#prismatic max

slight background detail: as Sam collects the vices, their respective colors remain on their respective parts when they rejoin with Bliss Max, rather than staying white

Pride:

Pride is sent to the White House after the vices are separated, and is quick to take his place as the president. He acts quite a bit like Sammun-Mak; a haughty ruler who believes himself to be supreme, and strikes down anyone or anything he doesn’t like. Unfortunately for him, everyone else is hypnotized to act like Hugh Bliss, so being president is kind of boring. Depending on how long it takes for Sam to track him down, he’s either bored at his desk or trying to break into the War Room to make things more interesting.

Since Pride is more clever than his counterparts (at least in his mind), Sam needs to trick him in order to get Max’s foot back. This can be done in a number of ways within the Oval Office, though the true solution is to move the White House phone (which is on Max’s desk in this episode) over to a shelf next to the camera, use the bug (which Sam is permitted to pick up) to mimic a ringing phone, and use the electrical cords to trip him as he rushes to answer it. The force of the fall coupled by the tension of the cord separates his foot easily, and he too is rejoined with his main body.

Greed:

Greed is the first blatantly obvious vice, even before Wrath. Hugh sends him to the elevator room just outside his lair, and from there Greed sticks close to Sam. At first Sam assumes he means to help, until he looks in his inventory and discovers that Greed is pickpocketing the talismans he needs to get the other vices. In order to complete the puzzles, he needs to chase down Greed (who always begins wandering away after stealing a talisman) and toss him, causing him to drop whatever talisman he has.

His hand can’t be split like Wrath’s can; after he sees what happens to his counterpart he’s sure to keep his hand close, except to pickpocket Sam of course. Sam isn’t able to get his hand back until they find Pride, who gets frustrated with Greed continuously attempting to steal things from his office and as a result knocks him out so that Sam can simply take off his hand like he did with Sloth’s tail.

Envy:

Envy is transported into Sybil’s office, and is initially resentful of both Sam and his counterparts. He has a similar superiority complex to Pride but is much more inclined to simply complain about being seen as lesser than rather than taking action. Envy is also the only vice that Sam can converse with normally, though he’s reluctant to say much in the beginning.

Since Envy can be conversed with, Sam is able to convince him to either give hints or to rejoin with Bliss Max, though in order to do so Sam more or less needs to force him to vent, either about the situation or his fellow vices (these venting conversations also serve as a low level hint system of sorts; locations, weaknesses, etc.). After every other vice is collected aside from himself and Lust, he gives up his ear, allowing Sam to take it off in a similar fashion to Sloth and Greed.

Lust:

Lust is a unique vice in the way that Sam doesn’t really have to find him, and that Max will seem relatively normal without him. He stays with Hugh while Sam collects the other vices, serving as a sort of alarm system whenever Sam tries to go back into the lair. Unless Sam has collected every vice (except Lust of course), Hugh will ignore him and Bliss Max. Hugh will only pay attention when Max starts snarking at him, which more or less leads to the normal 106 ending.

everything on the outside remains the same; Max is still an eldritch beast rampaging the city, the flaming Max heads are still flying around everywhere, etc. On the inside, however, the Max heads are changed to the vice versions of Max and are actually helpful to Sam rather than annoying.

The primary area, Max’s stomach, is occupied by Gluttony, who’s more focused on eating the corn dogs Elder Max is consuming to do anything initially. The gang goes up to the head as usual, and they find Sloth curled up on the couch. Like Gluttony, Sloth ignores everyone, until Sam goes to open the door to Max’s brain, to which he tells him it’s no use. He explains that Pride locked himself in there, and he’s sending away anyone who tries to enter. Sam, being the stubborn bastard he is, tries anyway, and the group is separated as usual.

