SPOILERS The Karen Jones Mystery

[Dan_1983]

I love that she told Susan to go to hell before she left 

[billiejoearmstrong8]

13 hours ago, BoulderFaceplant said:

So she probably rode off. She would’ve been vulnerable to a Murfree abduction, but I feel like she probably just stumbled into Annesburg and drank herself to death or something. Again, that’s more narratively fitting seeing how she was drinking more and more as the story progressed. 

Yeah that seems to be what's implied. It isn't presented as some kind of mystery, we see she was drinking a crazy amount before she left and Tilly thinks that's most likely what happened and there's nothing that suggests otherwise. Like Charles going to Canada and Sadie goung to South America it's the only thing that's suggested so we pretty much have to either go with that or just say we don't know.

[Sneaky Queeky]

59 minutes ago, Dan_1983 said:

I love that she told Susan to go to hell before she left 

Yeah lol. Karen was by far the angriest of the gang about Susan killing Molly, I think that was the real tipping point for Karen and her alcoholism.  It probably made her think about Sean a lot, too. I wish she had some more dialogue about Sean's death and I wonder if there is anything on the cutting room floor with her talking about him. 

[Agent Edward]

On 8/10/2023 at 9:22 PM, SneakyDeaky said:

A good summary of it!

 

It's weird it's Tilly that helps Jack and Abigail escape for me;  in my head, it makes a lot more sense that it's Uncle who stays to the very end, and the one good thing the lazy old sod does is help save Abigail and Jack, and that's why he ends up with John and Abigail in RDR 1, instead of John just randomly bumping into him in Blackwater (Even though that's a funny scene.)

 

One reason I can think of Tilly staying to the end is she actually has a closer relationship with Susan than the other girls. I noticed in Beaver Hollow recently Susan really insults Mary Beth for doing her make-up, while she comforts Tilly in another interaction later in camp. Also there's the mission where she goes after the Foreman gang.  

Yeah, both Karen and Mary-Beth leaves camp right after "My Last Boy" is completed, in the very next mission "Our Best Selves" both of them are gone, it ain't no mystery or plot hole from Rockstar's part at all like some people says it is. Tilly stayed because she is loyal to Susan for saving her life alongside Arthur, it's not just to have someone to save Jack in "Red Dead Redemption".

[Agent Edward]

On 8/13/2023 at 11:43 AM, SneakyDeaky said:

Wow, never heard that. Is it definitely deleted or is it just really hard to trigger?  

 

If Rockstar removed that on purpose, then maybe they did want what happened to Karen to all be a mystery? 

This interaction was deleted because it would have to happen between "My Last Boy" and "Our Best Selves", but Mary-Beth also leaves camp between both missions, as Dutch confirms, so Rockstar didn't have where to place it in the end.

[Lemoyne outlaw]

On 8/14/2023 at 9:04 AM, SneakyDeaky said:

Yeah lol. Karen was by far the angriest of the gang about Susan killing Molly, I think that was the real tipping point for Karen and her alcoholism.  It probably made her think about Sean a lot, too. I wish she had some more dialogue about Sean's death and I wonder if there is anything on the cutting room floor with her talking about him. 

on a side note. it's interesting how once a gang member dies they are hardly mentioned again. after sean dies dutch mentions it in the next mission briefly and that's it. i get that jacks kidnapping was important. but even when they got him back nobody mentioned sean. same thing with kieran. mary beth mentions him and tells arthur to make them pay. and after that. one quick mention during the colm hanging mission. lenny and molly are the same. and while hosea does get a few mentions. it's still not that much. as far as i can remember i don't think the epilogue mentions any of them. it's almost like once they die the gang act like none of them ever existed. i wish we got to keep a souvenir from each gang member like a hat or horse. or like how there is a memorial wall in the lost clubhouse in gta 4 tlad. it feels like the jenny and the callander brothers get more recognition after their death than anyone else. 

[Sneaky Queeky]

23 hours ago, Lemoyne outlaw said:

i wish we got to keep a souvenir from each gang member like a hat or horse.

