Gears of War/WMG

Marcus Fenix is a Time Lord
It seems to show up in every other WMG article. :shrug:
 * Alternatively, Queen Myrrah is a Time Lady.

Sera is an Alternate Universe version of Earth
This would explain all the similarities between each other (humans that speak the same languages being the dominant species, similar materials like rock, water and metal, similar weapons, humans having armies with a similar ranking structure, etc.) and yet all the differences between them at the same time (different geography and history, a gigantic separate race of beings living underground, humans having biceps bigger than their heads being commonplace among soldiers, etc.)
 * in fact. Sera isn't an alternative earth, is another planet, the humans find it because they completely wasted the energy resources from the planet... completely

Sera is a outer planet that was forgotten by people before Unification War.
The Alliance just erased it from any info sources after noticing that there was a giant war going on on it, figuring that if something works, keep using it (Erasing traces of planets, that is). == The Locusts base their civilization around Imulsion pools, where they use the light as shelter from the Kryll. The whole reason for the war is that COG drilling for Imulsion is causing the Imulsion pools to disappear from the Locust tunnels, and thus causing Locusts to be eaten en mass as their sources of light slowly disappear. == With the exception of General RAAM, it's repeatedly shown that the Kryll are completely unaffiliated with the Locusts, and will eagerly devour Locusts if given the opportunity. It's also show that the Kryll and the Locusts both live in the underground tunnel network beneath the surface of Sera. In the game, while exploring the tunnels, Imulsion seems to be the only source of light down there. As light is the only way to ward off mass extinction via being eaten by the Kryll, this is a very obvious rationale for why Imulsion seems so important to the Locusts. RAAM's particular ability may be a special monk-like skill that takes years to master and is not a practical solution for most of the Locust civilization.

Myrrah's monologue from the end of the first game indicates that the Locusts simply cannot stop fighting the war, and will continue to do so until they are extinct. Them fighting for their very survival would go a long way towards explaining this attitude.
 * This theory seems Jossed by Gears of War 2. In fact, it seems Imulsion is The Virus to the Locusts.
 * Alternatively, this might have something to do with the Kryll being extinct now. It's noted that the Lightmass Bomb obliterated the Kryll breeding grounds and there are no Kryll to be seen in Gears 2; perhaps the Kryll provided some sort of ecological balance and now that they're gone, it's starting to crack. After all, there were no Lambent in Gears 1 except some wretches, and the Lambent Wretches were associated with the normal Locust. Marcus does note that it's possible the civil war has been going on for a long, long time, but this seems unlikely given the visits underground in Gears 1 that showed no signs of it.
 * The "visits" in Gears 1 was a single short commando raid into an uninhabited section of the Hollow, and Dom points out that no one has been underground since the start of the war.
 * The Wretches are affiliated with the Locust, sure, but they seem more like attack dogs than a species of Locust. A Locust becoming Lambent is likely seen by Myrrah as someone would see a human who has contracted something like mad cow disease or rabies or something.
 * Canonically, the civil war between the Locust Horde and Lambent Locusts has been going on since before the war with the humans, so that suggests more than a decade at least. In fact, it was the alleged reason for the war with the humans. The theory might still work, though; the locust could have lived near immulsion pools, even if the pools weren't safe to go in.

Sera is Mars in the distant past.
Sera is Ares spelled backwards, which is another name for the God of War, Kratos Mars. It's already hinted that the COG use of the Lightmass Bomb at the end of the first game has resulted in an unintentional planetary holocaust, perhaps the destruction eventually spreads to the point that the entire planet becomes uninhabitable.
 * A bit of extrapolation on the last point: The draining of much of Sera's oceans at the end of Gears of War 2 (It'd take a HELLUVA lot of water to flood The Hollow) could have been what started the disappearance of Sera/Mars's Oceans.
 * Another thing supporting this idea from Gears 2. The characters pronounce Sera with a long e, rather than a short e, which would be what you get if you pronounce Ares backwards.

Adam Fenix was trying to negotiate with the Locust Horde.
In the extra levels in the Windows version of Gears of War, dialogue between Marcus and Dom indicates that Marcus' father was considered a traitor by the COG for trying to ""prevent the war before it began", or words to that effect. Adam Fenix also has an incredibly abnormally detailed amount of data about the Locusts' tunnels in his research lab.
 * The Locust Queen's dialogue in Gears of War 2 seems to hint that this might be true.

Since the backstory seems to indicate Adam Fenix was executed by General RAAM, apparently he didn't do so good.
 * Except the ending in Gears 2 shows you he's alive and kicking.
 * He wasn't killed by RAAM.

Myrrah is Marcus' mother.
No real evidence for this (other than Mrs. Fenix never being mentioned in the game), it's just that it would be a really funny Mind Screw.
 * Seems Jossed; Myrrah doesn't recognize Marcus as anything but his father's son.
 * I can also imagine the look on her face as she read that...
 * Could be jossed, but not necessarily. It's a fair explanation for how she knew just who Marcus was as soon as they met; she might have simply chose not to tell him for whatever reason.
 * Jossed-the wiki says Marcus is the son of Dr. Elain Fenix and Adam, of course. Maybe Myrrah's his sister, or a clone of some sort created with Adam Fenix's DNA. There's also a WMG below about Myrrah being Ruth.
 * I don't know, I think that when Elain went underground to look for Imulsion crystals she...changed. I can easily see her changing her name and appearance to the point where Marcus couldn't recognized her, not to mention he hasn't seen her in decades. I mean it's not the first time a woman that the main character knows was turned into the leader of another species.
 * She changed into a dead body. Which was found by Marcus and Adam. Cliffy B has even said it would be very stupid and cliche if Myrrah was Marcus' mom.

