Life Is Strange. Maxâs radio silence.
So, with all of the recent hype caused by the new LIS Before the Storm two episodes I see people growing angry at Maxâs ass for not texting Chloe back. I get it, in no way that would be something acceptable to do to your best friend after she recently lost her dad, so there are really no excuses for what Max did, but I think itâs interesting to try to understand Maxâs reasons or motives to act the way she did.
So first of all I would like to mention the fact that no, Max never forgot about Chloe. In the first episode, when Max is searching for Warrenâs drive you can find the picture of Max and Chloe together dressing as pirates inside one of Maxâs drawers. She carries that picture with her because it means something to her and even though she has not been in touch with Chloe she always remembers her.Â
Talking about Williamâs death, in her journal she writes âI wonder if I was happy to move away just to avoid the grief.â So yeah, it may be that Williamâs death definitely hit Max almost as hard as Chloe and Joyce since she was a close friend to the Priceâs. Even when she travels back in time into the picture to save William she states âItâs good to see William again.â And then she thinks that Chloe wouldâve been as excited as her to see him so you can tell she was also attached to Chloeâs dad.
Now letâs picture the whole situation from a thirteen year old girl, sheâs barely a teenager and this major event comes into her life, the loving father of your best friend passed away after a tragic accident, you know for a fact that your friend was more than attached to her father and now heâs gone, you know she will be broken inside because of this event but not only that, you yourself feel the pain for the recent loss, so things are already bad as they are and then you are told by your parents that you will be leaving town to a place where you wonât be able to come and visit when you feel like it, youâll be away, and youâll be pulled away from your already broken friend and there is nothing you can do, you know you will leave her in her lowest point and you wonât be there to hold her or comfort her, you can only text her to let her know that in some kind of way you are still there, she canât touch you, see you or hear you though which you often did before since you were such close friends so you feel yet another loss, your friend and that amazing friendship you used to share are no longer there the way it used to be.
And yeah, I know people would say âWell, text is better than nothing at all⊠if your hurting friend takes the lead to contact you⊠at least freaking text back!â Like⊠right?! But let us think about Maxâs personality.
Max is shy, rather quiet and awkward around other people, she keeps mostly all of her thoughts to herself and sheâs comfortable remaining unnoticed in the back of the class which is one of the reasons why she didnât want to enter a picture for the Everyday Hero contest. She finds it hard to believe in herself so that shows some low self-esteem and she rarely dares to break the rules, sheâs a photo nerd and has very few friends.
Now, going back to the grief avoidance we can picture a thirteen year old Max devastated by all of the unpleasant events filling her life, Chloe wasnât the only one that had to face a lot of changes in a short period of time, teenager Max moved from her home town to a big ass city into a new school where she was forced to make new friends and start from scratch, new place, new people, new teachers, new neighborhood, new lifestyle, new everything. She was the new girl around and considering Maxâs social skills (That are pretty much none) She mustâve been feeling lost, she wasnât able to run to Chloe anymore, she knew Chloe was hurt, William had died and she had a new life to build up, for an introverted girl this must have felt like too much to bare.
So somewhere between escaping from the recent loss and the struggle to build her new life she ended up neglecting Chloe, maybe for her own hurting from being ripped apart from her friend in such a delicate moment or the overwhelming feeling of not being able to help in the shape and form she wished she could she ended up shutting everything out, she was hurting, she was mourning too and she couldnât handle all at once so she took some space and distanced herself from Chloe, she wasnât able to be by her side anyway so what good could it bring to text her friend and let her know how sorry she was for her loss?
Time went by and maybe the bittersweet sensation remained attached to the memory of her old town, she left in a bad moment and the last memory she had was watching as Chloeâs life crumbled to the ground right before her eyes as she left for a new life away from her. Then this fear to face the truth may have evolved into guilt, she realized she had escaped for way too long for her own selfish purposes when Chloe need it her the most, and so the guilt started consuming her mind. She couldnât contact Chloe back because she had no right to do it; she had failed as a friend and abandoned Chloe to her luck for far too long. Why would Chloe take her back? She had acted like a cold hearted bitch, she had escaped when she obviously was need it to stay.
