Overview
This guide contains everything about Max, Chloe and Rachel. Guide contains spoilers for Life is Strange and Life is Strange: Before the Storm. Proceed at your own discretion.
Beginning
Beginning
Max Caulfield (Prequel)
▶️William Price, Chloe’s father, died in 2008, and Max moved to Seattle shortly afterwards as her father Ryan Caulfield had obtained a job there. Chloe and Max remained in contact but eventually Max started forgetting or ignoring Chloe’s messages, and they fell out of touch. During the events of Life is Strange: Before the Storm, Chloe feels abandoned and forgotten by Max and writes unsent letters to her. Max is not seen in any of the episodes of Before the Storm, other than the bonus episode “Farewell”, but her texts to Chloe can be viewed anytime during the game and her presence can be felt in many ways throughout the story.
▶️It seems that Max is very shy and introverted based on Chloe’s comments throughout. She also has a strong love of photography as mentioned several times by Chloe.
▶️Max is not seen, therefore her appearance is unknown. However, it can be assumed that she had a similar style to that of her appearance in the original Life is Strange as Chloe often comments that she “hasn’t changed”.
Chloe Price (Prequel)
“Sometimes when you meet someone who’s going to change your life… You just know it, I guess.”
— Chloe to Rachel in “Awake”
▶️Chloe Elizabeth Price (born March 11, 1994) is the playable protagonist of Life is Strange: Before the Storm, the prequel to the events of the original game, Life is Strange. She is the daughter of Joyce Price and the late William Price. She was the best friend of Max Caulfield until the latter moved to Seattle following the death of Chloe’s father. Being left alone in a time where Chloe needed her the most, Chloe drifts into the punk scene in which she meets Rachel Amber. The two grow very close and dream of leaving Arcadia Bay together.
▶️Chloe appears again in the bonus episode “Farewell”, which takes place on the day of William’s death and shows young Max and Chloe spending time together.
▶️Chloe is fierce, fearless, and sharp-tongued. She is also stubborn and doesn’t stop until she gets what she wants.
▶️Chloe tries to act cool and tough, but is actually quite insecure about herself, especially around Rachel Amber.
▶️The prequel explores how Chloe developed the punkish style that we know from Life is Strange: Season 1.
▶️Chloe has a “skater girl” aesthetic with her clothing consisting of T-shirts and jeans. She has short brown hair, similar to her alternative timeline appearance in Life is Strange: Season 1. There are no tattoos present or dyed hair. She wears subtle, soft pink nail polish, which later transitions to blue in the epilogue. Her jewelry appears to be more understated, yet there are bangles on her right wrist that are similar to the style of bangle that Max wears in the first game. When Chloe attends a rock gig, she is dressed in clothing that appears more “Alt-Rockesque”.
▶️Before the release of Episode 3, it had been hinted that the origin of Chloe’s distinctive blue hair may be addressed in Before the Storm. During Episode 3, Chloe is seen dying a streak of her hair blue for the first time, and in the epilogue she shows off her fully dyed hair to Rachel.
▶️Chloe is tall for her age and gender and is almost as tall as some male characters, including Nathan Prescott and Hayden Jones.
▶️Her appearance throughout the game is dependent on which outfit she chooses to wear.
▶️During Farewell, Chloe wears a green shirt depicting a cat in pirate-themed clothes. Chloe also puts on a pirate hat and a jacket while playing in the backyard.
Rachel Amber (Prequel)
“You’re hella mysterious, Chloe Price.”
– “Uh, hella? Who says that?”
– “It’s a Cali thing.”
— Rachel and Chloe’s response in “Awake”
▶️Rachel Dawn Amber (born July 22, 1994) is the deuteragonist of Life is Strange: Before the Storm. She was born in Long Beach, California and eventually moved to Arcadia Bay, Oregon. She attends Blackwell Academy and is one of the most popular students and a member of the theater group there. After saving Chloe one night, the two of them grow closer and become best friends. Their relationship is the central plot of Before the Storm. She and Chloe dream of leaving Arcadia Bay together as, according to Rachel, there’s nothing keeping either of them there.
▶️Like Max Caulfield, Rachel has an eye for images and art. Considering school performance in the effort put into being a model, she is a very ambitious person. She appears to have a caring personality, as she is well-loved by those close to her. Rachel also seems to have been more girly and idealistic than Chloe, reflected by her love of makeup and aspirations to become a model. Rachel is friendly, outgoing and good with people – traits that catch the attention of her peers and teachers, resulting in her popularity at school.
