Line #20 Fridge/SilentHill


1	!!The Games
2	[[AC:FridgeBrilliance]]
3	* At first, I disliked Travis in ''Origins'' because I thought he had absolutely no reason to be in Silent Hill in the first place. Then I realized that he was "picked" by Alessa because he too had been nearly killed by his mother. - @/{{Odile}}
4	** Well, a couple things about this. First off is the fact that the story really doesn't make any sense whatsoever, and even the writer himself has no idea what's happening in this game's story, as seen in the Twin Perfect videos on the game, and all the stuff with Alessa in Origins is total bunk. Second is that he DID have a reason to be there. It was pulling him there, calling him, to deal with his issues with his parents.
5	** Really, the ''Franchise/SilentHill'' series takes this trope to dizzying heights. Do you know why it has a reputation for high ReplayValue, and why spoilers are (generally) so closely guarded? You will after completing a story and playing it over again. It's a challenge ''not'' to recognize some subtle piece of {{Foreshadowing}} or grotesque symbolism you didn't catch before. - Javer
6	* The first ''Silent Hill'': the corpse hooked up to [=IVs=] in the [[spoiler: school bathroom]] where you get the shotgun, the corpse hanging off the wall in the corridor to the boat cabin, and the similar corpses practically ''everywhere'' throughout the game are [[spoiler: the same person. It's Burnt Alessa, watching over you as you progress through the world she has created, and the fact that the bathroom corpse has a clue written next to it ''and'' a weapon suggests that she is trying to help you, almost certainly to liberate herself from enslavement as the crippled incubator for Dahlia's God]]
7	** Except that it's not a clue written next to the corpse, it's a completely useless reference to a horror book.
8	*** Actually, it references the supernatural phenomena of poltergeists and hallucinations and how they usually happen to pre-going into pubescent girls under stress, much like Alessa, hinting that there might be more to her then meets the eye, (I know she's only 7 at the time of the ritual, but it would make sense for her powers to grow as she ages in addition to her suffering).
9	*** The graffiti in the bathroom needs to be read in order to find the book later on that hints at how to kill the upcoming boss. If you don't read the graffiti, the fairy tale doesn't appear. The graffiti initially doesn't make sense and isn't supposed to; you learn its importance later on when you discover the book tied to it. This, combined with the discovery of the shotgun lends credence to the suggestion that it's Alessa trying to help you in some way, even subconsciously. Note that the bathroom it's found in also is in a completely sealed off area only accessible by entering a different bathroom which teleports you between floors. The book referencing poltergeists is in the same room as the fairy tale book and hints to Alessa / Cheryl having powers but is unrelated to the graffiti.
10	*** The graffiti in the toilets is 'Leonard Rhine: The Monster Lurks" which, as has been pointed out above, is a book found in the library reserve with the 'Manifestation of Delusions' memo in it. The fairy tale is in the library proper next door and has nothing to do with the message by the corpse. You also HAVE to pass by the toilet with the corpse in it to progress, IE get to the stairs to the second floor and roof.
11	* In ''Silent Hill 3'', shortly after the shopping mall switches over to the "otherworld", Heather comes across a ladies washroom. When Heather goes to leave the room, the door to one of the stalls opens and the player finds the inside of the stall covered in blood. This seems in line with most of the game's other meaningless scares, such as the bleeding mannequin in the office building or the infamous "mirror room". All was well and good with this troper until reading that the game's overall thematic theme was teenage fears. One particular teenage fear being, shall we say, [[NoPeriodsPeriod underrepresented]] in most media.
12	** To be precise, the game focuses on feminine fears, especially body horror ones like botched pregnancies, miscarriages, messy abortions, and sure, periods as well.
13	** Another level of brilliance just occurred to this troper. The end has [[spoiler: the boss that Heather's been carrying around the entire game being birthed.]] What is the biggest fear of teenagers? Getting pregnant and having a baby.
14	** For me, the Mirror Room isn't a meaningless scare. I didn't realize it at first, but the game has a serious theme about identity. Early on, Heather notes she hates mirrors. Later on she finds the Mirror room. And later, a mirror image of herself--[[spoiler: of Alessa,]]--shows up to kill her. Meaningless? I think not. Mirrors, for Heather, seem to represent inner confusion and self hatred.
15	*** And again, what's a big concern of teenagers? Their appearance.
16	* The relationship between Murphy Pendleton and Anne Cunningham have interesting parallels to each other. [[spoiler:One of them is a father who has lost a child, and the other is a child who has lost a father.]]
17	* This troper just realized the town of Silent Hill is a representation of Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell. The regular town is described as peaceful and beautiful, which fit most people's idea of Heaven. The fog-covered town is where the protagonists - each of which has some problem - first enter and is unsettling but not quite disturbing. And the last one is... well, hellish.
18	* Why does the radio emit static? Because supernatural occurrences are said to emit ''electromagnetic interference''.
19	* Throughout the franchise, damage done to player characters is generally done by things that would seriously injure someone; lacerations, blunt trauma, etc. So why on Earth is the common 'small health' item a nutritious drink? [[spoiler: Silent Hill is a realm of the mind; of ideas and symbolism. Literally, because the drink is "healthy", it has the ability to undo physical wounds instantly while in Silent Hill.]]
