Norman Jayden is autistic.
He seems to have a large amount of trouble socializing/carrying on a proper conversation, reading verbal/physical cues, and can't seem to tell when he's bothering people. He also backs down from any kind of verbal confrontation as soon as possible, but if you listen to his inner thoughts or his recordings on ARI, he speaks regularly and very intelligently. He is also very focused on technology and crime solving, and an intense focus on a single task or interest is another indication of a spectrum disorder.- Perhaps it's in this troper's experiences, but his stunted speech at times helps further this theory.
- He is coming off a nasty addiction to a drug, which itself is mostly to combat overuse of a device that can cause dangerous hallucinations. Still, the very fact that he spends way too much time accessing ARI is evidence in itself.
- He does show signs of Asperger's Syndrome, so the stunted speech could either be that or a symptom of drug withdrawal. We know he's introverted, socially withdrawn and single-minded. One can cynically suggest that a high interest in psycho-profiling people and the ability to manipulate people are signs of having neurotypical tendencies.
The Origami Killer is a group of people.
They're all covering up for each other. That's why the OK's never been caught and why the player will confront various people all wanting to kill the protagonists. The Taxidermist from Madison's prologue DLC could have been one that ended up getting caught.- Gordi Kramer also admits that he was responsible for one of the killings, but not the rest.
- Jossed. The Origami Killer is Scott Shelby.
Scott Shelby's asthma is actually psychosomatic and caused by his memories of his brother's death.
Shelby's asthma attacks don't seem to be triggered by the physical rain, as he's shown many times being exposed to the elements and not being affected this way. When the game flashes back to his childhood, he is not shown being asthmatic at all. My theory is that his asthma attacks are actually psychosomatic, a physical reflection of his emotional trauma.- It seems to this troper that he's intended to be portrayed as an asthmatic in his childhood as well, it's just done subtly. In the first flashback he seems to have trouble keeping up with his brother's pace, and he actually starts wheezing during the second flashback while he's running to fetch his father.
ARI is just a pair of ordinary sunglasses.
Jayden is practicing mental memorization and organization techniques with the help of the trypto, hallucinating that he's using ARI. This would explain why he's the only person in the game to possess such advanced technology and why Blake makes comments about Jayden "packing up" and "riding his files" back to Washington despite clearly not having any. This also explains why he never uses them to investigate around other police officers.- Blake can use ARI in the ending where Norman dies fighting the Origami Killer, and Jayden can have bleeding eyes from using them too much.
- Jossed. Perry explicitly acknowledges its existence, and if you play through the game far enough, there is a scene where it turns out that the ARI is causing the hallucinations, not the drugs, due to Jayden's overuse of the ARI, which is subtly hinted at earlier in the game.
ARI is actually a miniature Animus.
Jayden is actually reviewing the case in the future, and any ending where he dies is actually just him desynchronizing. Which means that the hallucinations in his ending are caused by the bleeding effect.- Difficult to explain how Blake enters the ARI world though.
If Norman dies, his consciousness lives on in ARI-space.
When Blake puts on the ARI glasses in the end after Norman dies, he looks up to find Norman there to exact revenge on his amoral ass. Norman has become a particularly vengeful Virtual Ghost.- Or perhaps while stuck inside the ARI glasses, Jayden continues to help Blake solve cases with his unwanted input and may even pressure Blake into being less of a knob.
Everyone is in the Philadelphian version of the Reaper's Game.
Massive end-game spoilers below this point.In the events of Heavy Rain, there are four contestants: Ethan, Jayden, Madison and Lauren. Each contestant's game is tailored to their faults, and in order to win and be given life again they have to overcome it.
- Ethan died protecting Jason, and the Time Skip is intentional. His game is to save Shaun from the Origami Killer. Lauren is the same as Ethan, but she was picked up by Shelby as an (unknowing) Support Reaper.
- Jayden overdosed on Triptocaine. His game is to save Shaun without succumbing to temptation. If he wins, it's revealed he has a second problem, the ARI (hey, Reapers can get it wrong, right?) that's affecting his brain. If he loses, he OD's and is erased.
- Madison died as a selfish person, possibly during the home invasion we see in her first chapter. Her game revolves around helping others, such as Ethan.