▶️However, Rachel is also a person who is used to getting what she wants. She is easily angered, especially when things don’t go the way she wants (such as when the viewfinder failed to operate) and this leads her to take some impulsive and sometimes destructive actions, such as stealing wine or lashing out at Chloe Price. She is also prone to vindictive behavior, which is displayed if Victoria has taken over her role in The Tempest – Rachel will drug Victoria’s tea if Chloe fails to convince the latter to quit the role. Rachel can be seen as somewhat manipulative towards Chloe.
▶️When Chloe first sees Rachel in the old mill, she appears very different from the way she usually looks; she wears her hair in a ponytail and a dark studded jacket with several pins on it (the letter “a”, a skull, and a British flag with writing on it) over a black t-shirt with a white image of a person playing guitar on it. She also wears several necklaces: a black choker with three studs on it, a green necklace with a silver pendant with a red jewel on it surrounded by a black circle, and a long black necklace looped over her neck several times with an animal fang on the end of it. She wears denim shorts over torn-up black leggings, black fingerless gloves, and black boots. She has a black belt with a silver belt buckle depicting a hand showing the middle finger, overlapping another black belt with studs on it; she also has a chain hanging from a hoop clipped onto her shorts. She wears a single blue feathered earring on her left ear with a golden pheasant tippet at the top. On her left hand, Rachel wears a black bracelet with a blue strip down the middle of it, and on her right hand she wears a thin black bracelet and her classic bracelet (which she has given to Frank Bowers when Chloe and Max encounter him in the original game), a thick, brown-braided leather bracelet with silver-blue objects stuck on.
Max Caulfield
“I take photos. Of me, the world, everything. It may sound sad, but I have a blast.”
— Maxine Caulfield
▶️Maxine Caulfield, better known as Max (born September 21, 1995), is the playable protagonist of Life is Strange. She is an 18-year-old aspiring photographer and senior at Blackwell Academy. She left her mom and dad in Seattle for the seaside town of Arcadia Bay, Oregon, where she grew up.
▶️After saving her childhood friend Chloe Price from being killed by Nathan Prescott in one of Blackwell Academy’s bathrooms, she discovers she has the ability to rewind time and even stop it in its tracks. On the search for clues to solve the mysterious disappearance of Rachel Amber, Max must also discover how to use her powers to save the town of Arcadia Bay from a tornado.
▶️She is featured again in “Farewell”, a bonus episode to Life is Strange: Before the Storm.
▶️Max is geeky, quite introverted and slightly self-conscious, particularly when it comes to her photography. According to herself, she rather likes to observe the world around her than actually participate in it; that’s why several students including Juliet Watson think she wouldn’t really care for others. But on the contrary, she makes a genuine effort to show kindness to all of Blackwell’s students. She’s a clear, deductive thinker, smart and sneaky, but practical, reasonable, and mature for her age, especially compared to her best friend, Chloe. She is also brave, placing herself in harm’s way to protect those she cares about.
▶️She has a great affection for photography, always taking pictures of her surroundings, since she considers it a way to “be part of the world at a safe distance”, and aspires to make it a career one day. She especially has a fable for old analog cameras and instant camera selfies. She also seems to like obscure movies and anime, much like her friend Warren Graham. She has always dreamed of traveling and exploring the world, as well as going on “adventures” together with her childhood friend Chloe.
▶️Max becomes more confident and decisive as her adventure continues, probably due to Chloe’s influence combined with her time-altering powers. This newfound strength and self-confidence reaches its full extent in Episode 5 when she is finally confronted with Jefferson and has to save Chloe. Right from the beginning, Max feels deeply responsible for her actions and does not take her rewind power lightly, but perhaps doesn’t yet realize the full consequences of her power. At the end, Max appears deeply troubled with the consequences of her decisions and the responsibility she has to bear, as represented in her nightmare.
▶️Some people regard Max as “nosy” – as revealed in her Blackwell student file. There are several instances throughout the game where Max is called that by other characters, including admitting to being nosy herself. It’s obvious that Max is pretty interested in other people’s stuff, but it’s up to Max how far her curiosity goes, such as to what extent she goes to nose around in other people’s rooms.
