Portal 2 concept art (for anon)
The Portal timeline according to the Portal 2 Collector’s Edition Guide.
Consider me confused.
I know this is official, but the second to last should say 2000-200? though, I think, if we’re integrating it with the canon HL timeline.
I’m not confused; this all sounds about right to me. ¯\(°_o)/¯
I just want to know what “????” is lol. I’m guessing it’s 202?, not hundreds of years later, but that’s just me…
I think most people are confused because if BYDTWD was around 2000 and Chell was an attendee than it doesn’t make sense for her to be as old as she appears to be in the first game, which takes place about the same time as the Black Mesa Incident? She would have to have been a child or at most a teenager during the events of the first game, but she’s visibly older than that, so it doesn’t fit.
Other than that, though, I think this actually does a pretty good job at merging the backstory from the first game with the stuff from the second.
Is it ever stated officially that Chell was a small child during BYDTWD? I thought that was left vague? Like she could’ve been an older teenager or simply a volunteer?
I was taking the potato battery from the second game as proof that she was a small child, actually.
I mean, “Chell” isn’t exactly a common moniker, I don’t think there’s any chance it’s just a coincidence that one of the projects was signed with her name. And the project was almost certainly put together by a young child.
There’s also this other image that I got off of Google that appears to be a scan of the project’s texture? It’s different from the one in-game so it might be fanmade, but it mentions a “Mr. Johnson”, which would imply that BYDTWD took place when Cave Johnson was still around if it’s official.
The Portal timeline according to the Portal 2 Collector’s Edition Guide.
Consider me confused.
I know this is official, but the second to last should say 2000-200? though, I think, if we’re integrating it with the canon HL timeline.
I’m not confused; this all sounds about right to me. ¯\(°_o)/¯
I just want to know what “????” is lol. I’m guessing it’s 202?, not hundreds of years later, but that’s just me…
I think most people are confused because if BYDTWD was around 2000 and Chell was an attendee than it doesn’t make sense for her to be as old as she appears to be in the first game, which takes place about the same time as the Black Mesa Incident? She would have to have been a child or at most a teenager during the events of the first game, but she’s visibly older than that, so it doesn’t fit.
Other than that, though, I think this actually does a pretty good job at merging the backstory from the first game with the stuff from the second.
Action figure Chell looks like Jennifer Lawrence and that’s something I’m genuinely angry about? Chell is incredibly significant because not only is she one of only a dozen or so female video game player characters ever, but she’s also a woman of color and is the sole human playable character in one of the most popular and critically acclaimed series of video games in the last decade. She’s supposed to represent the everyday person, and be a figure that anyone can step into and play, so the fact that she’s not white or male and much less both is important. I’ve always been a really big fan of hers because Portal was one of the first games I ever played and finished, so I was excited to hear that she was finally getting an action figure, but it’s deeply disappointing to see how white she looks.
Here’s action figure Chell’s skin color as compared to in-game model Chell’s skin color. Both samples were taken from the left shoulder of the above images, which are each meant for display and reference purposes and appear to have little to no outside lighting influencing how the skin appears.
That’s… really not cool. Additionally, the figure’s face is much longer and closer together than the game model’s, which further makes me suspect that they modeled it off of a white woman instead of any official depiction of Chell or the woman her game model was based off of, Alésia Glidewell.
Chell is a character that’s already often extremely whitewashed in fanart - she’s given lighter hair, paler skin, and blue eyes instead of her model’s grey - and she was even a little whitewashed in her updated Portal 2 model, which has straighter hair and thinner lips compared to her Portal model, so to see her whitewashed even further in this action figure is a huge letdown. The figure is apparently going to be seven inches tall, which would mean the head would probably be about an inch to an inch-and-a-half long, certainly enough space to more accurately portray her facial features - and there’s never an excuse for giving a character lighter skin.