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21	[[AC: Fridge Horror]]
22	* The nurses and doctors of ''[=SH1=]'' are not monsters but civilians under the influence of White Claudia and the cult's semi-supernatural parasite.
23	* While the phone call Easter Eggs in ''Shattered Memories'' may be hilarious, it shows that the people are aware of the horrors that go on in Silent Hill. '''They just can't do a thing about it.'''
24	** Moving out of the town, eh?
25	** Like that ever works: you just get dragged back (see every game ever). You may quit with Silent Hill, but it's never finished with you until it decides so.
26	* The whole ''Franchise/SilentHill'' series in general actually. We know that some things have to be in the characters' heads and some have to be real. But in many (arguably most) places, it's not 100% clear what's real and what isn't. The monsters being people for example.
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28	!!The Movie
29	* The ending of the ''Film/SilentHill'' [[TheMovie movie]]. As disturbing as it is, as evil as they were, from what we can tell the church was right...
30	** Technically it was more of a SelfFulfillingProphecy, since she didn't make a deal with the devil until AFTER they had burned her to a crisp.
31	** Or it could be, as one WildMassGuessing postulates, that the entire story about being burned alive was one big fat lie, the town's fear of her was entirely justified, and she tormented them for years ''for no reason whatsoever''.
32	** Another one from Silent Hill. Alessa is very, very alike to Sharon when it comes to looks. Alessa [[spoiler: was raped by a janitor and survived getting burned alive some time later.]] Sharon is from an orphanage. Connect the dots together and...
33	*** That's more of a WMG, really. Sharon is Alessa's good side that split off when she made the deal with the "devil" (which caused Alessa's soul to splinter and created Burnt Alessa, Sharon (Good Alessa) and Dark Alessa).
34	*** The problem with connecting the dots is the timeline involved. Sharon is about 9 in the movie and there are adult members of the cult older than her who were born after the town was cursed. It’s a biological impossibility for Sharon to be the child of the janitor from that alone.
35	* Just a FridgeLogic one; why the hell did Cybil have to pull a heroic sacrifice? If she had entered the lift, and then closed the doors, there was an equal chance that it would have gone down, hence she wouldn't have needed to stay around and get captured. Even worse, when she is holding the GasMaskMooks at bay with her gun, she lets them know she's out of ammo by firing (when it was heavily implied that she knew it was empty), when she could have used the fact they didn't know it was empty to scoot around the room and get out of there. It is unlikely this was to buy Rose more time, since the lift was already rocketing down the shaft by the time this happens. Looks like she grabbed the IdiotBall and refused to let go.
36	** Actually, it's quite possible it was. If she would have left, Christabella and co. would have camped out and just waited for Rose to resurface, and likely kill her on the spot. With Cybil sacrificing herself, they occupy themseves taking her back to burn her. Granted, she could have tried to bluff them to leave, but this pretty much guaranteed they would leave the area, giving Rose ample time to finish her task.
37	* A bit of FridgeHorror. The cult, Dahlia, and even Officer Gucci don't seem particularly surprised that there's a reincarnated version of Alessa running around. Since Sharon is only nine years old, and since Alessa seems to be unable to torture the cult with her good side still incorporated in herself, this leads to the disturbing question of just how many Sharons there have been and what happened to the others.
38	** Christbella and the cult aren't surprised because they've been trying to survive in a literal Hell for 30 years. combating literal demons from their perspective. They've witnessesed all kinds of things stemming from Evil Alessa. A new Alessa duplicate on the scene would be par the course. And it's never confirmed that Officer Gucci ever saw a picture of Sharon and he only has Christopher's word that Alessa looks like exactly like his daughter, and Christopher is rambling when he says it.
39	* Fridge Brilliance: The motive of the Cult and the origins of Silent Hill's evil: When I originally saw the movie in theaters I saw the change in the cult's nature and motives as a case of Adaption Decay, but thinking about it now, it actually works extremely well with themes of the later SH games, particularly those like SH 2. While mainly an adaption of SH 1, by changing the villains from an obviously evil demonic cult trying to summon their God to a group of fanatical self-righteous zealots who kick off everything by torturing an innocent, the filmmakers bring similar themes of "personal hidden guilt" and "purgatory" to the movie adaption that became more prominent in later game entries after SH 1.
40	* Some FridgeLogic: Christabella believed that she was saving the world and staving off the Apocalypse by burning "witches", and towards the end she calls Rose's accusations "heresy". However, if she was familiar with the Bible — and [[Literature/BookOfRevelation Revelation]] in particular, which she certainly seem familiar with, given that the prayer she lead the cult in was a direct quote from it — she would realize that the Apocalypse is part of God's plan. Granted, she's obviously not a mentally sound person, so her theology is certainly bound to have holes aplenty in it. But wouldn't trying to prevent TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt make ''her'' a heretic?
41	** Elevating to FridgeBrilliance: Many religious zealots [[TruthInTelevision in real life]] will reinterpret the tenets of their faith to fit their personal views, sometimes twisting them so far that they bear no resemblance to the scriptures they came from. It’s not even a big stretch to say that Christabella is doing the same thing with the cult.

Context Fridge / SilentHill