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James William Rutland Jr. is the secondary antagonist of Tomb Raider: Legend.

Description and Personality[]

James is from a very wealthy family, as he is the youngest son of a Senator. Although he graduated from West Point under his own merits (barely), he is not as intelligent as Amanda. He's brash in his actions, and does things without thinking. He prefers to substitute tactics for speed in his plans. Although his stubbornness lends a hand in his need to get what he wants, James can hold his own without the help of his money and influence. He's a competent athlete, with the ability to focus on his selfish goals.

Amanda Evert was working with Rutland to obtain Excalibur, at some point developing a romantic relationship with each other. While it's clear they care for each other, they are also determined to find Excalibur and seek revenge on Lara for leaving Amanda to die in Peru. He also has seemingly unlimited Mercenaries working for him.

He is a very influential man as he is the only person that Amanda Evert trusts and loves.

He always kept a piece of Excalibur on him at all times, wielding it as a status symbol, rather than respecting it as an artifact of great power. Despite his disrespect, he wields it readily in combat, using it to greatly increases his defense, agility, stamina and melee abilities, as well as giving him the ability to levitate.

Events in Tomb Raider Legend[]

He first appears in Bolivia, trying to obtain a certain artifact called Excalibur. He saw Lara and was forced to flee. Lara has no idea that Amanda had been accompanying Rutland with his schemes, she assumed that Amanda had died. Before leaving, he orders his mercenaries to kill Lara, and when his Helicopter takes off, he opens fire on her, before fleeing with Amanda in tow.

In Ghana, where he personally decided to track down a piece of Excalibur himself, Lara managed to defeat his mercenaries until she caught up with him, where he was trying to find The Ghalali Key used to bind Excalibur. After a little speech trying to intimidate Lara he proceeds to try to kill Lara using the blade of Excalibur and Grenades. After a long battle he is defeated but left alive, although Lara takes his Blade of Excalibur.

After this he agreed that Amanda should go to Kazakhstan with some of his Mercenaries to try and figure out where the next piece of Excalibur was, but Lara manages to find the information first and then manages to escape with her life after Amanda uses her Entity to try and kill her.

His helicopter briefly appeared in Nepal, where he attempted to track down the Ghalali Key.

In Bolivia Redux, when Lara first seen Rutland he waves at her making her even more angry and then when she got to the main platform. He attempted, with Amanda to coerce Lara to give him the now completed Excalibur. But in the attempt an outraged Lara uses Excalibur at James and Amanda wounding him in the process, then he orders his Mercenaries to kill Lara. When they are all killed, he stumbles over to Amanda gravely wounded from the Excalibur attack and says to Amanda "See You..." and then collapses afterwards, finally dead. This outrages Amanda and starts shouting at Lara about his death and Excalibur, and then using the entity to kill Lara.

He is the only main antagonist throughout the entire Tomb Raider series that Lara did not mean to kill.

Tactics[]

In the Ghana level, James Rutland is the boss and he is a fairly difficult adversary, as he the only boss to use ranged and close up attacks. He is a very agile opponent and moves quickly and uses an unlimited amount of grenades. To defeat him you must shoot at him until he jumps up on a ledge to heal, while he heals himself you must shoot the support on the ledge until you are ready to be able to use the grapple to pull it down, repeat this process on all four ledges, then he can not heal, use this to your advantage and use your Assault Rifle and Grenades to finish him off until he is defeated.

Trivia[]

  • In the game, Zip says that James is the Senator's youngest son. This means that James must have at least one older full brother or older paternal half-brother.
  • He will taunt you several times while you fight him in Ghana, from his witty remarks which it can be assumed that he is arrogant and naive.
  • Even though Rutland doesn't appear when you attack his henchmen, he will die after you defeat all of his henchmen.
  • His glasses never come off within the game.
  • The boxes with his equipment stashed in them on the Bolivia Redux level are supplied by Natla Industries, which suggests that they were working together.
  • James Rutland is the only main antagonist throughout the entire Tomb Raider series that Lara did not mean to kill.

Quotes[]

  • "Hey, you have some too... Mine are bigger!" (Regarding their Grenades).
  • "We're done talking."
  • "History doesn't interest me."
  • Lara:" Tell me about that sword fragment you're so fond of waving about?" Rutland:"Huh, well I have been spending some time with it, and I've learned a couple of things... Let me show you."
  • "Hey, woah, woah.. I thought archaeologists were supposed to be careful!"
  • "Amanda was right about you Lara."
  • "And according to Amanda's research.. its right here."
  • "So your father did something here didn't he.... You know Amanda thought that maybe... he found the key."
  • "Kill her!"
  • "Amanda... See you...."

Gallery[]

References[]

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