▶️She is shown as extremely introverted, preferring to stay in her room, has to isolate herself with music and excuse herself to go to the loo to have a “meltdown” after being called on in class, is reluctant to submit her photo (despite strong encouragement from her favorite teacher), and has trouble getting to know people (even her dorm-mates), until her powers allow her to “cheat”. She also comes across as aloof to her peers (a common experience for people on the autistic spectrum or with anxiety disorders) and apparently fluctuates between being too quiet or too chatty. She is in an IEP (Individualized Education Program, a program usually reserved for students with some form of disorder which means they need help) according to her student file, but otherwise nothing is confirmed.
▶️She refers to herself as being clumsy after breaking and spilling a number of items and having to rewind time.
▶️Max is the quintessential hipster, preferring an understated style that consists of simple T-shirts bearing logos and “generic jeans” (as Chloe calls them). She has brown hair, blue eyes, and freckles. She appears to wear eye shadow and eyeliner, although this is also quite understated. She has no tattoos or piercings that we know of. She wears a set of three colored bangles on her right wrist that appear to be silicone wristbands.
Chloe Price
“My powers might not last, Chloe.”
“That’s okay. We will. Forever.”
— Max Caulfield and Chloe Price in “Out of Time”
▶️Chloe Elizabeth Price (born March 11, 1994) is the deuteragonist of Life is Strange. She was Max Caulfield’s best friend before she moved to Seattle, leaving Chloe in their hometown of Arcadia Bay, Oregon. They rekindle their friendship during the events of the game. After Max left, Chloe became best friends with Rachel Amber before Rachel went missing. She is the daughter of William Price and Joyce Price, and the step-daughter of David Madsen.
▶️Chloe’s death may be the catalyst to unlocking Max’s powers and their emotional journey together is the main thrust of the story right through to its conclusion.
▶️She is the playable protagonist in Before the Storm, the prequel to the events of Life is Strange.
▶️Chloe is a stubborn, mischievous, and rebellious young woman. She is the archetypal punk-rocker, expressed in both her music taste and style. She loves to get high, drink beer, and can be described as bold and outgoing. She has a big mouth often making snarky comments, acts fearless and loves to take risks, which often gets her in trouble. She can be prone to angry outbursts, and has serious issues with abandonment and trust after her father’s death, Max’s move to Seattle, and the disappearance of Rachel Amber. Due to all her bad experience over the years, she has become pessimistic and resentful of life, convinced that there wasn’t really anyone who actually cared about her or who she could trust in.
▶️She sometimes is very insensitive to other people’s feelings, and may act selfish and possessive, always wanting her loved ones’ attention for herself and getting jealous and resentful if they don’t spare their time for her or don’t act her way. She can also be very irrational and irresponsible, which often takes the form of blaming others for situations out of their control and avoiding any responsibility of damage caused by herself (i.e, when she says to Max that if she doesn’t blame someone else, it’s her fault), which even takes the extent of blaming her dead father for her misery; but she will in some instances eventually acknowledge when she was in the wrong and apologize. Nonetheless, Max is aware of Chloe’s flaws but still cherishes her highly and considers her a “good friend who shows up when you need her”. Chloe also is a very protective, devoted and faithful companion, though she tends to get too attached and obsessive. She is pretty straightforward with her (romantic) feelings for other people, and also very flirtatious and teasing. Despite her rough outward appearance, Chloe is actually a very insecure and scared person, and her tough acting may be nothing more than a facade she built up to protect herself from further harm.
▶️Chloe very likely has to deal with depression caused by her experience of loss and abandonment, and it’s implied that she suffers from insomnia and even had suicidal thoughts prior to Max’s return. It’s possible that her line “Rachel saved my life” literally refers to her preventing Chloe from committing suicide.
▶️She appears to show symptoms of a condition called Borderline Personality Disorder, as characterized by her trust and abandonment issues.During a conversation with Max in “Chaos Theory”, Chloe is shown having a meltdown and expressing typical fears of someone who has BPD.
