Board Thread:Episode Discussion/@comment-5430952-20200104163125/@comment-14909251-20200114031641

ChishioKunrin wrote: That does sound better, though again, how would Weiss or anyone else fake Watts' actual voice saying very specific things that perfectly line up with what happened? Councilman Sleet didn't believe the footage until he listened to Watts talking in the video. That seemed to be what got him to believe it.

I also have to wonder if Jacques had history with Watts, enough to trust him, unaware that Watts held no attachment to him. After all, not only did they seem somewhat familiar with each other, but we've known that the SDC has had a connection with the Atlas military's science team since Volume 2. In A Minor Hiccup, Ironwood states that the Atlesian Paladin was built from cooperation between Atlas scientists and the Schnee Dust Company. Given we saw how Watts was able to fabricate footage of Penny killing the people at the election party, I don't think it is a stretch to say a voice could be faked. The latter is probably less difficult. We don't know how effective his doctoring is because it is not like Ironwood needed to have the footage analyzed. He already knew what really happened. Not suggesting it would have been an argument that stuck, but it would have been an effective delaying tactic and allow him room to not get arrested immediately.

Alhazad2003 wrote:

I think you're forgetting one crucial detail: Jacques was already thrown off once he learned the heating in Mantle had been deactivated, on his authority no less. Which meant that he would've blamed for whatever chaos befell Mantle as a result. Think about what that would've done for his carefully crafted image. He was no longer about thinking about bringing down Ironwood, more like how he was going to mitigate the damages that were about to ensue. So there was no way he would've been able to bluff his way out of Weiss' accusations, especially when she had incriminating evidence, which also caught him saying he'd lay off all his employees if he didn't need their votes. Shows how much he cares about the people. That is hardly a crucial detail. His default response to adversity or challenge has consistently been anger and indignation, not panic. It also just leaves open the other problem that he gave some guy who pretended to be dead and was offering to do unsavory things for him his personal log-in credentials. Let's be clear: this is writing for wish-fulfillment, not due to anything more thought-out. Hell, if anything, the use of his account gave him the opening to say he was being subjected to a smear campaign and then blame Ironwood as the architecht. Someone was killing off Ironwood's critics after all.