FULL STORY OF SILENT HILL SERIES

Why is the legendary Silent Hill 2 Among the World's Scariest Games, Even 19 Years Later?

where is silent hill?

Silent Hill is a small tourist town in America. This town, which is famous for its natural beauties as well as many historical places, was a favorite town for many tourists. It also had abundant coal-producing mineral deposits. However, one day, a fire broke out in these mineral deposits and the town was abandoned due to the resulting damage and smoke. There were many bad rumors about this abandoned town after the great fire. It is among these rumors that those who left do not return, and that it is a cursed place.

SH Universe

There are two kinds of worlds in the town of Silent Hill. One is Normal, the other is Alternate (The Other World). Alternate World is a mysterious dark and nightmarish effect realized through the ancient powers of Silent Hill. In this world, the more creatures lurk around and the more deadly, the greater the danger. Everything on Alternate Earth is getting bloody, rusty, scorched, and it can put you in some stress, depression and anxiety because you realize something is wrong.

The town of Silent Hill is actually the reflection of everyone's own demons. We can understand this because each character in the game actually lives their own version of Alternate World. In other words, there is a separate Silent Hill situation for James, and a separate Silent Hill situation for Angela Orosco, the other character of the game. The important point here is that Silent Hill makes everyone live their own nightmare and hell according to their subconscious.

Every creature in Silent Hill is actually the embodiment of subconscious fears. And by looking at the Alternate World of each character in the game, we see what they are actually afraid of, and we can have an idea about their subconscious.

Basic Story

The writer James Sunderland, who lost his beloved wife to a terminal illness 3 years ago, still hasn't missed this event, but receives a letter from his late wife Mary saying that she is waiting for him in their private place in Silent Hill. As soon as he receives this letter, James, who is on his way to Silent Hill, will face the truth and live hell on earth when he arrives in town.

James Sunderland

The main character of the play, James Sunderland, is a writer who lost his beloved wife, Mary, to a terminal illness 3 years ago. Receiving an envelope with his wife's name on it, James sets off to Silent Hill to find his wife, and hell begins for him.

Mary Shepherd Sunderland

The deceased wife of James Sunderland, who passed away 3 years ago. Mary was a kind, sweet young woman. The emotional data of the last moments of depreciation after the preservation of a deadly well-being remained in distress, pain, anger, despair and endurance.

Angela Orosco

Angela is a quiet, insecure and gloomy girl who is shy of strangers who come to the town of Silent Hill to find her mother. Although she may seem like a normal girl, the way she deals with death and sex is clearly different from that of other girls. His sense of values ​​is eccentric and there is something dangerous about it.

Laura

8-y-old Laura is a little girl who befriended Mary at the hospital they were staying with before the events of Silent Hill 2 and bonds with her as if she were her own mother. They are so attached to Mary that in a letter, Mary mentions that she would like to adopt Laura if things had been different.

Eddie Dombrowski

Eddie is a young man who has been laughed at, bullied, insecure, and severely mentally disturbed all his life because of his weight and other physical features. His troubled past has drawn him to Silent Hill.

Maria

Maria is a mysterious woman who looks exactly like James' wife, Mary. James thinks/believes that he found in Maria everything that Mary longed to feel and live during her illness. When James realizes what's wrong with Maria, who was repeatedly killed and resurrected by the Pyramid Head, it would be too late for everything.

DETAILED FULL STORY

in my restless dreams, I see that town Silent Hill.

This was written in the letter that James received 3 years after his wife's death in an envelope with his wife's name on it. And it continued;

"You promised to take me there, but you never did. Now I am alone there. “In our special place”. I am waiting for you."

As soon as James receives this letter, he sets out for Silent Hill. Years ago, when they came here on vacation, Mary loved it and said she wanted to come back. What would their special places be? To James, all of Silent Hill could have had special places. Throughout the game, James will face his own hell as he searches for his deceased wife.

At the end of the play, it is revealed that James actually killed Mary, and then listening to the letter that Mary wrote to James before she died, in Mary's voice, puts an end to your psychology. Even more interestingly, in the novel of the play, James's deceased wife, Mary, is actually in the trunk of the car that James drove to Silent Hill at the very beginning of the play.

James' "Alternate World"

James's "Alternate World" has a depressing, dark and depressing atmosphere. Although the streets of Silent Hill are desolate and deserted for James at first, he will encounter creatures that will be more difficult to kill as the end approaches. These creatures are symbolic of his mind trying to keep James away from the truth because the fact of how Mary died is not very heartwarming. Clean sheets and padded hospital gurneys are also very common in James's "Alternate World". These stretchers represent Mary's illness and her death by suffocation with a white pillow. After James learns the truth that he killed Mary, the Alternate World becomes even more flooded—more water drips from the walls, the water rising up wherever it wanders. The water here symbolizes James' sadness. The basement of the Lakeview Hotel, the final location of the game, is flooded, but it looks burnt. This can actually be considered as the first step for James to accept Mary's death without error. But while doing so, he drowns in grief.

Every creature in James's other world also has a meaning. After all, Silent Hill is the expression of James' repressed psychology.

Nurses are representative of James' sexual frustrations. Nurses wear low-cut blouses that further emphasize their sexual nature. They also twitch, which may be attributed to James' anxiety over his sexual frustrations with the sexual abstinence associated with Mary's illness. The fact that they are nurses and figures associated with hospitals and health is also linked to Mary's illness.

Pyramid Head

We can say that the Pyramid Head is the iconic creature of the Silent Hill series. The first Silent Hill production, in which this creature appears in almost every Silent Hill production, is Silent Hill 2. Pyramid head James is an executioner who fulfills Mary's need to be punished for not admitting guilt in her death. During the game, he killed Maria, who is similar to Mary, 3 times in front of James. Each death represents James' crimes against his late wife, Mary.