▶️Chloe often drinks alcohol and smokes as a form of self-medication. She has had problems with drug addiction in the past, evident from her stepfather’s comment about weed being a big deal for her, as well as her large debt with the drug dealer Frank Bowers. Although Chloe was smart enough for Blackwell, which is evident from Alternative Chloe’s school report, she abandoned her studies. All these self-destructive character traits of Chloe, including her rebellion against authorities and her family, her drug abuse, her “boy toy phase” and the loss of control about her own life, which becomes apparent in her chaotic lifestyle and her lack of scholastic and occupational ambition as well as her refusal of responsibility, can be linked to her depression, representing Chloe’s way to deal with her desperation, to fill her inner void and to ease her pain. Also, her lack of sensitivity can be tied to her experience of loss and abandonment and her consequent depression.
▶️During her time with Max, Chloe’s personality seems to grow a lot, since she finds new strength in Max’s support and the resurgence of their friendship. Although Chloe may not seem like that on the outside as it is hard for her to show those traits, as their story proceeds, she appears able to show a more caring and brave side to her. At the end of the game, Chloe admits her selfishness towards her family over all the years, and even offers to sacrifice herself to save the town from destruction.
▶️Chloe has a punk aesthetic, she wears pale blue ripped jeans with braces/suspenders, black boots, and a white shirt with either a skull or heart on it. She’s always seen wearing her necklace, which is a chain with three bullets. Sometimes she wears a brown leather jacket, and a dark blue beanie.
▶️She has a tattoo sleeve on her right arm, an intricate design featuring flowers, butterflies, and a yellowed skull. Her dyed hair is light purple at the roots and blue at the ends.
▶️Chloe’s pajamas consist of light blue boxers and a navy T-shirt that says rock and has a chick on it.
▶️Young Chloe wears pale blue jeans and a grey sweat shirt with the Arcadia Bay lighthouse on it.She wears her hair long and straight, in its natural strawberry-blonde shade.
Rachel Amber
“Rachel Amber… she was my angel.”
— Chloe bout Rachel in “Chrysalis”
▶️Rachel Dawn Amber (born July 22, 1994) serves as a major character in Life is Strange (although she never appears in person) and as the deuteragonist of Before the Storm.
▶️Based on the information found in Arcadia Bay, Rachel was a popular student who attended Blackwell Academy. She and Chloe Price were both close and dreamed of leaving Arcadia Bay together. However, she suddenly went missing on Monday, April 22, 2013 with little to no information about her whereabouts.
▶️Rachel was 5’5″ and weighed 110 lbs (165 cm and 50 kg). She had blond hair and hazel eyes, and two tattoos; a dragon on her right calf, and a star on the inside of her left wrist. (This is evident from her ‘Missing Person’ posters.)
▶️Rachel’s character is a mystery, up to the point where there are mixed opinions about her personality. She is generally considered popular and nice, but also rebellious. She partied a lot, took drugs and had an affection for punk-rock like Chloe, expressed in both her music taste and style. Joyce Price fondly calls her a “hell-raiser”, while Chloe refers to her as her “angel”. However, Nathan Prescott describes her as a “fiend on her own”, which implies she was a drug-addict. According to Chloe, she was also smart and had an eye for images and art, just like Max. Considering her school performance and the effort she put into becoming a model, she was a very ambitious person. She seems to have had a caring personality, as she was well loved by those close to her. Rachel also seems to have been more girly and idealistic than Chloe, reflected by her love of makeup and ambition to become a model. However, there are also rumors of Rachel being sexually promiscuous. Several pieces of graffiti all over Blackwell support this image of her. A letter from her to Chloe indicates that she often hooked up with Vortex Club “snobs” such as Nathan Prescott, Zachary Riggins etc. It is also implied that she used Frank Bowers to facilitate her drug habit.
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Backgrounds
Backgrounds
Max Caulfield (Prequel)
▶️Max grew up in Arcadia Bay, where she and Chloe were close childhood friends who always hung around each other and used to play as a pair of pirates at their home or in the woods, dreaming of their future and the adventures they would experience together.
▶️In 2008, when Max was 13, she was with Chloe at Chloe’s house when Chloe’s father, William Price, tragically died in a car crash. Soon after the accident, Max moved to Seattle with her parents, leaving Chloe and her old life behind. The two fell out of touch and Chloe grew resentful towards Max, not only for leaving shortly after William’s death, stating that she needed her most at that time but also for being inconsistent with her emails and later text messages.
Rachel Amber (Prequel)
▶️Very little is known about Rachel before the events of the game apart from that she grew up in California, but the character confirms that in her early years, she has climbed Mt.Hood and broke her arm, so her father has carried her down to safety. It is later mentioned that she grew up without her birth mother being present (Sera), due to her abusing drugs.