- Scott is the Conductor and the Game Master, most likely the Composer as well. In the RG, he was a private detective who hand-picked the contestants for his game. He was never supposed to be caught as the Origami Killer, which is why he tries to kill the other protagonists when they confront him; the game has been ruined, and his only option is to erase them.
- Sam, Blake and Manfred are Support Reapers. Mad Jack, Paco, Adrian Baker, Leland White, Miroslav Korda and Nathaniel are all Harriers, though Nathaniel's beliefs coupled with the realization of what he was in caused him to retreat into his apartment, which is why Blake wants Jayden to kill him. Lauren and Hassan are interesting cases: they are failed players who Scott keeps around, most likely as punishment.
Madison's nightmares are because of her ordeal in The Taxidermist.
Madison has nightmares about invincible burglars in her apartment because when Leland chased her around his house, nothing she could do short of chainsawing him in the testicles could stop him.
- The Taxidermist was just an engine demo, the developers tried to fit it into canon by explaining this is how the nightmares started. The events of The Taxidermist and the main story both take place in the fall, so her sudden flare-ups make a great deal of sense.
- It's also worth noting that in one of the possible endings, after Leland is dragged away by the police, an exhausted Madison collapses onto the porch in a pose very similar to the ones she adopts while sitting upright on the sofa in the introductory chapter of the main game, and the Square One epilogue.
Norman Jayden is a time traveler.
As suggested by Yahtzee in his review of the game
, Norman Jayden is from the future, explaining his access to technology that seems startlingly advanced for the setting. His shakes and nosebleeds are not actually caused by his ARI/triptocaine abuse, but they're a consequence of him altering history.Scott Shelby is aware of the player, and is willfully misleading you.
- A lot of tropers have a problem with Scott's misleading thoughts, and the fact that we don't get to see the 'whole' event at the typewriter shop. A simple solution is that Scott is willfully screwing with your interface, editing certain events and painting himself as a sort of designated hero. This visage only breaks at the absolute end of the game, where he forces you to help him burn the evidence. Good Job Breaking It, you're now an accomplice to child murder.
- In fact, he's actually taking advantage of the player, as during the shootout at the manor there are many shots of a bodyguard sneaking up on Shelby from behind, and when you hit the required button he suddenly becomes aware of them. By making you a involuntary powergamer, he takes out the whole building.
Scott has dissociative disorder.
Maybe Ethan was closer to the truth than we thought.- Scott created a second personality to help him cope with the loss of his brother. This second persona, called Shelby, just wants to move on with his life, but the original persona, Sheppard, won't let him. It got so bad that Sheppard became the Origami Killer just to test his theory whether a perfect father could exist. Every time we play as Scott Shelby, we're playing as the Shelby persona, who really does believe that he's trying to catch the Origami Killer. It also explains why we never see Scott killing Manfred: that was Sheppard, and we're Shelby.
If there's no mention of the Heavy Rain Chronicles at E3, there won't be any Chronicles.
This means every WMG must be canon. Ethan's blackouts involve him visiting Jason's grave.
Jason happens to be in the same graveyard as John Sheppard, which is how Ethan ends up with the origami figures. The drowning bodies he thinks of are because the graveyard worker keeps telling him the story of how John died. Ethan is possessed by John Sheppard.
It explains the blackouts. Ethan is the reincarnation of John Sheppard.
If we assume that Ethan was concieved when John died, the ages roughly match. The trauma of losing his son and/or brain damage from the accident made it possible for John to take over. John, still a child and unaware of what is going on, panics when he wakes up in an adult body and does the one thing that could always calm him down: folding an origami figure. While he does this, he rushes back 'home' to Carnaby Street. Once he goes there he sees the fully constructed buildings instead of the construction site he remembers, and the shock makes him return to Ethan's subconscious. Ethan then wakes up at the street corner with an origami figure in his hand.- Ethan was born in September of 1978 and John died in the fall of 1977. Ethan also resembles what an older John might look like; in deleted content, he even sees John while in a blackout.
Norman's ARI shades aren't just high-tech, there's some sort of supernatural element to how it works and interacts with the user.
The ARI screwing with his head doesn't explain how Blake starts using the shades in one of the endings where Norman dies and later appears next to him in the virtual reality world. Nor does it explain the ending where Norman is in the ARI world without the glasses, talking to another Norman (unless that's just some hallucination in the ending when he dies from a triptocaine OD and I'm remembering it wrong). Maybe the ARI world is some kind of weird magic-y pocket dimension thing that your soul/spirit/mind can get tied to, or something. Blake and Perry are sent to jail.
