#WELL there's still the mystery of how Mark's apparently dead wife was seemingly alive and working for Lumon

[bumblingbabooshka]

It's obviously a diabolically infantilizing move by Lumon to make all the innies' manager a child but do we think it's also some sort of dig at Milchick? His computer's home screen still says 'Cobel' AND he has a child as his second in command and there's a moment near the end of the first episode where he seems to be terse with her, ordering her out of the room and closing the door when she tries to talk to him.

[meditatemoremedicateless]

The Raven (Before the Storm Theorycraft)

Credit to @geekremix for many of her theories of the original Life is Strange, as well as the Geek Remix Lets Plays I’ve been using as my source material for most of my research of the original game.

Since the release of the first trailers for Life is Strange: Before the Storm, the Raven has been a seemingly omnipresent figure. In the opening of many scenes in the game, including almost every scene with Rachel, the setting is shown, followed by the Raven’s entrance or presence in the scene before the player assumes control. It, for all intents and purposes, appears that Chloe is being followed by a bird. But why?

The symbolisms associated with ravens are varied, but both essential properties of ravens as well as myth specifically included or referenced in the game seems like a fair place to look. With that in mind:

- As carrion birds, ravens frequently represent coming death. They are highly intelligent creatures known to follow large groups of humans, such as caravans or military battalions, in expectation of death (and therefore food).

- As referenced in the placard next to the totem, ravens often stand in as trickster spirits or symbols of transformation.

- In many mythos, ravens act as godly messengers, likely due both to their intelligent and ability to mimic language.

 Now, the Raven could be understood as a mere symbol of death, transformation, or a divine message if they did not interact with the cast of their own accord. For instance, the blue jay in Life is Strange may have interacted with Max, but it didn’t demonstrate any awareness of her or anyone else, and doesn’t try to engage with her beyond responding to her actions (such as shooing it in episode 3). However, the Raven is heavily implied to be the source of Chloe’s vision in the junk yard, in which she discovers Rachel’s location and is told that “Sometimes, people need you, though. Even when they don’t admit it.” The way that the vision fragments visually, with William seeming to be more illusion than person, and with the Raven appearing every time the vision fragments.

Because the information that the Raven provided was accurate, I think there are a few safe possible interpretations.

-        The Raven may be a familiar/spirit animal (I detest Life is Strange’s use of spirit animals, so I’ll be replacing them with familiars for the rest of the post) belonging to Chloe, guiding her according to her own intentions. They watch over her, only interfering to help her accomplish things she wants (repairing things with Rachel) and help others (keeping Rachel safe). This would fulfill the ‘messenger of the gods’ role.

-        The Raven may be a guardian spirit for Rachel. I say this simply because of how often the Raven’s appearance is associated with Rachel’s, most notably at the Fire Walk event and the park hill between Arcadia and Culmination. Additionally, the Raven only actually interfered in a way that helped Rachel, both emotionally and in terms of safety (it showed Chloe a vision of Rachel burning, after all, and if she becomes injured she’ll likely require Chloe’s help to get out of the forest). In addition, Max’s special connection to animals in Arcadia Bay appeared at the same time that she developed her powers, meaning the Raven may be connected to Rachel’s relationship to the wind.

-        The Raven may be a puppet of the woman who kissed Rachel’s dad / watched the fire, hereafter referred to simply as The Woman. Because the Woman’s appearances are both directly related to the destruction of Rachel’s life, and because she takes so much pleasure in watching the fire begin (without any apparent excitement or agitation, suggesting she knew it would happen), it’s possible that the woman may be using the Raven to spy on and manipulate Rachel and Chloe in order to cause a sequence of events. More on this in another paper.

-        The Raven may literally be a person. Hearkening back to old theories of a shapeshifting Mark Jefferson, the concept of shamanism or animal shapeshifting in Arcadia Bay has always been a stretch, but a reasonable one. If that is the case, my assumption is that the Raven would be someone with a way to access both knowledge of the future as well as being able to gain a psychic connection to others. The most obvious way that this might be possible is if they have some bond with Arcadia Bay itself – however, whether this person wants to protect the people in the bay or to destroy them so far remains a mystery.

 Now, I have one last theory, and it is a theory that relies on other theories, and also my actual theory. Stick with me as I catch you up on my accepted theories regarding animals following episode 5 of Life is Strange.

