The Real Villain of Season 1
Many people look at Season 1 and say "Yup, the Stranger is the villain of this season." In some playthroughs, this is the case. Lee is a good man, who looks after Clementine properly, is kind to her, and still has a grip on his morals. In these playthroughs, the Stranger IS the obvious villain, as he takes Clementine away from a good protector at the cost of many lives.
However, this is not always the case. Throughout Season 1, you, as Lee, can become the true villain. If you are constantly telling Clementine her parents are dead and that she should just "move on", if you murder multiple men in front of her face, if you help steal the Stranger's only hope of survival from them, if you threaten or lie to innocent cancer survivor to get them to do what you want, if you are overall an evil player, the Stranger is justified in trying to get Clementine away from you. It really does become a rescue and not a kidnapping. So, who was the "real villain" in your story? Was it the Stranger, who caused multiple deaths in the process of kidnapping a little girl from a good protector, or Lee, a murderer and a monster and a thief who treated Clementine poorly?
Comments
Ugh, I hate thinking about that. I hate looking at the game that way. I'm so glad I'm not a terrible person. I play season 1 with Clementine in the front of my mind at all times, always taking her safety and happiness into consideration before anything else. Lee was a guardian and a savior. Shame on anyone who would have him be a bad man.
It was the walkers!
That's a cool way at looking at it. I play Lee as a nice guy who's anger sometimes gets the better of him like when you kill Danny and fight Kenny on the train. So in my story the villain is still the stranger but Lee isn't a complete hero.
My story was a bit more opaque. I (Lee) did shitty things, like killing every St. John brother (In front of Clementine, no less), and stealing from the car, among other things. I (Lee) also did good too, I never gave up on Clementine, I ACTUALLY believed her parents may have been alive 'till I saw them. So I never found a "true" evil to point my finger at in season 1 (except the St. John's). The Stranger was crazy; but, he was right. My Lee really wasn't a good guy or a bad guy, just another shade of grey.
If only the stranger didn't have a zombie head inside a bag and acted all crazy talking to it.
Villain or not, at least Lee wasn't cuckoo in the head.
I kinda wish they didn't give the Stranger the talking head thingy.
meh, all of it is determinant.
Besides, when the dead come back and eat the living, there is no right or wrong. You're either living or your dead. Leaving the groceries unattended, IN THE conditions they were, was really careless.
By the way, OP sounds like Larry :P
He was only like that because of what the group (and Lee if played that way) did to him. He was just a little league coach. After what happened to his family, he did go a little crazy. I think most people would go a little crazy if they lost their wife and daughter in the same day, finding them dead in the road.
Yeah, I've got charm coming out of my ass.
Ben was the main antagonist.
Except Clem still doesn't want to go with him. So it's still a kidnapping.
Besides,
That's the truth. You heard her mom describe her father getting bitten on the answering machine and freaking out. It's no more immoral than stringing her along on the false hope that she'll reunite with them again.
You mean two cannibals and a guy who was on death's door and was about to turn and kill them all?
You mean take food out of an abandoned car in the middle of the woods? You couldn't have known that the owners were coming back.
After he pointed a gun at you and was about to shoot. And "lying" about Clem being your daughter is hardly immoral.
Clementine, your parents are dead.
Clementine I'm killing these people so they don't come after us and try to kill or eat us. By the way, there's no hope.
Clementine I left Lilly on the side of the road because she was a danger. Also your parents are dead.
Clementine, come with me to Crawford. also your parents are still probably dead. Vernon, fuck off she's with me.
Hey. Clem. I just made you shoot this guy by not being strong enough. Also I cut off my arm. Fuckin' wicked right? Oh, look, your parents ARE dead. Love you. blargh
To summarize one of my playthroughs as a more 'heartless' Lee. It was done in the interest of making Clementine ready for a horrible world, and not become someone like Sarah is. Put her through hell, and if she survives she can do anything.
I didn't do all of those things but you could justify it by calling it survival, my Lee was nice though, besides Saltlicking.Larry....
