Life is Strange Episode 3 Re-Cap and Thoughts

(Major Life is Strange spoilers!  Don't read ahead if you haven't completed episode three yet!)

Re-Cap
I decided to take a break from witchering (a word I just made up) and to check out the newest episode of Life is Strange.  A brief recap of episode two--Max and Chloe's friendship really seemed to be repairing itself and there were a lot of warm, squishy feelings.  Chloe found out about Max's superpowers and much of the episode was about Max flexing these powers.  The big event in episode two concerned Kate Marsh, a fellow student at Blackwell Academy, who was being relentlessly bullied by the resident mean girls.  The Kate saga culminated with her near suicide (or suicide if you failed to talk her down) and rescue by Max who managed to stop time despite having almost used up her quota of superpowers while messing around with Chloe.  The very end of the episode sees Max in the principal's office and making a choice about who to accuse in relation to Kate's issues--Nathan Prescott, the rich kid, or David Madsen, Chloe's "step-prick," who Max has witnessed harassing Kate (I went with David Madsen).  Then you see Warren and Max hanging out on the lawn as more weird stuff happens--an unscheduled solar eclipse.

Episode three picks up directly after these events with Max in her dorm room.  She's clearly tired and shaken after the day's events but Chloe is texting her to ask her to sneak out of the dorm to investigate clues related to both Rachel Amber and Kate.  Max has to sneak through the darkened dorms and meet Chloe in front of the main building, but not before doing some more snooping in Victoria's room to look for clues related to Kate.  After exploring Victoria's room, Max sneaks out of the dorm and has to navigate the dark campus to find Chloe.  On the trek she is forced to use her powers to sneak past a very drunk Principal Wells who is hanging out on the front porch of a building near the dorms.

Max and Chloe sneaking through the school.

Max manages to sneak to the front of the school building and is surprised by Chloe who is lurking in the shadows.  Chloe reveals that she has swiped the spare keys to the school from David and that they can investigate the entire building.  They make their way to the front only to stumble across Mr. Jefferson (Max's photography teacher) and Victoria coming out of the building.  Max and Chloe hide behind a display and spy on the conversation between the two of them.  Victoria is being her normal, despicable self and trying to force Jefferson to pick her photograph for a contest.  They finally clear out and Max and Chloe enter the school building.  Once they're inside they head directly for the principal's office to search for clues.  Chloe quickly discovers that she doesn't have a key for the principal's office and sends Max to search for a key while she uses her "skills" to try to pick the lock.  The brief search of the office reveals that there is no key for the principal's office.  Max decides to ask Warren for advice about building a bomb to blow up the lock.  Warren texts her back instructions for how to build a small bomb and she sets off to explore the school to track down the materials while Chloe continues her attempts to pick the lock.

In her explorations of the school, Max tracks down the materials for the bomb and heads back to the principal's office.  Once there she fits the small bomb onto the door and she and Chloe take cover and wait for the results.  The bomb explodes and the door opens....but it also sets off the fire alarm.  This is the perfect time for Max to use her rewind powers so she heads into the office and then rewinds.  You hear Chloe swearing at the lock and then Max opens the door--ta-da!  Max and Chloe set off to investigate the files in the office for clues.  A cursory investigation reveals that Nathan Prescott has a spotless file despite the fact that he's a known trouble-maker and drug dealer.  Chloe looks through the files on the principal's computer and finds that much of the information about Nathan has been covered up or doctored to make him look like a stellar student.  Max finds files about both Rachel Amber and Kate Marsh and takes the information.  Chloe starts digging through the drawers of the principal's desk and finds an envelope labelled "handicapped fund" that contains five thousand dollars.  At this point players are faced with a decision about whether Chloe should take the money.  She wants to use it to pay off Frank, the drug dealer who threatened her and Max in episode two.  I opted to have Chloe leave the money--it seemed like if they got caught that stealing five thousand dollars would be a much bigger problem than breaking into the office.

Max and Chloe make their way out of the building and decide where to head next.  Chloe isn't content with simply heading home but decides that since she has the keys to the whole school that they should break into the pool for a swim.  Max does some exploring and manages to find the controls for the pool lights and turns them on.  Both girls hop into the pool and there is a nice bonding moment as Max and Chloe reflect on their friendship.  Eventually they decide they've had enough swimming and they decide to head home.  As they're preparing to walk out of the pool building a light shines through the window of the door.  There's a security guard in front of the building and he's coming inside!  Max and Chloe both hide and players have to figure out the best way to avoid the guard.  After they've left the pool building they head for Chloe's truck in the parking lot with the security guard hot at their heels.  They speed off, heading to Chloe's house.

