The Villain of this Story

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel BL:TPS Discussion
#1

I just had an epiphany. I know who the real villain of the entire Borderlands franchise is. A psychotic, blood thirsty manipulator whose been operating in plain view this entire time, bribing, tricking, coercing, and seducing everyone who crossed her path to do her bidding. A corrupt warlord who would force every man, woman, and child on Pandora to fight to the death for her own amusement, and who has successfully turned friend against friend and hero against hero in the past, a character whose very name means insane determination; Mad Moxxi.

What was Moxxi when she was first introduced? A fight promoter who ran a death-match arena. And in BL2 her main motivation for stopping Jack is that he shut down her arena. She also says she dumped him, calling out his plastic surgery, and saying he was clearly too extreme and violent for her. But when we see her in Pre-Sequel their relationship is already a thing of the past, he hasn’t had surgery yet, and he’s actually pretty meek. Yet she is running a bar, meaning her arena was also a thing of the past. In short; MOXXI WAS LYING.

But there is more to it than personal revenge; in Torgue’s DLC for BL2 she forces Mister Torgue to sign over control of his arena to her because, as she admits, death match arenas ARE ILLEGAL. And what was Jack trying to do in BL2? Bring law and order to Pandora.

This entire time Moxxi was the true villain; deliberately keeping Pandora a lawless killing field just so she could make a profit off her arenas, and she specifically targeted, seduced, manipulated, and betrayed Jack, and later manipulated Lilith and Roland into trying to kill him, in order to prevent the rule of law coming to her home planet and destroying her business interests.

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#2
#3

Once a Hodunk, always a Hodunk.

1 Like
#4

Nope; Lilith was just a pawn, not the mastermind. Just another bullet in Moxxi’s gun.

#5

Hmm… We also now know Moxxi is good with machines and other tech. So maybe she hacked the Claptraps to make them as annoying to the vault hunters and Jack as possible. She could have even planted code that lead to the Robot Revolution, which also paved the way for Fragtrap to be born.

#6

Here I have to question. Why would she bother doing that? What could she possibly gain from that? From her trying to kill the champions of her Underdome and her current/future boyfriend? I may not care about Moxxi, but I still care about logic.

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#7

I don’t like moxxi or lilith

hopefully in bl3 you kill them both

#8

I’d have to agree. If anything the most extreme example of Moxxi’s manipulation would be the Wedding Day Massacre.

It’s no secret that Moxxi is deeply ashamed of her heritage, and often casually issues death threats to keep it quiet. Yet she has no problem returning to her home town to organize a wedding between her family and their long time rival…effectively gathering everyone who knows her true origins together in one place. And to help with this she invites the Vault Hunters; battle hardened killers armed to the teeth with the most advanced gear, and experienced at killing what amounts to demi-gods….to organize a wedding. Let that sink in.

It begs the question did her little “love potion” actually fail? Or was it intended to give the Vault Hunters an excuse to clean house and erase any witnesses?

#9
#10

Stupidity is no excuse.

[quote=“Flameyes, post:7, topic:235625, full:true”]
I don’t like moxxi or lilith

hopefully in bl3 you kill them both
[/quote]I’m indifferent to them both more or less but needing/forcing us to kill one of them doesn’t sound too justified yet, maybe smack them in the face and get to realize their mistake sure but killing them seems a bit excessive.

[quote=“lewis_john78, post:8, topic:235625”]
t begs the question did her little “love potion” actually fail? Or was it intended to give the Vault Hunters an excuse to clean house and erase any witnesses?
[/quote]IMO it was genuine since she does seem to care for her kids and in the end there were plenty of witness left who now hate her and Ellie even more. Even being “battle hardened killers” there was bound to be witnesses either from someone surviving the “massacre” or someone who heard it happen via echo (We need reinforcements! Moxxi and the VH’s are trying to kill us!?!)

#11

Best thread in quite some time!

#12

Compelling, provocative thread. But it seems one of the only safe places is inside the nursery of claptrap’s “brain”.
The rest is a war zone.
What others achieve by endless combinations of weapons/shields/DOT’s etc,
she only needs her genius and sex appeal.

In the real world, most of the characters are monstrous.
But in borderlands either you are ruthless or get your memory wiped clean like dear beloved claptrap.
Or as Tiny Tina said, “Don’t hate the player, hate the game”.

#13

I do find these discussions interesting, but what about Ellie, who instigates genocide just because she’s slightly irritated at the gangs? (Even giving you bonus points for burning people’s houses down as they sleep in them). Or torgue, who sends his employees down to pandora because “there’s not enough people dying?” Or Roland, who sees an enslaved child’s corpse and smirks that Jack can’t charge the key? What about Brick?
Everyone is a murderous psychopath. Moxxi is no more evil than any other quest-giver. It’s an ARPG folks, where left-click shoots, and right-click shoots slightly more accurately.

#14

ARPG?

Action RPG?

#15

Yep, see also Diablo, Torchlight, Path of Exile. Traditionally the loot-n-levelup type of game was an isometric click-fest, Borderlands’ innovation was to try it as an FPS.

#16

The core difference here is that all those other characters are more reactionary or “small scale.” Likewise in the case of Roland he’s just spiteful. None of them are the good guys (hell Lilith encouraged a cult in her image to commit mass murder and mass suicide), but Moxxi stands above and beyond simply because she’s the only one whose actions have planet wide implications, and is actively manipulating the various factions instead of simply going “I don’t like them, kill them.” I guess you could say she’s the Doctor Doom of Pandora, while everyone else is B-List “villain of the week” material.

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#17

Don’t get me wrong, a storyline where Moxxi’s persona slips to reveal a manipulative, bloodthirsty maniac would be pretty cool. She’d be good villain, she definitely has femme fatale factor. But maybe if we knew any Pandoran character as long as we know her, I’d say the same…well except Scooter, he’s too dumb to be a threat.

#18

No she didn’t. She was distracting the Bloodshots and some crazy guy saw her and started the Cult, and she was worried that if she showed her face that they would freak out. That’s why she has you investigate them to make sure they’re keeping the burning among themselves and away from civilians. And when it turns out that they are killing civilians, she has you kill them to stop them. If you ask “Why did she not just talk to them?” Here’s what would happen:

https://youtu.be/N-isGzfYUZ4?t=1m43s

They would continue to do what they want and not listen to her. You can’t reason with religious fanatics, even if Jesus and Muhammad came down from heaven holding hands and told everyone to stop killing each other, no one would listen; in fact, they’d probably be shot at. Same deal here.

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#19

Excellent post and GREAT Python reference!

#20

That would be a very sound argument were it not for all the mid-mission dialog wherein its very clear she’s getting into the idea of having a cult, contemplating showing up in person, and is obviously struggling to remind herself that they could be dangerous. She repeatedly makes excuses for them, actively encourages the player to take part in their rituals, and doesn’t actually turn against them until the very last second. And even that feels reluctant.