Talk:Sander Cohen
From BioShock Wiki
The explaination on what happens in the game from the point of view of the player is completely useless. Yes, explaining the fight is helpful, but i've found that using proper nouns instead of 'player' makes for better and more effective encyclopedic development. Someone please fix this, I've done all of the rest of the characters that don't have "Jack" in for player.
Additionally, this could do with more information about Sander himself, his insanity, and odd obsession with the Quadtych. -Sheedy
- I agree that this article needs a good bit of cleanup and rewriting to be more in line with other character articles. Mainly what I see in good character articles is that it pulls together a description of the character and their history from all the sources available: gameplay, diaries, radio msgs. That makes it much more than just a walkthrough of your encounter and interaction with the character. Just a matter of who gets motivated to do it =) --Klivian 21:34, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
- Thanks, I've been roaming around fixing little grammar/spelling errors, bad sentence structure and the like, changing things into better perspective. Is there a way to register with the site? (I'm new to editing wikis) -Sheedy
- Yep.. top left corner of the site, there should be a Login and Create an Account link: [Create Account] --Klivian 00:53, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
Hi folks, great page. A couple of things:
1) I've played the PC version and don't see much difference from the Xbox version. Specifically, if you kill Cohen in Olympus, he is not "alive and instantly aggressive towards you" in Frolic. And you have his key and can open the Muse Box. Also if you set fire to the Quadtych after killing Cohen in Olympus, he will appear and attack you. All very much like the Xbox. The one difference I haven't tried is the concept of "unlocking" by killing Cohen after finishing the masterpiece (third paragraph in the Xbox version), but that sounds like something Xbox.
Maybe the small patch you get with the PC version makes it like the Xbox version? (That note for the PC was made by Chasmyr on Sept. 1, but I got BS on Sept. 16 with its official release.) Can someone see if they get the same thing I do on the PC - they don't see Cohen in Frolic if they kill him in Olympus, unless they burn the Quadtych?
2) As you can see, I've posted all of Cohen's "gifts". But I'm not sure it's in the spirit of the rest of the page - rather like a bio. (I like it!) If folks want, I can instead just have a link from the bottom of the page (before my editing) to a separate page, with the detailed breakout. And leave it like a bio. Or... maybe it's time to turn it into having separate sections, with the Bio being the first section.
Your thoughts? Great wiki! - MikeTheRed 18:58, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
One note: Anna Culpepper was not "Ryan's Songbird"; that was a sarcastic term used by her to refer to Sander Cohen, alluding to his excessive devotion to Ryan and his propagandistic music.
Contents |
[edit] Sander
It seems to have slipped by whoever wrote this bio that Sander Cohen is very much a homosexual. His "desciples" were also his lovers, as was Andrew Ryan, all implied in several audio logs and other dialogue.
[edit] amendment to above
Sander may not have been Ryan's lover, but he did have feelings for him.
[edit] amendment to the amendment to the amendment ;)
Why such a need to explicitly & repeatedly "classify" Sander as homosexual? (I'm referring to the article itself, not this discussion/talk page, btw.)
As it stands, the article goes out of its way to tell us that, essentially, "We're not certain that Cohen is gay -- but we think he might be. There's no real 'proof' that he's a homosexual, so we can't be absolutely certain."
Now, I realize the author(s) probably didn't intend this to come across as homophobic. That said:
(1) None of the other character bios discuss sexual orientation...much less "suspected" sexual orientation. Why doesn't Ryan's bio tell us that he was "presumably heterosexual, since he impregnated Jasmine Jolene, although this could mean he was merely bisexual; there is not enough evidence to conclude either way." Why doesn't Jack's bio tell us that his "sexual orientation is unknown," or "presumed heterosexual," etc? Where is the footnote at the bottom of every page informing us that "All individuals are considered to be heterosexual unless stated otherwise?" Etc, etc.
(2) The "need" to tag Cohen with the "believed to be gay" label results in another ugly side effect -- the immediate urge to tell us "but we don't know for sure" because...why? Obviously the intent here is to avoid disparaging Cohen without sufficient proof, and since gay=bad, falsely identifying him as such would be mighty disparaging, right?
All in all, it's just ugly and unnecessary. Nowhere else in this wiki is a character's entire sexual orientation/history deemed relevant; instead, the tone is much more encyclopedic/factual. Example: When describing the "character" Atlas, one can omit the tabloid-sounding "presumed to be heterosexual" stuff and merely present the facts as given -- eg, "Atlas enlists Jack to help his family (or "his wife and child" or whatever) to escape Rapture." (We learn Atlas is a father and a husband...these are plot points that are appropriate to speculate about. Presumptions about his entire sexual history are, presumably, not.)
