger, since Lana still refuses to tell her that Archer is her biological father. Archer learns A.J. called him "Sleeping Beauty" during the times she visited him while he was in coma and even kissed him so he could wake up, and it makes him happy. A.J. unwittingly embarrasses her mother by revealing that Lana referred to Archer as a "Sperm-Delivery Device". Archer then looks at Lana as she tries to save face by claiming that she "said that one time".
After being rescued, A.J. is returned to the boarding school but she is sometimes mentioned by her parents. Such as in "London Time", when Archer tries to prove that Lana is not fun when he brings up how she made him change A.J.'s diapers twice in one day, to which Lana replied that it was for his child (even though Lana only refers to A.J. as Archer's daughter when it is convenient for her).
In "Photo Op", Lana confesses that seeing Archer bonding with a baby gorilla makes her miss taking care of A.J., but she doesn't want to leave the agency since she feels it could fall apart without her. This might serve as confirmation that Lana has grown to prioritize A.J.'s education and her own career over family. Later, Lana is once again mad at Archer when he tells her to give the gorilla a message in case he gets killed during the mission. Upon being questioned by Lana about him not leaving an equally heartfelt message for A.J., Archer simply asks her to "tell [A.J.] I said bye". This could also mean that, while Archer loves his daughter, he has a hard time connecting with her due to the fact that she is at boarding school and Robert has basically taken over the role as her father, while pushing Archer out of the picture.
As of "Mission: Difficult", A.J.'s grandmother Malory retired and moved away with her husband to an undisclosed location. Lana and Robert's relationship ended and Robert sold ISIS to Fabian Kingsworth.
As Lana and Robert start with their divorce in "The Big Con", Robert threatens to sue Lana for custody of A.J., citing how Lana's job is dangerous and how much A.J. loves Robert and sees him as her father. This is most likely an attempt to control or punish Lana for leaving him. Meanwhile, A.J. also seems reluctant to answer Lana's texts so Lana tries to text her once again about getting her out of the school for the weekend to do whatever she wanted, but Archer told her that she was being too forceful and suggested that instead she tells A.J. that she loves and is proud of her. This finally caused A.J. to answer positively, making Lana happy to the point of telling Archer that he should be more involved in A.J.'s life.
In "Saturday", Lana is forced to work on a Saturday despite her protests that she had an entire Mother-Daughter day planned at Coney Island and a fancy tea place with A.J.. Pam babysits A.J. at ISIS while they wait for Lana to arrive. Pam is disappointed that A.J. refuses to call her "Aunt Pammy" since according to Robert it's because he is "teaching her about boundaries". At ISIS, A.J. defeats Cyril at Yudo, and shows a great acknowledge of technology due to her time at Science Camp. She also bonds with Cheryl's pet ocelot Baboo and shoots a gun. She also mentions that Malory used to give her shooting lessons every year for A.J.'s birthday, except when she was in Europe because Malory used to say that "they traded the right to bear arms for having limp fries.", even mimicking her grandmother holding a glass of alcohol while talking.
Overall, A.J. has a good time, until she is taken hostage by one of the people who were after Broker but she eventually manages to free herself. Once everything is over, she finally calls Pam "Aunt Pammy" and once again bypasses Archer and hugs Lana instead and the two of them leave to go watch some cartoons.
Lana brings up A.J. in "Out of Network" when Archer was trying to leave with his therapist for Europe to persuade Archer to stay in ISIS, which seems to be enough to convince Archer to stay.
In "Distraction Action", the trial for A.J.'s custody begins, with Robert doing everything he can to prove that Lana is a bad mother such as bringing up A.J.'s kidnapping. When Archer brings Lana a file that could prove Robert is unfit for parenting Lana instead lets A.J. choose. A.J. is asked which parent she prefers and she states that while she loves both her mother and step-father and is grateful of how supportive Archer has been she still prefers Lana and even asks Robert why did he even bother doing this. A.J. then hugs Lana and Archer joins them, with A.J. asking who he is before giving Archer the hug he so much longed for. Lana then discovers that Robert tipped them off to the police and A.J. is forced to tag along with her parents and their co-workers as they flee from the authorities and steal a yacht until all of them eventually flee on a plane.
