This was a really fascinating take on the concept of different endings that go beyond just ‘good’ or ‘bad’ or ‘true’ endings. Grief is a multifaceted experience, and imaginably even moreso if the deceased was euthanised. Love and hate are two sides of the same coin, ultimately - it is possible to hate someone you love for the suffering they caused you, but underlying is the truth that you wouldn’t be suffering so much, that it wouldn’t be all so cruel, if you didn’t love the person so much that their suffering causes yours. Is dying the less ‘evil’ option if all that is left in life will always be warped by suffering? If so, at what point does the amount of suffering tip the balance in favour of dying? When confronted with such a decision, does it even make much sense to think of one or the other as the ‘happier’ option? Maybe there is no ‘happy ending’ (especially if you think of realistic outcomes, like that post did), just different ways of reasoning out how that experience of grief should be resolved. Thematically, death and rebirth/new life are often paired together in fiction and in real life too. So maybe the “Leave” ending is less about James getting to escape Silent Hill (and by extension, what he did to Mary) and raise Laura, but more just a general idea that life will go on, but irreversibly changed (possibly behind bars for James, just like Crime and Punishment). Laura is less a symbol for redemption for James at the end, but more of a decision to preserve and honour life and the future. Maybe. Also, you’ve probably heard this before, but suicide by drowning was a common form of ritual death in Japan in the early 20th century - some people think drowning with a lover means they’ll be reborn together. So “In Water” could be seen as a happy ending in this context, or at least a way of trying to absolve the guilt in grief through retribution. Hmm… maybe the ‘Dog’ ending is about how all our suffering seems so cruel and indifferent, the only way it would make sense of it is if we were to find it was all orchestrated by a Shiba Inu in a control room? …Actually, yes that could be the true ending then.
The entire time I was reading your first paragraph, I could only think of Signalis. It feels like SH2 and Signalis are different (yet similar) takes on the same crisis, which come to different conclusions, I think. I should think more about that haha And I love that idea that "life will go on." That's what always gets me about fiction, that it requires an ending, of course, when in reality, life just continues. And it'll come to an end, sooner or later, of course, but trying to imagine what happens next in stories fascinates me. I mean, I guess regardless of what happens to James, life went on in the town, as evidenced by the sequels And yeah, I knew about the drowning (Osamu Dazai comes to mind), but I don't think I knew about the "being reborn together" part of drowning with a lover. I guess in some ways, that's a happy ending, right? Assuming that's what James had in mind, I suppose. Idk it's kinda tragic no matter what. Maybe "In Water" is the true "Rebirth" ending? There's a quote that's something like "don't take life too seriously, because no one makes it out alive," and so I wonder if you could apply that to the Dog ending too? The idea being that James spends so much time grieving and going through Silent Hill, but really, if a dog is controlling things, then it's all kind of silly, isn't it? Something that shouldn't be taken too seriously, despite the Pyramid Heads and lying figures, and dreamed up versions of your dead wife lol. But I suppose then, it all just loops around to being scary once more. Perhaps the dog ending, despite seeming to be a joke, is the most terrifying ending...
Thank you both for responding to my comment! In both games, there is a hidden ending which involves some kind of cultish ritual taking place to try and revive the deceased too, right? That’s another really interesting part about fiction. We ultimately cannot resist the base facts of life in reality - that we die and life goes on. But if you chose to, you can transcend that fact of reality in fiction. If you create something - if it’s your world - then I think it’s very hard to resist that desire to overcome death, no matter how bleak and gritty the story is. So it’s interesting how both games allow that kind of ending as a possibility. Hope, I guess, is born first in fantasy. “In Water” may have been ‘happy’ in that context… or maybe it was just a No Longer Human reference, seeing how popular that book is in Japan. Equally, I may be reading far too much into it, hahaha. “Don’t take life too seriously” was probably what they intended with the dog ending… I was just trying to figure it into how it could be a True Ending, hahaha. In any case, how terrifying can an ending with a dog be? It wouldn’t have solved any of James’ problems, but petting a dog wouldn’t have caused any more issues either…
My undestanding of the endings were actually that James loved mary, and also hated her. And the way he understands his motivation for killing her depends on how the player plays the game. Not really a difference in motivation, but in understanding oneself. We don't always understand the actions that we take, specially if we dont have a second hand perspective (like a therapist, or a friend, remember, James is a very lonely man), because our vision of our own problems becomes extremely biased
Great explanation. I may not have explained my thoughts well enough, but this is essentially my view of things, that James's motivation for his actions is convoluted and messy, and that the various endings are him determining what aspect of his motivation he chooses to focus on, which in turn determines how he proceeds. Great comment
I don't think this ending could possibly be true because, even though James's frustrations and suffering got the better of him on not thinking properly when he killed Mary, he couldn't live or give himself a second chance of redemption, Yes, Mary would be happy if he raised and took care of Laura, but, I think James was kinda reasonable on not doing so because, how much more damage he would cause to Laura on raising a child, that was a colleague from the hospital his wife was dying, developed a strong and warm connection with her, only to raise such child, but knowing that you killed the woman she loved so much and sees your late wife as a Mother. Realistically, no person that's not necessarily evil like James, could live with such horrible and disturbing truth, he never hated Mary, he was only frustrated with her and in death he could not only be properly punished, but finally stay with her with no suffering whatsoever. All the characters in Silent Hill 2 got unnerving and depressing endings, Ângela burns in her personal hell, Eddie becomes just as cold and artificial of a hollowed human being in a refrigerator where he is now a corpse, a glass cold and James drown into his own watering abyss.