After being fired by the police commissioner, they were captured by the entire police force for murdering an innocent man, Ethan, and sent to jail for it. Madison is a psychic.
It explains of how she can tell the police are planning on arresting Ethan in "The Fugitive" without looking at them. Captain Perry is behind everything.
Think about it. He cares about the press more than catching the killer is a common clue. Not only that, but he is almost always in the police station doing work in his office or holding press conferences.Ash and Charlene are the only cops at the police force who liked Norman.
Well, these two didn't do anything bad to him, right?Grace is entirely behind everything.
Well, why do you think she gets Norman and Blake to think that Ethan is the Origami Killer?Blake is Norman's Split Personality.
He was created by Norman's suppressive emotions of being a Butt-Monkey. This split personality is different from Norman in that while he is a By-the-Book Cop, Blake is a Rabid Cowboy Cop.As the two investigate together, Blake even tries to make Norman do bad things by killing Nathaniel and letting him to beat Ethan's psychiatrist and Ethan himself. As for the latter, he puts Norman at gunpoint in order to make him leave and takes control of him. To the eyes of anyone else, it is Norman beating Ethan up, not Blake.
The red balloon is behind everything.
It hypnotized Jason, causing the infamous Too Dumb to Live scene. As it was floating away, it spotted Shelby and hypnotized him into becoming the Origami Killer. When Ethan blacks out, it's the balloon fighting for control of his mind. Since it has control of the Origami Killer as well, it sometimes confuses the two, causing Ethan to make origami dogs when the Killer does. When Shaun disappears, Ethan breaks the balloon's control, but residual Too Dumb to Live prevents him from calling the police or asking for help. Why does the balloon cause such suffering? For the Evulz.The story is All Just a Dream of Ethan.
He is actually still lying in coma, trying to cope with his guilt about Jason's death. All the "new" characters in his dream (i.e. everyone except Shaun and Grace) are actually aspects of himself:- Himself = Ego/Self
- Norman = his Super Ego
- Blake = his Id
- Madison = his Anima
- The Origami Killer/Scott Shelby = his Shadow Archetype
The story is a Dying Dream of Ethan.
At the end of the second level, "The Mall", Ethan gets run over by a car while trying to save Jason. It is never shown if he dies or recovers from the accident. From that point on, the entire story is a Dying Dream of what his life would be like without Jason. All the three playable characters are his subconscious; Scott Shelby is his urge to be independent without a wife and children. When he is revealed to be the Origami Killer, he becomes the urge to kill people. Norman Jayden is the affirmation of being treated like hell by his peers. He represents of what his life could have been if he didn't marry Grace and have Shaun. Madison Paige is the manifestation of his love for his wife, showing of what would his life would be if he didn't divorce with her and continues to love her after what happened to Jason. Lt. Carter Blake is a manifestation of who Ethan, by this point, realizes Grace and Shaun see him after Jason died; a bad father and husband whose only concern is furthering his agenda. Furthermore, Ethan's blackouts have been a sign of the trouble. His own nature (Blake) eventually betrays him, a sign of Ethan accepting his own ruthlessness and what an awful family man he has been to his family.Madison was the victim of a home invasion in the past.
Traumatized by the fact that she could've been killed in her sleep by a burglar, she developed insomnia and nightmares. She tries to distract herself from it by getting involved in cases like that of the Origami Killer.The protagonists are Death Seekers.
- Ethan: the trials and shot to death by the police.
- Madison: fighting against Dr. Baker, confront the Origami Killer in his apartment, and in the warehouse.
- Norman: get Blake to shoot him in the police station, fighting against Mad Jack, fighting against the Origami Killer, overdose of ARI, and confront the killer again.
- Scott: drowning with Lauren in his car, fighting against Kramer's guards, and confronting Ethan, Madison, and Norman.
Shelby was the one who led Jason way from Ethan in the opening.
The Origami Killer first started his murders shortly after the time when Jason was killed. Perhaps Jason was his first intended victim, but he didn't count on Ethan finding him. After Jason got his balloon, he turned around to see Shelby, who got Jason to follow him. Sure, Jason is still Too Dumb to Live in this theory, but for a different reason.Kramer has a secret organization of murderers and corrupt officials.
