Ashley Williams is a favourite character — and one I also can’t stand
“That’s it. I am never saving her again.”
I sit furious, cross-legged and cross-armed, staring at the screen with my best real squad-mate (my golden retriever) staring at me happily. Every time I curse saving Ashley Williams. This time, it took until Mass Effect 3 when she insults one of my favourite characters for no reason in thinly veiled misogynistic terms. She is the most infuriating gaming character ever, I have absolutely no doubt about that.
A few months later though, I’m back on Virmire. I stare at the screen for a full minute before I snap out of my internal debate. I can’t just sit stuck at Virmire all day. I roll my eyes, decision made. Ashley, it is. Sorry, Alenko.
Virmire is still one of the most controversial decisions in Mass Effect. Leaving a major character to die was a pretty brutal introduction to the trilogy and fans of each character still argue endlessly over the decision. It’s not one I’ve ever felt passionately about either way because the end result just sucks. It’s not exactly fun to argue about who deserves to die the most, or least.
Yet, more often than not, I’m saving Williams, a character who I constantly disagree with. I’m actually glad she barely features in Mass Effect 2 just to get a break from wanting to throw something at the screen. When she does pop up in Horizon, the whole scene is enough to get me furious again and regret my choice (not too unlike when I save the Council).
This is a cycle that repeats itself more often than reapers crossing into the Milky Way. I feel a sense of responsibility for Ash on Virmire. It’s Shepard’s decision and Alenko has been with the team a while. Ashley, on the other hand, is relatively new, saw her last team get murdered in front of her and is Alenko’s junior in rank and age. It just doesn’t feel right to leave her there, and I hate that I can’t.
Ashley is not the most likeable character, although this has never concerned me. I’ve always been the champion for unlikeable women in fiction. The more rude and arrogant, the better. But Ash is someone I fundamentally disagree with. If she was a person in my life, I’d be hitting the block button on every form of social media without hesitation. Games though give a safe space to explore those types of characters and the issues they raise.
Every time Ash speaks negatively, it’s not just that she’s annoyed. There will be some misogynistic inference in her snappy remark or a trace of xenophobia even when she’s making the seemingly blandest of comments about an alien character. Ashley makes the game incredibly difficult and less enjoyable. Conversations with her can induce more stress than facing down a reaper on Rannoch. The games also feel lesser without her.
Saving Alenko is undoubtedly the happier route. While he is obnoxious in 2 and for the first part of 3, he does settle back into the good guy role. He’s easy to chat too and he doesn’t fight with half the crew. He’s sweet and just looks out for everyone, often while forgetting to look after himself. The game is lighter with him. For me, it’s also less substantial.
I want to throw my controller at the screen every time Ash speaks. But the wonderful thing that can come from that is when Shepard can argue with her, or when Ash acknowledges her own bias. She does grow, if very slowly. More than anything, Ash is a constant reminder of the dangers of not challenging hate.
“Ash is a constant reminder of the dangers of not challenging hate”
It’s not all her fault — she is what she’s been made into. She has severe survivor’s guilt after Eden Prime where her team were slaughtered by geth. The only thing the Alliance ever taught about geth were that they were evil robots. It’s no surprise she ends up incredibly threatened by them; she saw one team die already (and Jacob too expresses that same unease). Other characters have also done worse; Garrus repeatedly sticks up for turian tactics against the krogan and even admits that he would consider betraying Wrex. Javik wants to murder EDI and Legion and Mordin was responsible for keeping the krogan sterilised. All of these characters are incredibly challenging, it’s just that Ash tends to be louder and more direct about her views which make them feel that much more potent. Ash is also the character that we can look at and see ourselves. She makes us uncomfortable by how similar she is to us, and that makes it easier to hold her to a higher standard than aliens even though it’s unfair.
Ash shows that feminists who are breaking stereotypes can still be oppressive and hateful to women they don’t approve of. She still shows that idealists who believe in the beauty of the galaxy can also express deep rooted prejudice and fear of those that don’t look the same. Challenging Ash is like standing up to a bigoted relative — but in a safe space. It’s also an important lesson to always interrogate the people around us, and to ask for better. With Kaidan, I just feel too complacent. I’m getting too much of an idealistic view of the galaxy, and the politics feels less pressing and more abstract. The annoying, uncomfortable and downright irritating route feels like the one that captures the story best. This is game where politics is at its heart. Shepard must constantly navigate the different ideologies of the various characters in an attempt to try to get everyone working together against the biggest threat they could ever face. Few characters sum that up more than Ash. It’s why she’s one of my favourites, even though I really just can’t stand her.
