[SPOILERS] Some criticism on the endings

[themonsterofthenet]

Obviously, MAJOR spoilers in this post.

Ok I played this game recently and I felt dissatisfied by both endings. Part of the reason is that the death of a main character was really unexpected and not foreshadowed, another part is that it felt excessive (I don't understand WHY Devitt/Wakefield has to close the door from the Other Side and trap himself there forever), but now I realise there's also something else that bothered me.

So Du Pre tells Wakefield that Devitt wants to close the Last Door and undo everything The Playwright has done and trap everyone in Zha'ilathal and "must be stopped". It's right here that I feel that a crucial part of the story was skipped entirely. We REALLY REALLY needed to see the confrontation between Devitt and Du Pre.

We're told Devitt "doesn't remember everything"; sure. But it's established that he does remember his friends and cares about them; I mean, that's his whole motivation for going on this adventure in the first place. Are we meant to believe he went straight from "OMG my buddy is unresponsive in a wheelchair and looks like he's in trouble, I wanna help" to "oh I guess he's evil, I'll trap him in Zha'ilathal forever"? Wouldn't he be like, "DUDE WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" Or are we to believe that Alexandre didn't try to get through to Devitt either, and just hoped that his psychiatrist would? Even though these guys have been close friends since childhood? Surely they must have had an intense conversation, which would reveal a lot about the characters and their relationship. That would have been an emotional high-point in the story, and was sorely missing.

[themonsterofthenet]

Huh, that's a... weird interpretation. Not to say it's wrong (no idea what's right! many things are unclear in this story) just that I didn't see any evidence that the content of Zha'ilathal was shaped by the people we saw in there. I thought it was shaped by the memories of whoever had been in there at any point, including memories created after they left (we see Anthony's death, after all).

This game is a true gem, which is why it keeps coming back to my thoughts. I was affected more than normal... I was so invested in the story and the characters that I felt upset when the ending(s) gave me no closure. The major characters didn't really communicate with each other, and a cruel fate befell them where nothing seemed resolved. (Also, is Hugo going to be murdered by that sailor? I need to know!)

I can't help but imagine that the story continues... if Devitt is saved, Alexandre at al escape Zha'ilathal, and they confront each other at some point; if Wakefield is saved, Alexandre manages to cross before the curtain closes, confrontation happens on the Other Side. (Oh and for the love of God, someone go rescue Hugo!)

By the way, I don't think I've understood much of the plot. The more I think about it, the more questions I have.

- Who WAS Wright's intended "dearest visitor"?
- I think Lena Ashdown was implied to have been in the cave where Hugo was, because she had a black substance on her fingers and the piano in Zha'ilathal (which was a representation of the piano Hugo was playing) had a black substance on its keys. But... how?
- Did Wright and Alexandre just not realise that Hugo still had human intellect? If Wright refused to listen to the device after the transformation, he wouldn't have heard the piano. Or maybe he did but didn't care, and didn't tell Alexandre. Or did Alexandre knowingly abandon Hugo to fend for himself in that cave?
- "Old Mike" was evidently treated as a pet, wearing a pet collar and all. But he must have been human once, perhaps having undergone a transformation similar to Hugo's (his description implies that he had some human traits; also there was a cross on the grave, implying he was a christian). So... did this one lose his human intellect? That would be an exception (Laidcend didn't, Hugo didn't, Kieran didn't). Was he playing dumb? Hey, maybe he's the one who smuggled the serum to Ernest O.O
- What on earth happened to Anthony's child? Maybe he/she just died of illness or something, but then what's up with that portrait in Anthony's area in Zha'ilathal where you hear a baby's cries turn into a monster's roar... did the baby transform too? Maybe they went and pricked themselves with a syringe containing serum...

