I feel as though the Halo community (Including myself) has sort of built up sort of a bro-bond between Master Chief and the Arbiter. But is this really canonical? So how would they react to each other if they met again? I doubt they would bro fist. They haven’t exactly met on the best terms either. They met in Halo 2 in the Gravemind scene, and again in Halo 3 when Master Chief shoved a magnum up the Arby’s mouth. They didn’t seem very friendly. And they only fought alongside each other for what, a couple of days? Would MC even remember the Arbiter? I think the Arbiter would, mostly because the Chief is the one who turned him into the Arbiter. So, how would Master Chief react to seeing the Arbiter and vise versa?
Mutual respect.
The Arbiter would respect Chief a great deal because he’s a skilled warrior who he fought and brought down Truth alongside.
The Chief would respect Arbiter because he seems like one of the only Elites who doesn’t want to glass human planets and slaughter civilians.
Their alliance based on the situation may still stand. Of course, Chief may try and take the Arbiter out again due to the fact the Storm faction may instill the belief that the Sangheili are antagonists once again. If they meet in Halo 5, I’m sure Thel will explain the events that had transpired during John’s absence from the world he knew.
I think as Halo 3’s story continued on, they became brothers in arms, standing side by side to protect each other - the perfect example of this is Thel’s rescue of the Chief from the infected High Charity crash site. I don’t think they are exactly the kind of friends that get drunk and play pool together, but they do understand each other and know they work best together as a team.
I don’t think they have a friendship, although they probably do respect each other as allies and warriors. Chief was taught to cooperate and show respect for a clear ally; even if they come from the most unlikely of places. My guess is that the Chief would most likely be pleased to fight with the Arbiter once again, because his support is indeed useful.
Yeah I agree with the others in saying that John will at least not attack Thel unless he becomes a threat but he will know that he is an ally and can be sorta trusted.
But Thel still is part of an alien species that basically tried to exterminate him and the human race for 27 years and that just doesn’t disappear because you fought together.
> I feel as though the Halo community (Including myself) has sort of built up sort of a bro-bond between Master Chief and the Arbiter. But is this really canonical? So how would they react to each other if they met again? I doubt they would bro fist. They haven’t exactly met on the best terms either. They met in Halo 2 in the Gravemind scene, and again in Halo 3 when Master Chief shoved a magnum up the Arby’s mouth. They didn’t seem very friendly. And they only fought alongside each other for what, a couple of days? Would MC even remember the Arbiter? I think the Arbiter would, mostly because the Chief is the one who turned him into the Arbiter. So, how would Master Chief react to seeing the Arbiter and vise versa?
Their first meeting is sort of irrelevant on the basis that their final interaction was totally different in nature.
That being said I don’t expect much of anything at all out of it. Thel is an Elite, and John is a Human. That seems to be something insurmountable in this fiction. In Halo 4, the Arbiter didn’t cross Chief or Cortana’s mind once in connection with the continued hostility of the Elites. It seems like the writers have pegged Chief as not caring about Thel.
Friendship, unless MC discovers Thel lead the attack on Reach…I dunno how he’d react to that. But seriously Thel saved his -Yoink- on High Charity, stayed with him on the Arc when every other human sans Johnson retreated. They’ve got some bromance going there.
The first thing John does when they crash the Warthog into the Dawn’s hangar is to check that Thel is alive, they receive some very subtle development as their ‘friendship’ grows. As has been said before, Thel willingly goes into the Flood-infested High Charity completely unknowing of whether John is alive and puts aside his ‘honour’ to use a human flamethrower.
If 343i ever get to this, I hope it’s done well. Messing up their friendship would be one thing I couldn’t forgive - their developing, wordless bond was the absolute best thing about Halo 3.
> Their alliance based on the situation may still stand. Of course, Chief may try and take the Arbiter out again due to the fact the Storm faction may instill the belief that the Sangheili are antagonists once again. If they meet in Halo 5, I’m sure Thel will explain the events that had transpired during John’s absence from the world he knew.
Given the Chiefs been back for six months now, I would imagine the situation has been explained to him. The Chief likely knows about the Sangheili civil war.
As for their relationship, while they weren’t exactly best friends, they did form a strong partnership as soldiers. They may not have fought together long, but we saw them form a bond over the time they did. From the moment Johnson and company found the Chief, he and the Arbiter were together. Yeah, John shoved a gun in his face but the Arbiter clearly understood, in that same level we see him explaining things to the Chief. Once their base gets attacked, the Arbiter helps John clear out the enemy forces. Not only that, but in this level we see that the Arbiter has taken it upon himself to try and save everyone, he tried to convince the Yanme’e to leave the Covenant and help them stop the activation of the rings. He fought with the Chief to the edge of the Portal and was knocked out alongside him when Truth opened it.