Max Caulfield
▶️In 2008, when Max was 13, she was with Chloe at her house when Chloe’s father, William Price, tragically died in a car crash. Soon after the accident, Max moved to Seattle with her parents, leaving her best friend and her old life behind. The two fell out of touch, especially after Chloe’s mother Joyce Price remarried. Five years later, Max is granted a scholarship for Blackwell Academy – a school of arts and sciences. She moves back to Arcadia Bay, mostly due to her admiration for the work of her famous new teacher, Mark Jefferson, but she also wonders if she had wanted to come back all along, just to see if she and Chloe are still friends. Although Max enjoyed her time in Seattle, saying it was cool and perfect for photography, she also felt “kinda lonely” and out of her league.
▶️It is clear that both her parents care about her greatly, due to their separate birthday texts and her mother’s encouraging texts at various points in each episode. Her mother gets a special mention as Max talks about the coconut bites in her bedroom, revealing that she was given a $200 gift certificate with them for her birthday. On top of the money her father transferred to her account, it is clear that the Caulfields are a well-off family. She speaks fondly of her dad, reminiscing about them going to hockey games together to support the Seattle Thunderbirds. It’s also revealed that Max’s teddy bear, the Captain, is special to her because she remembers going to the ER with her mother to have his eye removed after she swallowed it.
▶️Max has dreamed of becoming a photographer since childhood and has a passion for analog photography, greatly preferring it to digital images. When looking at the retro cameras in the art classroom, Max is thrilled.
Chloe Price
▶️Chloe and Max grew up together in Arcadia Bay with their families, where they were close childhood friends who used to always hang around each other and used to play pirates at their homes or in the woods, dreaming of their future and the adventures they would experience together.
▶️We discover that Chloe had a cat named Bongo, who died in 2008.
▶️In 2008, Max was with Chloe at her house when her father tragically died in a car crash. Although Max was supportive at the time, her family moved away to Seattle, leaving Chloe to deal with her grief alone. Chloe always used to smile and laugh, but gradually became more resentful of her life without her father and Max. Later in the same year, Chloe’s mother Joyce and David Madsen became lovers. David Madsen is a military veteran and Head of Security at Blackwell Academy whom Chloe immediately despised. From there, Chloe started getting more rebellious, hanging around with bad boys, taking drugs and running away from home, making the junkyard her secondary home. She grew more and more frustrated with Arcadia Bay and conceived the desire to escape from her home town. Her emotional temperament took physical form, as she gradually changed her outward appearance to the punk-rockish style of today. She often got into varying degrees of mischief and thus earned a bad reputation with the local police over the years.
▶️Chloe attended Blackwell Academy until at least 2010, where she eventually found support from another local girl Rachel Amber, striking up a firm friendship.Her student file reveals she had a 1.7 GPA, taking part in pranks and vandalism before being thrown out of the Academy about three years before Max began attending. Chloe and her new best friend planned to run away together to California to start a new life before Rachel’s disappearance prior to the beginning of the game. Chloe planned to leave Arcadia Bay without paying Frank back.
▶️Chloe originally had long strawberry-blonde hair before cutting it. She began to dye it some years ago during her time at Blackwell, in chunks at first, as evident from a picture of her on her birthday with David and her Blackwell Academy Record photo; her hair gradually progressed from streaky to entirely blue. She’s also got tattoos and piercings.
She actually went to Blackwell in the year 2011 it says that in the report card in Episode 1 of Life is Strange™ in Chloe’s room. Only you will be able to see it is by breaking Chloe’s snow globe.
Rachel Amber
▶️Rachel attended Blackwell Academy and was both successful and popular with the students and faculty. With an outstanding GPA of 4.0, she was considered the quintessential representation of Blackwell by Principal Wells and excelled in both her studies and numerous extracurricular activities.
▶️Her diverse goals included a career in international law and fashion modeling and she was very ambitious to realize her dreams.
▶️In 2010, she got to know Chloe Price, as they were both Blackwell students, and soon they became very close friends. Rachel helped Chloe through her hard time after facing her father’s death and her mother’s new marriage. The two often got into varying degrees of mischief and spent most of their time in their secret hideout, a den in the American Rust Junkyard. They even planned to leave Arcadia Bay together to head for Los Angeles, California.
