Yeah, I said it!
Baldur's Gate 3 spoilers- whatever. At this point if you haven't bought Baldur's Gate 3 and played the thing through, what the heck are you doing on a blog about it? Maybe you didn't know. Maybe the name 'Karlach' just sounds like the hacking-wheezing noise your neighbour makes when they're hocking a wad of phlegm out their window- but now you know she's a character from the RPG you have a choice to make, either retreat now or spoil the greatest game of the year for yourself. Okay? We're good? Great, now they're gone let's dive into the topic of today's blog where I place myself in front of the heavy ballista's which are the Baldur's Gate fandom to say the thing you just don't say. Karlach does not need a happy ending patched into the finale of Baldur's Gate 3, and though I know that some only call for it out of a joking sadness, others are very earnest and it's that latter party I want to reach out to.
So Karlach is one of the most beloved character from BG3 largely because she's one of the only characters who doesn't turn around and pull a right strop when you don't romance her. She's a Tiefling Barbarian, the best race, and a passionate friend who thirsts, beyond anything, to live life free from the enslavement to the demonic Blood War that she's know for about half her life at this point. Karlach is deeply emotional and allows that well of chaos to brew up to great effect, whether screaming bloody murder or despairing about the ticking time-bomb that is her Infernal engine for a heart, threatening to kill her if she doesn't return back to Infernus for good, forcing her back into the arms of her erstwhile master. The struggle to try and rid this infernal Engine is the driving force of her personal quest throughout the game, and it's a compelling journey to travel along.
But the big sad twist of the matter is that there is no way to repair her heart as it threatens to burst in her chest. Karlach has to go back to Avernus at the end of the game and the best the player can do is go with her or let her die on the pier rather than slip back into the hands of Zariel, her fallen-Seraphim master. Of course for such a beloved character above an extremely passionate fanbase, outpourings of desperate hope for some secret hidden path to save their beloved Tiefling soul and give Karlach what her endlessly endearing hopefulness deserves. Vindication and freedom. And upon that comes a vocal minority who ask, nay demand, that Larian pack in a secret ultra-good ending for Karlach into one of their extensive patches, thus changing the course of fate. But I'm here to tell you that even if that is something you yourselves want, it would not be for the good of the story.
What is the core emotional drive that connects pretty much every major character you ally with throughout the course of Baldur's Gate 3? It's a toughie when you overthink it, because they all want vastly different ends for themselves, Power, Freedom, Purpose, Honor- but shirk those higher ideals and bring yourself down to the root which binds the party. The Mindflayer parasite, and what drives everyone to want to be rid of it. They all desire to live. It's actually right in the name of the closing song of the entire game "I want to live, Don't let me die- there's more to do if I can only live." (Appropriately, the song is called 'I want to live.') In some way every character is faced by this most basic of drives and the way they deal with it forms the heart of this game that so many people resonate with. We get those who earn their clear break to live the lives they want, those who decide their ideals outweigh the base most desires and fall upon their swords and those that settle into compromise. Karlach, in a way, embodies all three.
Karlach is possessed by her new lease on her fresh life right from the start of her liberation and rages bitterly against the fate prescribed her way, but she's also so diametrically opposed to the idea of servitude she would rather die than return, even if that result upsets her just as much. It's the player's choice to let her die with dignity, or seek a compromise that some sort of living is better than no living at all. The compromise here is the 'good ending' for Karlach, in the conclusion that in some instances the hope of the living outshines the finality of the resting. Should you believe in that, some might say the peace of the departed overweighs the suffering of the tortured. The very existence of that debate tells the poignant nature of her ending, giving us contemplatable depth in place of a forgettable check list where everyone gets what they want and go off on their separate ways happy. Throwing in a third 'fix all' option would sully that, and one game which really highlighted this, was Cyberpunk's Phantom Liberty.
That's right, I'm on a spoiling spree today! So the ending of Cyberpunk 2077 is somewhat similar to Karlach's, in that you go on this giant adventure to win back control of your dying body only to learnt that with everything you did you've only brought a little bit more time- a few months at best. Everyone's already dead, all your options have been expended, and you've still not conquered the death sentence. (Unless you're a rube who fell for the Arasaka ending, in which case I'm sorry you're so gullible. She ain't never giving you a new body!) Phantom Liberty was marketed with a totally new ending to the base game that I was somewhat fearful of for the way it may invalidate the actually fantastic finale of the base game, such that I wanted to somewhat avoid the thing. But instead I found myself rather pleasantly surprised. And a lot more unpleasantly, for that matter.
Phantom Liberty does, indeed allow you to escape the ticking timer on the rest of your life, but only for the cost of robbing you of that life completely. You spend two years in a coma, ripped from the heart of the main storyline before it's conclusion, and are thrust back in the world with a scarred nervous system incapable of handling any of the combat implants which made you a legend back during the events of the game. Everyone has moved on, most suffering the rawest of deals from engaging on questlines that never got resolved by the driver of events themselves, and every bridge you built in that life is burned and shattered. Even your closest friends want nothing to do with the person who was dead for two years. It's a really confrontational finale that only really works in tandem to those that already exist, as a comparison piece to ask you what is more important- living for life's sake, or enduring the lot you have however cruel it is. You rejection of, or appeal towards, that ending can tell you a lot about what you value core-most out of life- and I for one know that while I like that it exists, I'd rather die early and bloody with the people in my life that I care about than start a new life as someone else. Although, that's something I already knew about myself from finishing Life Is Strange all those years back. I don't do take backsies.
Karlach is a tragic fiction figure, with the tragedy itself and how she handles it representing a core aspect of her characterisation. I think she's pretty much perfectly handled and portrayed and the whims of the fans threaten to put a dampener on a light that glows brightest exactly how it is in the moment. And on a much more tactile level, with Karlach as she is in most people's playthroughs, trudging around the plains of Avernus, she is perfectly poised to be a major player in the direct follow-up to BG3 tackling Zariel that Larian refuses to admit is going to happen. (But it really has to. There's no way she can't make a video game appearance after being invented specifically for Baldur's Gate 3 lore.) So I say let Karlach have her day, in the hopes that maybe we might just meet the girl again some day. Just because her ending is tragic, doesn't mean it's the last word we'll hear out of her.
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