I think the Stranger is the villain, as even if Lee is good and does all morally sound things the Stranger still takes Clem. This shows that he doesn't actually care if Lee is evil or not. He just wanted a reason to take Clem.
While it did happen to be true, one could not be certain of it. And besides, just because Ed was bitten does not mean that Diana was dead as well.
They weren't coming after them. They were no longer a danger to anybody. Killing them was indeed murder in my eyes and in the eyes of Clem. Regarding Larry, you don't know that. He could have made it, and killing him took away any chances of him living.
That car was as abandoned as the motor inn was while the group was gone. What if some people just came along and stole all of the supplies at the motor inn? "They couldn't have know they were coming back."
He pointed a gun at you because you broke in to their hideout. You could have been from Crawford and dangerous, and you can just as easily talk him down calmly. Not only can you lie about Clem, you can lie about having medicine to get them to come along.
There's also murdering Ben, not giving food to Clem or Duck, and using a girl as bait to add on to that list.
If he takes her from a good Lee, that's grasping for reasons. If he takes her from an evil Lee, that's justified.
Again ,out of all of those all I did was saltlick Larry....
My comment was directed at DomeWIng333, not you, mate.
I know, I'm just saying
You have an interesting point of view, but I have to disagree. The Stranger is clearly derenged (have you met his wife?). Even the most brutal and assenine Lee develops, at the very worst, a protective relationship with Clem, whereas the Stranger wants to replace his family with Clem as if they were a bunch of little goldfishes. We don't know what he would do should Clem not meet his expectations and be enough to satisfy his delusions.
The thing is that, even if you control Lee, he does have a personality of his own, so there are certain things you can't do. In "No Time Left", Lee goes after Clem for completely selfless reasons. If he was truly villanous, he would've left her to the Stranger. No matter how ruthless or brutal your Lee is, all the bad things he does are for Clementine's sake and his treatment of Clem is "tough love" at it's worse. Basically, Lee can be bad, very bad, but the Stranger is way worse for Clem.
I did half of those things...does that make me a villain?
You make a decent point in him going after Clem, but one good action doesn't automatically redeem a multitude of evil ones. If you listen to the Stranger's story, he loses his son Adam, his daughter Elizabeth, and his wife Tess. He doesn't kill them because they weren't good enough. The reason he took Clem was because he believed Lee was evil. This can either be true or untrue. One might bring up Clem being locked in the closet, but he had a reason for doing this. He knew Lee was going to go after him, and he planned to kill him. He didn't want Clem to have to see that. I do not think the Stranger is a good man by any means, but Lee can be far worse with all the lives he ruins.
I think that's a little too simplistic. I mean, otherwise, the St. Johns deserved no punishment for what they did, the murdering, raping bandits were actually pretty cool folks, Lilly shooting Carley was not a reason to leave her on the road or punish her in any way, and Carver should have been let off with a slap on the wrist (or hell, a pat on the back, a slap on the wrist is still too much).
If anything, when the dead cause the downfall of society, right and wrong become that much more important, because it's what truly separates you from the dead. After all, they're not called the "living dead" for nothing. They're mobile, they see, they smell, they hear, and they eat. In all the most basic ways that matter, they are "alive", so one must look deeper for the differences between the humans and the zombies than just being alive and being dead. Ultimately, it comes down to the battle of right, wrong, good, evil, and all that jazz. Without them, the living may as well just join the living dead, since there would be no difference anyway.
That shows that he didn't care if Lee was evil or not, he just wanted Clem. He just tried to justify it by making Lee seem evil, regardless if he was or not.
The Stranger is a reaction to Lee. The Stranger who takes Clem from a good Lee is a different kind of Stranger than the one who takes Clem from an evil Lee. They're two different people, just as good Lee and evil Lee are two different people.
