Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-6192340-20170611193738

Before we launch into the discussion, I would like to say, here there be spoilers.

Hello friends! After the release of episode 10 of season 15, lots of people are probably wondering about the identity of Temple. I've seen theories pop up and thought I'd compile them here from least likely to most likely to better organize the discussion. If any of you have ideas not mentioned here, be sure to share them! Now, without further adieu, let us begin.

Sharkface



So, starting from what I consider to be least likely, we have the possibility that Sharkface is Temple. This would account for Carolina knowing Temple and Temple's desire for revenge against the Freelancers, especially Carolina. We also see Temple say that he could not defeat Carolina in a fight, just like how Carolina wiped the floor with Sharkface when they last met. The last reason I think Sharkface could possibly be Temple is that when Temple reveals his true intensions, you can here a version of Sharkface's leitmotif playing in the background. This theory suffers from some major flaws. The biggest one is probably that Sharkface is dead. Wash and Kimball gunned him down then incinerated him in a nuclear blast. It also doesn't make sense that Sharkface would join up with the Blues and Reds, and his voice and personality are different. I personally am happy that it seems unlikely that Sharkface is Temple, because that would really introduce anything new to the series or Sharkface's character, and ultimately would be a really cheap premise to base the season on. Now that we have that out of the way, let's get on to some of the more likely theories.

Someone we've never heard of

I rank this as the second least likely, but vastly more plausible than Sharkface. There's no reason to assume Temple is someone the viewer has ever heard of. He might be some Insurrectionist mook that Carolina ran into over the course of her time in Project Freelancer. He might be a Freelancer mook that blames Carolina for the project's downfall. He might be a childhood bully for all we know. I don't think this is too likely because creating an entirely new antagonist wouldn't tie much into the series mythology. However, Red vs Blue has created whole new antagonists before like Locus or Felix, but even they had some marginal tie to the story, in their service to the Chairman.

A member of the Insurrectionist elite team

Sort of along the lines of Sharkface, Temple could be a member of the Insurrectionist elite team. That would include the Sleeveless Insurrectionist, the Sniper, Girlie, the Demo Man, and maybe others that I'm forgetting. Of all of the members of the elite team that I would suspect, my money would be on the Demo Man because he has revealed himself to be nearly unkillable. I'm not too on board with this idea, as it feels like Sharkface 2.0 and wouldn't be very fun for the series. And although we didn't know the elite team very well, Temple doesn't really seem like any of them. Still, it is certainly possible.

Agent Illinois



Temple is possibly Agent Illinois. The backstory we get on Illinois is that he was a demolitions expert, a crack shot with a rifle, not a particularly highly ranked agent, and a drinking buddy of York's. Temple is responsible for a number of bombings, including the attack in the first episode, which squares away demolitions expert. He also is a good shot with a rifle, killing a hornet pilot during the attack on Armada 8. He can't fight Wash or Carolina, which is because Illinois was lower ranked. As for the drinking buddy part, Illinois might be bitter about what Carolina did to York and all of Project Freelancer. This theory has a couple of flaws, such as Loco building the bomb in episode 1 and Temple missing the pilot several times. However, I think this could be an interesting idea for a villain, even if a Freelancer who was friends with Washington and Carolina going rogue and killing other Freelancers is a bit too similar to the Meta.

Carolina's Simulation Troopers

This is a theory I'm on board with. The concept of simulation troopers hasn't been explored very much, even though our protagonists are sim troopers. Temple's actions in the light of a simulation trooper who is bitter about being used by Freelancer make sense, even if they're a tad sadistic. Even before the reveal, Temple is fiercely protective of his sim trooper identity, complaining to Wash and Carolina that they don't treat sim troopers like people. Additionally, it has been a long time since Carolina would have gone through a training simulation and likely wouldn't remember her troopers' voices, explaining why she didn't recognize Temple when he clearly recognized her. This would also account for Temple telling Wash and Carolina that he couldn't beat them in a fight. I personally really like this theory, because it allows Red vs Blue to explore the honestly horrifying concept of simulation troopers outside of the lens of the Reds and Blues. It's like at the beginning of Reconstruction when Walter Henderson is describing Omega's rampage in Valhalla where we see how terrifying something can be when the Reds and Blues aren't involved. This also creates a revenge story that feels fresh and complex in a way that the Sharkface plot never quite achieved. With Sharkface, Carolina was just exercising self-defense. With sim troopers, Freelancers throw away the lives of innocent people. As a subset of this theory, I've heard a lot of theories saying that Temple is one of the Triplets. Given that the Triplets were the original sim troopers along with their Charon counterparts, that could be a thing. It would also be good for drama to watch the zany Triplets devolve into bitter murderers craving vengeance. I'm not sure if he's one of the Triplets, but I can totally picture him being a simulation trooper.

So what do you think? There are a few theories I've heard that I haven't added to this list because there's no evidence to support them (You know who you are, Felix people). If you have any that aren't on this list though, feel free to add them to the comments. Whatever Temple's identity really is, I'm excited to see where Rooster Teeth takes this villain. 