In the first, James and Maria escape from Pyramid Head along a narrow corridor. James gets into the elevator at the end of the hall, the door of which is closed, and leaves Maria behind. Pyramid Head kills Maria because the elevator door does not open. This event represents James' selfishness. James lost Maria because he was selfish and got on that elevator first.

In the second, he finds Maria in one of the two cells separated by bars, but there is a bar between them. Maria sexually arouses him and beckons him to the other side of the fence. When James reaches there, he finds Maria covered in blood. This incident is due to the fact that James sees Maria as a sex object and wants to go to her because it is just sex. The sin here is that he cheated on his wife, Mary, because he could not have sexual intercourse.

In the latter, Maria is hung upside down, while Pyramid Head stabs a spear and kills her. Here, Maria standing upside down symbolizes Mary's life being turned upside down in her last days, and then being killed with a spear by James to suffocate Mary with a pillow. He was shot in the back because he did not expect such a thing from Mary James. In this encounter, James realizes that Silent Hill is actually calling him to punish him and that Pyramid Head is his punisher. He no longer needs Pyramid Head. Therefore, after the fight with Pyramid Head, Pyramid Head puts the spear in his hand around his own neck and the punishment ends.

Here we understand that Maria is actually a being created to punish James.

Mary (boss)

Mary is the final boss of the game and serves the purpose of defeating James' guilt. This boss can be either Mary or Maria depending on the end of the game. If Mary is the boss, Mary will hold a grudge against James for killing him and then continue to attack. If the boss is Maria disguised as Mary, she will be rejected by James as she is neither real nor Mary, and then attack her in anger. In both cases, the creature attacks, resembling Mary's upside-down corpse. Its mode of attack is black tentacles and moths that it spit out. The bed that Boss is tied to embodies Mary's feelings of being imprisoned during her illness and final days. The moths he spit out symbolize death. Strangling James with black tentacles during the fight may be a throwback to his own suffocation. Defeating this creature is symbolic of James overcoming his guilt and being able to leave Silent Hill.

Angela's "Alternate World"

In Angela's "Alternate World", the walls are covered with flesh, which evokes sexuality. In fact, in the scene where we fight Angela's father (Abstract Daddy boss fight), there are pistons on the walls that would clearly imply sexual intercourse. This is a direct reference to the sexual abuse Angela suffered by her father and brother. In Angela's other world, fire is more dominant, which is because Angela feels psychologically in hell due to the abuses she has experienced. Angela, who came to Silent Hill to look for her mother, was called to town because she killed her father and brother.

Abstract Daddy

Abstract Daddy is a manifestation of Angela's father. Angela calls him "dad", suggesting that she sees the creature as her father. Since James doesn't know Angela's father, he sees her as a creature. Abstract Daddy looks like two figures lying on a bed, having sexual intercourse. The top figure has legs dangling from the sides, while the creature's bottom figure screams with obvious agony. Abstract Daddy's attack method is to "embrace" James into the opening rift. This rift further highlights the apparent sexual abuse. While Abstract Daddy is directly associated with Angela, the abusive may be indirectly associated with James as a symbol of masculinity.

Eddie's "Alternate World"

Eddie's "Alternate World" is like a slaughterhouse, with bags of cold and meat hanging. These meat bags may be a clear reference to Eddie's weight gain from eating too much and therefore being constantly bullied. The coldness can be attributed to Eddie's detachment from the world and his self-isolation. We know that Eddie pretended to kill his creatures, even though we never saw them, but talked about them as bullies. The reason why he was called to Silent Hill is that he lost himself as a result of these bullying and committed mass murders. He even mentions in part of the game that he killed someone just because of his gaze.

Laura's Alternate World

Laura symbolizes innocence in the game. Therefore, he has no "Alternate State" and does not encounter creatures. This is how Laura survives in the town despite the creatures we encounter in other "Alternate Worlds".

ENDINGS - Leave

After the final boss of the game, James sees Mary for the last time and Mary gives her a letter. James then leaves Silent Hill with Laura.

ENDINGS - In Water

After the final boss of the game, James sees Mary for the last time. She tells James that she has suffered enough for killing him and gives him a letter. Mary coughs violently and dies again while James holds her hand. According to the novel Silent Hill 2, Mary's body was in the trunk of James' car. He removes his body and places it in the passenger seat. James comes to the conclusion that he cannot live without Mary, and realizes that he has come to Silent Hill to commit suicide. He drives the car to Toluca Lake and commits suicide. Now James and Mary can be together.

ENDINGS - Maria

After the final boss of the game, James returns to Rosewater Park to look at the water. Inexplicably resurrected, Maria asks James if he killed Mary again. By saying that she isn't "Mary," James implies that she knows she's just a hallucination. James leaves town with Maria. But as she leaves, Maria begins to cough. This cough is symbolic of Maria suffering from the same illness as Mary.

ENDINGS - Rebirth

After the final boss of the game, James goes with his wife Mary's body to the Church of the Rebirth on Toluca Lake Island to resurrect Mary by confronting the "old gods of Silent Hill". However, the result is unknown.

IMPORTANT PS: In the game Silent Hill 4 THE ROOM, which tells after Silent Hill 2, we learn that James did not return after going to Silent Hill. Silent Hill 2 does not have a definite ending, so we cannot say that this is the real ending. However, in my opinion, the real end of the play is the end of "In Water", that is, the end where James commits suicide. Because James never came back from Silent Hill.