Soldier's sexuality wasn't supposed to be revealed during Bastet?

(when I say Bastet, I mean in the timeline, not the story itself. I couldn’t come up with a title that fit)

Before people flame me or report this topic : I’m not saying that Soldier wasn’t supposed to be gay. I’m saying that at that point in the story the reveal wasn’t in the writers’ plans. Please, read the post.

I was going through some character voice interactions and there is this one, from May of 2017, that was datamined, between Ana and Soldier. It was about how Soldier wouldn’t be comfortable sleeping in the same room as Ana(1). This takes place after the events of the “Old Soldiers” comic, around the time that the Necropolis map was put into the game. It doesn’t make sense in the context that Soldier is gay and Ana knows it! So why make the voice actors record it, then and put it in the game data?

I guess this voice interaction wasn’t put in the game because maps like Necropolis,Castillo and Black Forest are quick arcade modes, so there isn’t much spawnroom time. But it shows how the writers don’t follow a delicate planning as they claim to do. In the past they kept delaying the reveal of lgbt characters, justifying that “it should come up naturally in the story”. The lead writer said the same thing in the past when fans asked who Pharah’s father was, about “finding the right time or context”, only to answer, “It’s Sam!” during a Blizzcon panel. The Soldier reveal came during a time at the year that there is a lot of competition between games’ player bases(December and January). So when they say it “naturally in the story” what they really mean is “strategically to bring the players’ attention back to our game”.

(1)

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I think Bastet was just a way to have a better setting for Ana and Jack for the story of Overwatch 2 - and finaly reveal who was on this picture at the same time. They did the same later for Baptiste short story, it’s a good setup for what is coming and fill a bit the gap so we won’t be completely lost when we see the heroes again in OW2.

AS for the unused interaction, I think he doesn’t want to be in the same room as Ana for personal reasons… he has secrets too and was probably alone for a while so even if she is his friend, that said friend was supppose to be dead and I guess you can be warry around them?

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But he was hurt and she was the one that rescued him, so he didn’t have much of a choice.

I mean just because he is gay doesn’t it mean that he should be completely comfortable with sleeping in the same room with Ana.

Also soldier is incredibly stubborn and likes to do things his on the way.

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He is a trained Soldier, he should be comfortable/used to sleeping with more than 10 people in a room.

Sodiers are trained not to be picky.

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He just wanted some privacy so he can cry and do bicep curls in his little depression corner

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Maybe Ana had feelings for Soldier at one point and he just doesn’t know how to approach it? I could see him making an awkward decision like that.

You say that as if Ana wouldn’t want to spy him doing that while crying and drinking her depression tea.

But Ana knew he was gay since the omnic crisis days :woman_shrugging:t5:

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and Ana was already with Sam and had Fareeha with him at that point… lol I really doubt Ana ever liked Jack in that way

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Well, Jack is as the same stupid as she met him years ago. Which woman would want to live with this kind of man? He makes her only problems.

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Soldiers are also not machines. While it can be easy to forget, the heart of a man still beats within Soldier and that heart is prone to making irrational decisions or statements based purely on emotion.

Sure, he probably could sleep in the same room as Ana but that’s no guarantee he’d be comfortable with it. It’s also not ‘one size fits all’ situation.

He probably has slept in the same room with ten other people but this is Ana: A close friend and ally who was severely wounded and thought dead while flying the banner of his organisation. It could be possible he feels deeply responsible for what happened to her and other members of Overwatch and fears that having others stick that close to him will only get them hurt. Naturally, he’d want people he cares for as far away as possible, especially during the vulnerable period of sleep where almost anything awful could happen to them.

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The interaction is Ana making fun of Soldier and him being embarrassed about it.

They are friends for more then 30 years and Ana is also a soldier, so they are equals in each others’ eye. When they met during Old Soldiers and Bastet they were in very friendly terms. There was nothing of this fear of people being close to him getting hurt. He even recruited her to fight on his side again. Soldier just want to go after Talon and uncover the truth.

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Well, yeah. It felt hella forced. That’s why as a gay man I didn’t like the reveal. There are games that have done it right and it’s obvious that blizzard isn’t familiar with it.

