Halo: Why Master Chief Can Activate The Madrigal Object

Warning! Spoilers ahead for Halo, episode 1

In the premiere episode of Paramount’s new Halo series, Master Chief activates a mysterious artifact found on the colony world of Madrigal. Engaging the alien forces of the Covenant, John-117 and his SPARTAN unit known as Silver Team discovered the object of unknown origin that the Covenant Elites had been looking for. However, it activated the moment Master Chief made physical contact with it. Here’s what makes John-117 so special, and how the object relates to the race of beings known as the Forerunners (who likely created the artifact).

In Halo episode 1, a colony on the planet Madrigal is attacked when the daughter of an insurrectionist leader named Kwan Ha and her friends stumbled across a detachment of Covenant forces. While the Covenant wasted no time wiping out the colony, the UNSC and Silver Team arrived to intercept, taking out the Elites and saving Kwan as the colony’s sole survivor. However, they soon realized that attacking the colony was not the Covenant’s primary mission.

Finding a dig site near the Covenant’s dropship, Master Chief and a fellow SPARTAN investigated the interior, discovering the mysterious object the Elites had been excavating. Not only was John-117 able to activate the artifact, but it seemingly restored fragments of memories that the SPARTAN program’s Doctor Halsey surmised belonged to Master Chief himself but that the UNSC had previously erased during his training. However, the reason why Master Chief John-117 was able to activate it at all likely has to do with the Forerunners from the preexisting Halo canon, an ancient race of beings who created the Halo rings and other technologies scattered across the galaxy. While the Covenant revere and worship the Forerunners as gods, humanity was chosen to be their successors. Furthermore, select humans known as Reclaimers can activate and interact with Forerunner technology while the Covenant cannot. As such, this is the most likely reason why the seemingly Forerunner artifact on Madrigal responded when Master Chief touched it, seeing as how he’s a Reclaimer in the continuity of the Halo games and novels.

Humanity was chosen by the Forerunners under what’s known as the Mantle of Responsibility. It’s also why the Covenant desires to wipe out mankind. Despite their inability to activate the technology, the Covenant believes they should be ones to take on the Forerunner’s Mantle with the Covenant Prophets motivating a holy crusade built on the lie that they’re the true successors. Unless this new series is planning to wildly deviate from the source material with its new Halo continuity and timeline, Master Chief activating the Madrigal object is likely because it’s Forerunner in origin.

The odds are good that the object will lead John-117 and his new ally Kwan to a Halo ring and its ability to wipe out all life in vast sections of space. Having been chosen to take on the Mantle of Responsibility as interplanetary protectors, it seems as though Master Chief will be integral to the UNSC learning about the Forerunners’ intentions for mankind. John-117 activating the Madrigal object is simply the first step. As such, the stakes of the Human-Covenant will likely get much higher as Halo continues.

Halo releases new episodes Wednesdays on Paramount+.

About The Author

Kevin Erdmann
(2557 Articles Published)

Kevin Erdmann is one of Screen Rant’s staff writers. With a major in Cinema Studies and a minor in Comics and Cartoon Studies from the UofO, Kevin is pretty sure he’s writing for the right site. While Kevin is a huge Marvel fan, he also loves Batman because he’s Batman and is a firm believer that Han shot first. Disney also shares a big part of his fan patronage. Kevin lives in Oregon with his wonderful wife and sinister cat who is no doubt currently plotting his demise.

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