Sam goes through to find everyone, and finds Wrath with Papierwaite and Yog-Soggoth in the arm control, Envy and Lust with Sybil in the leg control, and Greed alone in Max’s inventory. The arm control is the first and easiest to take care of, as Wrath is able to tell Sam that he needs to say the opposite of what’s on screen out of frustration. When the control room is contaminated, Wrath is the one to take Sam to safety, agreeing to help to the best of his ability. Their first stop is the head again, to attempt to get Sloth’s help as well. Sloth tells Wrath exactly what he told Sam before, which makes Wrath mad and prompts him to start pounding on the door. Since he himself is also a part of Max, he isn’t teleported away, something that Sloth seemingly hadn’t expected. As Wrath continues to beat on the door, Sloth gets up to stop him, and their colors blend as they touch. Almost as quickly, Sloth disappears and “Wrath” gains his blue color on half his body; Sam realizes that in order to get into Max’s brain and take down Pride, he’s going to have to collect the vices into one being.

With this new plan and Pseudo-Max (who’s ever so slightly more like his old self) in tow, they head to the leg control. They talk to Lust first, who’s quick to agree to help without much detail, and Pseudo-Max gains another color. They attempt to do the same with Envy, but he refuses to even listen, instead broadcasting false thoughts in order to turn Sybil against Sam. Both Sam and Pseudo-Max try to convince her to use the treadmill so they can control the legs, but with Envy still separate and broadcasting thoughts, she refuses. Sam and Pseudo-Max then proceed to Max’s inventory to get Sam Jr.. Greed gets upset with them for trying to steal his things, but is quick to shift his anger towards Pride when Pseudo-Max explains what’s going on. He helps them get Sam Jr., then merges into Pseudo-Max as well.

They return to the leg control and Sybil sees how Sam reacts to Sam Jr. getting insulted, finally agreeing to use the treadmill. Envy finally listens to them once he notices that his broadcast isn’t working, and much like Greed, agrees to join once he hears of Pride. With the legs under control, they return to the stomach, where they trade the corn dog with Sam Jr.. Gluttony gets disgusted as Sal comes flying in, as bugs are one of the few things he refuses to eat (for plot purposes), and he’s quick to merge with Pseudo-Max as well as there’s nothing else to eat, thus nothing better to do in his opinion.

As usual again, Sal is sent to help Papierwaite and Yog-Soggoth with the arm controls, and once he succeeds, they shock Elder Max to dismantle the lock of the door to the brain. Sam and the nearly fully formed Pseudo-Max go in to find Pride, only to find that he’s stuck behind Dark Dimension tentacles. Rather than finding Max’s Super-Ego as they do in the actual episode, they instead find another Max, one that doesn’t have his vices showing. He reveals that he split his vices in his own body in hopes that, if they remained pitted against each other, that they would disperse once he went back to normal and he could go back to a normal life without them. Pseudo-Max attempts to lash out at him, but Sam holds him back, telling him they should talk to Pride first to see what can be done.

They do so, and Pride explains that in order for Max to ever go back to his lagomorphic self, he had to re-merge with his vices. Since his vices had been present for so long, his memories now lied with the vices rather than him, and without memories he would be entirely unable to shift out of his Elder Max form. Sam asks how he can get Pride free from the tentacles, and he gives them the Astral Projector, telling Sam that Pseudo-Max should have the memories necessary to retrieve the Cthonic Destroyer and free him. The Astral Projection sequence remains the same, and they’re able to free Pride and successfully merge him with the now complete Vice Max.

The two Max’s confront each other, and gradually Vice Max convinces him that literally tearing himself apart will only harm him. Brain Max insists as a last straw that he’s the real Max and no one else, to which Vice Max agrees, telling him that no one is taking that from him. Dr. Momma Bosco gives one last warning as Brain Max finally relents, allowing Vice Max to merge with him. With all the pieces together and finally at peace with each other, Elder Max’s form begins to fracture, and Max teleports everyone out of him before the form crumbles completely, returning him to his normal state without the colors of the vices.

There’s a brief scare as Max falls, getting buried in the rubble. Sam panics much like he does at the end of 304, immediately going to search for him and pulling him out. He kneels there for a while, just holding Max tightly, and just before the credits roll, Max returns the hug and the screen fades out.