Myrrah is Sarah Kerrigan, and The Locust are the humanoid evolution of the Zerg after being repressed for centuries and forgotten
I mean, look at their similarities in both tactics and social structure. The Zerg, the hive minded scourge of the universe, defeated the Terrans and the Protoss, but not before taking critical losses and being forced to hibernate underground for millennia, evolving into humanoid creatures and losing their spacefaring abilities. Eventually, the surviving humans came to Sera, and settled there, eventually forgetting a time that they weren't on Sera, and, eventually, awakening the Zerg, which promptly declare their evolved form the Locust and fight the battle for dominance once again.
 * Meanwhile, the Sires were created by Samir Duran, still up to his old tricks after millennia of hiding.
 * And the name Sera is a corruption of the popular Terran planet-name-closer "Sara", as in "Mar Sara" and "Chau Sara".

Myrrah is an Overlord, and the Locust are beefed-up Minions
This game clearly takes place long after any of the Overlord games, during which the Minions became stronger, but still not much smarter. The Browns became Grubs, the Blues developed into the Kantus, the Reds became Flame Grenadiers, and the Greens devolved into the lowly Wretches. This would also explain Myrrah's humanoid appearance and her unforgiving outlook on humans; after all, it is customary for an Overlord.

Myrrah is Maria, Dom's long-lost wife
This makes marginally more sense. Maria Santiago, Dom's wife, disappeared during the war after her children were killed, and hasn't been seen since. She's supposedly going to be playing a large role in Gears of Wars 2's storyline. Myrrah sounds an awfully lot like Maria.
 * Jossed by the second game: Myrrah and Maria are both seen on-screen, and they are different characters.

Also, for the apparent leader of the Locust Horde, Myrrah's voice sounds human, as opposed to the more alien speech-patterns shown by Locust soldiers and General RAAM.

Locust Generals will be a standard enemy in Gears of War 2
In a case of Degraded Boss, Tartarus the Brute Chieftain was the final boss of Halo 2, and Halo 3 features Brute Chieftains as high-ranking standard enemies. Likewise, just as General RAAM was the final boss of Gears of War, Gears of War 2 will feature tough, but slow-moving, minigun-wielding Locust Generals (probably without a Kryll shield, though) fulfilling a similar combat role to Boomers. The tough, slow-moving minigunner is a common shooter enemy role that hasn't yet been filled in Gears of War.
 * I think the Boomers fill this role as well.
 * In the sequel, the tough but slow-moving minigun-wielding Locust position is filled by Boomers called Grinders, who wield their Mulchers just like they do the Boomshots. And yes, they do yell "GRIND!" right before they spin up their gun.

Sera is a long lost Earth colony
Earth started to send droves of colony ships out in space to repopulate other planets. But the sera colony got lost in space and landed on planet sera. Thus rebuilding their human history and civilization. The descendants probably forgot about this past incident decades or centuries later. Likely The COG's (and other past governments) know of this, And is hiding their history from the public because they don't want it undermining their governments. Or at least if not A long lost earth colony, it's THE earth colony. The ship/s they came to sera with are probably damaged or are considered a Lost Technology. possibly lost through the centuries they been on sera.
 * Alternatively it's a sort of castaway prison/detention planet. Where the castaways were sent there centuries ago and they formed their own governments/civilization. Eventually forgetting or not teaching the younger generation on how humans came to sera, either out of spite or lost history.

Marcus Fenix is bald.
He wears the bandana for the same reason Hulk Hogan does.
 * The novel says it's because he doesn't like his crew cut. So, close enough.
 * Jossed in Gear 3, though maybe he just hasn't cut his hair recently.

The humans of Sera are losing the war because of their equipment.
First off - The standard issue COG armour. Marcus says to Ben Carmine in the tutorial of Gears of War 2 after Ben mantles over some cover: "Nice mantle rook. Not an easy move to make in full gear." which implies their armour is very heavy and greatly hampers their mobility, and that most Gears can't easily move around, and since we all know that the armour doesn't make them Immune to Bullets, it means most Gears are easy targets out of cover.

Second - The Lancer's bullet calibur. The magazine of it is around the size of modern assault rifle magazines - maybe even smaller. You can try seeing it fall to the ground in Gears of War (well, 2, at least, that's what I checked it in). But since the modern assault rifle magazines I'm comparing it to use 5.56 x 45mm NATO rounds, and hold 30 rounds, that would mean the 60/50 magazines of the Lancer within Gears of War 1/2 have rounds which are roughly half the overall size of common real assault rifle ones. Bullets around half the size of standard assault rifle rounds could probably be shaken off by people under the effects of an adrenaline rush, and since the Locust have stronger and harder bodies than humans, could shake them off easily. Increasing the size off the bullets probably wouldn't affect most Gears negatively as the playable characters seem to be capable of firing on full automatic and still be aimed on the target for around 2 seconds (this is going into assumption - I've never actually fired a gun, and can't really say the effects of recoil on different competent people). In essence, the Lancer assault rifle's bullets are too small to effective fight the super-tough Locust.