Oh, that would have been great to keep all their hats! 

 

 

[Lemoyne outlaw]

1 hour ago, SneakyDeaky said:

Oh, that would have been great to keep all their hats! 

 

 

yea i really like hoseas blue hat. the one on his artwork. i always wonder what the gang does with the deceased members items. what happens to their guns, clothes, money and horses? as far as i know we never see anything of theirs after they die. of course john gets all of arthurs stuff. but that's because he becomes the new protagonist.  

Edited August 16, 2023 by Lemoyne outlaw

[diperro]

On 8/15/2023 at 12:37 PM, Lemoyne outlaw said:

on a side note. it's interesting how once a gang member dies they are hardly mentioned again. after sean dies dutch mentions it in the next mission briefly and that's it. i get that jacks kidnapping was important. but even when they got him back nobody mentioned sean. same thing with kieran. mary beth mentions him and tells arthur to make them pay. and after that. one quick mention during the colm hanging mission. lenny and molly are the same. and while hosea does get a few mentions. it's still not that much. as far as i can remember i don't think the epilogue mentions any of them. it's almost like once they die the gang act like none of them ever existed. i wish we got to keep a souvenir from each gang member like a hat or horse. or like how there is a memorial wall in the lost clubhouse in gta 4 tlad. it feels like the jenny and the callander brothers get more recognition after their death than anyone else. 

I'm replaying the story right now and there's a part of me that agrees with you and a part that doesn't. Not because your argument is not valid, quite the opposite actually, you have a very fair point.

 

I feel the world and the story has so many layers to it that it can be very time consuming to get all the camp conversations/camp requests/companion activites/etc. There's always a lot of stuff happening and new pieces of dialogue in relation to what you do/don't do in freeroam and missions, and it's super easy to miss conversations and the like. I can only imagine how much dialogue players missed cause they sticked to playing the story and not much else. This game has tons of cut content and I'd assume the same happens with conversations and dialogue. They probably kept what was fundamentally important for the story and ditched things that gave more insight into events of the game but didn't add new information. I can only imagine how much of a nightmare it must be to develop such a complex game as RDR2, so that is my safe guess.

Needless to say, I 100% would have liked to hear more about the deaths of each gang member cause it helps to bridge the gaps between events of the game. But I feel the story still works without it. 

 

[Agent Edward]

19 hours ago, diperro said:

I'm replaying the story right now and there's a part of me that agrees with you and a part that doesn't. Not because your argument is not valid, quite the opposite actually, you have a very fair point.

 

I feel the world and the story has so many layers to it that it can be very time consuming to get all the camp conversations/camp requests/companion activites/etc. There's always a lot of stuff happening and new pieces of dialogue in relation to what you do/don't do in freeroam and missions, and it's super easy to miss conversations and the like. I can only imagine how much dialogue players missed cause they sticked to playing the story and not much else. This game has tons of cut content and I'd assume the same happens with conversations and dialogue. They probably kept what was fundamentally important for the story and ditched things that gave more insight into events of the game but didn't add new information. I can only imagine how much of a nightmare it must be to develop such a complex game as RDR2, so that is my safe guess.

Needless to say, I 100% would have liked to hear more about the deaths of each gang member cause it helps to bridge the gaps between events of the game. But I feel the story still works without it. 

 

Well said.

[Sneaky Queeky]

23 hours ago, diperro said:

I'm replaying the story right now and there's a part of me that agrees with you and a part that doesn't. Not because your argument is not valid, quite the opposite actually, you have a very fair point.

 

I feel the world and the story has so many layers to it that it can be very time consuming to get all the camp conversations/camp requests/companion activites/etc. There's always a lot of stuff happening and new pieces of dialogue in relation to what you do/don't do in freeroam and missions, and it's super easy to miss conversations and the like. I can only imagine how much dialogue players missed cause they sticked to playing the story and not much else. This game has tons of cut content and I'd assume the same happens with conversations and dialogue. They probably kept what was fundamentally important for the story and ditched things that gave more insight into events of the game but didn't add new information. I can only imagine how much of a nightmare it must be to develop such a complex game as RDR2, so that is my safe guess.