Finally: Why were the members of the Playwright so indifferent to the danger, even as entities were haunting their homes? We see the presence of supernatural entities in Anthony's home and in Alexandre's home, and both knew about them, and yet they kept going. Anthony apparently had a moment of clarity where he realised what was happening and that those beings were coming through from the Veil, he thought to warn Alexandre not to open the Last Door, but then he just... forgot about it? Was it really just obsession on their part, or was the Veil messing with their heads and altering their sense of danger? That would explain why Devitt (who was, ironically, the most devoted to their cause) was the only one to realise the gravity of the situation: he hadn't spent much time in the Veil, hence was still rational. [This interpretation carries the sad implication that the Playwright were not of sound mind, hence not responsible for their actions, and essentially victims of unknown forces. It adds a tragic note to their imprisonment at the end.]

[themonsterofthenet]

Thanks for this reply! You seem to have enough background to interpret clues that I can't (I've only read a couple of Lovecraft stories).

I think it was mentioned in the letters in Alexandre's home that Old Mike died of an illness(?) - also, Wright mentioned in a flashback that only the human mind can access the Veil. I was assuming that Alexandre and Anthony were experimenting on Playwright members, who were probably eager to be the first person in Zha'ilathal (these guys generally seem to defy risk).

Three of the founding members do seem to have mental baggage from their childhoods (nevermind from their adult lives); we are explicitly told about Devitt and Anthony, whereas Hugo is implied to be traumatised from being abused (ie the shadow of the frightened child that contains a memory of his in Zha'ilathal). But I didn't pick up on anything of the sort when it comes to Alexandre. Did you notice anything?

Ooh, and there's one other thing that I kind of wish was clarified: how the serum deals with the separation of body and mind. From what I gather from the last episode of the first season, when you enter the Veil your body is in a trance and you're an astral projection, but when you wake up from the trance you teleport to wherever your astral projection, er, projects onto the human world. In the meantime, does your body have to be taken care of? Will it age? Can you kill someone by killing their body when they're in a trance? While the obvious answer would be "yes", if we go by Edgar Allan Poe's stories (since he's an obvious influence) then your body is basically immortal in that state, and you'll only age/starve/die/decompose/etc once the trance ends, or something hurts your astral projection. So, for those stranded in Zha'ilathal in the end... forever really means forever! Same for whoever is stranded on the Other Side. Otherwise they will just die at some point when their body does. (BTW why would they be stranded in Zha'ilathal? The door that closed was between Zha'ilathal and the Other Side, not between Zha'ilathal and the human world...)

Also confusing: people who enter the Veil via a serum only enter as astral projections, but people who use the primal terror method seem to enter it physically (at least Wakefield doesn't seem to leave a body behind).

(I am indeed obsessing :P)

[themonsterofthenet]

Not sure what you mean by "3rd dimensional time", but I think you're spot-on when you say that time passes differently in the Veil and beyond it. There's the slow-ticking clock you mention, and there's also Wakefield's description of his journey through the desert as "eternity", both of which imply that time runs slower; and also some of the dialog with members of the Playwright seems to imply that time can also go faster for them. It may have to do with the psychological perception of time, or by how far into the Veil you are, or other things I can't think of. (I haven't watched Altered States, but now I think I'm going to. Also, did you say "claymation"?)

I don't know what to make of Alexandre; unlike Anthony (and of course Devitt) most of his characterisation comes from other people's impressions of him. His curiosity, his recklessness and even his haughtiness imply immaturity. He is also manipulative apparently, judging by the way he exctracted information from the soldier survivors and persuaded the captain to go along with his plan. He had a pet he apparently loved, he seems to genuinely care about Devitt when the latter wakes up from his coma, and maintains a friendship with Anthony for many many years, so he doesn't come off as a sociopath; and yet he is cruelly indifferent to Hugo's plight (which is why I'm inclined to think that he simply didn't realise that Hugo was still the same on the inside, otherwise it's hard for me to wrap my head around it). Was he only interested in knowledge/power, and coldly willing to sacrifice anything and anyone to his cause? Or was he carried away by his own overconfidence and ended up harming people without expecting it? Was he oblivious to the damage caused by his research into the occult, or was he carrying the guilt and hoping it would be worth it? Was it all for himself? For Devitt's sake? For his (fewer and fewer) friends? For the elite, which he was part of? Probably not for humanity, what with all the secrecy involved.