The two posters above me seem to understand this; both merely discuss a couple of perfectly legitimate questions in encyclopedic, factual terms: Some evidence suggests Cohen was secretly in love with Ryan, but some speculate Cohen and Ryan were lovers some time in the past. Of course, only a moron would think that a man could say "I loved him" (when referring to a powerful, charismatic individual with celebrity status) without meaning that in a sexual sense...but that's beside the point. :)
Sorry for the long rant -- but I'm new to this wiki and I'm really overwhelmed with how excellent the writing is throughout many/most of the storyline and biography sections. So you can imagine how it was really disappointing to run across Cohen's bio and find myself in the middle of this weird focus on whether a character is "gay or not gay" when that's *so* far from the point, has nothing to do with the plot, and (by the way) we really don't know the answer anyway.
Food for thought: Near the beginning of the article, the author suggests Cohen's character is believed to be based on Salvidor Dali. Now, I think that's a big stretch...but either way, it provides us with an excellent real-world example: throughout Dali's career, we know (as in, the following statement is backed up by substantial evidence including Dali's own testimony) the brilliant artist explored all kinds of sexual experiences with various men and women *during* his long-time marriage to the woman he repeatedly called "the love of my life." (Dali would later go so far as to incorporate her actual image into every one of his Master Works, the enormous paintings that each took multiple years to complete, and were proclaimed by the artist as the pinnacle of his entire life's work.) His wife was fine with him fooling around, and he clearly adored her, but they never had a child.
So...was Dali (the purported basis for Cohen) gay? Or did his marriage (and adoration) to his wife somehow make him immune to that charge? Was he straight before and during his marriage UNTIL the microsecond prior to his first homosexual encounter...? And did that make him gay, bisexual, or just "curious?"
Rather than try to find an appropriate label for the guy, it might be a bit easier to merely describe his life (and how he lived it) in detail -- but just the facts, ma'am. :)
Okay, ranting tirade ending in 5..4..3..
//Fjord Ubiquity//
[edit] Alexander Cohen?
I do not have an account here, but was curious if anybody else thinks that Alexander H. Cohen, "Lord of the Flops", could possibly be, in some way, related to the character design of Sander?
203.113.233.224 17:06, 4 June 2008 (UTC) kurushi
[edit] Random Comment
In the movie "Last Kiss", isn't the art studio called "Sander Cohen"? Just thought that was interesting.
[edit] Fred Astaire?
I saw a bit of this movie with this actor named Fred Astaire, he bears an uncanny resemblance to Sander but less rough looking, especially in the small picture of him on the two way, just google it
[edit] It could just be...
It could just be that he isn't a homosexual, if one observes the audio file when he notably remarks "a man I once loved", one must keep in mind that he considers himself an artist, a musical genius, and a literary master. In keeping with this, the love remark could well mean that he simply considered Ryan a close friend, as many plays from Shakespearian and similar works made similar comments, and only meant someone who is close.
[edit] Rise Rapture! Rise!
Oh Rise, Rapture Rise! We send our hopes into the skies! Oh Rise, Rapture, Rise! Upon your wings our dreams will fly. A city in the ocean deep, A promise that we'll always keep, To boldly turn our eyes upon the priiiiiiize! So Rise, Rise, Rise! Oh Rise, Rapture Rise! We merrily pinch every crime, Oh Rise, Rapture Rise! To help us crush parasites inside. A city on Poseidon's door, A set of ideas we adore. A philosophy we all can emphasize So Rise, Rise, Rise!
[edit] Laser pistol
See in one of the pics on the sander cohen page, there appears to be some kind of pistol that I've not seen in the game. Can anyone explain that? It looks like some kind of Bioshockesque pistol.
[edit] Cut Content
Apparently one of the demos of the game before its release talked about retrieving a record for Cohen, seems like a big cut content.
[edit] Out of Order
I killed Rodiguez before Cobb and put their pictures in that order. The only problem is:.... There Is No Quadtych When I try to Put Cobb's picture! I then tried using a hidden thing called: "Cohen's Masterpiece", but it doesn't work!!! Why??!!! I'm on the PC 173.32.11.67 01:31, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
[edit] Misc. Comment
In response to the comments above concerning Cohen's sexuality: While I agree with what was said, I feel as though those assumptions about Cohen came from the other well...assumption, that his disciples are his former lovers. Cohen makes a comment over the radio about Finnegan stating, "I admired his ... carriage." While I am not saying this is necessarily true, I am just simply speculating where this idea could of came from.
[edit] Survival?
Could it be possible that the crazed Sander Cohen lives? He seems to share DNA with Ryan considering his ability to use bathyspheres. Also consider the event triggered after attacking his masterpiece, as the event seems too believable to be considered a glitch, as well as the possibility to avoid Cohen's demise by choosing not to kill him period. Perhaps this is a hint showing he has indeed survived Jack's murderous rampage during his delightful stay in Rapture.--Atlas216 22:40, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
In my opinion, the "glitch" with the quadtych seems to be more of an easter egg for nostalgic gamers than any sort of canonical event. There are many plotholes in Rapture's history. Seeing that Ryan didn't come back to life even though there were other Vita-chambers scattered across Rapture could possibly prove that the developers intended Cohen to stay dead as well.24.81.79.129 22:09, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
