i've heard lots of confused discussion about whether certain characters are real or not. I would argue that all the characters are real, physical manifestations of James & Marys disturbing thoughts & emotions. Thats what the SH town does afterall, manifests raw emotions as people & monsters.

-Maria is the manifestation of what Mary believe James wants; an exotic, hyper sexual seductress. In truth, james doesnt really want that & its more of a reflection of Mary's extreme jealousy & insecurity that Maria & the nurses appear as sexual/slutty as they do.

-Laura is the personification of the bratty, ill-mannered side of Mary (as James perceives it). James absolutely hates when she behaves this way & scolds her harshly as if she were a child not a grown woman, possibly physically disciplining her as well.

-Naive Eddie reflects Marys view of James as an idiot who couldnt do anything right at times. She was probably unfullied & unhappy with her own place in life, but took it out on James. Whenever he failed to perform a task, she insulted his intelligence & condesceded towards him, disparaging his job as a clerk.

-Crazy Eddie is the manifestation of the bi-polar side of James as Mary perceives. He can switch from a sweetheart to an absolute psycho without warning.

-Angela is the manifestation of both James & Marys feelings of victimization, self-indulgent pity (theyve each convinced themself that they share no fault in their problems in life), feelings of lonelyness, depression, & suicidal thoughts.

They are both deeply disturbed people. And i even question whether Mary is really sick or if shes faking the whole thing to keep james from leaving her and/or possibly guilt him because he did leave her. But thats a whole nother topic for another thread

That's because there's plenty of it to find. If you go through the pages of thread lists in the Silent Hill 2 subforum, you'll come across roughly one thread per page dealing with this idea, often in great detail.

As such, it's best that, if this discussion must continue, one of those many threads would suffice for it.