According to the theory, "The Origami Killer is a group of people", he organizes these people:- Big Bad: Kramer
- The Dragon: Gordi
- Evil Genius: Captain Perry and Dr. Baker
- The Brute: Blake and Scott
- The Heart: Mad Jack
Norman Jayden is placed on a protection program in the end of the game.
The police's uselessness attracted the attention of the Witness Protection Program who sent a social worker to investigate. After Norman has told him about his partnership with Lt. Blake, Captain Perry has lost control of the police. That's why they don't get mentioned in the news or got suspended in the end when Ethan is killed by Blake. ARI was created with alien technology.
The American government either salvaged it from a crashed alien ship, traded for it, or maybe even captured it. While humans have been able to modify it greatly, nobody really knows how it works or it's true capabilities. Like complete personality uploadings to a simulated world.Norman Jayden is the protagonist all along.
This is a crime drama, right? It should have started with an investigator going to the scene of the crime, and solving a crime where the police is useless for.Later in the game, Norman will leave the police to investigate on his own.
Getting tired of Blake's ruthless ways would be a motivation get him to quit working with the police and start working on his own.- Confirmed.
The Origami Killer is related to the Raincoat Killer.
Killing in the rain? Check. Leave a Calling Card? Check. A sympathetic killer? Check.Norman Jayden is a Terminator.
At first, he looks calm and collected. Not only he gets angry, but also rarely show other emotions. A Terminator has come from the present and kills the real Norman Jayden and took on his form. It is given the ARI, and how? It is placed inside the living tissues since the time portal will only transport living organs. Here's one thing to know: it can read the character's feelings such as when Blake puts it at gunpoint for punching him in the face, it reads his emotions that he will not do that because if he does, he'll lose his job if he shoots a cop.Norman Jayden is working for Internal Affairs.
It seems how useless the Philadelphia police force really attracted the attention of Internal Affairs. They need a plan to expose of how useless they are. As a result, they hired Norman Jayden of the FBI to infiltrating the police as their helper in finding the Origami Killer. Why would IA need the FBI? Because they have high authority on the police and needed an agent who is disliked by cops to let the police slip up of what makes them useless.So far, the agency has learned from Norman via the wire they planted on him that Blake is out of his mind, accuses an innocent man of being the Origami Killer, and his boss, Captain Perry, has the gall to declare it to the press. It's enough proof to get them in trouble, but IA needs evidence to show Blake has crossed the line. When Norman has found out the Origami Killer's location, he is ordered to act like he's in a hurry to get Blake to follow him, thus falling into their trap. If he shoots Ethan dead in front of Madison, Norman (if he survives), and Shaun, IA uses this evidence to convince the police commissioner to suspend Blake and Perry.
Blake had a partner or close friend die during the investigation.
This is why he is acting like the Jerkass he is to Norman and wanted him to leave as soon as the Philadelphia police closes the investigation.- Or perhaps his own nephew was kidnapped by the killer and his brother/brother-in-law died or disappeared shortly after.
Norman Jayden is an Assassin.
Given the fact of how much of a badass he is than the other three, it is considerable. He has obtained all that badassery from the FBI, including the art of killing. The ARI is his version of the Eagle Eye. When he first met Blake, it would appear he is blue, as in he's an ally. They argue many times and Blake is still blue. However, when he puts him at gunpoint in "Under Arrest", Norman sees Blake red, as in he's an enemy. It turns out the Philadelphia police are Templars. When Norman tells Captain Perry about it, he lets Blake do what he wants instead of stopping him. This reveals Perry is red instead of blue.- I object to the description of Norman as a badass. By and large, his main combat strength seems to just be that he's totally used to getting wailed on and therefore can take more than others.
- He is able to beat Shelby, who is pretty much the Memetic Badass of the Heavy Rain verse.
Blake sees Scott as more than just a friend.
Norman Jayden is a descendant of Cole Phelps.
Both of them are cops who follow by the rules and really honest, working alongside corrupt/incompetent cops, and partner with a cop they don't like because of being corrupt/useless he really is. They don't have a love life, although Cole has a wife, there are no other scenes of them getting together before she kicks him out for his affair with Elsa. Lastly, both of them die saving people from drowning from rainwater, although for Norman's case, it depends on the player.Jayden's boss at the FBI has been keeping tabs on the police all along.
