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"Mature Content Warning!" |
| “ | Vault hunters: I need your help. The power inside the next vault could bring peace to Pandora. Only badasses like you could brave the horrors of Pandora and find it... Which is why you’ve gotta die! See, I can’t just have some psychopathic murderers getting to the Vault before I do. Don’t get me wrong, it’s cute that you all think you’re the heroes of this little adventure, but you’re not. You’re bandits. You’re the bad guys. And I...am the goddamn hero! | „ |
| ~ Handsome Jack introducing himself. |
| “ | What's that saying? "Don't pick a fight with a man with nothing left to lose?" See, I'm gonna show you just how much YOU have to lose -- and I got the most powerful Siren on the planet to do it with. Lilith, kill the Vault Hunter. We've got a date to keep with the Warrior. | „ |
| ~ Handsome Jack after Angel's death and capturing Lilith. |
Handsome Jack is the main antagonist of the Borderlands franchise.
Jack is the CEO of the Hyperion corporation and self-proclaimed hero of Pandora, as well as the arch-nemesis of the Crimson Raiders, who seeks to restore peace to the lawless planet. In actuality, he's a power-hungry dictator who regularly abuses and kills his own employees for his amusement. His ultimate goal is to open the Vault of the Warrior and use it to wipe everything he deems evil.
He was voiced by Dameon Clarke.
His Evil Ranking[]
What Makes Him Heinous?[]
Background/In general[]
- Connecting his own daughter Angel to computers that would allow him access to the communication systems on Pandora. It was probably justified because according to Jack and an echo recording in Borderlands 3 his wife died because of Angels powers becoming unstable. However, after the scar that he received from Lilith, the abuse that Jack gave to her got worse to the point that he was willing to use her powers along with an energy known as erodium to awaken the warrior, thus sucking all the life out of her and killing her in the process.
- He manipulated the events of the first game with Angel's help by manipulating and relaying instructions to the original vault hunters Roland, Lilith, Mordecai, and Brick to open the vault of The Destroyer and defeat it, after words rising up the corporate ladder and by orchestrating bets to his superiors and persuading them to build the Helios space station in order to keep watch on Pandora in order to equip the Destroyer's eye into a laser weapon dubbed "The Eye of Helios".
- Even after everything he's done he still believes himself to be the hero of the story despite the pain and despicable actions he commits.
- While he does have several comedic moments such as talking to the vault hunters while eating pretzels, naming his pet diamond pony Butt-Stalion, failing to play a violin sarcastically after he kills Mordecai’s bird Bloodwing, or mimicking Roland after he kills him and steals his echo recording, none of them detract from his heinous crimes with most of them showing just how sadistic he is.
Borderlands The Pre-Sequel[]
- During The Lost Legions takeover of Helios, Jack's sadistic side starts to become apparent as after confronting and sparring the meriff he tries to kill Jack but has a terrible aim and thus Jack kills him and becomes determined to show no weakness. He then Subsequently obtains his own robot army by procuring an AI called Felicity. Afterwards he permanently retires all of his scientists out of fear that one may be secretly working for the Legion.
- After being betrayed by Roland, Lilith, and Moxxi, resulting in the destruction of the eye of Helios and his own face. Jack turns his back on peace on Pandora and decides to scorch the planet with The Warrior killing all bandits and everyone who betrayed him.
- After donning his trademark mask he strangles his boss Mr. Tassiter to death and thus becomes the new CEO of Hyperion. (Though it was kind of justified as his boss was kind of a jerk to him.)
- Shortly after becoming president, Jack searches for the H-source which is a series of Hyperion technological secrets buried in Claptraps system. After extracting it, Jack uses one of the modules to destroy all robots of the Claptrap line. Thus, Betraying, nearly killing, and leaving for dead Claptrap.
Borderlands 2[]
- He also wastes no time abusing his new found position of power, bullying and murdering his employees, enacting corporate and military control over Pandora, and using the substance of eridium on animals and people for deadly experimentation which resulted in the creation of characters like Krieg and Tiny Tina ( the later of which her parents were tortured and killed under jacks orders).
- With help from an informant, Jack and his enforcer Wilhelm were able to locate New Haven and destroy it. Capturing Helena Pierce and some survivors with Jack personally executing Pierce while also mocking her face and saying that her and her husband now had something in common since their both dead. and ordering Wilhelm to kill the rest.
- Jack then tracked down the vault key that would open the warrior and its owner Dr. Patricia Tannis, who was tortured by Jack into giving it up. And as stated before had Angel charge the key with Eridium.
- He then tries to find other vault hunters in order to lure them into his sphere of influence, showing a need for them. After luring them in, he then tries to kill them. This however would eventually be the beginning of the end for Handsome Jack as vault hunters don't die so easily.
- He captures Bloodwing (Mordicai's pet bird) does deadly eridium experiments with her and after the vault hunters knock her unconscious he kills her with an explosive collar.
- After Angels death, Jack Angrily kills Roland in cold blood and kidnap's Lilith in order to use her powers to charge The Warrior blaming them for her daughters death when in reality it was his fault.
- There are 2 missions in the second game that are given to the player by Jack. The first one involves killing yourself, and the second involves going to his grandmas house for a visit and its revealed that he ordered bandits to kill her. (though again the latter was kind of justified as he was physically abused by her which would most likely become one of the main contributors to the decline of his mental state as he became older).
- He mentioned that he once scooped out the eyes of someone with a spoon right in front of his children causing them to cry.
What Makes Him Inconsistent?[]
- He has a genuinely tragic for two reasons:
- He was abused by his grandmother during his childhood, with her not only beating Jack with a buzz axe as a "disciplinary" tool, but she also drowned his puppy when he didn't make his bed. While Jack being physically abused by his grandmother was tragic and definitely contributed significantly to his mental instability in adulthood, Jack's numerous heinous crimes as an adult made him more monstrous than his abusive granny. This is especially poignant with Jack becoming an equally abusive parental figure to Angel.
- He lost his wife due to Angel's powers becoming unstable when the latter used her siren powers to protect her family from a group of bandits. While it was harsh, Jack locking Angel up was a genuine loving, yet misguided attempt to not only protect everyone else from dying to Angel's unstable powers (like her mom) but Angel herself, at least initially.
- He cares for other people:
- Despite the abuse, he still loves his daughter and did have strong feelings for his wife, In fact, the password for when you get to Angel's chamber literally says, "I love you." Not to mention he cancelled the bounty and threatened the bandits if they killed the vault hunters before him.
- He also had several healthy relationships with other women after his wife's death. One such example being Nisha (if you kill Nisha, you piss off Jack).
- While Jack was a MASSIVE hypocritical knight templar in many regards, he did have minor well-intentioned motives for unleashing the Warrior to cleanse Pandora, due to the planet being a dangerous, hostile world full of sociopathic bandits and vicious creatures.
Trivia[]
- He is the only Borderlands Inconsistently Heinous.
External Links[]
- Handsome Jack on the Villains Wiki
- Handsome Jack on the Borderlands Wiki
- Handsome Jack on the Ultimate Evil Wiki