▶️Rachel was connected with Arcadia Bay’s drug scene and developed a relationship with drug dealer Frank Bowers, which she kept secret from Chloe, but she left him after he became violent towards her.
▶️As memos from Principal Wells’ office reveal, Rachel was accused of drug dealing by Nathan and David Madsen. In her defense, she claimed that David was following her and taking pictures, but Wells didn’t take any side’s accusations seriously due to Rachel’s acquaintance with Frank at that point. Arcadia Bay Police Department reports indicate that David actually caught her with “controlled substances” at school.
▶️Secret files from David’s computer furthermore reveal that he was actually investigating on her some time before her disappearance. Moreover, they prove that she was at least one week before her disappearance cutting school and meeting up with Frank.
▶️She also was a popular member of the Vortex Club and regularly attended Vortex Club parties. The last one she attended was probably on March 28, just one month before she went officially missing on April 22 after she met someone who “changed her life”.
▶️After an unknown period of time, the Arcadia Bay Police Department decided to close investigations on Rachel’s disappearance, and even her parents gave up hope looking for her. Only Chloe didn’t want to give up, believing she was still out there and distributed Missing Person posters all over the town.
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Alternative Timeline
Alternative Timeline
Max Caulfield
▶️In the alternative timeline, Max appears to be a different person after “Chaos Theory”. Her clothes are different, more up-market, and she is seen hanging around with members of the Vortex Club; people she previously stayed clear of. She’s clearly good friends especially with Victoria and Nathan who, according to Max’s diary, helped her make her style more “fashionable” and celebrated her 18th birthday with her.
▶️Victoria seems to be friendly and cautious around Max, calling her Maxine and becoming worried when she is corrected with the “Max-Never-Maxine” rule; Max also refers to herself as Maxine in texts to Chloe, proving that she is definitely a different person since letting Chloe’s father live. The texts Max receives from Nathan and Victoria, as well as Taylor, indicating that she could have replaced Victoria as the “Queen-Bee” of Blackwell. Nathan texts her about hanging out and, according to Victoria’s texts, is worried about her since she ran off. Furthermore, Max has clearly supported Taylor during the rough time with her mother’s surgery. Alyssa also seems disappointed in her, commenting that she is disappointed that Max hung out with the popular students.
▶️In this timeline, she seems to be more rebellious than usual, is often partying and drinking, and participates in taking drugs (Victoria offers her the chance for a smoke in the ladies room, and talks about scoring more drugs in a text). Although she still seems to have a caring relationship with her mother, Max is more snippy towards her and troubles her with high expenses.
▶️Max had very little interest in her diary since moving back to Arcadia Bay. Her lack of attachment to it could be due to her confidence and new flourishing social life as a member of the Vortex Club, combined with the social stigma of keeping a diary at her age.
▶️In the alternative timeline, Max kept in touch with Chloe through letters. She also sent texts to her in August before leaving for Blackwell. However, William is surprised to see her when answering the door, implying that she did not, in fact, keep in touch as much as she meant to. Max’s diary entries and text messages reveal that Max only marginally thought about rekindling with Chloe since she’s been back at Blackwell and that she has been more interested in partying with her new friends. Unlike their first meeting in the original timeline where she is accusatory and apprehensive towards Max, Chloe seems genuinely happy to see her best friend again. She is slightly abrasive when she mentions that writing is easier than visiting and dealing with awkward conversations about the accident.
▶️It has also been revealed in a text to Nathan that alternative Max used a dark room to work on a photo assignment. It is unknown if this room is the same as Mr. Jefferson’s Dark Room, but it is more likely to be a regular darkroom used for photography.
Chloe Price
▶️Chloe’s previous history as an archetypal punk rocker has seemingly been wiped out completely in the new timeline Max created in “Chaos Theory” by preventing the death of Chloe’s father, William. She is now restrained to an electrical wheelchair which assists with movement, as well as a breathing apparatus. This is due to a car accident that Chloe was involved in 2011 after William bought her a vehicle. An SUV cut her off, and she crashed, tragically snapping her spine and paralyzing herself. Chloe also has severe troubles with her respiratory system, and is deteriorating quickly. The complete collapse of her respiratory system is inevitable, according to her doctor. Her parents decide not to tell her, ignoring the advice of the doctor. However, Chloe is fully aware of the situation, having heard the doctors discussing it while she was pretending to be asleep.