Itâs this same guilt and shame that keeps Max from contacting Chloe even when sheâs back in town, she wants to do it, she wants to contact her best friend but now more than ever sheâs afraid of rejection, sheâs so close to Chloe and finally able to talk face to face to make things clear, to apologize and fix her mistakes but she feels so far away from that beloved friend, she doesnât know her anymore and as far as logic goes Chloe might as well hate her guts for ignoring her the way she did, she wouldnât blame Chloe for hating on her and she couldnât do any objection if she did anyway, she had owned that burden but she was afraid to face the music so she postponed her meeting with her old friend until she was forced to do it because she was too much of a wuss to do it on her own.
If we think of Maxâs low self-esteem and the struggle she has when it comes to believe in herself along with the introverted personality and her lack of words to say in the right moment, it makes sense that she would back off from Chloeâs life out of fear for her initial and unforgivable mistakes, fear, guilt and shame, she failed as her best friend so she thought she had lost the privilege of having Chloe in her life and she stopped trying (Even though she never tried at all but as time went by she might have thought that there was no use to start doing it at that point, and just like that she got stuck in a cycle of guilt, every time she thought about trying it was already too late⊠or even more late since the previous time she thought about trying and it continued on and on until she got to Blackwell.) She was punishing herself for her mistakes because she couldnât take the idea of Chloe rejecting her.
Itâs just a theory of mine, a way to explain why Max would stop talking to Chloe when she clearly still cared for her. It would also explain the sudden change in Maxâs attitude, when she meets Chloe and she gets to talk to her again she sees that even though her friend is upset she doesnât push her out of her life, she takes her back after a couple of complaints, she takes it less hard than Max had expected and just like that Chloe was back in her life, the surprising reaction of her old friend relieves all of her fears for rejection and hope finally grows inside Maxâs mind, she has a chance to win Chloe back as the best friend she once was to her.
From there on we can see Maxâs efforts to support Chloe in any way she possibly can, she has overcome the fear to lose Chloe so now she can fight for what she really wants, to be that friend that she was supposed to be years ago, to take her place as she was expected to do, she stands by Chloe side without any second thoughts because she has a big gap to fill, she needs to prove she cares and sheâs not afraid of walking out of her shell anymore because her friend needs her to stand strong through all of the shitty situation sheâs going through with Rachelâs disappearance. She was gone for so long so the least she can do is hold Chloeâs hand through all of the shady places she takes her to. She is able to see that Chloe is packed up with troubles but she doesnât care because sheâs her best friend, so no guns, drugs or dangerous creeps will make her back down, sheâs there and sheâs there for Chloe because she can finally overcome her past mistakes. Due to this the once shy Max evolves to be the nosy adventurous photographer thatâs searching for the truth for her friendâs sake.
So the game evolves and at the end of it we see Max telling Chloe she is the most important thing for her, that statement didnât came out of the blue, this isnât a feeling that she developed in the lapse of that crazy week in Blackwell, this are feelings that she held on for five long years and that she wasnât able to let out until that very moment, Chloe had always been the most important person for her but she wasnât able to tell her because of her stupid mistake of running away in the worst moment ever. Chloe was so important for her than she couldnât forgive herself for what she did back then and she felt unworthy of having Chloe back in her life. She didnât deserve her friendship so she had no strength to fight for it, but when she has her back she fights with all her might because Chloe herself gave her forgiveness, that unforgettable friend shows her the kindness and big heart that she used to know all too well, she loved Chloe, she always did, as a friend or maybe more but she in deed loved her to the point that when sheâs forced to choose between saving her or the entire town she doesnât know what to do, because for her Chloe is all that matters, she always was but now she is able to show it.
Thatâs why the nightmare in episode five attacks her by placing in perspective all of her choices throwing at her face the fact that she was willing to manipulate other peopleâs lives and destinies just for her own selfish purposes, just to help Chloe, and within that dream Chloe comes again to save her from all the shit that sheâs afraid of and her own guilt. But yes, Max Caulfield was acting selfish because she didnât care for anything else, even though she knew some of the things she did werenât the right things to do she did them for Chloeâs sake. She wasnât aiming to do the right thing, that was never her main goal, she was aiming to help Chloe and win her back.
So thatâs that. Those are my thoughts about Maxâs long radio silence.
Iâm not justifying that nerd, Iâm just searching for the reasons behind her absence and I know it wasnât that she had forgotten Chloe because she remembered her all too well along the game and carried that picture of the both of them all along.
Pricefield Kiss for the ship supporters :)
Hope you enjoyed my crazy theory hoho!
Câya!
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