1, 2, 6, 13, 14, 19
[EDIT: The information in this post has been largely superseded by the character page I have on Mar. If there's any conflicting information or the characterization in this post doesn't match, the character page should be believed over this post.]
Oh wow did this get long. Thanks for sending in all these questions!
1. What name do you give your Boss?
My main is named Guiomarââ[p]ossibly derived from the Germanic name Wigmar meaning âfamous in war.ââ I donât know if that meaning translates over to the nameâs use in Portuguese/Spanish, but Iâm hoping it does! She usually goes by Mar, though, not in any small part because she was tired of people fucking her name up. Here are some pictures of her from SR4.
(I also have another bossâValeriyaâbut sheâs not quite as fleshed out as Mar at this point.)
2. What is your favorite headcanon about the Boss?
I hope by âfavorite headcanonâ you meant âtop five.â The lesson here is to never ask me about headcanons unless you want a stream of talking directed at you.
Mar loves cars and motorcycles. Loves them. Her father was a mechanic for the Saints on the side and a lot of her earliest memories as a kid have to do with sitting on her dadâs workshop bench while he worked on the Saintsâ cars. Working on her cars and bikes is one of the main ways she relaxes and driving has always been her main source of entertainment, and she takes an incredible amount of pride in her collection, which is arguably better protected than any of the living spaces in her cribs.
If she isnât driving sheâs the pissiest, most sarcastic backseat driver youâll ever come across, but god help you if you say so much as one âholy shitâ when sheâs driving. Everyone in the gang is continually surprised that she has a 100% legal license that she doesnât bribe anyone to keep. (Though, granted, sheâs actually a very good driverâitâs mostly that sheâs a very good driver who enjoys going fast and gets a real kick out of the Near Miss diversion, which makes her generally terrifying to ride along with.)
If sheâs upset or trying to work something out, sheâll go out on a long bike ride by herself around the city. No radio, no homie, just her and her helmet and her Kaneda. They all end at the same scenic vista areas in both Stilwater and Steelport, regardless of where she starts from. Sheâs spent a lot of hours looking out over both cities and just thinking. Provided she gets there, that is; she tends to be much more reckless on them than when sheâs out driving around normally, so most of her driving-related injuries come from them.
Mar owns exactly two suitsâthe one she bought years ago for Aishaâs funeral, and the purple one she has in SR4. She wears the purple one on a semi-regular basis for when Kinzie forces her to dress up for an event she has to make an appearance at; the one she bought for Aishaâs funeral sheâs only worn at Aishaâs funeral and the re-do of Gatâs funeral that was held after STAG and the Syndicate were taken care of. (Iâm well aware that this is probably directly in opposition to what the Boss is canonically shown wearing, but I donât care.)
Sheâs tall. Really fucking tall. Like, 6â2â or 6â3â, depending on who youâre asking. She also eats like a pro swimmer to go with her swimmerâs buildâlong, lean, muscular in a lithe way. Sheâll mess you up, donât get me wrong, but sheâs not what most people would consider a bodybuilder. (Also, despite the fact that sheâs built like a swimmer, she actually hates being in the water and avoids any sort of water-based anything whenever she has a choice in the matter. Sheâs in the âcompletely loses all muscle coordination when put in a body of water where she canât touch the groundâ boat, which makes for some interesting home videos of the two times the crewâs been able to convince her to get into a pool.)
Queer as fucking get out. That might be my favorite headcanon.
Iâm going to stop, but I want you to know I could go on and on. Iâll save it for the big post I do on her, I suppose.
6. We all have a favorite method of killingâwhat weapon canât you live without?
An RPG with infinite ammo is a girlâs best friend.
In terms of melee, Iâve got a lot of attachment to the baseball bat with barbed wire wrapped around it, though the hand-to-hand in SR3/4 really makes just going and wailing on some jackass that whistles at you when youâre walking down the street very rewarding. Among the conventional guns I donât have a favorite, though I tend to default to dual wielded pistols if I donât know what sort of combat situation Iâm going into. With the special gunsâŚman, the Abduction Gun makes me laugh every time, and the Singularity Gun is really handy when you get up into higher notoriety situations just because of how much it can take out.
13. Whatâs your jam? Favorite song featured in the games?
If I had to pick just one song, Iâd say that Face Down from SR2 (tw: abuse) and Renegades from SR3 are tied for my favorite. Thatâs a hard choice, thoughâthereâs a lot of good music spread across the series.