▶️She is still a punk at heart, visiting websites for local rock shows and looking at magazines related to punk music and style. She has an old, spiked bracelet on her desk, reminiscent of the old Chloe.
▶️Chloe refers to herself as a science nerd, and got straight A’s before her accident. We know that she was unable to keep attending Blackwell Academy due to the lack of disability access available around the historic campus. Principal Wells suggested that she go to a different school, as evident from his letter to Chloe’s parents dated the 8th of August, 2011.
▶️In this timeline, Chloe collects snow domes; keeping the one of the Doe. She also enjoys fluffy, cuddly toys, and has high-tech equipment for communicating online. Her room is decorated very differently; the walls are serene and no longer messy. Her inability to physically write on her walls is probably the cause, as she admits that sometimes she purposely rebels against her parents just so they will shout at her instead of treating her like a baby. She seems unhappy that she can’t go “party like a rockstar” or “get into teen trouble with her folks”. A picture of angels with the word “Faith” above it suggests Chloe or her parents are hopeful and possibly that they are turning to a small part of religion for guidance through their rough time.
▶️This Chloe doesn’t blame anyone for her condition, even though she had the right. She isn’t angry at her parents or at Max, just grateful to be alive and to have her family watching over her.
Rachel Amber
▶️In the alternative timeline, not much is known about Rachel but she is still missing, and probably already dead as in the original timeline. We can find newspaper articles on her, which show that finding her is still a public issue. An article says that, contrary to the original timeline, the police and FBI are still investigating. The article also says that “family and friends have intensified the search” for Rachel and that her family even offered a reward for any information. Rachel’s case has even caught the interest of a national reality show revolving around missing person cases.
▶️Chloe and Rachel had never met in the alternative timeline but Chloe reveals that she read about her in the newspaper when Max asks.
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Deaths
Deaths
Chloe Price
▶️Chloe has many instances in which she could die with or without Max’s power:
▶️Nathan shoots Chloe in her stomach, but Max rewinds to save her.
▶️Chloe is almost crushed by a train before Max rewinds in order to reroute the train.
▶️She accidentally shoots herself in the chest after a bullet ricocheted off the car bumper in the junkyard, also saved by Max rewinding (avoidable).
▶️Chloe dies in the alternative timeline if Max accepts her request to overdose her.
▶️She gets shot in the forehead by Jefferson after he doses Max.
▶️Chloe is presumably killed during the storm while Max and Principal Wells are at the Zeitgeist Gallery.
▶️If Max chooses to sacrifice Chloe, Max travels to the moment when she took the photo in the bathroom. In doing so, Chloe dies the exact way she did in “Chrysalis”, restoring the original timeline and stopping the storm from ever happening.
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Associated Deaths
Associated Deaths
Max Caulfield
▶️One of the reasons for Kate to commit suicide is her perceived feelings that Max does not care for her.
▶️If Max decides to sacrifice Chloe for the town’s sake, it will leave her to be killed in the girl’s bathroom by Nathan.
▶️Chloe dies in the alternative timeline if Max accepts her request to overdose her.
▶️Frank dies after being shot by Chloe, depending on Max’s dialog choices and whether Chloe has David or Nathan’s gun. Max can rewind and stop this from happening.
▶️If Max manages to warn Victoria about Nathan and the Dark Room, she will approach Jefferson for help, which ends her up in the Dark Room, drugged and tied up next to Max. She pleads for Max to help her but is later murdered by Jefferson.
▶️Nathan is killed by Mark Jefferson in an attempt to cover his tracks after Max and Chloe get close to finding out the truth.
▶️If Max decides to tell David about Chloe having been killed by Jefferson after he rescued her from the Dark Room, he will shoot Jefferson in an act of revenge.
▶️If Max decides to sacrifice Arcadia Bay it will leave many of the inhabitants of Arcadia Bay to be killed by the storm.
Chloe Price
▶️While Max and Chloe talk to Frank about Rachel on the beach in front of his RV, Chloe can shoot Frank and Pompidou with David’s or Nathan’s gun if he gets aggressive towards them because of reasons in their conversation (i.e. he finds out they broke into his RV). This is, however, avoidable with the right dialog choices.
