[Finale Spoiler] Finale discussion

[Agiel7]

The prophecy could have been a vision and a legend even to them.
Just like our "Jesus"

But i agree with you, as i said it is the most non cliché ending.
It is as far as i know the first time in a Blizzard game a former villain may have the chance at redemption..

I think the only way Kerrigan can ever redeem herself is if she undertakes a kamikaze mission of such unimaginable and unprecedented noble epicness that it puts Tassadar's sacrifice to shame and the cutscene would make Roger Ebert rescind everything he said about video games not being art.

(In my best Jim Raynor impersonation): "Awfully tall order there, darlin.'"

[Articorse]

If they were going to end the story with Kerrigan regaining her lost humanity, here's how I would have done it:

The combined forces of the Dominion and Raynor's Raiders are on the brink of annihilation on Char. Confident that victory is hers, she decides to visit the battlefield just as the Zerg are mopping up. While on the ground, she sees the Zerg about to close in on the final pocket of resistance, where Raynor and company are hunkered down. Outgunned, outmanuevered, and exhausted, Raynor finally collapses just as the Gauss rifles of the other Marines click at the pull of a trigger. The last of the Terrans look onto the hordes of Zerg with despair, that is when Raynor spots a female ghost that was part of his detachment on her knees and on the verge of tears. He embraces her, attempting to comfort the ghost. That is when New Gettysburg flashback cinematic flash inside Kerrigan's head, then images of her crimes. She suffers a conscience attack as a result of her confronting the scale of her crimes, so massive that she screams in agony as she clutches her head.

Cut back to Raynor, Jimmy and company look up to see that the Zerg of Char are now docile with no Kerrigan to command them. Fearing that they would aggravate them again if they start shooting, the group carefully walks between them, completely bewildered by this sight. The small detachment eventually happens upon Kerrigan, who is now completely catatonic. Tychus doesn't betray Raynor because it's completely ludicrous that Mengsk banked on a single Marine on being in that situation to kill Kerrigan (and lets face it, Tychus is an awesome character), and Raynor cradles the still catatonic Kerrigan in his arms and walks back to the Hyperion and into an uncertain future.

Granted, my idea is no different from fan-fiction.

Sorry, dude, but THAT is the kind of ending that would've made me call bullshit on Blizzard. Kerrigan in her role as the Queen of Blades has never shown any remorse - she kills, evolves and spreads her Zerg. Her going from absolute monster to suddenly realizing what she's doing is wrong just from such a sight would be terrible and cliche as all fuck.

I don't like bashing people's ideas, but I honestly think Blizzard handled this the best way they could. You have to realize, if nothing as drastic as this ending occured, then the ending of Brood War was set to have Kerrigan kill and assimilate everything in the Koprulu sector, then fight alone against the Hybrids. They simply wrote themselves into a corner with Brood War's ending, which was brilliant, mind you, just insanely hard to get a good story going again if things remained the same.

As much as the ending was an ass-pull, I think it was the best one they could've gone for.

[Aldrius]

The Queen of Blades is essentially Kerrigan with her conscience turned off and her viciousness unleashed. Far as I can tell, de-infesting her simply brought her back to the way she was before.

That's so silly, though. It's the same thing they did with Arthas. Making magic/SCIENCE alter their personalities to push the plot in a certain way, and then undoing it later. Despite the original stories implying that it was circumstances and the events that were happening to them that made them the way they are. Having people's personalities just 'revert'... it's just... so... cheap. =S

Her conscience was turned off because she was PISSED about being a slave for so long. To the confederates, to her own guilt, to the Overmind. That always seemed really clear to me.

I think it's a tad premature to conclude that Blizzard has made the two of them into two distinct entities since we've hardly seen any hint of Kerrigan's behaviour or thoughts after de-infestation.

Well she's smiling and nuzzling up to Jim...

Easy. Arcturus probably knew more about Valerian's plans than he let on. He then made a deal with Findlay to get close to Raynor and since he would be best placed to off Kerrigan permanently. While infested, she'd be nearly impossible to get close to, let alone kill. As a human, easy pickings.