I agree an ending doesn't have to be depressing to be deep. I think we are more easily affected by sad things and thus a good ending is harder to do. But pain isn't more profound just because it hurts.
See how I always interpreted this ending was James feeling in his head that she was murdered by him. Mary being there saying that he didn't do anything out of hatred may imply that he didn't kill her but instead neglected her in her final hours, that he may have tried killing her and couldn't bring himself to do it. That she instead had died in his care on the visit home that she wrote about in her letter. The ending we see is his conscious trying to get him to see that his guilt is valid but needs to be lifted from his shoulders. Idk if that's right or not as it's been a minute since I beat SH2 last and I am eagerly waiting for the remake to come out before I experience the story again.
So about the James disappearing part, i like to think James informed friends and family that Mary passed away, prepared a funeral for her, and spent a few years raising Laura until she could support herself on her own, then turned himself in to the authorities, this a bit too wishful thinking but it feels like it would be the best outcome for everyone James father could just be implying that James either got disowed after the truth was revealed or that he was sent to a far away prison with little contact with the outside and his sentence has yet to expire.
The ending doesn't change the reality of James' reasoning. The thing that differs is his perspective of what happened. We'll never know the actual truth, just that perspective. Same as james.
This was a really fascinating take on the concept of different endings that go beyond just ‘good’ or ‘bad’ or ‘true’ endings. Grief is a multifaceted experience, and imaginably even moreso if the deceased was euthanised. Love and hate are two sides of the same coin, ultimately - it is possible to hate someone you love for the suffering they caused you, but underlying is the truth that you wouldn’t be suffering so much, that it wouldn’t be all so cruel, if you didn’t love the person so much that their suffering causes yours. Is dying the less ‘evil’ option if all that is left in life will always be warped by suffering? If so, at what point does the amount of suffering tip the balance in favour of dying? When confronted with such a decision, does it even make much sense to think of one or the other as the ‘happier’ option?
Maybe there is no ‘happy ending’ (especially if you think of realistic outcomes, like that post did), just different ways of reasoning out how that experience of grief should be resolved. Thematically, death and rebirth/new life are often paired together in fiction and in real life too. So maybe the “Leave” ending is less about James getting to escape Silent Hill (and by extension, what he did to Mary) and raise Laura, but more just a general idea that life will go on, but irreversibly changed (possibly behind bars for James, just like Crime and Punishment). Laura is less a symbol for redemption for James at the end, but more of a decision to preserve and honour life and the future. Maybe.
Also, you’ve probably heard this before, but suicide by drowning was a common form of ritual death in Japan in the early 20th century - some people think drowning with a lover means they’ll be reborn together. So “In Water” could be seen as a happy ending in this context, or at least a way of trying to absolve the guilt in grief through retribution.
Hmm… maybe the ‘Dog’ ending is about how all our suffering seems so cruel and indifferent, the only way it would make sense of it is if we were to find it was all orchestrated by a Shiba Inu in a control room? …Actually, yes that could be the true ending then.
Such a heartfelt and insightful comment.
The entire time I was reading your first paragraph, I could only think of Signalis. It feels like SH2 and Signalis are different (yet similar) takes on the same crisis, which come to different conclusions, I think.
I should think more about that haha
And I love that idea that "life will go on." That's what always gets me about fiction, that it requires an ending, of course, when in reality, life just continues. And it'll come to an end, sooner or later, of course, but trying to imagine what happens next in stories fascinates me. I mean, I guess regardless of what happens to James, life went on in the town, as evidenced by the sequels
And yeah, I knew about the drowning (Osamu Dazai comes to mind), but I don't think I knew about the "being reborn together" part of drowning with a lover. I guess in some ways, that's a happy ending, right? Assuming that's what James had in mind, I suppose. Idk it's kinda tragic no matter what. Maybe "In Water" is the true "Rebirth" ending?
