Johnny ending forgot about Judy?

[Sander]

Just beat the game and picked Solo-storm Arasaka tower with Johnny ending, was very surprised to see that Johnny just ♥♥♥♥♥♥ ghosted romanced Judy, thought for sure he would tie up V's loose ends and tell them the truth of what happened, but he did not tell anyone ♥♥♥♥ except rouge? That seems very out of character for him tbh. Is there some explanation for why he did not even bother to call/meet Judy? Feel like that is the least he could, and would, do for V, for giving away his/her body...

[Vela Darney]

My guess is he told Rogue first and after she reacted so poorly to it he went like "Screw this, I'm not gonna get lectured, or beaten up, or flatlined by V's friends about something that's not my damn fault. Not like it was my decision that brought me back here, if I'd had my way, I wouldn't even be here now." I can imagine that, at first, he'd be quite mad at V for pullng such a stunt on him and sending him back into V's body when it was supposed to be V going back. So he might just react like that out of anger and spite (cos, you know, he's still Johnny). And at some point, he'd figure it's too late to tell them.

[Silverbane7]

Part of the problem is that yeah, he probably started with Rogue.
That, and everyone just likely assumed he took over the body and 'left V to die'
Panam especially assumes he did.

There is no way to have V leave a message ether. No way to have Alt record even a text message. Otherwise I'd send one general message (if the game let you)
Like...
"Look...I'm sorry but.....its bad, okay? Got two choices..... me? I got six months....nothing I can do about it, Alt says.....but johnny? He can live. Assuming he doesn't get his gonk arse killed doing something stupid again....so.....just.....don't hate him when you see....me. Cause its not his fault. He told me he'd take the fall....my life for his, but its not right. Damn it, its hard to explain but.... He deserves this chance..... And me? I got a chance to survive out here, past the Blackwall. Its not much, nothing like what I know..but its worth tryin...so please....don't kill him.... kay?"

He probably ghosts on them because first, they assumed he did this (or, he expects that after Rogue gets so mad at him, that everyone else will react the same way)
Second, he does not want to hurt them any more than he has already.

Third....he's just had the biggest kick in the gut to his ego, lost someone he cares about. The closest thing he's ever had to a best friend (at least, since his army buddy who I think got blown up by a landmine when he was a teenager)
Giving him the body hurts him at the same time as saving him.
Every time he sees 'his' reflection, he sees V.
Every time he hears 'his' voice, he's hearing V speak.
But V isn't there.
Its been a few months. (when we get control of the character)
He's moved out of the H10, got rid of everything. New place rented, new clothes,
Trying to deal with the fact that he survived again, but his best friend did not.

You get out of bed and he picks up the mirrorshades, and you can be old style Johnny about them, or new style Johnny. Or feeling sorry for himself Johnny.
Fact that he can kick himself when he's down (no one cares what you look like) when you put them on, shows how much he's still hurting from the choice V made.

Its true, by the time you are riding away on the bus, he's feeling a little more hopefull. His voice fades away to become Vs voice, a way of showing he's finally starting to heal a little.
Guess getting away from NightCity helps, putting the place where everyone he cared about died behind him helps too.
Johnny is a survivor, but that does not mean he doesn't care. He just keeps going, because that's how he's always done. Slogging ahead since what else can he do?

(Assuming you the player didn't have a bad relationship with him, or decided to actually 'take' the body. In which case, your friends anger is justified and he's just feeling guilty as the reality of what he did creeps in. He starts changing the memory again, to fit better in his mind. Starts to feel sorry, "gota stop talkin to ya, V....you ain't there....")

[Vela Darney]

I really don't know where you get that Johnny doesn't care about V at all unless you either played a completely different game or antagonized the poor guy at every twist and turn so that he'd be glad to finally be rid of you ...

He doesn't drop off the dogtags, he drops off V's bullet pendant.

And you got a completel wrong take on Johnny in general so I guess you HAVE been playing a completely different game indeed. Or been heavily buying into the propaganda. If no one really matters to Johnny except for Johnny - why does he get V to check up on Kerry, huh? If Kerry didn't matter to him why didn't he just let him blow his head off in the shower? The thing about Johnny accepting V's ending their own life - that's not Johnny not caring about V, that's Johnny accepting that, in the end, the decision what to do is V's, not his. If he really were so selfish and only caring about himself - wouldn't he go out of his way to try and stop V from ruining "his" (Johnny's) brand new body before Johnny can take over?

The big question seems to be: Is Johnny still a person or just a bunch of data? Which probably does change the way you look at him completely. Me, I decided, after that talk with those monks, to see him as a person. But I'm odd like that, I also consider TNG's Data a person (strictly speaking, he's just a machine imitating human behavior - a machine that's smart enough to learn but, in the end, still a machine). And I'm pretty sure he's serious about not wanting V's body. If he isn't - why is he getting so mad when V decides to go with Alt and tries to stop them multiple times? It's just the same with the Temperance ending as it is with the suicide ending - in the end, Johnny's come to accept what V wanted: for him to have a new life. But he can't have that new life in Night City.