In the end, Alexandre is sort of a tragic figure, having condemned himself to loneliness: he lived a secret life, which distanced him from people not in the Playwright; he never made a family for himself; he was so withdrawn from the human world that he was in Zha'ilathal for years while his body was catatonic; he lost his three closest friends because of his (and their) involvement with the occult; his pet died, and if you're right he killed it; his servant seemed to be his only companion that had nothing to do with the Veil, and left precisely because of Alexandre's occult practices; in the end, he's left serving a lifetime (or even eternal) sentence away from the world, in the otherworldly place he had always chosen over humanity (though at least there are other people there).

[themonsterofthenet]

Regarding Hugo... that's no excuse for abandoning him. He knew it was a risky operation, but I doubt he was told he would be left to his fate if anything went wrong.

I totally agree that Alexandre went the wrong way about it, but it was Devitt who started the secret society, and seemed adamant on the "secret" part, considering their motto - so Alexandre couldn't really change that. But yes, knowledge should be open to everyone, and allocation of resources on research etc should be subject to public scrutiny. But it's hard for me to pinpoint a "fatal flaw", so to speak. Academic/intellectual curiosity is a good thing, of course. Disregard for collateral damage and other people's wellbeing would be a terrible flaw, but it's not clear how much of it is actual indifference vs simple miscalculation and good old supernaturally-induced insanity. Pride and ambition seem to define him, but these characteristics have both good and bad aspects. What else? Overconfidence? Tunnel vision? I think he just failed to have enough checks and balances so things wouldn't get out of control, and part of it was because of the "secret society" approach, but I don't think it was because of some major personality flaw that he messed up without even realising it. I don't know, I still feel for the guy who seems to genuinely not realise that his endeavours were dangerous and was shocked when his friend turned against him (and was probably even taken aback when Wakefield didn't take his side, since in his mind he had done nothing objectionable).

What you describe as 3rd dimensional time sounds like just... changing your frame of reference? With a relativity-like principle that allows for some kind of time dilation? (Sorry if I misundeerstood!)

[themonsterofthenet]

Well in my book if he knowingly treated him like this he's a bad person. It's one thing to be oblivious and a whole other thing to be cruel. Anyway.

About character development: YES YES YES and YES. That's why there was no closure for me. (Not sure what you mean by "the way Alexandre was standing"?)

You're luring me into a tab-explosion trap, aren't you :P

[themonsterofthenet]

So today I learned that the french word "pré" means "field", and my brain wanted to think about the game again (I am powerless against my brain). I can't help but make a connection here: "Du Pré" VS "Wakefield", as in "field" VS "wake+field"... it can't be a coincidence, but I have no idea what it means. A field, and a field that's... awake? Some surnames are definitely clues, for instance "Wright" (creator, just like the Playwright). I think all the names mean something, but it seems too cryptic a riddle (Ash+down? Beech+worth? And what even is "Devitt"? Or even "Kohne"?) especially if the first names are somehow involved as well.

I also just noticed the parallel with Greek tragedy (yes, I can be slow with these things). It's quite ironic that The Playwright, who donned the masks and robes characteristic of Greek tragedy, couldn't see that they were doing exactly what gets characters in Greek tragedies punished - committing hubris. Anyone familiar with Greek tragedy should have predicted that this was not going to end well for them... and for an extra layer of irony, their founder was a classical philosophy professor and still didn't catch it. (Incidentally, what was Alexandre a professor of? Same as Devitt?)

BTW I think the monkey may have died of the mysterious "traveller's companion disease" (the one that killed Kaufmann, and Lena Ashdown, and possibly Anthony's family as well). In that case, Alexandre's ventures killed it, but only indirectly.

[themonsterofthenet]

Oh and actually... the note that Monsignor ate... who wrote it? Can't have been him, he was blind!

[avec]

I contributed to The Last Door. For what's it worth, I made a revised ending: https://thelastdoor.fandom.com/wiki/New_ending