It's still... way too complicated. And that's never made clear -- that he knew what Valerian was planning.

Though I know everybody loves to believe Mengsk is omniscient... despite... devastating evidence to the contrary. I mean maybe that'll be made clear in the next game, but I dunno. Doesn't seem right to me.

[Articorse]

That's so silly, though. It's the same thing they did with Arthas. Making magic/SCIENCE alter their personalities to push the plot in a certain way, and then undoing it later. Despite the original stories implying that it was circumstances and the events that were happening to them that made them the way they are. Having people's personalities just 'revert'... it's just... so... cheap. =S

Her conscience was turned off because she was PISSED about being a slave for so long. To the confederates, to her own guilt, to the Overmind. That always seemed really clear to me.

It's really not the same thing they did with Arthas at all. Arthas CHOSE to become corrupted, he became overzealous and too bent on revenge, which let the Lich King corrupt him. He simply never struggled to stop that corruption, which is why I think that Arthas becoming a good guy again is fucking idiotic, since he was never really a 'good guy' to begin with.

As for Kerrigan, she was a genuinely good person before being infested. Her corruption was forced on her, she even tried to fight it be calling out to Jim before the infestation was complete. Once it was complete, however, she stopped being the good, caring Sarah Kerrigan and became the Queen of Blades. The Overmind wasn't directly controlling her, as in, guiding her every action. It had simply instilled in her the idea that he is God, just like that idea was in every Cerebrate's mind. The Cerebrates' personalities didn't change once the Overmind died, why should Kerrigan's? So I really don't think it was just her being pissed at everybody, because that makes no sense. Why would she be pissed at Jim? He did everything in his power to save her, and then some.

This isn't just someone's personality 'revert' or a cheap, cliche 'What have I become?!' moment. This is James Raynor saving the woman he loves, and at the same time damning her to unending torment, while damning almost everyone around him by risking their lives for something HE wants. Everybody hates her, if somehow people forgive her, it'll take a LONG time and a LOT of work on her part. Not to mention that now that her conscience is back, she will feel like the biggest monster in the history of ever. She will hate herself, her inability to do the right thing, I wouldn't be surprised if she tries to kill herself, only for Jim to stop her.

I know we just lost one of the most badass antagonists ever, but I personally am very satisfied that Sarah's back. This, for me, is definitely the best way they could've dealt with her, it allows for so many storytelling options it's just unreal. I think this ending is incredibly complex and has the potential to turn into something truly great, like the original SC and BW stories.

And let's not forget, we've only seen 1/3 of the SC2 story. I CAN'T WAIT for HotS.

[Dalamar]

No one seems to get that human kerrigan and the queen of blades are two entirely different entities. The human kerrigan is moral, compassionate, emotional, has all the characteristics of a human that is not a villain. The queen of blades has nothing to do with this. Infestation and subsequently the death of overmind did not "free" her mind, but changed the way it comprehends alltogether. Emotion and morality are not defined in the same way when you are not a human but one with the swarm. The need to consume and evolve and persevere is the only natural one. It is not immoral to consume entire human colonies and make them part of your strain, it is very natural and normal. It is not wrong to expand and consume everyone in your path when thats what your species do. You can say that kerrigan is "evil" as much you can say it for a wild animal that kills to feed, or a virus that infects and propagates. Of course kerrigan is a billion times more complex than those examples but the principle behind her is the same.

That is precisely how I view the issue of good-evil as well. In particular, the example of the wild animal killing to feed, exemplifies the matter perfectly. Kerrigan is (was?) the predator that lurks in the dark, waiting for you to separate from the pack.

This isn't just someone's personality 'revert' or a cheap, cliche 'What have I become?!' moment. This is James Raynor saving the woman he loves, and at the same time damning her to unending torment, while damning almost everyone around him by risking their lives for something HE wants. Everybody hates her, if somehow people forgive her, it'll take a LONG time and a LOT of work on her part. Not to mention that now that her conscience is back, she will feel like the biggest monster in the history of ever. She will hate herself, her inability to do the right thing, I wouldn't be surprised if she tries to kill herself, only for Jim to stop her.