14. Describe in detail the Bossâs relationship with your favorite NPC.
I got this question two other times, so Iâm doing it for a few different NPCs! Check the other answers for moreâŚuh, answers. Iâm also excluding Homies from this, since thereâs a question specifically for them. That being said, Iâm going to do Carlos for this first oneâhe should probably count as a Homie, but you can never actually call and roll with him, I donât think, so.
Mar has a very interesting, unique relationship to Carlos, in that heâs the only one of any of her lieutenants in any of the gamesâoutside of perhaps Gatâthat she really treats like a sibling. All the other lieutenants are her family, definitely, but CarlosâŚshe thinks of Carlos (at least subconsciously) as her little brother. She grew up an only child but thereâs something about him that brings out a protective and mentoring side in her that the other lieutenants donât.
She tells Carlos that sheâs âgonna make a banger out of [him] if it kills [her]â on a subway train in one of the Brotherhood missions. Ignoring the really skewed everything in that statement, itâs fundamentally different from anything she says at any other point to anyoneâshe doesnât have to âmakeâ anyone else. She doesnât feel any sort of responsibility in shaping their growth or personal development, for whatever reason. With Carlos? She does. She wants to be there for him and help him really come into his own as a lieutenant and as a Saint member, and she can see the potential he has to grow into a thoroughly impressive example of both. In a lot of ways, her relationship to Carlos is similar to Gatâs relationship to herârole model, mentor, and leader. Carlos isâŚvery young, very naĂŻve, and very determined to âmake itâ in and with the Saints, and that sort of combination resonates deeply with her as the Saintsâ new leader, because not so long ago she was in his position.
So of course his deathâand, in particular, the way it happened and the people responsible for itâhit her incredibly hard. Itâs like watching what her brush of death was like, except from an outside perspective and except that Carlos doesnât make some miraculous recovery. Carlos dies at her hand after being put through an excruciating experience. Itâs a mercy killing, but think about itâthis is someone she thought of as a younger brother, her protĂŠgĂŠ. âOut for revengeâ doesnât even begin to cover it. Her anger at the Brotherhoodâs a goddamn tornado, but thereâs also a pretty sizable part of her thatâs incredibly angry at herself for letting him down. I imagine she spends a lot of nights after Carlosâs death asking herself if she couldâve done anything else, if she shouldâve done things differently.
She grieves for Carlos for a long, long time, and, like Gatâs death, I donât think itâs a heaviness that ever fully leaves her. It colors her interactions with both her core crew and other gangs in a subtle way; sheâs much more protective of her crew after it, though it may not always be outwardly visible, and when people fuck with them she goes after them with enough vitrol and fury to take down entire mountains. Carlosâs death makes fucking with any of the Saints, but fucking with her lieutenants in particular, the worst thing you could ever do to Marâand the worst thing you could ever do to you, too, because she will hunt you down to the ends of the Earth and make you regret ever existing. Itâs a weakness as much as it is a strength, and Mar wonât hear a word about it either way.
19. Is your Boss a sociopath or simply a misunderstood puckish rogue?
âŚI think Mar has a very seriously skewed sense of morals when it comes to things that goes way, way beyond misunderstood puckish rogue. Even looking purely at canon events, the things that go on in the series generally go beyond âgray moralityâ and straight into the Boss being either a ruthless jackass or a wholly reprehensible person.
Like at the end of Act II in SR3, when you get all the prostitutes off the Morningstarâs boat and have a choice about either handing them over to the Morningstar for a big cash payout or keeping them for yourselves? Is a really thoroughly shitty choice all around. These women were being kept in fucking shipping containers for god knows how long, seemingly without any food or water, and were going to be incorporated into a prostitution network that is known for being incredibly brutalâŚand you take them and just turn them into prostitutes for you instead. Really? Really?
Add in a bunch of other really shitty stuff you do in the name of the Saints or just because you donât give enough of a shit about anyone but the Saints, including and certainly not limited to the casual and disregarded deaths that happen in the course of missions, diversions, and just travelling around Stilwater or Steelport, andâŚwell. Marâs not a nice person to know if youâre not in the Saintsâor, rather, if youâre not in her core people. Sheâs got a lot to answer for.
Sociopathyâs a whole other ballpark, and I really donât have the knowledge about it to say anything without sounding like Iâm talking out of my ass, so Iâm going to let it alone. (Though I know itâs a reference to that joke inâŚgod, either SR3 or 4, I donât remember which. ButâŚI donât know. Sociopathy is just a really muddied topic in general because of how casually itâs thrown around. I donât feel comfortable rolling with the joke.)


















