10 Divisive Video Game Characters You're COMPLETELY Wrong About

Of all the playable characters in the Red Dead Redemption series, Jack Marston gets the worst wrap. Most people see him as an angsty replacement for his own father, John, without the fleshed-out personality and sympathetic backstory both John and Arthur can boast about.

It's easy to see why most people would disregard Jack, given that you don't spend as much time getting to know him as you do with the other two protagonists. However, this doesn't mean Jack Marston's character is lacking. In fact, he's possibly one of the most tragic characters in all of Red Dead Redemption.

This is because Jack's arc is the culmination of all the mistakes and sins of his predecessors. Prior to his father's death, Jack was an innocent and intelligent child that both Arthur and John tried to protect from the ruthlessness of their criminal lifestyle and provide him with a better future.

However, their criminal past isn't easy to erase, and when John ultimately brings the attention of agent Edgar Ross on himself for taking revenge on Micah, he dooms his family and Jack's future, rendering everything he and Arthur sacrificed for Jack pointless.

This is why, when Jack takes revenge on Ross for killing his father, he doesn't actually get a good ending—he merely restarts the same cycle of violence his predecessors tried so desperately to stop. It's a tragic display of an innocent man turning into a bitter shadow of his former self that not many people recognize for what it is.