Odysseus gets a happy ending LOL! Sure, he has to slaughter a bunch of men who have been relentlessly hitting on his wife, but he comes out on top! That is a very interesting comparison to Karlach, given the 10 years away from home commonality. Huh, I like that.
Isn’t Odysseus the tragic hero because he lost 10 years of his life away from home at sea? Once he’s home, hasn’t the tragedy happened already? That’s the weird thing about Karlach. Her whole life has been a tragedy. Then she gets home and it’s just more tragedy. Although I can’t say she’s unique among the Baldurs Gate companions in that sense. The more I play it, the more I realize just how depressing a game it is.
But I will say, there is a difference between Karlach and the other companions along the lines of one theme. It’s a theme that lingers in my mind from DOS2. No major spoilers. But you’ve got that lizard lady in Ryker’s graveyard who says that Ryker can “take the you from you.” And like with Lohse in DOS2, she’s got a malicious visitor in her head who is taking the “her from her,” and Sebille had a master who enslaved her and took the “her from her” as well. Larian loves this kind of theme. Your selfhood and independence, your freedom, versus forces that are controlling you, and the catharsis that comes about when you’re able to break free.
We saw that in DOS2. We see that quite clearly in Baldurs Gate 3, no spoilers, but I’m thinking particularly of Shadowheart’s and Lae’zel’s storylines. There are forces that are trying to take the “them from them,” their selfhood from them. And, depending on player choice, they either can get that selfhood back or no, same as in DOS2.
But the thing about Karlach that makes her ending different, is that for 10 years she had the “her taken from her,” right, in Avernus. She couldn’t be truly herself in any way, because it was too dangerous. Then she comes home and she’s able to spend this very brief period coming back to herself and remembering who she really is and living the life she wants to live, to some degree, at least compared to Avernus. But at the end of the day, as we all know, her selfhood, her “her,” is taken from her regardless, whether through death, whether through losing her self again in Avernus. And that’s just in such contrast to other origin characters who do have the opportunity to reclaim their identities and their lives.
And I think that’s one of the things that makes Karlach’s endings so bitter. You don’t have that nice arc like you get in DOS2, where you have the cathartic breaking free and ability to make a fresh start in your life. Yeah so it’s not cathartic, it just sucks. You don’t have a choice, like you do with so many of Larian’s characters, as to whether she breaks free from these forces that have taken the “her from her” or succumbs to them. Back in comparison to Odysseus again, he does come home and reclaim his rightful place in his society! So he’s a tragic hero but, my goodness, that doesn’t have to mean that his entire life is a tragedy.
