Jack should turn into an author at the end. Sadie should be a anti-hero then apart of the law at the end.

The issue is that you’re letting them get away. They can’t get away. That’s the whole point. People don’t get to ride off into the sunset in Red Dead Redemption. The whole point of the first two games was that these characters’ lives don’t work anymore. It’s a bygone era. And they are forced now to pay for what they did. That’s one part of why I don’t like Sadie Adler. She’s arguably the most vicious and murderous person in the gang. She kills without need, she kills with a vendetta, she’s better at it than she reasonably should be, and she faces no punishment. No recourse. Arthur and John did some bad things, and even when they renounce it and do their best to live a good life and find their Redemption, they pay for what they did. John gets used like an asset for the government, before being blasted to bits on his own land. Arthur is chased down like game and only his disease (another ill-gotten commodity) manages to outpace the Pinkertons. So what happens to Sadie, who goes out of her way to instigate huge gunfights and chase people down because of their association, who at every turn has some other tryhard violent outburst to showcase her StrongFemaleCharacter-Ness, who flat out tells a sheriff she killed somebody she didn’t need to? Nothing. She really does get to ride off into the sunset. At least Charles kept a low profile. He was from murky enough of a background, and once the gang collapsed, it seems like he blended in with the Wapiti and became a street fighter. Sadie became a bounty hunter, constantly dealing with the law, and nobody ever thought maybe this Sadie Adler was the same Sadie Adler from that notorious gang that the government was hunting down. Or if they did, she probably killed them effortlessly and without consequence too. This is all to say that a Redemption character who gets away isn’t a very good Redemption character. The tragedy is the appeal.

So Sadie Adler is just a poop sock?

…sure.

She fits more in a Revolver game tho.

Sadie Adler the mega thot

'The West is dying' is the theme of both Redemption games. After the first one, there's no one left to punish and no Wild West left, thus the series has to end there. Like everyone else, Jack can't get a happy ending because he killed Edgar Ross. At the same time, however, as the West has gone, the 'circle [of fate]' that the Soothsayer mentions has ended; no one can take revenge on him because that whole world has disintegrated. Therein lies the paradox of Jack's future and why it's not really possible to continue his story in any meaningful way. His life has to remain of mystery.

Perhaps, as the Soothsayer says, "This is now the time of machines. The time of things. The time of man came and went as all things pass. As all things pass, my friend." Not only have lives passed but an era as well.

As for Charles, he killed very few people throughout the game and generally only did so when absolutely necessary. He was a bastion of integrity and his positive moral influence on Arthur - and, to an extent, John - means that he can be absolved of his moderate crimes. Of course, the theme that everyone will eventually pay for their deeds may equally mean that Charles could get hunted down because, ultimately, he was a member of the gang. Although for different reasons to Jack's, Charles' future is also hard to ascertain and is something of a paradox. Thus, his story cannot continue in any meaningful way either.

With Sadie, I think BarrelBoy got it right - according to all laws of fate in the Redemption universe, she does not deserve a happy ending. Unlike Charles, she did not exert any positive moral leverage on Arthur and instead dragged him into her troubles, which often involved mass murder. She took revenge and is yet unpunished, which by all accounts SHOULD mean that she gets her eventual comeuppance too. For her to be excused from it when participating in revenge and mayhem would make her an anomalic, arbitrary and, from Rockstar's point of view, embarrassing enforcement of the Redemption series' story themes. Of course, fans would argue that she did good things too or that she only fought bad people - and that is true to some degree - but it does not matter. John and Arthur did likewise and it couldn't save them, nor could it save Edgar Ross. Unlike Charles or Jack, Sadie's future, when considering the deterministic morality of Redemption lore, is not paradoxical but is negative. Therefore, a story focused on her could not and should not end happily.

As a result, I think the only valid direction of the series is backwards. I think there are multiple avenues for that, such as playing as young Arthur, Dutch or Micah. I personally think playing as Micah would be fantastic - I think many players would like it in the end as there'd be lots of action and no one would feel bad or out of character if they shot up a town. It would be the embracement of the survivalist, nihilistic spirit of the Wild West.

Thank you.