Highlights

  • Borderlands 4 faces a challenge in introducing a new Siren character without breaking the tradition of playable Sirens that fans have come to expect.
  • The options for a new playable Siren are limited, as there are already three playable Sirens in previous games and two NPC Sirens in Borderlands 3.
  • The potential solutions of making Ava or Tannis playable Sirens in Borderlands 4 come with their own issues and may not fully address the problem.

Borderlands games evolved over the years from a fun and mesmerizing looter-shooter to a franchise with complex lore surrounding it, and Borderlands 4 is likely to take all this to the next level, especially following some big events from its predecessor. There's a lot of hype around Borderlands 4, although the title has yet to be officially announced, and the recent Gearbox tweet about the story so far in the series has fans hoping a reveal is coming soon. When it does happen, however, Borderlands 4 is already in a lose-lose situation concerning the introduction of a new Siren, something that has become a tradition for the series that Gearbox may not want to break.

Sirens are mysterious beings in Borderlands lore, as only six of them can exist at a time, but Borderlands 3's seventh Siren is starting to create an out for Gearbox if it so wishes to add more. The main issue is that there has always been a playable Siren in Borderlands games outside of spin-offs like Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel or Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, but there have also been a few Siren NPCs. As the story goes, so far there have been a total of five unique Siren powers revealed in the game, and three of them belong to playable characters.

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Borderlands 4 Is At a Fork In The Road With Vault Hunters

Borderlands 4 is likely still some time in the making, but when it comes out it needs to carefully choose what it wants to do with Vault Hunters.

Why Borderlands 4's Siren is Caught Between a Rock and a Hard Place

BL4 Can't 'Recycle' Past Sirens as Playable Characters

With three playable Sirens in the form of Lilith, Maya, and Amara, and then two NPC Sirens in Borderlands 3 being Tyreen Calypso and Patricia Tannis, Borderlands 4 is already out of options for a playable Siren. This Siren could be an all-new character with the sixth and final power revealed, also meaning a new Siren character can't really be introduced at the moment. If that happens, the only plausible explanation is that the new Siren NPC is someone with the same powers as Tyreen or possibly Lilith, although the state of her abilities and whether she is coming back are up in the air.

The problem is that Tyreen's Siren abilities are by nature easy to associate with "evil" characters and antagonists, so having a playable character with those powers to save the sixth and likely final Siren for later is not solving the problem. Another option would be to give Lilith's powers to the playable Siren in Borderlands 4, but that too is not a great solution considering that Lilith has been a playable character before.

It's worth noting that Tyreen's powers were Nyriad's first, and Tannis' abilities were the same as Angel's from Borderlands 2. Both Nyriad and Angel died, and eventually, these Siren powers were passed upon them.

Why Borderlands 4 Shouldn't Use Ava as a Playable Siren

Ava and Tannis Wouldn't Solve the Siren Conundrum in BL4

A potential solution would be to make Borderlands 3's Ava playable in BL4, but that doesn't seem a fantastic option either due to the heavy backlash the character got in the latest installment of the series and how she would also have the same powers as Maya, who was playable in Borderlands 2. There is also a chance the sixth Siren is introduced as an NPC and there is no playable Siren in BL4, but that would mean breaking a longstanding tradition, and a new playable Siren is something gamers have really come to expect from Borderlands as a whole.

Commander Steele from Borderlands 1 was also a Siren, but her powers were never revealed, and later she met her demise keeping this secret.

Having Ava as a playable character in Borderlands 4 does seem like a good option on paper, especially story-wise, but it could easily backfire. The last option would be to have Tannis become a playable character, but it too has its set of issues, seeing how she has been a recurring NPC in every mainline game and already has a big part to play in the story - especially after Lilith's ending in Borderlands 3. Sirens are a big part of Borderlands' lore and worldbuilding, and having a new playable one seems inevitable, but that doesn't mean it will be easy for Gearbox to address these potential issues.