Third: The standard Gear helmets which cause them to look like The Faceless. As You Know, you would not be able to see very well at all wearing those, which, naturally, would allow you to be easily flanked. The standard Drones of the Locust Horde are stated to use swarm tactics, which would be very effective against the 'can't see shit' Gear.
 * My experience with the weapons in Gears 2 leads me to believe that the Lancer is, in fact, greatly superior to the Locust Hammerburst because of its full-auto-capable nature. While the Hammerburst does seem to fire larger, more damaging rounds, place two people twenty feet apart and have them open up on each other and the one with the Lancer will win every time. Also, the rounds for the Lancer are probably smaller, but the discarded clips are significantly longer than standard assault rifle ammunition, suggesting a longer cartridge with as much or more powder. COG Centaurs seem capable enough in good hands against Brumaks, but the King Raven does not seem able to defend itself adequately against Nemacyst or Reavers. The COG clearly could use some form of jet aircraft able to outrun these threats for close air support and removing Reavers/Seeders.
 * Granted, the cartridges could be longer, but would that still mean a bullet which is overall smaller than a real-life one (so they can fit 50 cartridges in a magazine roughly the same volume as a real-life one) is hitting the super-tough Locust, who may be able to shrug it off as Its Just A Flesh Wound. The force of the bullet is presumably around the same as another assault rifle, to keep the recoil manageable (though as players would note, it's pretty easy in the hands of our inexplicitly strong protagonists).
 * I, a Lancer-favouring person, get my ass kicked by my Hammerbust-using little brother's accuracy on a still target while mashing the fire button. Are you sure you remembered to do that in your test? Pressing the fire button real fast on the Hammerbust has its fire rate ramp up.
 * I second the above troper. The Gears 2 Hammerburst is an overpowered win machine. It's the only weapon I have ever felt was overpowered aside from the quickly-remedied 50 HP Backburner.


 * WRT "full gear:" Doing a mantle is difficult to do in "less" restrictive gear like what the modern US Army wears. You could ask a soldier in modern full kit to do that move, and he could do it, but it would be pretty hard, too.
 * WRT rifle calibers: Single Lancer bursts have been shown to easily kill Locust in cutscenes. Also, Lancer magazines are twice the size of the magazines of your typical M16 or other NATO 5.56x45mm rifle.
 * They look much larger, but I'm sure they are clearly at least half as thin as the common 5.56x45mm's magazines. So, it would presumedly hold around the same amount of 5.56x45mm's cartridges as them.
 * The magazines look, to me at least, far wider than STANAG magazines, closer to triple- or quadrouple-stacked rather than STANAG's double stacked. Even with 5.56 NATO or 6.8 Remington, 50 or 60 rounds could easily fit in that magazine.
 * Lancer bullets look like they shoot WAAAAYYYYY faster than what we have. Look at the bullet holes in concrete, the rounds go so fast that they burn holes in it. Stopping power isn't reliant on the size of the round, it's reliant on how many joules the round puts in the target. If a round is half the size of a 5.56 NATO, but it's shot at about 5 or 6 times the speed of a 5.56 round, it's gonna do more damage. The reason they don't seem to have much stopping power is because CO Gs where power armor made of space medal and Locust are 7 foot tall thick-skinned lizard men.

The humans of Sera are in some way responsible for creating the Locust.
This is greatly implied but never explicitly confirmed during Gears of War 2. The New Hope Research Facility is filled with stasis tanks full of weird Locust like hybrids. The fact that when the project was shut down, the subjects of the research were taken to Mount Kandar (under which the Locust palace just happens to be) seems to be too much of a coincidence. The only thing buggering up this theory is that it seems so unlikely that the Locust could have built up such a large civilisation so quickly (although it is not specified as to when the New Hope project was finished) or the fact that there are even more ancient ruins under Sera.
 * In order to create a human-Locust hybrid, wouldn't the Locust have to have existed already?
 * Part-way transformed Locust men would be more accurate.
 * I agree and am willing to bet that The Locust were some sort of secret weapon created to be used in the Pendulum Wars. That would tie-in with all of Myrrah's babbling about how humans are responsible. That is also why The Locust started taking prisoners in 2, which surprised Delta. They were creating more soldiers.
 * Consider the WMG below, that Myrrah is Ruth from the New Hope Medical File.

The Locust Queen is Ruth from the New Hope Medical File.
Since the Sires are still locked in their tanks when you get to New Hope, we can only assume that they were failed experiments. Ruth was their first success, keeping her consciousness and intelligence instead of devolving into a snarling beast with dreadlocks. She was, of course, kept in captivity and studied for a long time, which is where the Captivity Marks come in. Eventually she escapes underground after being taken to Mount Kedar, and runs into the Locust, who currently don't give a Kryll's ass about the surface or the humans on it. However, it just so happens that their calendar has predicted the coming of their new queen, and Ruth ends up in the throne, using her new-found authority to take revenge on the humans who imprisoned and experimented on her. Cue Emergence Day.
 * Word of God essentially confirms this.