Needless to say, I 100% would have liked to hear more about the deaths of each gang member cause it helps to bridge the gaps between events of the game. But I feel the story still works without it. 

 

 

The actual thing that disappoints me most? That John doesn't have any words when he visits the graves (except at Arthur's when you get 100%)

 

It would have been cool to hear John say a few words at each grave about how he felt about that person; but, hey I have 6 family in one cemetery, in RL myself, and I 95% of the time just think about that person, I don't "think out loud." But once in a while, I really do, and I would have liked to hear some words from John to add to his personality and the relationship he had with those who had fallen. 

[Bigglo145]

On 8/16/2023 at 1:13 PM, Lemoyne outlaw said:

yea i really like hoseas blue hat. the one on his artwork. i always wonder what the gang does with the deceased members items. what happens to their guns, clothes, money and horses? as far as i know we never see anything of theirs after they die. of course john gets all of arthurs stuff. but that's because he becomes the new protagonist.  

Probably buried it with them

[JB1982]

This one has always bothered me. This game is so meticulous when it comes to tying up all the threads relating to most of the gang members. We see what happens to most of them through the story, or hear/read something, the chance encounters in the epilogue, the end credits etc. And RDR1 does the rest. Except for the case of poor Karen. She just... disappears. And the most we get is speculation at best from Tilly's letter. And it's quite logical speculation to be fair. We all see how the drink takes hold of her, particularly during Chapter 6.

 

But it's always felt strange to me that there's nothing more definitive. I see that there was cut dialogue referring to her leaving camp. It makes you wonder what else might have been cut. Was we supposed to have had some kind of encounter with her in the epilogue? Could she still be out there in the game somewhere waiting to be found? Surely someone would have found her by now.

 

I have to admit that I mostly agree with Tilly and what others have said on here regarding her fate. But I do sometimes wonder if she was tied into the cut missing princess storyline. This is just pure speculation on my part but there's a few camp conversations that you can hear between her and Mary-Beth where she often dismisses Mary-Beth's love of stories as fairy tales and such like, showing a lot of cynicism towards (even though she seems to read them herself!) and there's also a conversation at Clemens Point that she has with Trelawny where she alludes to being a Cinderella type and Susan is the wicked stepmother (if you haven't seen it, it's brilliant as Trelawny performs a magic trick!) which plays into that fairytale princess angle, and if you overhear a certain intimate moment she has with Sean upon his return you will hear her say that she just wants someone to "see her". So my mind does sometimes speculate if Karen was meant to be revealed as the missing princess at some point or at the very least pose as her in a scam as we find out when they go and rob the bank in Valentine that she was good at play acting.

 

Funny where your mind can go with things like this. Not sure what Rockstar intended to do with Karen, whether there was something more or whether this ambiguity was their intention. But it just feels like such a loose thread to me the way it is.

 

A toast to Karen! Wherever she may be!

Edited February 3, 2024 by JB1982

[olivier8472]

She’s in Mexico ,  based on a camp conversation , maybe with Javier …

[billiejoearmstrong8]

On 2/3/2024 at 7:48 PM, JB1982 said:

This one has always bothered me. This game is so meticulous when it comes to tying up all the threads relating to most of the gang members. We see what happens to most of them through the story, or hear/read something, the chance encounters in the epilogue, the end credits etc. And RDR1 does the rest. Except for the case of poor Karen. She just... disappears. And the most we get is speculation at best from Tilly's letter. And it's quite logical speculation to be fair. We all see how the drink takes hold of her, particularly during Chapter 6.

 

But it's always felt strange to me that there's nothing more definitive. I see that there was cut dialogue referring to her leaving camp. It makes you wonder what else might have been cut. Was we supposed to have had some kind of encounter with her in the epilogue? Could she still be out there in the game somewhere waiting to be found? Surely someone would have found her by now.