There's a quote that's something like "don't take life too seriously, because no one makes it out alive," and so I wonder if you could apply that to the Dog ending too? The idea being that James spends so much time grieving and going through Silent Hill, but really, if a dog is controlling things, then it's all kind of silly, isn't it? Something that shouldn't be taken too seriously, despite the Pyramid Heads and lying figures, and dreamed up versions of your dead wife lol. But I suppose then, it all just loops around to being scary once more. Perhaps the dog ending, despite seeming to be a joke, is the most terrifying ending...
Thank you both for responding to my comment!
In both games, there is a hidden ending which involves some kind of cultish ritual taking place to try and revive the deceased too, right? That’s another really interesting part about fiction. We ultimately cannot resist the base facts of life in reality - that we die and life goes on. But if you chose to, you can transcend that fact of reality in fiction. If you create something - if it’s your world - then I think it’s very hard to resist that desire to overcome death, no matter how bleak and gritty the story is. So it’s interesting how both games allow that kind of ending as a possibility. Hope, I guess, is born first in fantasy.
“In Water” may have been ‘happy’ in that context… or maybe it was just a No Longer Human reference, seeing how popular that book is in Japan. Equally, I may be reading far too much into it, hahaha.
“Don’t take life too seriously” was probably what they intended with the dog ending… I was just trying to figure it into how it could be a True Ending, hahaha. In any case, how terrifying can an ending with a dog be? It wouldn’t have solved any of James’ problems, but petting a dog wouldn’t have caused any more issues either…
I want this to be true. Because I find the suicide and rebirth ending are so nihilistic, where James goes on this great journey only to kill himself.
My undestanding of the endings were actually that James loved mary, and also hated her. And the way he understands his motivation for killing her depends on how the player plays the game. Not really a difference in motivation, but in understanding oneself. We don't always understand the actions that we take, specially if we dont have a second hand perspective (like a therapist, or a friend, remember, James is a very lonely man), because our vision of our own problems becomes extremely biased
Great explanation. I may not have explained my thoughts well enough, but this is essentially my view of things, that James's motivation for his actions is convoluted and messy, and that the various endings are him determining what aspect of his motivation he chooses to focus on, which in turn determines how he proceeds.
Great comment
I don't think this ending could possibly be true because, even though James's frustrations and suffering got the better of him on not thinking properly when he killed Mary, he couldn't live or give himself a second chance of redemption, Yes, Mary would be happy if he raised and took care of Laura, but, I think James was kinda reasonable on not doing so because, how much more damage he would cause to Laura on raising a child, that was a colleague from the hospital his wife was dying, developed a strong and warm connection with her, only to raise such child, but knowing that you killed the woman she loved so much and sees your late wife as a Mother.
Realistically, no person that's not necessarily evil like James, could live with such horrible and disturbing truth, he never hated Mary, he was only frustrated with her and in death he could not only be properly punished, but finally stay with her with no suffering whatsoever.
All the characters in Silent Hill 2 got unnerving and depressing endings, Ângela burns in her personal hell, Eddie becomes just as cold and artificial of a hollowed human being in a refrigerator where he is now a corpse, a glass cold and James drown into his own watering abyss.
I agree an ending doesn't have to be depressing to be deep. I think we are more easily affected by sad things and thus a good ending is harder to do. But pain isn't more profound just because it hurts.
Very well said. "pain isn't more profound just because it hurts" is so, so spot on
See how I always interpreted this ending was James feeling in his head that she was murdered by him. Mary being there saying that he didn't do anything out of hatred may imply that he didn't kill her but instead neglected her in her final hours, that he may have tried killing her and couldn't bring himself to do it. That she instead had died in his care on the visit home that she wrote about in her letter. The ending we see is his conscious trying to get him to see that his guilt is valid but needs to be lifted from his shoulders. Idk if that's right or not as it's been a minute since I beat SH2 last and I am eagerly waiting for the remake to come out before I experience the story again.
So about the James disappearing part, i like to think James informed friends and family that Mary passed away, prepared a funeral for her, and spent a few years raising Laura until she could support herself on her own, then turned himself in to the authorities, this a bit too wishful thinking but it feels like it would be the best outcome for everyone
James father could just be implying that James either got disowed after the truth was revealed or that he was sent to a far away prison with little contact with the outside and his sentence has yet to expire.
The ending doesn't change the reality of James' reasoning. The thing that differs is his perspective of what happened. We'll never know the actual truth, just that perspective. Same as james.
great video
Another great video.