RAAM is alive and leading the Lambent.
Locust become Lambent from exposure to Imulsion, and having an Imulsion bomb detonated next to you while your train car plummets into a crater filled with the crap sure as hell counts as "exposure" to me. As for the "leading" bit, the Lambent would not fight back against their queen unless they had found a new leader to motivate them. As for whether RAMM returns on your side, or returns to kick both human and Locust ass deserves a WMG of its own.

RAAM cannot control Kryll.
They're attacking him. He's just so Badass they're not even hurting him. End of story.
 * It wouldn't surprise me. They've learned to associate the roar of a Troika with agonizing death, and while RAAM calls to them, they come looking for a meal, hear/see the Troika, and fly around him.
 * Then why do the Kryll leave Raam and attack the player when Raam points at the player?
 * "Hey, look. Humans! Go eat them and stop annoying me!"

The Locust Queen is Helen Cooper, the creator of the Lightmass Process.
Many people have speculated that the Locust Queen was originally human, as she appears very humanoid compared with the rest of the Locust, and there are hints to this, notably in the New Hope facility.

Locust are humans mutated by Imulsion. Lambent Locust are created by over-exposure to Imulsion.
At least the first locust were created this way, then they procreated into the horde they are now. The New Hope facility was created in an attempt to monitor and control the process and Rust-Lung is an early stage of this mutation. Imulsion drilling done by the humans stirred up the imulsion and created the lambent. This would explain just about everything, especially Myrrah's repeated statement that the humans are ultimately at fault here.
 * Very likely considering that, in one piece of collectible data, a human test subject at New Hope was described as undergoing physical changes (hardening, graying skin, loss of hair, etc...) that match the appearance of Locust Drones.
 * It's more likely he was turning into a Sire, which seem to be unholy hybrids of human and Locust DNA.
 * Another intel item has Baird remarking that it's strange that there are apparently no Locust children. So if there are no kids, where do the adult Locusts come from? Converted humans is a decent guess.
 * Boston America is trying to turn us into Locust!
 * Alternatively, it resurrects dead bodies. This would be really poetic and fit Go W's occasional "War is bad, mkay?" theme.
 * Jossed in Gears 3;

The non-humanoid Locust (Brumaks, Reavers, Tickers, Corpsers, etc...) are simply natives of the Seran underground that were tamed and put to use by the Locust.
We don't really see any references to experiments at New Hope or anywhere else creating creatures like these, and we know Sera has conditions wholly unlike those on Earth (razorhail, anyone?) so it's entirely possible these things evolved naturally.
 * When you get to the New Hope facility it is clearly overrun by Wretches right from the start, about halfway through the mission, the Locust turn up and Dom acts surprised. This suggests that the Wretches at least are separate from the Locust and exist as wild animals.
 * Additionally, it has been stated that Brumaks share a remarkably similar DNA profile to that of a gorilla, possibly indicating an Imulsion-related mutation.

Immulsion is sentient.
The only way to explain how the lambent appear to be a different faction intstead of just mindless killers. The fact excess immulsion from a fallen drone actually retracted back into the rest seems to prove this.

Sera has notably higher gravity than Earth.
This would explain why Marcus and the other Gears are so freaking huge, and why they don't jump much.

Dizzy is a Memetic Badass and the Big Bad of Gears 3
If I recall correctly, Dizzy drops off the map and is MIA after you last see him fighting off Skorge. Only Tai was confirmed captured. Obviously, Skorge wouldn't have left Dizzy alive or uncaptured if he could help it. The only possible explanation is that Dizzy handed Skorge his butt in the fight, no, not with the Lancer, but with his Cowboy hat. While Skorge was retreating, he managed to rescue Tai from the hat-wielding fiend. The locust were actually performing surgery on Tai to repair the trauma caused just by watching Dizzy's onslaught, but the damage had been done! Obviously, Marcus has killed so many locust that they will not be able to fend off this new menace ~ that is why Daddy Fenix is angry at you.
 * Well, you're at least partially right - there's a Dizzy Fan Club thread on Epic Games' forum, where he is naturally, a Memetic Badass.

Skorge is not dead.
All you really see is him falling to the ground at the end of the Hydra battle. He doesn't get impaled on any sharp rocks or anything. Knowing how resilent Locust can be...it's possible he'll be back for Gears 3.
 * Here's hoping he'll actually be able to put up a fight or be on our side.
 * Given the Deader Than Dead treatment used for most deaths in the series, this is a real possibility.
 * Combining this with another guess above, he will be around to compete with the new Big Bad lambent RAAM in Gears 3.

Immulsion is really The Lifestream.
If you think about it, it does have some pretty close parallels to FF7's Lifestream.
 * Weird inexplicable glow? Check.
 * Sentience, or at least semi-sentience? Check.
 * Excellent Power Source? Check.
 * Used by mad-scientist in weird experiments? Check.
 * Unpleasant side-effects from exposure? Check.

This could also explain why the Locust were so hell-bent on eradicating the Humans. They were killing the planet.

Immulsion is really Phazon.
All of the above criteria also apply to Phazon, and the Metroid Prime series has shown that it can take different colors, at least blue and red, so why not a sickly yellow-green? It was the first thing I thought of after reading "Immusion is sentient" above.