In "The Anglerfish Stratagem", Archer is dismayed upon finding out Lana has told the new employee about A.J.'s kidnapping since he is not comfortable with sharing information about his family to a stranger.
In "30 for 30", Lana is frustrated over having to be at the field in every mission instead of the office as she thought being at the office could be good for A.J..
In "Plaque Removal" Lana tries to get on the good side of a museum curator who is also on the board of the Abernathy private school, one of North America's top prep schools and ultimately succeeds.
In "Archer: Into the Cold" AJ and Archer bond as he takes her to the zoo and she finally calls him dad. He also broke into a zoo cage and got AJ a gibone.
Appearance[]
A.J. is a preteen girl with green eyes, shoulder-length thick curly brown hair and a medium-brown complexion. She looks nearly identical to her mother except that A.J. is of mixed-race since her father is white and her mother is black, so her skin is lighter than her mother's.
- As a preteen, A.J. has chin-length hair pulled back by a black hairband and wears a black turtleneck sweater, a gray skirt, black leggings and black Mary Jane shoes. She sometimes wears a long beige cardigan. In "Archer: Into the Cold", AJ wears a pink cardigan and a white sweater instead.
- As a preschooler, A.J. is tall for her age, making her appear older. She has her hair tied in a ponytail with a pink ribbon tied around it. She wears a pink winter coat, navy blue jeans and pale blue snow boots.
- As a two year old, she wore a frilly, cream colored, sleeveless smocked dress with thin, peach colored horizontal stripes as well as a sash and Mary Jane shoes of the same color with white stockings and her hair tied in two pigtails with two white ball hair bands. At Woodhouse's funeral, she wore a black dress over a white long sleeved shirt, black stockings and black Mary Jane shoes.
- As a baby, she had very thin hair and always wore at least two long sleeved pink onesies; one with buttons on the front and fucsia pink trimming on the neck and sleeves as well as the feet and another one that was all pink with sleeves that looked like a bolero jacket and sometimes a pink headband with a bow on it.
Personality[]
A.J. is overall a happy, kind and polite child. Despite her mother and stepfather sending her to boarding school overseas she seems to love them very much and look up to them. A.J. even attacked a dangerous criminal to protect her mother and while scared she didn't cry while in captivity, showing that she is very brave. She also seems to be fond of Archer despite being unaware that he is her biological father. For example, during the times when Lana took her to see Archer while he was in coma, A.J. kissed him in an attempt to wake him up like in the tale of the "Sleeping Beauty" and greeted him with a handshake upon being introduced to him.
A.J. shows strong hints in both body language and perception, that she inherited Archer's traits, including a liking of dominating the conversation. An example of this is when A.J. first introduces herself to Archer where she, like her father has done on previous occasions, holds out her index finger as to interrupt Archer while she finishes her juice box. This is something Archer is known to do with his drinks. The behavior can seem intimidating in nature. As with the "Sleeping Beauty", her perceptive skills and exploits are remarkably similar to that of Archer's, e.g. when she recollects Lana's description of Archer as a 'Sperm-Delivery Device', and feels the need to bring this detail up, a kind of nitpicking Archer is known to do extensively. However, is plausible these characteristics are due to her young age. By the series finale, she has learned and accepted Archer was her father with them even going to the zoo and possibly implied to have stole a gibbon. A.J. even called him "Dad", signifying their restored bond. Another trait she inherited from her father is her love of animals, as shown where she managed to easily tame Cheryl Tunt’s pet ocelot Babou and later enjoyed visitng the zoo with her father, where it was implied that he had stolen gibbon for her as a pet.
As she grew older, A.J. has also grown to be very confident, blunt and sassy. She is not afraid to speak her mind and loves showing off her science and dancing skills but she won't perform if someone who isn't her mother or step-father ask her to, claiming that she "doesn't perform under command".
