Now that I think about it, Booker’s death isn’t that different from Songbird’s: both are caught off-guard and drowned by their (metaphorical) daughter, although Songbird clearly takes comfort in Elizabeth’s presence as it dies. And Comstock also dies by drowning! The parallels must be deliberate, although what they mean is up for debate.

I also appreciate your attempt to unpick the reasoning behind Daisy’s decisions, instead of dismissing it as moustache-twirling villainy the way I did. However poorly handled by the designers, there is a certain logic to her decision… and it’s echoed at the end of the game, when Booker tells Elizabeth to “strangle the son of a bitch [Comstock] in the cradle”.

1) I don’t think it’s right to say that Booker sacrificed himself at the end. He isn’t a martyr, and he isn’t Tony Stark at the end of the Avengers, the selfish man proving that he’ll take one for the team at the end of the game. Elizabeth grabs both of his arms and forces his head under the water just as he is understanding what is happening. To his credit he doesn’t fight her off, but to imply that he knowingly went to his death and gave himself up is I think more of a testament than Book deserves.

2) On Daisy – the way she was handled was awful, but I don’t think what they were going for is totally out of line. Daisy goes to kill Fink’s kid and says that she needs to pull the weed up by the root. Even though Elizabeth is the one who stabs her in the back, Elizabeth is the character through which Daisy’s philosophy is most validated, when she drowns Booker in the ending. Even AU-Elizabeth paraphrases Daisy in her justifications for her actions.

And ultimately, I can see Daisy’s point. Fink’s son might be a kid, sure, but he’s a kid raised to believe in white supremacy, and Christian supremacy. What are the odds that a child like that, who watched his father be murdered in front of him, who was part of Columbia, a city that gleefully considers itself an ark and waits for the world below to be drowned in fire, is going to turn out to be a progressive person sympathetic to Daisy’s cause and willing to recognize her humanity?

I don’t think she was handled well at all. But I don’t think that the fact that she was going to kill Fink’s kid was a random or unnecessarily villainous way of portraying her. The game eventually vindicates her philosophy and ties in well with the themes of the game. The game deals with whether or not redemption is possible or even meaningful, and I think Daisy’s arc poses that same question on a societal level.

If only they did a better job of demonstrating all of that…