Gears of War 3 will feature a human-Locust alliance
The Lambent are building up to be more powerful than anything else on Sera, sometime soon both sides will realise that they need to work together to defeat a greater enemy.
 * Combine this guess with the one below and you've got humans and locusts fighting a lambent-human-locust force, unless the idea above that lambentified humans become locusts is right. Still it is potentially awesome, two armies fighting together against a copy army that glows, using brumaks and centaur tanks together against partially lambentified brumaks(or some other big thing) and centaurs, with the hammer of dawn being the only advantage the non-lambent have, unless there's a bit where the hammer falls into enemy hands.
 * Jossed. The only thing humans and Locust can agree on is that the Lambent need to be shot. That does not preclude them from shooting each other, and they do this quite a bit.

Rustlung is a far bigger problem than anyone realises
After releasing large amounts of imulsion into the air, many humans are coming down with an unexplained disease. Now what other health problem do we know of caused by imulsion exposure? They're being Lambentified.
 * Also, let's look at the post credits line where Marcus' Father seemed pretty miffed that Humanity has carried out the plan he was suggesting. Why? Not that they Had carried it out, But the Method they used to do so, Another Light Mass Bomb. Compare this to how the Locust were attempting to carry out the exact same plan, a more Natural method of using a Giant Worm. That was a safe, imulsion emition free solution. The Locust Understand the problem with Imulsion, which is why they're attacking humans, to stop them using it. Which is why they Get More And More Desperate with Each Big Imulsion Based Explosion we humans cause. Mark my words, now there's been a second Giant Imulsion Explosion, Rustlung, or maybe something even worse, will be on the rise in the third game.

The locust are humans!
Think about it, Niles from the secret facility in Go W 2 talks about how human culture is "corrupted", he is likely refering to Sera's warlike past, and how constant battle is killing the planet. So his team tried to mutate humanity in to a hive-like species to unite them and save their society. The sires where the first experiment gone wrong. At some point there may have been an uprising of some sorts which led to the test subjects retreating to the underground. The locust are fighting the war for revenge after what they had to go through in the name of science.

The Locust Queen is a Precursor
She doesn't much look like your run-of-the-mill locust. Gears 2 seems to imply that the locust were genetic experiments on humans, but those underground ruins are much older than a few decades. Perhaps Myrrah is the last of her kind and she blames the humans for the death of her race. In multiplayer, she seems to refer to the locust as a separate race that she is using for her own goals.

RAAM was The Starscream
This ties in with another theory above. He was supposed to kill Adam Fenix, but he obviously did not. He takes a dive into an immulson pool, and now there is a new lambent Locust faction out to take over the joint. I think he had some bad blood with the queen for a long while now. In fact, he may be intentionally holding the surviving Kryll back, so the humans can have enough room to launch operations and hurt the main locust horde more.

Dom has a Son/Daughter
Maria was pregnant when her and Dom got separated, and Dom will meet his son or daughter (or twins?) later on in the series.
 * I seem to recall some promotional material from Gears 1 that said Dom lost both his wife and a son on E-day, so this is possible.
 * My Dom action figure's packaging says he lost two sons.
 * And the novels say he lost a son and a daughter (Benedicto and Sylvia). Jesus, Dom. Keep track of your damn kids!

The ligtmass bomb and the sinking of Jacinto are part of the Locust Queen's Evil Plan to completely cripple the humans
The ligthmass bomb ultimately did more damage to the humans than to the Locust through Rustlung, and the sinking of Jacinto has destroyed their last safe haven and has likely caused untold damage to the ecosystem. They're making the surface more and more uninhabitable for themselves, and the Locust can easily regain their numbers, so if they keep up this pattern of temporarily stopping the Locust at the cost of the planet, then eventually there won't be any more humans and the Locust can just waltz on up.

Marcus has Rustlung
But he's such a badass that it doesn't do anything to him except make his voice really scratchy.
 * You Know, combined with some of the Above ideas, that could have some very Interesting Consequences...

Gears of War takes place in Warhammer 40000
Lessee... we got Imulsion, which is clearly infused with the Warp, we got chainsaws, we got really big guns, we got Tyranid offshoots (probably started with a genestealer), we got a clear and present interest in More Dakka, we got badasses coming out of our ears...
 * Note that Gears in full armour bear a passing resemblance to Space Marines. Also, the COG has conscription, something the Imperium is totally all about.
 * The Locust seem more like Orks to me. Maybe Gears is set before the Age of Strife, and the Gear's armor was engineered into the space marine armor when humanity screwed itself over. The locusts themselves are Orks that haven't developed their Orkiness yet and Lambants are possibly the next step before the entire species turn green.
 * My theory is that it takes place on a planet forgotten by the Imperium for whatever reason, and it's been like that for several centuries. At first they absolutely raped the indigenous aliens with their superior weaponry, but after being forgotten and stranded they eventually ran out of ammo and had to start making their own weaker weapons, and after a while the Locust noticed and started the war. The Gears are either the watered down offspring or watered down clones of Space Marines. The final game will end with the Imperium discovering the planet again and sending down Space Marines to take care of the Locust, and Marcus and the other Gears will be drafted into the Imperial Guard as super elite soldiers.
 * I like the idea of EXTERMINATUS better. It'd at least be funny since it practically happened before.