I had not considered the consequences of Kerrigan getting her conscience back and the torment this will put her in. Thanks for pointing it out! I agree, this will present excellent storytelling opportunities in HotS.

[userstupidname]

A possibility is that infested kerrigan will remain inside kerrigan

Maybe HoT is about kerrigan only being able to control a small cluster of zerg and needs to regain everything.

Meanwhile as she controls more and more zerg her infested self lingers over here

I dunno :/

[Lopan91]

i think karrigan will slowly revert back to becomeing the queen of blades again because her hair was still zerg like (which i understand why they did that because as someone mentions earlier it would have been ridiculous to give her back her red hair or make her bald) but he going back to becoming the queen of blades doesnt make sense because the artifact should have destoryed all zerg in her.

but on a unrelated note(i guess related i dono)
but i had a dream after beating the game about the last cinematic basically after jim carries her off hes alone and talking to her and then she quickly turns back to her zerg self then infests jim

i actually thought this could be a cool ending but the prob with it is jim is such a big terran character people would be pissed off but you could always have matt or mengsks son become the new terran hero

[hyde]

The ending was shit and full of cliches.

Raynor goes down in a "quickdraw" with Tychus. Tychus just stands back and doesn't realize that Raynor is gonna pump one into him?
Riightt....And you can hear Raynor unclick his pistol holster..like that wasn't big enough of a
"HAY IMMA SHOOT YOU" .

I'm sick of all this cowboy shit, mainly because I live beside a lot of ranches and have a cowboy themed city wide festival each year - but still...enough of the space-cow boy hick stuff. Marshall this, country music juke box that, jesus.
Our hero just walks out with his hoe and thinks everything is alright? Yeah sure Zeratul said she can't die, but guys I seriously doubt Kerrigan was evil strictly because of the infestation. Even after the overmind died, she was still a treacherous bitch. Like others said, having just lost so much power and becoming some ugly human with zerg tendrils as hair? I think she's gonna want to go back to being infested or some variant - leading the way for Heart of the Swarm

And I can't believe those idiot goons even released this art work years ago, I saw this crap ass story coming as soon as I saw this picture. It's LITTERALLY "THE" Scene, you walk into the hive and you see this human hand sticking out.
This is just from a different angle.

[mr. peasant]

I was hoping for a post-credit stinger where it would be revealed that Kerrigan had ascended to the point of no longer needing a physical body or is able to create duplicates of herself (remember, we do fight and 'kill' her several times in the campaign), and that the body Raynor is holding would act as some sort of spy.

However, that's not the case.


Regarding the Zerg campaign, I have been saying for some time now that with a title of 'Heart of the Swarm', it was going to be about a nicer, less hostile Kerrigan seeking atonement/redemption.

[Spartan13]

A possibility is that infested kerrigan will remain inside kerrigan

Maybe HoT is about kerrigan only being able to control a small cluster of zerg and needs to regain everything.

Meanwhile as she controls more and more zerg her infested self lingers over here

I dunno :/

revert to queen of blades again?? what's this a game?? zerg-human-zerg

who would like this stuff?

I was hoping for a post-credit stinger where it would be revealed that Kerrigan had ascended to the point of no longer needing a physical body or is able to create duplicates of herself (remember, we do fight and 'kill' her several times in the campaign), and that the body Raynor is holding would act as some sort of spy.

However, that's not the case.


Regarding the Zerg campaign, I have been saying for some time now that with a title of 'Heart of the Swarm', it was going to be about a nicer, less hostile Kerrigan seeking atonement/redemption.

Yes we fight and kill her several times...But during the mission each time u ''kill'' her it's being quoted that she retreats-runs back


P.s Correct me if i'm wrong but in the final mission Nova talks to Raynor at some point and he thinks she's Sarah??