The ending "Uploaded" shows Blake will have a temporary personality takeover.
Due to him seeing Norman's "ghost" in the ARI, Blake will briefly thinks he's Norman. It's gonna happen every time he puts on the ARI.The ending "Uploaded" shows Blake will have a permanent personality takeover.
That is, something happened while using the ARI after Norman's death, and Blake's mind will be shattered and overwritten with Norman's memories. Therefore, Carter Blake is dead, and Norman Jayden is in complete control.WMG that connects Ethan, Madison, Norman, and Scott.
- They're miserable.
- Try to reconnect to a normal life.
Jayden will run afoul of useless police officers.
Because Jayden is a By-the-Book Cop, he'll be off the case at some point. In other words, he'll be dumped once his usefulness with them is outlived. Most likely, it would start from looking at the body of Jeremy Bowles to Blake declaring that the investigation is over.- Confirmed.
Blake is spared as an act of Cruel Mercy.
It would have appeared that out of the major characters, he doesn't die. What else is that neither of them would have the guts to kill him. Luckily, depending on your choices, he gets punished. Shelby was adopted by a rich family as a child.
This is the only explanation as to how Shelby can afford all the stuff used in the murders. There's no way he could have made that much money as a police officer. When he was adopted after John died, the family who took him in could have been pretty wealthy, and left him quite a bit of money after passing away.- Uh... not actually. He kept some high-profile criminals out of jail, so they repaid him by helping him set up the trials. Perhaps they're aiding him financially, or he's being paid to keep quiet.
The Origami Killer is based on the "smiley face killer"
Targets young men (well, boys in the game)? Check. Has them drowned? Check. Named after ritualistic marks he leaves at the site of murder? Check. The Shaun glitch is actually another alternate ending.
In it, Ethan has completely lost his sanity, and started shouting his son's name at random intervals. is actually another alternate ending. Every playable character has psychic powers, has had them in the past, or has experience with the supernatural
This is from the cut content that explains Ethan's black outs ( When Ethan had his accident, he made a mind-link with Scott so he blacks out every time Scott kills someone or does anything as the Origami Killer. That street he keeps going to is actually where Scott's brother died), but here's the basic idea of what I think is going on for each character, keeping this in context:- Ethan is a telepath who developed his powers due to brain trauma or the severe mental trauma of Jason's death. Since he can't control his power when it emerges, he loses control completely because he's being overwhelmed with Scott's emotions. This also bites him in the ass since he can only telepathically communicate with one person - the Origami Killer, who is aware of the connection between the two.
- Madison is a seer capable of predicting the future as well as a much weaker telepath, only able to read the people much closer to her. At one point, her insomnia allowed her to predict someone breaking into her apartment and thwart the men who tried to rob/kill her, but the trauma has led her to block her visions and suffer nightmares of the intruders. This would explain why she prefers to sleep in a motel — her Third Eye isn't seeing her in any danger there.
- Norman had ESP which allowed him to sense evidence at a better rate than any detective, but he has lost his power. He's using the ARI as a substitute because he can't operate at his level of skill without it and the ARI has much worse effects on him than any other user because of his now-diminished powers.
- Scott has worked some... bizarre cases in the past that the police don't want acknowledged, and he keeps quiet as a sort of duty.
- The Origami Killer is a telepath like Ethan but has control over his power. He sees into the eyes of other people and uses it to search for possible victims as well as a means of mind control because there's only so far that one person can go with a police uniform, especially at his age. He, at one point, made a permanent link with Ethan and is controlling the neural bridge to keep Ethan's mind out of his own, but the stress of the murders overwhelms Ethan and causes the black-outs. Ethan trying to save Jason, plus the formation of the mental bridge, served as his stressor and sparked the murders. He did work for the police as a psychic consultant on the side... up until he witnessed the car accident.
Norman Jayden and Carter Blake are a deconstruction of buddy-cop duos.
