Return To Silent Hill needs to lean heavily on the game’s difficult themes

When any adaptation of a beloved medium is announced, fans will always be a little skeptical. This skepticism comes from a place of love, and it often seems that the people in charge of these adaptations do not share that same love. However, when it comes to the latest version of the silent hill movie franchise, Return to silent hillNo one can deny that Christophe Gans is a true fan.

Gans’ silent hillwhich adapted the first game of the franchise, got many things right. The atmosphere is perfect, the city itself is great and the scares work. However, the script could use a second pass, especially when it comes to the dialogue. Now, 20 years after his last attempt, Gans can do a lot in this upcoming adaptation, which is based on Silent Hill 2. The adaptation should adopt that same atmosphere, with a script that offers a greater sense of tension and addresses the difficult themes of the game.

silent hill 2 It is considered the best game of the silent hill franchise, and not just because of its impressive graphics at the time of its release. The game is an uncomfortable experience that focuses on pain and guilt. The characters have serious traumatic histories and many of the monsters that protagonist James Sunderland sees are based on his own repressed feelings. This does silent hill 2 a difficult property to adapt, but to do justice to the story, it is necessary Return to silent hill face them head on. So what exactly are these complicated issues and issues?

Spoilers ahead for silent hill 2

James’ complicated motivations for that twisted ending

In silent hill 2James Sunderland receives a letter from his wife asking him to join her in Silent Hill, a resort town that was the site of one of his happiest vacations. However, this is disconcerting from the start, as Mary has been dead for three years. As James searches for Mary, many characters he meets along the way ask him why he is looking for his wife if he knows she is already dead. Still, James can’t let it go.

James meets a double of his wife named Maria. Eventually, Maria is revealed to be a creation of Silent Hill itself, intended to test James’ loyalty to Mary. This comes to a head when James discovers the truth about what happened to Mary. Before the events of the game, Mary had been diagnosed with a disease that deteriorated her skin, caused her hair to fall out, and left her moody. She sometimes verbally abused James and alternated between wishing for death and wanting to live. Once she was released from the hospital to live out the rest of his days in her care, James was on edge.

The players learn that Mary did not die from her illness three years ago. Instead, James killed her a few days before heading to Silent Hill. However, he couldn’t deal with what he had done, so he tricked himself into believing that she had died from her illness.

Of course, this revelation complicates James. He is no longer a man searching for his lost wife, but a murderer who cannot bear what he did to someone he loved. Additionally, the game delves into even more complicated aspects of his mixed feelings about his wife’s illness. Some of the game’s monsters are sexually suggestive, implying that James may have been repressing his own sexual desire during Mary’s illness. That also explains why the idealized Maria is a stripper, a more seductive version of his wife. There’s also the infamous Pyramid Head, an executioner who constantly haunts James as a way to punish him for what he did. James may not be heroic, but his complexities make him a great character and one of the reasons the game stands out so much.

Angela’s tragic home life

Like James, Angela is also looking for someone: her mother, whom she claims she hasn’t seen in a long time. She is scared and warns James that something is wrong with Silent Hill. Angela also corrects herself by saying “mom” to “mother”, implying that there is some kind of developmental problem with her and that there is more of her in the search for her. Eventually, the players discover that Angela’s father was an abusive alcoholic who also sexually assaulted her. Her mother blamed her and told her that she deserved it. When Angela could no longer take his abuse, she stabbed her father to death.

In silent hillAngela’s trauma from her abuse is personified in the monster Daddy Abstract, who is a fleshy mass that resembles two figures intertwined on a bed. Interestingly, the version James sees of this monster is different from the one he sees Angela and probably less horrible. This is a dark part of the story and would be very difficult to adapt into a film. However, it is necessary to portray Angela’s contrast with James. While her endings give him the option to forgive himself, for Angela there is no other way. In the last scene of her game, it is implied that she chooses to end her own life.

How Eddie’s Bullying Led to His Instability

A secondary character, Laura, is innocent and does not see the world of fog to which James and Angela are subjected. Eddie isn’t so lucky. At first, Eddie seems a little shady, but harmless. He is as disturbed by the dead bodies as James was at the beginning of the game. However, as the game progresses, Eddie’s psyche begins to deteriorate. It turns out that before they got to Silent Hill, Eddie snapped, shot his bully in the leg, and killed his dog. When he first arrives, he tries to escape what he has done, but as he spends more time in the city, he becomes convinced that everyone is equal in death and James is forced to kill him in self-defense. .

Like Angela, Eddie is another juxtaposition of James’ character. James feels immediate pain at having killed Eddie, and this act serves as a step toward revealing that he is capable of murder, leading him to understand how his wife died. As bleak as Eddie’s narrative is, it is necessary to James’ overall story.

While silent hill 2 has received praise for its story, it is undoubtedly bleak. However, the only way for this next entry in the silent hill What film franchise works is if Gans faces that darkness head-on. Just as James must confront his actions, it takes all the darkness of the narrative to get the full picture of him. silent hill 2The story of and what makes it so unique even more than 20 years later.

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