Like, besides the fact that they forced it into soldier specifically because he has the least amount of gay stereotypes and they want to prove they can write layered heroes (which to me is just as bad as heroes that seem gay) . The timeline was so bad.

Why didn’t they do the reveal in a past event? It makes so much more sense to have Vincent be revealed in his youth when… you know, they were actually together. And not based off of a photo in some rando bunker in the desert in his old age.

Like, why…? Even if Vincent wouldn’t be in the story, that photo makes so much more sense in a locket during an omnic event or even in his base of overwatch.

That’s specifically why I think it’s forced

Ok can we stop using the word forced shoehorned and retcon.

Saying that he has the least gay stereotypes makes you sound incredibly ignorant.

It’s like you literally want a character to be a walking gay stereotype which like it or not literally do nothing other than force it down people’s throats and make them nothing more than the gay character.

The thing that people have been complaining about with soldier despite that not being the case.

If you’re wondering why the reveal wasn’t in the past it was to highlight a very key theme in Jack he’s stubborn and very much lives in the past consumed by regrets.

Despite what he says to Ana it’s clearly obvious that he still has a flame for Vincent. Hell even in the way he talks when referencing both Ana and gabe’s relationships shows that it’s something that he desired.

The whole point of the scene wasn’t to elaborate the fact that he was gay but it was to show no just how obsessive he was over work to the point where he had to give up something that clearly made him happy and that he clearly wanted to pursue as his life goal. Why because he knew he couldn’t give his significant other the affection they deserved.

Here’s the kicker you could literally have swapped out Vincent for Vanessa and nothing about that section would have changed besides his orientation it’s still would have showed the exact same themes and would have still highlighted the exact same character flaws.

In a situation like that for the love of god please explain to me how it’s forced.

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Still think it’s forced. Makes no sense to happen in a bunker in the desert. Sorry not sorry.

That literally would not have happened to any straight character, and that’s why I think it’s forced.

So if Soldier had had a picture of his girlfriend Michelle - and Ana teasing him about it - that would have been forced for you too right?

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You think that’s a hint at his sexuality? Here’s how I’m interpreting the interaction:

Ana: You don’t have to be a gentleman and give me privacy.
Jack: I actually want to be alone for unrelated reasons.

But without more context, it’s hard to say for sure.

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What privacy? She lives in the open at the Necropolis ruins.

By Ana’s line Soldier is acting like as if it would be scandalous for a man and a woman sleep together in the same room. When, they are friends for more than 30 years, are trained soldiers that are used to sharing quarters, sleeping unprotected in the desert could kill you and he is gay.

What undisclosed reasons he could have that would make him say that he is fine to sleep in a harsh enviroment? Be a better target for someone to shoot? He told Ana what he is doing there.

It’s the pacing of the story. Ana and pharah is nicely put in since she’s abandoning her stuff and soldier is pressuring Ana to come clean to her.

But the pictures part of the story, yes, it’s absolutely forced, 100%. They’re prepping for a mission and pharah makes sense for Ana because it’s the next phase in her leaving to be a part of whatever crusade they’re on. Taking down the people that have a vice grip on anas city, it’s weird to force out the photo albums. It’s abrupt and weird and disrupts the flow of the story, and it definitely feels like Michael chu tried to find a way to include it for clout.
It throws off the pace of the buildup.

If it was a woman, yes, I would still think it disrupts the flow of the story and feels off because it does.

Ana tells Jack that he looks pretty good in one of her interactions. She seems to be naturally flirty, or at least humorous and good natured towards sex. Her making jokes about intimacy or complimenting his looks isn’t out of her character.

I would imagine that Jack is reserved about sleeping in her room because of PTSD or nightmares. As she details in the same story, Ana woke up with memory loss, and while she remembers and recalls more now, she’s not as all there as she could’ve been. Jack hasn’t forgotten a thing. He’s been through every trauma of war, but to be betrayed by your own friend and watch his warped flesh get vaporized in an explosion would easily push anyone to the breaking point. There’s a plot point in Gears Of War with similar reasoning to this.

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