-        Both because the butterfly is present for Max gaining powers as well as Chloe’s funeral, I believe that the butterfly is Chloe Price. I follow an interpretation of the Sacrifice Chloe ending of the game that the ultimate justification for Max’s powers was to give Max some of the time with Chloe that was stolen from her upon Chloe’s death. In so doing, Max was able to realize her feelings for Chloe as well as recognize that Chloe could forgive her – in effect, Chloe granted Max her powers so she could make her know how she felt about her, to forgive her, and to give Max a chance at making new connections with people (all the people she got to know in the week she erased).

-        It is heavily implied that the doe in episodes 1-4 is Rachel, guiding Max through her journey so that her body might be discovered and she could gain closure. Because Max is the only one capable of seeing her, it seems clear that Max is capable of seeing a version of Arcadia Bay that other people can’t – a spiritual plane lain over the same landscape. Considering the way in which her reality literally fragments in the Nightmare, it appears that people may exist simultaneously on an embodied and spiritual plane.

If we are to believe that certain animals within Life is Strange are the spirits of people, there is no reason to assume that familiars actually exist in Arcadia Bay. Rather, the Raven is the manifested spirit of someone who needs to resolve something. While William is certainly one possibility, and one of the only relevant dead characters at this point, I simply can’t imagine William becoming a raven after his death – transformation, death, and trickery all don’t line up with anything we know about him. However, someone who was interested in creating death and tricking Chloe would appropriately come in the form of a raven. Currently, the game still seems to be hinting a lot about the storm, so the coming death that the Raven is trying to bring may in fact be the storm. Except, who would gain anything by bringing the storm?

My proposition? A Prescott. Of course. I always come back to the Prescotts, don’t I?

Here's my reasoning. Firstly, the wildfire that Chloe and Rachel cause starts up to the north of Arcadia Bay, between it and Culmination. From what we know of Pan Estates, it is built very near there, and its construction doesn’t seem to have started yet. As such, the Prescotts may acquire the land that is to become Pan Estates after the wild fire deforests the land. Secondly, we know from at least one angle that the Prescotts could potentially benefit by bringing the storm to the Bay: in Episode 4 of Life is Strange, Max and Chloe discover that the Prescott family is responsible for a huge bunker boom in Arcadia Bay during the cold war. This exchange occurs in mandatory dialogue, so it must be significant, but there was never any follow-up in Life is Strange – to the contrary, the bunker beneath the Prescott barn was suggested to have been created with little knowledge or input by Sean. However, if Pan Estates were built significantly inland, and it either was built with bunkers or a large number of people in Arcadia Bay simply have bunkers under their homes, then Pan Estates becomes the obvious choice of real estate once people are forced to relocate during the reconstruction of Arcadia Bay. Lastly, in episode 4 of Life is Strange, if Kate was saved and Max brings up Nathan, Kate remarks that the Prescotts “have something to do with death.” While Nathan may have killed Rachel, there’s no real reason for Kate to generalize this concept. However, if the Prescotts actually have a spiritual connection to ravens, a symbol of death, and this Raven is capable of entering people’s dreams, it is possible that Kate encountered the Raven at some point (most likely when drugged by Jefferson).

So, let’s say I’ve gotten lucky and yeah, it’s a Prescott. Although in my own works I’ve usually pointed the Nathan’s mother as a source of a lot of the potential Prescott weirdness, she isn’t dead in Life is Strange – Sean clearly remarks about his and his wife’s feelings about Nathan’s deteriorating mental state in a letter than Max can read in the Bunker / Dark Room. Kristine, too, is alive as of Life is Strange. So what other Prescotts do we know? While I’m hesitant to suggest it, Henry Aaron Prescott seems like one of the easiest people to point to – with a supernatural view of both the spiritual plane of Arcadia Bay as well as the ability to see the future, the Prescotts’ acquisition of so much of the land and power seems trivial. However, it could just as easily be any other Prescott who has died, Henry is just the only one we know the name of.

Now, while this theory leaves Life is Strange extremely consistent in its supernatural logic, it is precisely because of that that I doubt it. At least under DONTNOD, the mystical elements of Arcadia Bay, including Max’s powers, were never consistent. Even if Max is considered to have say, four different powers instead of the expected two, parts of her powers don’t make much sense, such as her flash forward in the opening sequence of the game. Ultimately, I expect that the Raven will be a familiar to someone implicitly, and we’ll never get anything more explicit than the vision that they appeared in. That being said, there’s already a lot of material to work with on the Raven, so I think this is a good place to start.

Let me know if you have any more ideas about the Raven or animal spirits in Arcadia Bay!