There Will Be At Least Four Games
Forgetting that one of the guys at Epic was saying they're going to milk this for a decade, I mean, make it last for a decade, let me point out the number of Carmines left. According to Carmine Number 2, there are 3 left, including himself. Gears one had a Carmine die. Gears 2 had yet another Carmine die. Let's face it, the Carmines are the Gears' Kenny. We have two left, so that's at least two more games, unless they're going to kill two off next time to mix things up a bit. Past that? Maybe Mr Carmine is still alive, or if he's not currently, maybe we're going to have a prequel where he is, for him to die during. Past that? Ummm Carmine Cousins? Or maybe even... well, as far as I can remember, Carmine only ever spoke of Brothers, who's to say he doesn't also have some sisters?
 * Of course, Carmine dying can only be done for so long. D. Carmine (the 4th carmine) will most likely survive just to confuse us.
 * Of course D. Carmine survives. He's going to be a muscular powerhouse built like a Berserker who dual-wields Mulchers with Chainsaw Bayonets and who wears a tank top, Hulk-style ripped pants, boots, and a helmet (because no armor could ever hope to fit on such a wall of pure manliness). If he ever starts to lose, Dizzy will show up and give him his Cowboy Hat, which will turn him into a Brumak mounted with hundreds of Hammers of Dawn. The only thing you fight for the rest of the game are Wretches.
 * You, sir, win the internet. And chances are he'll survive, depending on what the fandom thinks. One problem though, it's Clayton Carmine. Oh well.
 * ALL MEN ARE WRETCHES COMPARED TO THE MIGHT OF D. CARMINE!
 * It does fit into the Carmine Escalation Principle-- Anthony was a dribbling moron who got capped by a little thing like a .50 Caliber sniper bullet to the head. Benjamin was an expert sniper who had to be killed by digestive parasites in a monster worm's stomach. Clayton can choke out a drone, starts off with a Torque Bow, and.

All the Carmines Are A Reference To Saving Private Ryan
Same as above, but either one act or one mission in Gears of War 4 will involve saving the fourth Carmine.

The fourth Carmine won't be saved because he'll be the one doing the saving.
I don't think there will really be a fourth Gears of War game, what with the pervasiveness of the trilogy structure in modern entertainment and all. Instead, the third game will introduce the third Carmine who, following the pattern, will survive further into the game than either of the brothers that came before him. In fact, he is so long-lived that, by the time something comes along that can kill him, it's a serious enough threat to require a Big Damn Heroes moment to save Delta. And that Big Damn Hero will be the fourth Carmine, itching for revenge for his brothers...

The fourth Carmine will kill a Berserker with his bare hands
. In a moment of rage over the deaths of his lost brothers, the fourth Carmine will throw off his mask, climb on top of a Berserker's back, and rip out its spinal column. After this, he will sharpen its spine into a spear, and use it to stab the eyes out of a Brumak, before climbing onto a Corpser's head and plunging his hand deep into its brain.
 * I will be very disappointed it they don't do that, or at least top that.

The last Gears of War game will have a mission level called "Saving Private Carmine"
...cause all his brothers are dead and he gets to go home. Plus it really fits with the vicious theme of these games.
 * ...but he dies anyway, because that'd be even more vicious and keep the theme of the Carmines' dying over and over.

The fourth Carmine will be Dizzy
Think about it, everyone is already figuring the fourth Carmine brother will be awesome to counteract the deaths of the other three, and the name scheme is kind of obvious (A. Carmine, followed by B. Carmine) With this pattern we'll be left with C. Carmine and D. Carmine. Now who do we already know who's awesome and name starts with a D? That's right, Dizzy. He'll show he's not dead and reveal himself as a Carmine brother in the same badass save the party scenario as listed above.
 * While Dizzy did survive Skorge, his family name is Wallin.

The Gears are all emaciated under their bulky armor.
They don't need to have lots of muscles because their suits work like the power armor from Halo, and can't be fat, since Sera is so impoverished. Therefore, when they're out of uniform, they're a bunch of skinny dudes.
 * Go to the main page. Look at Coles arms.
 * Sera is so impoverished because all the food goes to Gears to keep them in fighting shape. I mean, come on. LOOK AT COLE'S ARMS.

Dizzy has a family relation to Marcus
Though the only basis is behind-the-scenes: They're voiced by the same person. Hey, at least I'm not saying anyone has relations to characters from other series.

Gears of War takes place within the Unreal universe
. Either the far future or the past. Hey, they're made by the same company, and Unreal Tournament III has graphics similar to Gears of War
 * Of course! The Nanoblack and Necris are what they came up with to fight against the Imulsion filled Lambent and their shinyness since black and glowing white are complete opposites of each other.

Adam Fenix created the Locust inadvertently/Locust are human
. It goes something like this. Humans arrive on Sera, not knowing that its a death world. After the Pendulum Wars, Adam realizes that if humanity (at least on Sera) were to survive and thrive, they would need to adapt as well as resist Imulsion poisoning. To do so, he discovers Locust... but not the locusts of the games, but generally peaceful/harmless versions that don't at all resemble what they are in the games - possibly even it just being some sort of virus or what not. His idea? Mutation and crossbreeding, creating proto-Sires in the hopes that humans (now Locust) would be able to thrive better. He did his job too well (not well enough) and these Sires escape, recruiting and changing others as they go. The Sires in the second game are a continual attempt to make controllable Locust. This is also why COG glassed the planet which would not make any sort of sense (outside of desperate scorched earth policy) if the Locust live underground (it doesn't take a genius to realize that trying to shoot something through miles of bedrock doesn't work). The series ends with a human-Locust baby - a new branch of humanity, combining the best of human and locust abilities (and resistant to Imulsion).

