YMMV / The Mental State

• Alternative Character Interpretation: Zack is an extremely complicated character and a mass of contradictions. He is either a ruthless dictator who uses the illusion of freedom to control people or a revolutionary forced to take drastic action to protect other people’s liberties. In fact, for most of the story, it is open to interpretation as to whether he is helping people simply to improve his own standing or just using popularity as an excuse to justify helping others.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Zack gets two over the course of the story.
  • Firstly, he performs a karaoke version of Alice Cooper’s ‘No More Mr. Nice Guy’.
  • Secondly, he demonstrates the prison’s change from orange uniform to casual dress by performing what is essentially a striptease to the music of the Eurythmics song ‘Missionary Man’.
• Magnificent Bastard: Zachary "Zack" State has countless schemes in mind, can manipulate whole gangs into turning on their own members and can exploit any situation in ways that most people could never imagine. After taking brutal revenge on his enemies and going to prison for it, Zack masterfully plays inmates and guards and orchestrates a coup to become the leader of a gang. When an undercover cop starts poking around, Zack changes his plans, digs up dirt on him and blackmails not only the cop into dropping the case, but also a high-ranking official into changing the state’s entire prison system to his liking. Zack manipulates the inmates into making him their official representative and even takes down an international crime lord; reducing him to a nobody spending his entire life in solitary confinement. To top it all off, Zack does it all without losing a single second of his good-conduct time and sustains no injuries at all while in prison save for a small bruise.
• Stoic Woobie: When Zack sees Rosemary again after his release from prison, she seems to have moved on with her life and put the past behind her. However, she is quieter than she used to be. She gets better.