Handsome Jack AI

Handsome Jack AI is a digital copy of Handsome Jack, and one of the main antagonists of Tales from the Borderlands.

Involvement

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel

The prototype of the Handsome Jack AI was created by Professor Nakayama. This version of Jack has the same personality and memories of Handsome Jack after his rise to power as Hyperion's president.

Tales from the Borderlands

Zer0 Sum

Jack is first mentioned in the beginning of the episode by the narrator, Marcus. Later on when Rhys reactivates Prof. Nakayama's Hyperion ID chip, Jack's voice is heard - although it is not clear that it belongs to Handsome Jack. He is not heard until Rhys is messing with his glitched out gadget. Rhys yells that "he's got it."

"Do you, champ? Do you really?" The voice says. Rhys says that he does, which causes Sasha to say, "Do what?" Rhys shrugs it off and Jack isn't heard until the end when Rhys and Fiona discover the Gortys Project. "This ladies and gentlemen... is the Gortys Project. And it's going to lead us to a vault! And then I'll probably kill you."

Atlas Mugged

Picking up right where the first episode left off, Jack looks at Rhys and tells him that it's good he's working for Hyperion. Jack leads him upstairs and Rhys tells him that he is dead, Jack is in denial and tries to rip Rhys' throat out but is unable to due to his state. Rhys keeps backing up and hits head and falls over the stair railing and hits a computer, Rhys can choose to tell about seeing Handsome Jack, although they don't believe him and bring him up. He is not seen until later when Hugo Vasquez hits Rhys. Handsome Jack says as much as he would like to watch "this idiot kill you two idiots”, he won't let it happen due to Handsome Jack being a part of Rhys.

Handsome Jack enhances his ECHO eye and gets to overload the gun, which causes it to misfire. Handsome Jack points his finger forward which also happens to Rhys. Rhys punches himself in the head in order to get Jack away. They run off and they get picked up by Loader Bot.

Jack is seen later in the episode when Rhys gets knocked down again by Hugo. He is then when Hugo leads Rhys through the hallway. At the end of the episode when they put together the Gortys cores, Hugo and August point their guns at Sasha and Vaughn. Fiona tells them to back off by grabbing Felix's smoke grenades. Jack tells Rhys to let him into his subsystems to hack the Atlas drones. Rhys can choose to trust Fiona or trust Jack. If Rhys chooses to trust Jack, he will change Rhys ECHO eye color from blue to orange and Jack gains control over the drones.

Catch A Ride

Escape Plan Bravo

The Vault of the Traveler

Jack plays a major and final role in this episode. Following the events of the fourth episode, he shows his true colours once more, revealing that Rhys will be killed, as Jack plans to surgically implant a robotic endoskeleton into Rhys' body with Jack's personality uploaded into it, effectively turning him into Jack.

Rhys, understandably, objects to this, which immediately results in Jack turning on him. Rhys then goes to work to prevent his fate and this results in the shutdown and fall of the Helios Space Station and its subsequent crash into Pandora.

Following this, Rhys emerges from the wreckage, alive, and is taunted by Handsome Jack through still-functioning monitors within the broken office. However, after a legitimately hurtful remark from Rhys, a careless move on his part leads to Jack downloading himself back into Rhys' eye, where he takes control of Rhys' arm and attempts to strangle him to death.

Rhys saves himself by impaling his arm through a piece of shrapnel and severing it entirely. Jack remains heartened and unfazed by Rhys' success in deterring him. However, his cocky attitude soon becomes one of a pathetic whelp as Rhys begins removing his EchoEye implants.

As Jack kneels before and begs Rhys to stop removing the implant, he reveals true fear at the prospect of being permanently sent to an empty void after it's disconnected. Rhys goes through with removing it entirely, but not before Jack lunges at Rhys in an attempt to prevent it from happening, only to fizzle out of existence the moment his hands reach Rhys' neck. It's at this point the player is given a choice:

Crush the Eye

If Rhys chooses to crush the EchoEye, he will permanently destroy Jack's AI, effectively ending Handsome Jack's life and legacy once and for all.

Keep the Eye

If Rhys chooses to keep the EchoEye, he will keep it in a pocket, effectively leaving Handsome Jack alive, but presently in no dangerous state.

Relationships

Jack's Grandmother

Jack was sent to be raised by her at a young age. Her treatment of him was terrible as she would subject him (at a minimum) to physical abuse. This would affect his mental health over time and may have played a role in his development into whom he became as an adult. During his time as president of Hyperion, he had some assassins kill her as a way of getting revenge on her for her treatment of him.