Cos one, the city's a bad influence on anyone, and with Johnny's history, he'd be prone to fall back into old patterns if he stayed. And two - well, V's friends simply wouldn't let him life that new life. Proof of that? Both Rogue's and Panam's reaction. You really think they'd just let him live in peace? Both of them basically threaten to end him if they ever cross paths again. I really can't blame him for not wanting to find out how River or Judy or Vik might react. Vik's never been a fan of Johnny and would probably deck him, at the very least. River's a cop and we know Johnny doesn't like cops, so he'd only think the worst of River. And as for Judy - he says himself that he's kinda fond of her so he probably doesn't tell her what's been happening because he doesn't wanna risk her ending herself in the very same bathtub Evelyn died.

Imo, people who only see Johnny as the cold, calculating villain who's only after V's body and is playing a long game the entire game through, to deceive V and lull them into a sense of security by pretending to care or pretending to be nice, or just fun to hang out with - those people are too content with taking everything Johnny says and that we're told or shown about Johnny at face value without even trying to dig deeper. Proof of that? There's STILL people out there who think it was JOHNNY who blew up Arasaka Tower even though we are told EXPLICITLY in game that Johnny's memories of the event are not what really happeneda and there's actually stuff in the game that contradicts him being behind it. You don't even have to dig into the tabletop's lore (which, I admit it, I did) - IT'S RIGHT THERE!

I mean, if we wanna look at characters only superficially, then V's an idiot kid whose delusions of grandeur got their best friend killed and who'd be rotting in a landfill with a bullet in their head if it hadn't been for Johnny. Vik's a loser who couldn't cut it as a boxing champion and walked away with his tail between his legs. Misty's a nutcase who thinks all that esoteric ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ is real. River's a creep who's bulldozing (female) V into a relationship and wants to domesticate her and have her play good little wifey for him (kids included). Judy's a whiny ♥♥♥♥♥ who can't make up her mind. Panam's another nutcase who never thinks before she acts so that not even her own family wants her around anymore. Rogue's a stone-cold ♥♥♥♥♥ who sold out to corporations and sold her own soul just to get where she is now. Kerry's a washed-up has-been who wasn't even able to keep his marriage and kids - probably because, in addition to being a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ musician, he's also a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ husband and father. Oh, and he's also insane (blowing up equipment trucks and yachts - c'mon, what sane kind of person does that?) ... See how that works?

We all know those characters are a lot more complex than that. Same is true for Johnny.

[Phynrae]

Yeah that cheesed me off aswell.

I felt like it undid all the positive character development Johnny had gone through, and the friendship that had developed between Johnny and V.

V was willing to help Johnny get closure and try to set things right with Rogue, Kerry, and to some extent Alt and the rest of the band, even settle his score with Adam Smasher and Mikoshi, and in return, Johnny can't even find the backbone to send V's loved one a text to tell her what happened?


It's especially jarring considdering how important it was to Johnny to set things right with his own friends, and it's actually Johnny who reminds you to call Judy (or whomever you romanced) before storming the AHQ, because he doesen't want you to make the same mistake he did.

And then he ghosts them all right after.. wha? Wha happun? Why?

[Silverbane7]

Well, we never actually get to see/read his side of the conversations.
All we get are a bunch of angry people leaving him messages on Vs phone.
Panam and Rogue specifically threaten him.
Nether of them believe V just up and gave him the body, they are convinced he stole it.

That only happens (taking the body) when WE, the player choose that path tho.
Everything he does (outside of conversations and a couple of arm movements) are what WE the player choose to do.
There are, admittedly some few moments we don't see.
What he does between "Hello, NightCity!" and us waking up in the Northside apartment complex.
How he gets from point a to point b both the time he takes us to the hotel in Pacifica and getting us from Embers to Vik.
There is no autonomous point at which he actually TAKES over to take Vs body away in the game. (Likely because they knew players would riot if it was not their decision to do so, one way or another)

So it is possible that he had sent at least one text to each of them (or at least, the ones who know its Johnny, and reply as such) and it went badly.
"I'm going to kill you, if I see you!" badly.

[Phynrae]

Originally posted by Silverbane7:

So it is possible that he had sent at least one text to each of them (or at least, the ones who know its Johnny, and reply as such) and it went badly.
"I'm going to kill you, if I see you!" badly.

We know he did not contact Judy at all. If you've romanced Judy and then give Johnny the body, she calls you in a panick, begging you to please pick up, to say something, anything, because she has no idea whats going on or what happened.

I'm assuming you've not seen this combination of choices (romance Judy + give Johnny the body), because it is crystal clear from Judy's call that Johnny made no attempt to contact her. She has no idea what's happened or if V is even still alive, and no idea that Johnny now has the body.

We could argue that he maybe contacts Panam, but he certainly doesen't contact Judy.

[Silverbane7]

Yes, that's a combo I have not watched.
I've seen some of the conversations, know both Panam and Rogue threatened him in the credits holocalls.

The conversations at the end are an area I'm not that up on, since its a part of the game I've not delved into.
Watched the endings once or twice, in parts, so its not as familiar as the rest of the game for me.

[Vayde Knyght]

You can also open your phone during Johnny's Epilogue, and you'll see texts from V's loved ones... but no texts to them.