simeonalo wrote:She's basically forced to walk up the stair case and "admire" her work, you know, it's basically forcing her to own up.
I enjoy subconscious puns. Just sayin'.
alone in the town wrote:It's not just about James. We are given exclusive access to his story. It doesn't mean the others are less important.
If one considers Maria as a part of the equation, then my answer is yes. Daddy and the Laughing People are Angela's and Eddie's equivalent of James' Maria. I do not believe they have their own unstoppable Pyramid Head-like monsters, however. Considering what I believe Pyramid Head really represents, perhaps their lack of a suitable equivalent indicates that they were doomed to never come to terms with what they had done.
I like this.
James does ultimately have the option to become mentally healthy in the end- he manages to beat his
punitive super-ego (AKA Pyramid Head). Angela still embraces her PSE at the end, ("I deserve this") which is why I believe she's her own "punisher." At least while
we get to see her. Who knows? She may find the will to become healthy at the top of those stairs, or she may just sit down and let the fire consume her. She's ultimately her own worst enemy, in that what she did, she did to protect herself. Her guilt prevents her from accepting her own drive to survive as healthy, so she punishes herself. ...In re-reading that sentence, I'm thinking it's pretty unlikely she'd get healthy, and probably kills herself.
James, on the other hand, is in such deep denial of his part in Mary's death, you could argue that PH is sort of his visualization of the "damned disease" that killed her- and just happened to also be him. As such, it's really fitting that he has some "physical" being following him around trying to punish him, since it's the way he perceives what he's done to begin with: it wasn't
me, it was
someone else. But at the same time, somewhere in him he
knew what he'd done, and he wanted to atone for it.
As for Eddie, he was weak. He had the chance, like all of them, to face his PSE and get some self-esteem. Based on his "crimes" as we know them, they weren't really super devastating sins: he maimed a guy, and while killing the dog was bad, like Harrys said, it's not killing your wife or family. All he needed was to get some self-esteem and atone for that, and he'd be healthy. Instead, he got defensive and buried himself in his defenses. Once a patient has entrenched themselves in their defenses that deeply, it's unlikely they'll come out again. Not to the same therapist or confronter, anyway. In SH, the confronter was the whole fucking town. So, naturally, the healthy part was smothered by the defenses and got broke. James became the necessary euthanizing method at that point, and it just helped him in his own course towards recognizing what he'd done to bring him there. In other words, having to kill Eddie was more a happy coincidence than a set role of "Eddie's Punisher."
...Sorry, long. I've been transcribing patient sessions all day and it just put me in that sort of "gung-ho PsyD" mood.
You'll be missed. You were missed. I am missing you.