Adam Fenix is an A.I., like Niles
This could explain how he's still around after seemingly being killed in the past. The message from Adam at the end of Gears 2 has the same grainy sound as Niles' broadcasts in the New Hope facility.
 * Adam Fenix is.

The Gears of War series isn't going to end well.
The humans have scorched the surface of Sera to oblivion in an attempt to keep the locust from claiming it. They've destroyed the underground (which probably had just as much biodiversity as the surface, if not more), and from the looks of the trailer for Gears 3, things don't get a whole lot better after they sink Jacinto and kill most of the Locust. The war between the humans and the locust horde may have already decimated the planet to the extent that it can't support enough food for either species to survive at sustainable levels.

There is a decent chance that Gears 3 will end with the planet being completely destroyed, but even if it doesn't, the Gears Universe already seems to be post-apocalyptic. There is almost no way that the locust or humans can get out of their war alive, and even if one of them does win, all they're going to inherit is an ashen wasteland that probably doesn't have very much arable land left (if any).
 * Jossed. Its a Bittersweet Ending, but mankind survives.

The Locust invasion is a Blight.
Think about it. If you've played both games I shouldn't have to explain it, but for those of you who haven't:

Locust: come from underground. Darkspawn: Come from underground.

Locust: Huge numbers, swarm tactics, human weaponry. Darkspawn: Huge numbers, swarm tactics, human weaponry.

Locust: Kidnap people for no known reason. Darkspawn: Kidnap people for no known reason. (note: there could be, I haven't beaten DAO yet)

Gears of War: Does not take place on Earth. Dragon Age Origins: Does not take place on Earth.

I rest my case.


 * Note that the in-game codex for Dragon Age explicitly compares the way the Darkspawn swarm as "like a horde of locusts."

Humans are actually an evolution from the Locust.
I honestly have no support for this, but since a common theory is that humans exposed to imulsion create Locust, it would be itneresting to see that really, Locust are the original natives of Sera, and some were mutated by imulsion into humans. Lambent locust are actually starting to transform into humans, hence why they are fighting the other locust and vice versa. They only attack you because they are half-and-half, and their locust dna is telling them to kill humans. This would explain why, despite apparently using imlusion extensively, rustlung only appeared after it became a gaseous form: since humans evolved due to imulsion, they are immune to any negative effects of the liquid form.

Near the end of the Gears 3, a portal will open up to regular Earth.
And the surviving Carmine will go through it, where he will become an incredible bowler until he's killed by a mob boss by being dropped down an elevator shaft. Onto some bullets.

Sera is a Genius Loci and Emulsion is the lifeblood of it.
My friend (T) and I (I) had been in the Emulsion pumping station in Gears 1, and I commented that the rock formations nearby, like the stalagmites (or is it stalactites?) and the ceiling of the cavern looked uncomfortably organic. His response was that the whole planet was uncomfortably organic-the rocks look organic, the plants took charge in urban areas that should have been irradiated way too quickly, and there is razorhail, which comes at a disturbingly inconvenient time. All of these point to two facts-one, Sera is a Death World, two, the planet seems to hate everyone. Then we jumped to the conclusion that the planet could be a Genius Loci.

Also, Emulsion is found in way larger quantities and in more convenient locations than any naturally occurring substance logically should, so then I jumped from there to the conclusion that it is Sera's lifeblood, and it put it there so that the humans and Locust could use it. But, as we all know, Humans Are Bastards and Aliens Are Bastards, so they fucked up-the Locust caused whatever it was that made the Lambent, (The Locust are bastards. Desperate bastards but bastards nonetheless. They are definitely at fault for something.) and the Humans fought over the emulsion and eventually orbitally bombarded Sera, which got righteously pissed and went all Gaia's Vengeance on them, using the Lambent as its revenge against all who destroyed it.

It's all just a really dumbed down stripped away remake of basic Celtic Mythology
Malicious things driven underground messing with the humans. Think about it.

Gears of War is the end result of Dwarf Fortress.
Dwarves of the Fortress variety tend to build their homes in dark areas with lots of magma - Imulsion - and water sources. They also build needlessly complex architecture all over the place and sever all contact with the outside world except for setting humans/elves/goblins on fire. Gears of War is this scenario, but millions of years into the future. The swords and hammers have been replaced by Lancers and Hammerbursts; dwarves have lost all skin pigment from being underground for so long; humans have attempted contact with the locust (diplomats and liaisons) and failed; and finally, humans will never understand why the Locust fight because they are getting their orders directly from the player, a malicious and malevolent being in its own right.

Queen Myrrah is in fact Romily
Aside from looking too human to be a Locust, the old nursery tale might hint at what really happened.

