‘Halo’ Just Killed Off Jacob Keyes! Here’s What Happened to Him in the Games

We’re halfway through the second season of ‘Halo’ and the live-action show is starting to adapt ‘The Fall of the Reach.’ Just like the game/book storyline, the episode was filled with death and sacrifice even though it was completely different from the established canon. One of the notable Covenant victims in the episode was none other than Admiral Jacob Keyes, he was a pretty major side character in the show, and due to that, we decided to explore whether he met the same fate in the games as well.

Jacob Keyes unexpectedly met his end during the events of ‘Reach’

Back in episode 3, we’ve learned that Covenant was ready to storm Reach and they’ve been operating in the Visegrad area for quite some time unnoticed. Naturally, it’s not that nobody noticed it’s that nobody actually did anything about it. Ackerson revealed to Keyes back in episode 3 that they were aware that Covenant discovered the Reach and was about to invade it, but he had Cortana run some simulations and calculations and there was a snowball’s chance in hell that humanity could win this battle.

This is why efforts were focused on evacuating important assets off of Reach, it’s not that humanity is not going to fight, it’s that it’s going to lose no matter how you look at it.

Keyes wanted to declare Winter Contingency but he didn’t have time to organize any semblance of counter-attack since Covenant attacked out of nowhere and extremely fiercely killing hundreds of civilians in a second.

Master Chief, Riz, and Vannak were separated and it took them a moment to reach UNSC headquarters to attempt to retrieve their Mjolnir armors, this is when Vannak broke the news that their armors were gone and this is when Jacob Keyes apologized to Master Chief for not taking him seriously and trusting Ackerson.

Jacob knew that he was going to die

After the preliminary situation assessment, Jacob Keyes gave a motivational speech to the troops, it was clear as day that they weren’t actually trying to “win back” Reach, they were simply trying to hold off Covenant long enough to evacuate as many civilians as possible. Jacob mentioned that every marine who decides to stay and fight most likely won’t survive, and that included him again.

Jacob wanted to fight, but Master Chief told him to stay away from the worst hot spots because his knowledge, experience, and tactical mind were too precious to lose. Jacob and Corporal Lopez were just about to take off with a ship going off the planet when Jacob noticed that fuel lines were still connected to the ship. He existed and was quickly surrounded by the Covenant forces. He disconnected the fuel lines and saturated both himself and the area surrounding him with fuel, planning to blow the Covenant forces to Kingdom Come, and he did exactly that. Corporal Lopez evacuated the civilians as she watched Keyes and the Covenant forces being swallowed by flames.

I gotta admit we’ve both expected casualties during the Fall of the Reach, but we’re still surprised that Keyes met his end so early into the story.

In the games, Keyes died during the events of ‘Halo: Combat Evolved’

‘Halo’ TV show was often criticized for changing the story too much when compared to books and games, and as a matter of fact Jacob’s story was changed as well. In the games. In the games, Jacob Keyes met his end on the Halo Ring Installation 04.

Keyes was captured and held prisoner aboard the Covenant battle cruiser, the Truth and Reconciliation. He endured interrogation and torture until the Master Chief, ODSTs, and Marines rescued him with Cortana’s help. They combined Keyes’ intel with Cortana’s data to learn more about Halo.

As they were trying to escape from Installation 04 they found themselves in Alpha Base which actually served as a Flood Containment Facility, but they didn’t know it at the time. A Pod infector latched onto his back and infected him.

The rest of Keyes’ story was told on the pages of ‘Halo: The Flood.’ Apparently, Keyes was able to fight off the infection, for a time. Keyes was overtaken by the Flood, becoming part of a collective intelligence. He resisted, holding onto vital information while sacrificing personal memories. Eventually, he succumbed, but not before warning the Master Chief to leave him. In the end, the Chief retrieved Keyes’ neural interface, enabling the destruction of the Halo ring.

Have something to add? Let us know in the comments below!