 

I have to admit that I mostly agree with Tilly and what others have said on here regarding her fate. But I do sometimes wonder if she was tied into the cut missing princess storyline. This is just pure speculation on my part but there's a few camp conversations that you can hear between her and Mary-Beth where she often dismisses Mary-Beth's love of stories as fairy tales and such like, showing a lot of cynicism towards (even though she seems to read them herself!) and there's also a conversation at Clemens Point that she has with Trelawny where she alludes to being a Cinderella type and Susan is the wicked stepmother (if you haven't seen it, it's brilliant as Trelawny performs a magic trick!) which plays into that fairytale princess angle, and if you overhear a certain intimate moment she has with Sean upon his return you will hear her say that she just wants someone to "see her". So my mind does sometimes speculate if Karen was meant to be revealed as the missing princess at some point or at the very least pose as her in a scam as we find out when they go and rob the bank in Valentine that she was good at play acting.

 

Funny where your mind can go with things like this. Not sure what Rockstar intended to do with Karen, whether there was something more or whether this ambiguity was their intention. But it just feels like such a loose thread to me the way it is.

 

A toast to Karen! Wherever she may be!

I think it's deliberate - it's realistic that at least one of the gang members would disappear with no one knowing for sure what happened with everything that was going on. It adds to how tragic her character is that the best we get is one of the other members assuming she drank herself to death. Really it makes the ending of her story more interesting than if she was simply known/confirmed to have died that way.

[Deadman2112]

On 11/6/2018 at 6:23 PM, saintsrow said:

Karen Jones better have a powerful role as a kick-ass mission giver in Red Dead Online,to bring the world back into balance.  

 

 

But online takes place before story modes so...

 

Not having resolution to her story does leave things a bit disappointing but that's how they chose to leave things. I've always kind of agreed with the idea that she drank herself to death.

 

Regarding the mysterious stranger / Josiah Trelawny connection...

 

I also at one point had a hunch that they might have been the same person as well.

This was due to what I interpreted as a number of clues that would point to this.

Things such as the conversation between Dutch, Hosea, and Arthur when they go on their fishing trip.

 

You have the ability to talk about Josiah with Dutch where both he and Hosea will tell a story and give a few clues about him. Those Clues almost seem to hint as if they were referencing the fact that he might be more than what he appears on the surface.

 

With that said, there is definitive proof that John and he interact in camp on at the very least ,two occasions.

Although the encounters are extremely rare... they do exist.

 

I was able to capture photos of the mysterious strangers character model.

I can tell you definitively that the models do not resemble one another at all excluding the top hat and mustache.

 

Have a look for yourself if you disagree...

 

 

 

 

Last but not least the reason John mentions that his photo seems familiar when he sees it at the shop in armadillo, has nothing to do with the fact that he assumes it's Josiah.

It's actually because John saw his face in the painting in the swamp, again in the mirror when he enters the shack, and then when he journals about the encounter.

 

The mysterious stranger encounter is really only significant to us as players because we ultimately know that we run into him again in Red Dead Redemption. Clearly for John the encounter in RDR2 was an insignificant passing moment that he doesn't have much of a recollection of.

 

This is also portrayed and emphasized in the side missions "I Know You" played in Red Dead Redemption where John repeatedly states that he's not sure how they know one another.

.

 

 

 

Edited March 26, 2024 by Deadman2112

[billiejoearmstrong8]

Trelawny doesn't even look like the Strange Man. They just have similar extremely common smart outfits and moustaches that millions of men had at the time. They only stand out because most of the characters in the game are cowboys/outlaws who don't dress smartly. 

[Agent Edward]

This recent theory of Susan being the one who killed Karen is such a bullsh*t, cut content shouldn't be used as a fact, it was cut for a reason.

 

And even the cut dialogue between Susan, Mary-Beth and Tilly doesn't really sound like she killed her at all, it sounds more like Susan is feeling guilty because Karen ran away from the gang and that's it.