Here’s the important thing. When the Flood landed, he fought with the Chief to the downed ship, the centre of Flood activity. He could have gone another way but he went with him, yet he didn’t enter the ship. He left John to do so alone. Remember this for later. The Arbiter, the Chief and Johnson all went to one tower each (Johnson was captured and John had to take care of his tower) and deactivated the shield protecting Truth. John and the Arbiter entered the Citadel together and were together when a brief alliance with the Flood was formed. John bore witness to the Arbiter’s revenge and in many ways, was key to the Arbiter achieving his goal.
The pair escaped the Gravemind and found the replacement ring. The Chief decided to go into the Flood hive (High Charity) and retrieve Cortana. He did so alone. Fought his way through and when the Flood tried to overwhelm him, the Arbiter appeared. This was the greatest concentration of Flood that either had ever encountered, and the Arbiter went in unaided to help the Chief.
They went to the ring and the two of them, plus Johnson, fought their way through the Flood to the control room and witnessed Johnson’s death at the hands of Guilty Spark. As the two made their escape, the Arbiter gave the Chief his condolences. He could have simply marched on but he acknowledged that the Chief had lost someone important. As they made the jump into the Dawn they each checked that the other was alright.
As you can see, over the course of Halo 3 the bond between the two grew stronger. No, they’re not going to hug, but I think they’ll each be silently glad that the other made it. It’s not a bromance, but they do care about each other to some extent and would help the other if need be.
Man, reading all these posts leaves me extremely upset that the Arbiter wasn’t at least mentioned in Halo 4.
He better be in Halo 5, especially if the flood return.
> Man, reading all these posts leaves me extremely upset that the Arbiter wasn’t at least mentioned in Halo 4.
>
> He better be in Halo 5, especially if the flood return.
Not only that, he was rarely mentioned in the books as well.
> > Man, reading all these posts leaves me extremely upset that the Arbiter wasn’t at least mentioned in Halo 4.
> >
> > He better be in Halo 5, especially if the flood return.
>
> Not only that, he was rarely mentioned in the books as well.
Wasn’t mentioned? The entire motives of the characters in the books was to kill the Arbiter. All the action in the Thursday War was the assault on his state and the Humans defense of it. Sure he wasn’t a main character but the Arbiter is very much an important figure in the books.
I hope they bring him into the next one as well since The Thursday War ended with Lord Hood discussing more diplomatic talks with the Arbiter. They even consider giving him a tour of the Infinity.
> Man, reading all these posts leaves me extremely upset that the Arbiter wasn’t at least mentioned in Halo 4.
Honestly there was no reason to mention him. For the most part the Chief and Cortana were always doing things. They didn’t have much time to reminisce. Halo 4 was a fast paced story. Not to mention, to a certain extent Halo 4 was supposed to be accessible to new players or those who came after Halo 3. Bringing up the Arbiter, Johnson or any of the others would have caused problems in that regard.
After reading Thursday war I dont see how Thel’s gonna come back unless we go to Sanghelios, and considering how strong the storm has gotten how do we know that Thel’s faction is even still around? But what I’d prefer to see is going to help Thel on Sanghelios fight the storm, this wouldnt be a hard situation for Cheif and Thel to work together.
For all we know, Thel will meet an awful death at the hands of Karen Traviss
Let’s just hope that brobiter will not die though. We NEED to see him.
> For all we know, Thel will meet an awful death at the hands of Karen Traviss
If she kills him off it will be because 343 told her to do so.
i could see chief traveling to sangellios. perhaps to track down jul 'mdama and retrieve half of the juno key.
I think the key to chief and arbiters bond, was johnson.
it was johnson who, befriended the chief after all the other Spartan IIs were killed(seemingly) despite the chiefs “mild sociopathic tendencies”
it was johnson who originally fought alongside the arbiter on delta halo.
it was johnson who brought him back to coordinate with the human resistance on earth.
it was johnson who brought the arbiter out into the jungle to retrieve the chief at the beginning of H3.
it was johnson and arbiter, not the chief and arbiter, who did the human/elite wepon swap prior to the joint Ark invasion.
as thier bond solidified it was johnsons death that cemented it. arbiter wasn’t just offering condolences to the chief. he was morning WITH the chief. when the arbiter attended the memorial service(at great personal risk), I believe he was there every bit as much for johnson as he was for the chief. maybe more.
Good to see I wasnt the only fan who missed Arbiter Halo 5 Maybe?