Monday, April 1, 2013

Peeling Back the Layers of the Bioshock Infinite Onion

by Dexter Jaekel

Don't be sad my dear

Since completing Bioshock Infinite late last Friday night, I have been deep in thought about the stellar and mind blowing ending. Here in this Spoiler filled article I will lay all my theories out on the line for you to view. I had spent a significant amount of time trying to locate extra Voxphones to unravel more information about the story. So if you have made your way through the story without finding these Voxphones, then I will help to fill in the details for you. If you have not beaten Bioshock Infinite yet, please bookmark this page for future reading! I think you will like what you are going to read.


SPOILERS START NOW
First things first, Booker DeWitt is Comstock. The reason Elizabeth drowned you in the river was because Comstock was born from the Baptism in the river. In one universe, Booker goes to the river to be Baptised and rejects the Baptism. His lives with his guilt for his misdeeds towards the Indians, which leads to gambling, debt, he has a daughter and the mother dies during child birth, and in order to wipe away the debt he sells his daughter to Robert Lutece. Of course, we see Comstock taking Anna DeWitt into his own universe, and she loses her pinky in the closing portal.

Comstock is born from every universe where Booker chooses to be Baptised. He changes his course of life, meets Rosalind Lutece, and creates Columbia with her Quantum Levitation. His ego gets the better of him and he takes the basis of Christianity and twists it to his favor. This gains him many followers and he is able to populate Columbia. Comstock prophesies to all these followers that his child will pave the way to an even better world. Problem is that all his time working with Rosalind Lutece on her Quantum Levitation, and subsequent parallel universes, caused him to become sterile. It was at this time that he jumped into the Universe of Booker the gambler and took his daughter.

Comstock tries to murder the Luteces because they know the truth about Elizabeth. At this point, they go back to the other universe to get Booker in an attempt right this wrong that they have made. Booker is brought over and immediately looses his memory, due to the fact that in this universe he has no memories of what happened after refusing Baptism, since after that moment only Comstock existed. He then begins to make up an existence and purpose based on some small pieces of his old universe that he is able to hold onto, "Bring us the girl, wipe away the debt."

The Lutece twins are actually not twins. They are in fact the same person. In one universe, Momma Lutece has a boy named Robert Lutece. In another universe, Momma Lutece has a girl named Rosalind Lutece. Through their work with Parallel Universes, the two decide to live together in the Columbia Universe.

The reason why Elizabeth has the power to tear open rifts is because her pinky was left in a different universe. Rosiland Lutece said something about this in one of the voxphones.

The name Bioshock Infinite is a reference to the fact that there are Infinite universes within the game

The scar on Booker's right hand saying "AD" stands for Anna DeWitt. The Lutece's refer to it as his hairshirt. Back in the day, hardcore Christians would wear scratchy and uncomfortable shirts under their clothes to punish themselves for whatever they believe their sins are. They wore them as a painful reminder. So, DeWitt scared his hand as a painful reminder of the day when he gave his daughter away.

The constant use of the song "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" is a pretty obsious metaphor for the whole game. When the game is over, the circle is finally broken.

When the Luteces have you flip a coin at the beginning of the game, you should assume that these Two have asked the other Bookers in other Universes the same question and marked it on the sandwich board. So, if you count the number of tally marks you will see that this is actually the 122nd time that they have tried to break the chain of events. Also, whenever you ring the bells at the top of the lighthouse in the very beginning of he game, you ring the bells once, twice, twice. One Two Two. 122.

The choice between which necklace Elizabeth should wear is an interesting thing. The game gives you this seemingly important choice, and makes you wait for that moment when the game reveals what effect this choice will have on the universe but it never happens. This is interesting. I think what Irrational Games was trying to portray is the illusion of choice. What you should take away from it is the idea that no matter what decision you make, all the parallel universes bring you to the same place. The outcome will ultimately not be changed.

After the credits, you see Booker back in his office. The newspaper indicates that it is the same day that he would have given Anna away. But there is no knocking at the door. The way Booker says Anna's name, like there is some question in his mind as to wether or not it is real, tells me that this is the same Booker that we have been playing all along. All the other Elizabeths faded away at the end of the game, so maybe Elizabeth brought Booker to the new universe that had been created where Comstock never gets to exist and never takes Anna. A world where Booker is now completely ready to be a good and loving Father after learning all the things that it means to be a Father while he was in Columbia.


------------
Rapture is another Parallel universe

This is a theory that passed me by until today. Of course I saw the Rapture part, but I thought that was a clever nod to the original game. However, Elizabeth says that this is "one possible universe." So if this is true, then in another universe, the Comstock version of Booker became Andrew Ryan and created an underwater version of Columbia. The parallels are too strong to ignore.

Rapture is created to feed Ryan's own ego, much like Columbia was created to feed Comstock's ego.

Plasmids are just Vigors by a different name, same as EVE is just like Salts.

Atlas/Fontaine plays the same role as Daisy Fitzroy.

Dr. Lutece plays the same role as Dr. Tenenbaum.

The biggest Mind Blow is that Elizabeth and the little sisters are the same. Elizabeth is like one large and powerful Little Sister. In the original Bioshock, the little sisters were protected by a bunch of Big Daddies. In Bioshock Infinite, Elizabeth is protected by nothing less than the Ultimate Big Daddy, Songbird. Just look at these two pictures of Elizabeth and a little sister. Even the clothing color combination correlates!





-------

Well that's all I can think of right now. Please feel free to leave any corrections or additions in the comments below.




Written by Dexter Jaekel
Editor-in-Chief of TheTechFixation.com
 

0 comments:

Post a Comment