The next morning there is a nice reflective moment as Max wakes up at Chloe's house and remembers all the time she's spent with her friend and her family.  Max realizes that her clothes still smell like chlorine from the night before and Chloe encourages her to dress in an outfit that was left by Rachel Amber.  Max heads downstairs to have a nice breakfast prepared by Joyce.  Players can spend a little time exploring the house and yard.  In the yard you discover a bunch of dead birds--what the heck is going on?  Once you return inside you eat breakfast and have a friendly discussion with Joyce, Chloe's mom.  It gets sad as she shows Max an old photo album from when she and Chloe were kids and William, Chloe's dad, was still alive.  Chloe finally arrives at the table and whispers that Max should go explore the garage and try to break into David's files to find more clues about the disappearance of Rachel Amber and his involvement with Kate Marsh.  After going through a sequence of guessing passwords and rewinding, Max manages to get into David's computer.  The files on the computer reveal that he was definitely following and gathering information on both girls.  The information on Rachel Amber reveals that she was spending a lot of time with Frank, the drug dealer guy who keeps threatening Chloe.  Max leaves the garage and re-enters the living room to find Joyce and Chloe sitting silently.  The front door opens and David enters the house.  He's angry because he had been up all night investigating the break-in at the school.  Max and Chloe decide to confront David about the information that they've collected and there's a big confrontation in which players are forced to decide whether they side with David or not.

As Chloe is angrily driving through Arcadia Bay, she and Chloe notice Frank's RV in the parking lot of the Two Whale's diner.  Chloe decides that they should break into his RV to look for more evidence related to Rachel Amber.  Chloe formulates a plan for Max to get Frank to give her the keys to the RV and then she will rewind time with the keys.  It's genius!  The plan is not as easy as it sounds and involves a lot of discussion with different characters and much rewinding.  After Max has gotten enough satisfactory information she can use this information to get Frank to take the keys out of his pocket where she can then swipe them.  Once the keys are in her possession, she can rewind and meet Chloe in the parking lot.  They enter Frank's RV and start looking for information.  Max discovers a sort of diary hidden in a vent.  The information within the diary reveals that Rachel and Frank were much closer than Chloe thought and were involved in some sort of relationship.  Max take the diary to Chloe and shares this information.  Chloe becomes very upset and decides to take Max back to school--there's an uncomfortable discussion in the car where Chloe blames everyone for her problems and is inconsolable.

Back at school, Max returns to her dorm room and looks at a photograph that Joyce gave her.  The photograph is of her and Chloe when they were younger.  It was taken on the day that Chloe's dad was killed and Max remembers many of the events that happened that day.  Then, something weird starts happening with the photo--almost like it's moving.  Max focuses on the picture and then she is transported back to the exact time of the photo.  She's 10 years-old and hanging out in Chloe's house.  Chloe's dad is still alive and Max realizes that shes has been transported back and has the ability to prevent him from being killed.  The phone rings and it's Joyce asking him to come pick her up at the diner.  Max starts looking for his car keys so she can hide them and prevent him from driving...and getting into the accident that kills him.  Her efforts to hide the keys are foiled by a beeper that he has attached to the keys.  Max has to hid them somewhere where he can't hear them.  She chucks them out the door into the yard.  William finally gives up on finding the keys and Max convinces him to take the bus to get Joyce.  She just saved him!  Players are then greeted with a montage of family photos--those of the current world, like from William's funeral, burn away and are replaced with happier photographs of the family.  It appears that Max has completely changed Chloe's life and has been able to keep the family intact.

Max is jolted awake and is now back at school.  Oddly enough she's hanging out with Victoria and her group.  The discussion in the group seems to indicate that Max is one of the Vortex Club in-crowd.  Max scrambles away stunned and hops on a bus to head to Chloe's house. On the way she is greeted by a strange scene--whales have beached themselves and are dead.  At Chloe's house, Max rings the doorbell an anxiously waits to see her friend.  Chloe's dad opens the door and calls for Chloe.  You expect to see a happy, non-blue haired Chloe bounding to the door but instead see Chloe bound to a wheelchair as a quadriplegic.

Thoughts
I felt like episode three had very slow pacing.  The preview led me to believe that this episode was going to be much more action-packed.  The parts I found most tedious were those that involved the most rewinding--at the diner you have to talk to the same people multiple times in order to gain the insight needed to get Frank to put the keys to the RV on the table.  The story seemed pretty flat until the cliffhanger right at the end.

The story did manage to keep me somewhat hooked but I feel that my focus has shifted away from what happened to Rachel Amber to what is happening with Max's powers.  The ending of this episode implied that Max's powers have allowed her to alter events to the point that in this new world things are completely different.  She's one of the cool kids who she spends so much time despising!  The big question that I'm sure everyone is wondering is what happened to Chloe?  Why is she now in a wheelchair?  It has become apparent that Max's powers aren't an easy solution to all the bad things that are going on.

Even though I felt like this episode was pretty slow the ending did manage to spice things up enough that I want to find out what happens next.  Are Max's powers going to destroy Arcadia Bay?  Is Max going to be able to fix Chloe's life?