Surely unconscious evil when it just comes natural without even trying is the purest of evil ^
Well, we both know this could go on for weeks
. But, to sum up what I think, I believe that even the most evil, child-starving, people saltlicking, cannibal murdering, Ben dropping and unnessesarily honest Lee is better for Clem than the Stranger. The Stranger is obviously delusional (I recall someone in this forum hilariously stating he was OK with him up until he started talking to the bag) and this make him dangerous, imo. Even if he didn't have to do as many bad things as Lee doesn't mean he's not dangerous. Besides, his "rescue" of Clem always seemed a part of his delusion to me. More an excuse than an actual reason.
Mistakes are different from evil. A mistake is an accident, and not wanted to happen. The purest form of evil is evil consciously done and known to be evil by the doer.
Well, his "rescue" can be a delusion, but to spare a lot of unnecessary debating I think we can agree to disagree. I think the Stranger is better for Clem than the evilest Lee, and you think the evilest Lee is better for Clem than the Stranger.
Well the worst killers in history have the same trait in psychology a lack of empathy or understanding of their actions so to me a subconscious evil is much worse as it's out of control for the person
Fair point. But I don't think Ben lacks empathy.
That's all I ever wanted
. I can tell we're both pretty convinced of what we're saying.
That last phone message sounded a lot like a last will to me. And that was a couple months before Lee first has the opportunity to tell Clem that her parents are dead. In all likelihood, they were dead.
No longer a danger? These are two guys who started trapping, dismembering, and eating people 2 months into an apocalypse. And now they have nothing left to lose, a huge vendetta against your group, and full knowledge of where your base is and how many people are there. I mean I let them live too, but to say that they no longer posed any threat is just false.
He had a heart attack with no medical help around. The likelihood of him coming out of that situation alive was not worth risking everybody in the group, including Clem. And she recognized that. Even Lilly said she understood why you did it.
Then that would have been shitty luck on our part. I would be upset that we lost our things, but not at the people who just happened by our loads of seemingly abandoned supplies.
No, you had to grab the gun from him or he would have shot you in the face. Talking to him does nothing. And even if you lie about the medicine, you did so to get a member of your group the help he needs. A lie to save a life.
Ben flat-out told you to let him go and there were a bunch of zombies approaching.
I'll agree about the not giving food to Clem and Duck and using the girl as bait thing. Those were dick moves. But the Stranger knew nothing about either of those. Clem didn't even know about the second one.
While I disagree with you on all of those points, I think we can agree to disagree here. I think those make somebody a bad person, adn you don't. We have different ethical points-of-view.
HA!
In other terms, yes. But when it comes to leaving supplies behind in a broken down car, no.
the real villian is shaun bc he was frends with that fat chick
I did many of these things, including killing Jolene, Larry, and Danny. I also left Lilly behind and dropped Ben. But I don't consider my Lee to be a villain. He's more of an anti-hero than anything else. None of those things were particularly "nice", but my Lee did them for the sole reason of protecting the group and those he cares about. About the only way I could see Lee being outright evil is if the player made the "bad" choices purely because they hated Larry or Lilly, or just wanted to kill someone. I didn't like making the pragmatic choices i did, but I'd make them again because it was for the sake of the group. The only one I would change is Ben's fate. Out of all my choices, dropping him is the only one I can truly say I regret.
Wait, are you Cany0udance?
Bingo. That's him.
Solid theory right here. Good one, Stache. You know if you look at the other way it can be our fault that Ben had to deal with the bandits because we agreed to check the barn with everyone. Larry's death affected Lilly to snap and shoot Carley/Doug and stealing the RV later on. And Mark's death. (determinant) In this world you can't just trust anyone. That was the main verdict in Season One other than redemption. St. John's, cancer patients even your own group members (Ben and Lilly)... That word ''Trust'' just a joke. Not everyone has Clementine luck. She got lucky in this world. She met good people. Lee (one and only), Kenny, Luke, Christa... but not everyone is innocient and kind-hearted. You know before ''In Harm's Way'' came out, some players/members thought Luke betrayed the group. You know why they thought that? Because Season One made them think twice before trusting someone.