Blake is directly in league with the Origami Killer, and subtly works against the police in order to keep the slayings going
- Firstly, it explains why, despite having possible leads to go on with the forensic evidence, and the vehicle recordings, the police haven't seemed to investigate that much further, or even find potentially huge leads like the origami figures and shoeboxes handed to the parents of the victims. He doesn't WANT to find evidence. Not the real evidence, anyway. He'd prefer to putz around with people he knows aren't the real guy, but sort of match the image of "serial killer with a twisted gimmick" so it seems like he's actually investigating. which leads me to my second point.
- In the earlier parts of the plot, He always seems to be VERY eager to pin anyone he comes across during the "investigation" as the killer, ESPECIALLY if they have some known psychological condition. While this could be chalked up to simple ableism, I believe it's because he sees them as an easy scapegoat for a serial killer. He knows it's only a matter of time before the public get fed up with yet another death and barely a lead, which would likely eventually leave him thrown to the wolves and taken off the force, as well as make the whole force look like buffoons, so they need someone to take the fall to make them look like they're doing their job. Speaking of which...
- When/if they arrest Ethan, he and the Police Captain immediately stage a media conference to basically say "we got em" before Ethan even goes to jail, or they're even done "interrogating" him, they try and force a full "confession" through behind-closed-doors violence, and refuse to even consider the possibility of his innocence. He seems convinced that Ethan was the Origami Killer the second his wife comes into the police station with her information. Almost like it was a golden egg that fell right into his lap that would have went over well with the courts.
- As to WHY he'd do this, one of the scenes in "Manfred" that happens if you mess up the fingerprints in Manfred's shop establishes that Shelby and him have a history, as he talks about him being "in trouble again", as well as saying he'll "take care of it". Kinda unusual to be able to take care of something so suspicious so quickly. I believe it's that friendship, as well as the fact that he was a cop to be the reason why he continues to cover for the killer. That, and when they eventually arrest the "killer", it'll look great on his career portfolio, and maybe what he needs to move up even further through the police.
The Origami Killer molested their victims before sticking them in the drywell
Should Ethan be gunned down by police, Shaun becomes a Serial Killer targeting crooked cops when he grows up to avenge his father's death
Shaun was always meant to be the Origami Killer's final victim
Our favourite Serial Killer spends most of the game collecting and destroying evidence. He also plans to settle down with Lauren and perhaps even marry her, although she won't be too keen on that. As theorised in the Headscratchers, he also finally goes after a decent father in a desperate attempt to find a capable one after the failures of the deadbeats he tested. In the ending where she and Scott survive, Lauren called Scott for a meeting
Lauren kills herself in both endings where she learns who the Origami Killer is
Ethan impregnated Madison during their tryst
If the game is adapted to a film or TV series:
- The Origami Killer's identity will be changed, possibly to Blake, Perry, the Kramers, Lauren, John Sheppard, etc. For this reason Shelby's character will either be altered or cut out entirely.
- The ARI will be cut.
- The psychic link plotline will be added back.
- One of the men will undergo a Gender Flip.
- One of the characters will undergo a Race Lift.
- Shelby's backstory will be even more traumatic.
- Jayden will be explicitly queer.
- Madison will undergo Adaptational Modesty.
- Ethan's architecture expertise will come in useful, such as exploiting weak structures in the trials.
- Madison's journalism expertise will come in useful, such as writing an article extolling Ethan's innocence, condemning the police, revealing the killer, etc.
- A character's job will be changed.
- Madison will be a failed actress, failed model, nurse, war medic, war veteran, blogger, private investigator or the relative of an Origami Killer victim.
- Jayden will be a local police detective, private investigator or another father forced into the trials.
- Madison and Jayden will be merged into one character.
- Jayden and Shelby will be merged into one character.
- Madison and Shelby will be merged into one character.
- Ethan and Madison's relationship will start earlier.
- Shelby's parents will have a bigger role.
- Jason will be alive for longer.
- Shaun will be more proactive.
- Ethan will not be the protagonist.
- A gay couple will both have to undergo the trials to save their son.
- The mothers will also undergo the trials.
- There will be more and/or different trials aside from the main 5.
- The story will be adapted to the modern day.
- The film/show will be a sequel with an Origami Killer copycat.
- Pascal Langdale, Leon Ockenden, Jacqui Ainsley, Judi Beecher or Sam Douglas will make a cameo.
- Ethan, Madison or Jayden will be killed.
Cast for a film or TV series:
- Ethan
- Jayden
- Madison
- Shelby
- Lauren