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Name Meanings
Name Meanings
Max Caulfield
▶️With its Latin origin, the name Maxine means “the greatest”, and is a very noble, strong and feminine name. The fact that Max prefers the shortened form of her name, which is more gender ambiguous and simple, shows that she doesn’t identify with the noble, self-confident and feminine nature of that name. She doesn’t consider herself something special or unique, and she also doesn’t set great value upon femininity which is expressed both in her style and attitude.
▶️The name Maxine also implies a special power or fate for its owner, and so refers to Max’s time-controlling powers and the great things she is able to do and undo with them.
Chloe Price
▶️The name Chloe derives from the Greek mythology as an alternate name of the goddess of agriculture and fertility, the springs and animals, Demeter, and refers to the young, green foliage or shoots of plants. Demeter was especially worshiped for her power over air and water from historical times in Arcadia, a utopian unspoiled, harmonious wilderness, which is believed to be the mythological basis for the town of Arcadia Bay. Some have speculated that Demeter being worshipped for her power over air and water may also connect to the theory that the storm is a manifestation of Chloe’s wrath and anger toward her circumstances in life, with her father’s death, her best friend’s abandonment, and Rachel’s sudden disappearance. Demeter also presided over the sacred law, and the cycle of life and death, which may refer to Chloe’s connection to death and her constant reviving by Max. She was known as the “goddess of the blessed afterlife”, which could tie in with connection to the spirit animal world. Chloe is a springtime name symbolizing new growth, though by no means as fresh as it once was, which refers to Chloe’s character development in numerous way. It also is a Biblical name mentioned in the New Testament.
▶️Chloe’s surname, Price, can refer to her life literally being the price that Max has to pay for using her powers, even if she uses them to save other people’s lives. However, should Max choose to sacrifice Arcadia Bay to save Chloe, she becomes her “prize” as she gains Chloe’s friendship and love for the rest of her life.
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Others
Others
Max’s Abilities
▶️Max can rewind time to a limited degree. She herself is unaffected by this, remaining in a fixed position while time flows backwards around her, and she retains all recollection of what happened afterwards. As a side-effect of this, Max may seem to suddenly disappear and/or appear out of nowhere to those under the effects of her powers. Any item(s) on her person before time traveling are also kept with her after the fact. As a sort of focus for her powers, Max normally extends her hand out to rewind time.
▶️Max once “jumps” back in time into a specific situation. This is the instance when she discovers her ability to rewind time after witnessing Nathan kill Chloe in a fit of rage. The first and only instance occurs, when she suddenly finds herself back in class, several minutes prior to the incident. It’s likely that this a deeper manifestation of her rewind power that requires a lot of energy and only when experiencing that kind of shock was she able to do this.
▶️Max once stops the flow of time. The first and only instance occurs when she attempts to save Kate Marsh from committing suicide. She is unaffected by this and is still able to move around normally, but the amount of concentration to maintain it was extremely harsh on her body, as seen by her being too weak to use her rewind power after she made it up to the roof. Similar to when she is reversing time, Max held her hand out during the duration of time being frozen.
▶️Max can transfer her consciousness back to the time period when the photo was taken in order to change the past by focusing on a photograph with her in it. However, she is unable to pass the ‘photographic bounds’ of the background while using the ability. The Max of the past seems to only remember the altered timeline.
▶️Max gets visions through which she can deduct the future from to some extent. In these visions, she is able to witness Arcadia Bay being destroyed by an oncoming storm. It is possible that they aren’t just visions but rather ‘time jumps’.
Meteorological Anomalies
▶️Some Meterological Anomalies occur in Arcadia Bay, within the week from the 7 to 11 October, 2013 which are likely connected with Max Caulfield’s ability to control time.
▶️A snowstorm occurs in the afternoon of October 7, which is very unusual for the time of year. Max and Chloe experience it near the lighthouse.
▶️An unscheduled eclipse can be seen in the evening of October 8. Max and Warren watch it on Blackwell’s campus.
▶️Many wildlife animals like birds and stranded whales die on October 9.
▶️Two moons can be seen in the night of October 10. Max and Chloe notice them on the Blackwell parking lot on their way to the “End of the World” party.
▶️A tornado is coming from the water towards the town on October 11, as foreshadowed by Max’s vision. Max and Chloe look at it from the beach and near the lighthouse.
