Did People Care About The Boss?

[Weedle_McHairybug]

The Boss works because she is the final point of a soldier. She does what she's told, she goes through with missions even when she, and her life, is being used by the government for selfish means. She's incredibly skilled, and highly intelligent but that doesn't matter because she's a soldier. She isn't the one making the decisions. She isn't the one deciding what her skills are used to benefit. She isn't the one deciding who is right and who is wrong. This role is often played by our Metal Gear protagonists rather than the antagonists: Solid Snake, Raiden. Both start their journeys as yes-men doing missions with no concern as to the reason, but eventually coming to pursue their own personal sense of what's right rather than their country's, and engaging with the world as individuals.
The Boss is the antithesis to this. She knows the reality of her mission and she walks blindly ahead because she's a soldier. She's been a soldier her whole life, what else is there for her? Snake and Raiden could have just as easily ended up the same.

Many of you have pointed out that we didn't really know her, only knew her skills and that she was a hero. That's the point. Despite how 'close' they are Big Boss knew nothing about her. He didn't know her name, didn't know she'd been a mother, he didn't even know anything about any of The Cobras. And yet he cared because she was his ally, because she trained him. For a soldier whose entire life is being a soldier it doesn't take much to be close-that's why Big Boss can't really explain to EVA what she is to him. I care about her as the player because he cares about her, and there's a tragedy in being forced to end her life based on that fact alone.

To say that Big Boss' actions after MGS3 are motivated by The Boss' death is true but I also feel it's something of a simplification. The Boss' death necessitated Big Boss' actions, lest he become The Boss. She wasn't just his mentor, she was his future, and she made that clear to him with everything she said in MGS3. "A soldier is a political tool, nothing more. That's doubly true if he's a career soldier." The Boss went on to prove this herself. After Big Boss was established as a career solider with his promotion why wouldn't he fight against that with every fibre of his being? Why would he not carry the woman that imparted that knowledge onto him (even as she laid her own life down) with him? It's not about how well he knew her, or chemistry they had, or how close they were by our standards. It's about the fact the government threw away the life of a soldier who had done everything they asked, and that he too had just done something he felt was wrong because that same government had asked. The Boss' one defiance was having EVA tell Big Boss this. The only exertion of her free will as a soldier...was to let Big Boss know that she followed her orders as one. And that singular defiance is what turned Big Boss into what he became.
I need to replay Peace Walker to form much of an opinion on what that does for Big Boss' story but MGSV works well as a continuation of MGS3 because it shows him avoiding his fate as a soldier by becoming the very thing he swore to oppose-the manipulator who decides what's right and wrong and has soldiers lay their life down for it, stripping them of their identity and using them for his own gain without their knowing.

I do still respect her for at least BEING painted in a positive light regarding her patriotism in MGS3 (something that isn't exactly common with Metal Gear), even if I vastly preferred an actual showing of American patriotism rather than the kind that came across as being more Nazi

bro thinks there's a difference 😂

Yeah, I really wouldn't go so far as to say The Boss was any less of a manipulator than Big Boss (ignoring she manipulated Volgin a few times in the name of the mission, she even admitted she sold out her Cobra Unit just before the final battle). Besides, technically, the manipulation you were referring to was actually being done by Ocelot and Zero, NOT Big Boss (since he was still in a coma when the whole plan to create Venom Snake happened), and even the scene where Big Boss agreed to it came across more like Ocelot pressuring him into accepting. If anything, Solid Snake showed FAR more manipulation of Raiden by comparison.

As far as your last point, GK Chesterton certainly felt there was a difference between American patriotism and Nazi-esque views of patriotism, at least. Just read this thread if you don't believe me:

Just replayed MGS3 and listened to the Boss at the beginning... - Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain