The wider cast ofTomb Raider’sSurvivor trilogy are pretty forgettable. There’s Jonah, who gets remembered in part because he’s the most likeable and well-written, but also because he’s constantly by your side in Shadow of the Tomb Raider.Then there’s Sam, who only appears in the original 2013 reboot, not the two sequels, but is a notable absence due to what feels like an unfinished story between her and Lara. Then there’s, you know, the rest. Watching the new Tomb Raider show onNetflix, I was reminded of them, and particularly of Reyes.
Reyes has always gotten a bad deal. She doesn’t really like Lara. We are Lara. Ergo, she doesn’t really like us. As a result, most fans who care enough to remember would put her at the bottom of the list of Lara’s companions. But I’m not sure that’s fair, and it’s a shame that the cast were never really built on. On the one hand, many of them die, and Rise of the Tomb Raider is such an excellent game I’m wary of suggesting it required sweeping changes (way more comfortable saying that of Shadow). On the other, it seems odd that Lara starts her journey with an ensemble and then the series becomes mostly a solo outing.
Can The Netflix Show Do Tomb Raider’s Wider Cast Justice?
I’ve only seen the first episode of Netflix’s Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft, so I’ll be saving my thoughts on that for another time. But it’s clearly set after (a version of) the 2013 game, but before Rise joins the party. So far, we’ve only seen Reyes -and Sam- via flashbacks, but her words have a major impact on Lara, and thus she will likely be a major character across the series. Maybe that will also allow fans to re-evaluate her role in the story.
This flashback is of Roth’s death, which happens the same way as it does in the game. While they are under attack, an axe is thrown at Lara. Roth grabs her and spins around, taking the axe in the back, saving her life and losing his. Just like in the game, Sam tries to comfort a traumatised Lara, and Reyes yells at her. It’s easy to paint Reyes as the bad guy, never cutting Lara slack, but consider Reyes' perspective.
Roth had known Lara since she was a little girl, thanks to his friendship with her late father. He treated her like the daughter he never had. The catch? He did, in fact, have a daughter. With Reyes. Now, he doesn’t actually find this out until the expedition he dies on, but if I as a white man had sex with a Black woman and nine months later she had a mixed race baby, I’d probably do some maths on my fingers.
Reyes is a strong character, and Lara is not in the 2013 version. She doesn’t even rise to be a tomb raider until the sequel. It’s her origin story, where she is a naive, occasionally helpless character whose emotions still drive her actions too much. It’s a good arc for Lara to go on, and makes sense for a reboot, but it paints Reyes as callous. But if Reyes had met the Lara of Legend, or TR2, or Angel of Darkness, maybe they would have gotten on better.
Lara is grieving, and Reyes tells her she deserves no sympathy and that Roth’s death is her fault. That’s undoubtedly a mean thing to say to someone who just lost her father figure, especially when they never really recovered from losing their actual father. But she’s also… not wrong? They are all on the island because of Lara. They are all following Lara’s plan. Roth probably wouldn’t have so readily given his life for anyone besides the fairly spoiled version of Lara that Reyes sees in front of her.
Still, it comes off as harsh. The flashback in Netflix’s show doesn’t make it any less so, either. But I am hoping this is a little bit of a trick of the mind - Lara remembers it as especially nasty, but only because she has built up the shame and guilt of that moment in her head. When we meet Reyes in the show, I hope her character gets a little more depth. She needs to be her own person with her own motivations, not a means to Lara’s narrative end.
It’s ironic that her whole deal is not liking how central Lara is to their lives, and yet her only notable contribution to the game is in her reaction to Lara. I don’t know how many of this gang we’ll ever see again, withthe sequel said to unite the Legend and Survivor timelines, or if therumours of Lara training a gang of proteges is true. But I hope the show does Reyes a little more justice, and the next Tomb Raider game can give its cast more room to shine.
