With a roster of over 30 heroes that each has their own backstory to justify their superhuman abilities, it is not surprising that Overwatch 2 has a decent amount of lore to catch up on. Some of this is easy to come by, with players able to watch animated shorts like “Dragons” to learn about the conflict between Genji and Hanzo. Other bits of story are a bit more subtle, like the history between Symmetra’s Vishkar Corporation and Lucio’s father. However, some of the most important lore is tied to Overwatch’s six founders.
Though Overwatch has been reformed by Winston and features a new team of heroes that will be seen in the upcoming Overwatch 2 PvE campaign, the original group had an incredible run. Stopping the original Omnic Crisis and helping to achieve world peace is no small feat, but eventually, the group still crumbled. Since then, its founding members have experienced some very different fates, with some becoming anti-heroes, one assuming the role of a villain, and another even dying.
Soldier 76, Ana, and Reaper: Overwatch 2’s Vigilantes and Terrorists
While Jack Morrison was originally the leader of Overwatch, things have changed a lot for him since the first version of the group disbanded. Jack was a part of the event that marked the end of the group, as a fight between himself and Gabriel Reyes saw the Swiss HQ destroyed. The level of destruction was extreme, and though Jack was believed to have died in the explosion, he survived. Now, he spends his time hunting down criminals, believing that there was a conspiracy behind Overwatch’s shutdown. A proper vigilante, Soldier: 76 fights violence with violence as he hunts for the truth.
Ana Amari is another character who founded Overwatch but was believed dead, and she too used this as cover to become a vigilante called Shrike. While she keeps the people of Egypt safe, she let all of her friends - and her daughter Pharah - believe she was dead. This selfish decision makes Ana very complex, and it will be interesting to see what the future holds for her. Between the unfinished business with Widowmaker since she took Ana’s eye, and Ana’s relationship with her daughter being in desperate need of repair, there are a few directions for Blizzard to go in.
Though Reaper continues the trend of characters everyone thought was dead being alive, he did not serve as a protector after Overwatch disbanded. Instead, he went even further off the deep end, joining the terrorist organization Talon - a group Overwatch once fought against. Forever changed by Moira’s experiments, Gabriel Reyes went from a man willing to do the hard thing for the right reasons to a complete monster. He now hunts down the members of Overwatch who he believes wronged him and is in constant pain due to his condition.
Reinhardt, Torborn, and Echo: Overwatch 2’s Returning Heroes
Breaking the trend of heroes coming back from the dead, Reinhardt was a German Knight who defeated many Omnics in his younger years. Forced to retire due to old age, Reinhardt never lost his fighting spirit, and he eagerly joined the reformed Overwatch once Winston issued the Recall. Seen fighting in the Zero Hour animated short alongside his squire Brigitte, Reinhardt is likely happy to fight alongside a close friend one last time. Brigitte’s father and Reinhardt’s fellow Overwatch founder Torbjorn could end up joining the new version of the group as well. While Blizzard has not revealed much about what the turret builder and father of eight has been up to lately, aside from a friendship with Bastion, an engineer will always be useful in a fight.
This leaves Mina Liao as the final founding member of Overwatch to touch on, and unfortunately, she is the only one to no longer be alive at the time of Overwatch 2. Killed during an attack on her lab, the genius robotics expert has a complicated legacy. While she unfortunately was a key part of the Omnic Crisis, as her machines were the ones that went rogue and led to a massive loss of human life, she also created Echo. With Liao’s voice, personality, and likeness present within the Echo AI, she has found a way to live on after death, with Echo helping to right the wrongs of Liao’s mistake.
Overwatch 2 is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