Trivia[]
- A.J. was born in the Republic of San Marcos ten days before her due date and was delivered by Pam with some help from Malory.
- When A.J. was first born, she exhibited similar traits of Archer, such as raising one finger as if to say "just a minute" while nursing. This was a definite clue that she was his daughter seconds before Lana confirmed it.
- A.J. never got to meet Woodhouse since he went missing around the time of her birth.
- Abbiejean was named after Lana's grandmother.
- Abbiejean is also the name of creator Adam Reed's grandmother.
- Later on, A.J.'s name is changed to add "Malory" as her middle name, thus having A.J. named after one relative from each side of her family. It is unknown what A.J.'s original middle name was, or if she even had one at all.
- Out of all of her parents' colleagues, Pam seems to like A.J. the most and is very protective of her.
- Archer and Lana's coworker Ray Gillette expressed interest in being A.J.'s guardian should her parents die even though he was smoking in front of the infant A.J..
- Malory is convinced that she will have to pay for a liposuction for A.J. as a graduation gift.
- According to Lana, being impregnated with Archer's sperm was not her idea, but Malory's. However, when confronted, Malory told Lana to "prove it".
- When A.J. was still a baby, Cheryl Tunt had a strong dislike of her (and babies overall), even referring to her as "fat, gross baby" and suggested kidnapping her and sending her to Bhutan to train with Ra's Al Ghul (referencing Damian Wayne from Batman) just to ruin Archer and Lana's relationship (back when they had briefly reconciled). It is unknown if Cheryl's opinion of A.J. changed now that she is no longer a baby.
- Malory expects Abbiejean to call her "Grandmother Archer". Despite this, A.J. refers to her as "grandma" in "Saturday".
- In "Deadly Prep", it shows that A.J. had toy spaceships and may have been interested in astronomy or at least one of her parents liked the subject and tried to teach A.J. about it.
- In "Sitting", it can be seen that among A.J.'s things that there was a stuffed ocelot. Her father has an extreme enthusiasm for wild felines and probably gave the toy to her in an effort to share that with her, further demonstrating his strong affection for his daughter.
- It is also implied that Malory may want A.J. to be a spy like herself and Archer or at least to know how to use guns since at one point Malory let A.J. manipulate a gun as revealed in "Caught Napping".
- Archer has threatened to have A.J.'s grandmother Malory arrested on multiple occasions whenever she restricted A.J.'s food when her parents allowed Malory to care for her while they were away. In "Caught Napping", it is shown that Malory still doesn't like it when her granddaughter eats carbohydrates.
- A.J. has many things in common with her father, Archer:
- Both were born in war zones outside the US.
- Both their mothers are spies who were not married when they gave birth.
- Both are rarely called by their first names as Archer's co-workers (sans Malory) call him by his last name while people usually call A.J. by her nickname.
- Both slept in the same crib as babies due to Woodhouse passing down Archer's old crib to A.J. as a baby shower present on Archer's behalf after he failed to give Lana the present he had originally planned.
- Both have the middle name "Malory" after Archer's mother/A.J.'s paternal grandmother (In A.J.'s case, Malory used extensive manipulation and bribery to force Lana into adding this to the child's original name.)
- Both were sent to boarding schools at five years old (but unlike Archer, A.J. doesn't seem to be negatively affected by this, or at least didn't show it).
- Both are/were unaware of who their real fathers are since not even Malory knows who Archer's father is while Lana decided to keep this information from A.J. and let her believe Robert is her father until A.J. became a preteen.
- Both like animals and Cheryl's pet ocelot.
- In "Saturday", it is revealed that Lana signed A.J. up for Yudo classes to boost her confidence and that Lana sent A.J. to Science Camp, Music Theater Camp and Dance Camp.
- Archer stated that A.J. "barely knows [Archer] as a father". This could imply that Lana told A.J. who her birth father really is after she decided to divorce Robert.
Appearances[]
| Appearances for Abbiejean Kane-Archer |
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Gallery of Images[]
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