Sera was a UNSC Colony

 * It all makes sense to me, Sera used to be one of the UNSC's main Colonies before the Covenant attacked, their attack on Earth forced the UNSC to stray and Sera was lost and eventually developed into its own government, which any minute, can be found by the UNSC.
 * Assuming Sera was cut off at the absolute beginning of the war, there is still less than a 30 year period before the UNSC would be able to return there. That is not enough time for Sera's technology to change that much, especially with some of it becoming more advanced, while it is less advanced in other areas. The manufacturing capabilities are also too different Sera can mass produce armor on a level that would bankrupt the entire UNSC.
 * Except the novels mention that the COG is literally running on fumes. Weapons and armour are now almost more valuable than the people who wield them. The UNSC, however, still had ships on the line at the end of the Human-Covenant war. In fact, they could technically out-produce the Covenant.
 * Actually, it would make more sense if the colony was lost far before the Human-Covenant war, or never had alliance to the UNSC in the first place. After all, the UNSC at it's largest point consisted of over 800 planets, and it took about 300 years for it to get that big. It's also confirmed by the novels that not all of them were founded by official efforts. All that was needed was a large enough ship, and a large enough population. It's not to far a stretch to imagine a fed-up politician, possible one of the Kolsovic revolutionires that the UNSC defeated in the early 2100's, getting together his followers, packing up into a starship, and going to some unknown planet to escape the "tyranny of Earth," or whatever. 300 years is plenty of time for the COG to set it set itself up, discover Imulsion, and have the 60+ year long Pendulum Wars happen. Plus the 15 years of the Human-Locust War.

Myrrah's bizarrely human appearance is a result of genetic modification by Adam Fenix
Adam's weapon kills Lambent and Locusts, but leaves humans unaffected. He was trying to modify it so that it wouldn't affect Locust, but one other solution would be to modify the Locust themselves. Myrrah was spliced with human DNA in order to protect her from the weapon (it worked too, given that she survived the activation), but for whatever reason (most likely the time and resources needed to perform genetic modification on an entire civilisation) Adam was unable to save the rest of the Locust.
 * However, Myrrah has a very Locust-Supremacist attitude and it seems highly unlikely she would allow herself to be transformed into a human if she was originally something else.

The fourth Carmine brother is going to be the protagonist of Gears of War 4.

 * Marcus should be done, since his storyline was always intended to be a trilogy. It also fits the escalation the first three Carmine brothers had.

Queen Myrrah is Doctor Chakwas.
In Mass Effect 3, Chakwas will be a romance option for a male Shepard. A Paragon interruption will allow you to take a bullet for her and allow her to fulfill her dream of tending to a handsome soldier and falling in love with him she alluded to at the beginning of the first game. If you tell her that you aren't interested and you only took the bullet for her because you are A Father To Your Men, she starts becoming a Stalker with a Crush and harasses you throughout the whole game. Eventually you have the Renegade option to fire her and tell her to get lost. Chakwas snaps and goes Ax Crazy, killing several nameless crew members and leaving in an escape pod. She winds up on Sera during the Pendulum Wars, and all of the human men in military uniform she sees everywhere remind her too much of Shepard, so she hides herself in a cave and winds up in the Hollow. She decides to live with the Locust instead, eventually becoming their queen, but she never loses that grudge she has against humans and human soldiers.

The Locust were not completely wiped out
Not that they are a genuine threat anymore, but the Locust were affected the same way as humans were by Adam's Anti-Imulsion pulse. It's just that they had been around the stuff so much longer than humans that there are fewer of them who wouldn't be killed by it. Myrrah wanted him to fine-tune the effect of the machine to target only the Lambent, but Adam didn't have enough time before the final life-cycle stage went into play. In the "around the world" cutscene we only get one pass-over of the Locust civilization, while all detailed shots were of the Lambent themselves collapsing.
 * The ending does show non-Lambent Locusts dying. You mainly see drones, but if you look towards the backgroud, you can see all different types of Locust, including a Brumack, dying.

The war with the Locust was staged
The entire war was originally established as a Running Man-style game show of sorts, meant to be a kind of gladiatorial form of entertainment. Only everything got out of hand, the Locust got all genocide-y, and everybody on Sera started fighting a war for real. When Cole Train says "Nobody plays this game like me!" he's the only one who hasn't adapted to the reality of the situation and he's still playing "the game".
 * The WMG would have made a lot more sense if it was made before Gears of War 2 came out, when the real cause of the war was detailied, or even Gears of War 3, which went into great detail about it.

RAAM's Shadow Predictions

 * The Bad Guy Wins. That's a given.
 * Minh's personality will be completely different. In this DLC, he will be a cocky, laid-back Cowboy Cop who plays by his own rules. The events of the DLC scar him for life and turn him into the rigid By-The-Book Cop we knew him as in Gears 1.
 * RAAM's sword execution was recently shown in a G4 preview. He picks his victim up by the head just like he does to Minh in Gears 1, but instead of impaling them, decapitates them instead. At the end of the DLC, Minh stabs RAAM with a blade of some kind, staggering him long enough for Zeta Squad to make their escape; which is why RAAM doesn't settle for decapitating Minh in Gears 1 and instead gets his revenge Ulquiorra-style.

Sera is actually Earth after a nuclear war

 * Sometime in the future, nuclear weapons become far more destructive than present day. When the nations of Earth actually use these weapons, they radically alter the environment and the shape of the continents. In the ensuing dark age, nearly everything about the pre-war world-even the name of Planet Earth-is forgotten. Eventually, human civilization rebuilds itself into the form seen in the games' backstory.

RAAM uses the same ability to control Kryll that Skorge uses to control the rift worm.

 * Kantus seem to be able to control animals ( tickers, the rift worm, etc.) and it could be a learned ability. RAAM learned it, somehow, and decided Kryll were a lot more useful on the battlefield.