Angel

“

Handsome Jack to Rhys about his sacrifices

— Oh, you can´t even BEGIN to understand my intentions. You think I haven´t had to make sacrifices?

”

Ever since the discovery that she was a siren, he used Angel when she was little as an important instrument for his rise in power. He would eventually use her to charge the vault key in order to open the Vault of The Warrior by injecting immense amounts of eridium into her. This made Angel dependent on the substance for her own survival. Because of this, Angel would grow to detest her father. After being forced to do his bidding for so long, she secretly assisted the vault hunters aligned with the Crimson Raiders in attacking the location she was in. They would then go on and destroy the eridium injection systems keeping Angel alive. When the eridium injectors were destroyed, Jack pleaded with her to stop. With her last breaths she called her father "an asshole" before she died from her eridium dependency. Jack then proceeded to go mad due to the fact they had killed his daughter, believing her death to be the Vault Hunter's fault and not his own.

If Rhys says to the AI of Handsome Jack that he deserved to die, he will tell Rhys that he can´t imagine what sacrifices he had to make (which includes Angel) to gain his high position in Hyperion. However the AI is unaware that Angel is dead, saying that he would like to see her after the vault was found. If Rhys chooses to reject Jack´s offer to become the president of Hyperion he can say that he died alone because Vault hunters killed his friends and family (including Angel), which causes Jack to become furious. Later, the A.I finds out about Angel´s demise from Helios' data files.

Rhys

“

Rhys arguing with Handsome Jack about his failed life (Determinant)

— You know you died alone, right? Vault hunters killed your friends, they killed your family and you croaked in some volcano in the middle of nowhere.

”

It is unclear what Handsome Jack and Rhys' relationship is. While he did call Rhys a `real winner´, he also said that Rhys was just a `pitful little code monkey´, the latter being the same insult used by Tassiter on Handsome Jack. In episode 5, Jack tells Rhys "I should have seen this coming - Ever since I came to this nacho-flavored shithole of a planet, I've been betrayed by everybody I gave a rats ass about." which he then lists: his boss, his girlfriend, his daughter and indirectly Rhys himself. This is later revealed that Jack was only manipulating Rhys, in order to get back into his body and kill him. After Jack fails to strangle Rhys, he says that as long as Rhys has the cybernetics in him, Jack would be with him, waiting to take him out or just watch him wither away with age. Rhys begins to cut out his ECHO-eye, while Jack is begging him not to do it. Either way, Rhys tear out his eye and AI Jack disappears.

If the player chooses to be respectful of Jack and accepting offers of friendship throughout the game, at the end of episode 4, he gives Rhys a chance to rule Hyperion. If Rhys accepts, he takes over Helios and announces to everyone that Rhys is the president of Hyperion and tells Rhys that Pandora, Elpis, and Helios are just he start of their reign. The similarities between him and Rhys are lampshaded constantly by Jack throughout the series. Also near the end of episode 5, Rhys is asked by Fiona if he is going to follow Jack's footsteps. Rhys can say that he learned one thing from Jack: that he never wants to become like him, just follow his own path.

Hugo Vasquez

“

Handsome Jack to Vasquez

— Whoa, wait a minute...Wallethead!

”

Handsome Jack met Vasquez when he worked in the Hyperion mailroom. He used to call him `Wallethead´, because he used to stick money to his head when he was getting hair implants and he was always punching him in the face, the latter of which Vasquez approved of because he was a big fan of him. After Vasquez is killed, he only congratulates Rhys that his rival is finally dead.

Fiona

“

Handsome Jack on Fiona

— Yeah, hurry up Rhys! God, she is so cute when she's excited.

”

Although they don't directly interact, Handsome Jack appears to have great interest in Fiona, possibly even having a crush on her. This is shown as when Fiona urges Rhys to 'hurry up', Jack comments on how 'cute' she is when she is excited. Furthermore, Jack rates her as 9/10 on his 'hotness level' (Higher than both Vaughn and Sasha) commenting that he likes her hat, as well as saying it will be weird if Rhys slept with Fiona (to attempt and discourage the idea to Rhys due to Jack wanting to instead). If Jack ends up controlling Rhys, he will be very suggestive towards her, calling her 'sweetie'. When Fiona is puzzled by Rhys's odd behaviour, Jack answers "I just gotta be me, baby." Fiona is completely unaware of Jack's feelings or even his existence inside of Rhys.

Appearances

Notes

Handsome Jack AI is the only version of Handsome Jack that can actually survive.
It has the same personality and memories of Jack up until the start of Borderlands 2.