A bunch of Mordy headcanons because I need this guy to get more love.
Warning: discussion of symptoms of alcohol withdraw. the bad ones.
Mordecai will sometimes ask a question about something on Pandora and he’ll low key get pissed off if someone answers it.
He doesn’t really want to know when he asks, he just wants to be mad about it, and sometimes the answer just pisses him off even more because then he’ll have more questions.
There was a lot of rivalry between him and Roland at first, thanks to them both being the most experienced with firearms. It took awhile for him to acknowledge the former soldier in a leader capacity.
To some degree he thought he was better than the others thanks to him being the oldest, most traveled, and considered himself the best marksman in the history of sharp shooting.
Constantly brings up winning an interplanetary sniper contest when he was younger when he has the chance.
Learned some humility after being knocked on his ass a few times by the others in duels, and some respect when being saved from getting eaten by some giant skag.
Youngest of multiple siblings and considered the runt of the litter. They picked on him a lot as a kid.
His older siblings frequently scared off his romantic partners in an attempt to be nice and tease their youngest brother but inevitably backfired.
Frequently blames others for his failed relationships.
Mordecai drank a lot during the events of borderlands 1 but not nearly as much as he does in borderlands 2.
More of a steady climb into heavy alcoholism. Rakk ale was a bit strong for his taste at first. He took his first venture into trying it when he and the other vault hunters buried TK. After nearly getting killed by the Destroyer he got over it he spent a week in treachers landing stealing booze from the bandits there until something new came along, gradually drinking more and more with every disappointment or loss. Moxxi leaving him for someone else just made the pattern apparent.
I think for him Moxxi was more of a prize to be had than a lover, but he did genuinely care for her.
Unfortunately his ego gets in the way of maintaining romantic/sexual relationships. Once he’s in the relationship he doesn’t really do much to keep it. He’s the sort of person that wants what he can’t have.
Friendships are a little different in that he finds them more engaging than romantic relationships. A friend is someone you can work with, while a romantic partner isn’t.
Blamed himself for Sanctuary’s shield being taken down, and wanted to make up for it by capturing more intel from Hyperion, which is why he wasn’t as careful when he got ambushed. Blames himself for Bloodwing.
Brick re-joining their group helped him a lot because they were able to talk about loss when it came to their pets.
Mordecai fully expected to die when the time came to fight Jack. Almost wanted it too. He’ll never admit out loud that Brick saving his life meant more to him than a lot of things in his life.
After having Talon for awhile he got to thinking about going sober after having a nightmare about Talon being captured or shot down.
He talked to Hammerlock about it first because he knew the scholar wouldn’t mention anything to anyone else.
He got scared when he learned about some of the symptoms of withdraw, but after another nightmare he decided to go through with it. Whatever he had to go through would be worth not having to suffer the same loss again.
When the hallucinations started everyone got scared.
Mordecai suddenly bolted up from his chair, screaming in Spanish and patting himself off. He was seeing bugs everywhere and about ready to throw something.
Brick had to hold him down while Lilith quickly got Dr Zed. The both of them were wondering if Mordecai had gotten into something new since he quit drinking but were informed that this was one of the symptoms of heavy addiction withdraw.
Mordecai had problems with his symptoms for a long time, and Talon actually did have to be taken care of by Tina and Brick for awhile until Mordecai had some sense of “normalcy”.
He was carefully watched by Zed for a long time.
When he got stable things got a bit more normal.
He got Talon back, which was good since they missed eachother.
Tina cried when she saw Mordecai again telling him that he wasn’t “allowed” to die.
Brick and Lilith had the same sentiment.
There were times he’d stand outside of Moxxi’s bar for hours. Craving nothing more than to drown himself in booze.
A few times he even went in, but Moxxi would only ever give him water or soda.
He cried on his one year anniversary of being sober.
Side note: I like how it looks like he’s gained weight in borderlands 3 versus the previous games because it can imply that he lives a healthier life with the emotional support of Brick and Tina.
