Yeah this sucks still actually, i just rewatched it, never cook ever again.

You comparing jimmy to james is one of the biggest opinioned roasts ever. James isn't bad as jimmy in the slightest Homlander and jimmy have the ego boost. But james is a neutral villain, not a chaotic villain. He killed his wife due to cancer and guilt of cheating But people always call him a bad guy. it's crazy. The only reason the maria ending changed in the remake was due to it not having a good ending in the original they made it more sinsiter, saying you got to do something about the cough, It was guilt and anger in his voice he has a little ptsd or trauma since everything he been through. Also, i think fans get mad because their sensitive feelings because they forget maria is the antagonist, which has been confirmed from the original game If you look at the new clues in the remake I was shocked since you noticed she left more clues she also dyed her hair acting like mary one of the biggest stalkers in james life btw. I dont know comparing mouth wash to Silent Hill 2 is a huge disappointment since jimmys character is based on the shining well in space.

What I find troubling about this video is that it disregards the key points about the creators' intended direction and refuses to acknowledge them. This results in a misleading narrative that paints James as an abuser. The most-liked comments, from about four people, seem to reinforce this perspective, aligning with what the guy in the video says-using a blanket statement to push a fabricated narrative. It feels like an attempt to manipulate viewers into believing his version of events.

Silent Hill 2 with James is a pretty conflicting story to pin down. Calling James an abuser or not I believe is both correct tho. The story opens up the ideas that James is unreliable and the only truth we are given is from Silent Hill itself. Funnily enough, the most unrealistic thing with the otherworldly to happen in real life, is the only true things we have about James. I do love your assessment of James as an abuser, but I also see why people see him not fully as one either. The game is complex with this topic and I find that is the main reason I love it so much a story!

Let’s be real…if this were a courtroom…James defense would be the equivalent of “I forgive myself”

i've watched this before. i just booted it up, after my first viewing around six months ago. at the time, i thought it was impactful. how couldn't you? but, three weeks ago, i lost my best friend. the first person to ever show me compassion outside my family. in my entire life. one week ago, i got broken up with. we're still friends, but it's a raw wound for me and i still don't really understand why. two hours ago, i was cleaning out an old snake tank for my sister's new pets while sobbing and hyperventilating while my mom screamed at me about how useless i am i relate to the concept of being a friend with a character heavily. the aforementioned "best friend", i met in 6th grade. i went to a catholic elementary school, and was heavily, heavily bullied there. i still carry scars from there. and when i tried to kill myself before i could write five paragraphs, my favorite characters were there. on saturday, i'm seeing a movie and having a sleepover with my former partner, now friend. i'm pretty excited. this video made me cry. thank you.

wtf this video is amazing????

excellent video

"You better do something about that cough" is such a cold and accusatory statement. As if the sickness were Mary/Maria's fault that they should take upon themselves to rectify.

See, i remembered there being a point in the game that talks about how Mary also kinda mistreated James because of the stress of her illness clouding her better judgements. I recall the scene where she yells at him and quickly apologizes. The story of SH2, from my perspective, was just “hurt people hurt people.” Mary was lashing out at James and abusing him verbally while James did all he could to support his wife. Then, in his own pain, he snapped and retaliated. James was certainly the worse person, when calculating the gravity of one’s actions. But to call him an abuser just seems a tad far, is all. It’s a complicated story, and people who cant swallow nuance really love to assign a villain and victim role to stories, but it’s just not simple like that. It’s a very human story, it’s not some fairy tale with moral paragons. There wasn’t an abuser there, in my mind. Though, I’ll say, we will often dehumanize people with abusive tendencies in an attempt to sanitize our own egos. But it’s a good thing to remember that abusers are humans too, with just as much complexity as anyone.

Finally tried gris and it’s gorgeous

I think James being an abuser is clearer in the original SH2, he always had a much harsher tone when talking to Eddy or Laura for example, and the cough-line in the Maria ending is gutwrenching. They made him a lot more sympathetic in the remake which is not necessarily a bad take since it makes the reveal he killed Mary more impactful imo, but I can see why people who didn't play the original are defending him more. I feel like your analysis was spot on though

I have watched tons of essays and its truly the first i come across that talks about him as an unreliable narrator because of his abusive character.

Is James a man who snapped under his own carnal weight? Or was he a monster the entire time? This video is actually brilliant, not many people see through James' distortion as the game, especially the original, was crafted such a way. Thats what silent hill is, a distortion of reality. Thats why every character, if you believe theyre real, experiences different things in the town. Everyones got their own demons that influence their own perspective. After watching, I can believe both options being true. From his perspective and from the outsider (us fhe player/viewer). Man you just added more layers to an already incredibly layered game. Is he a man? Or is he a monster? Maybe thats what team silent wanted us to wonder the whole time

Ted taught me humility and forgiveness to myself it had such impacts on me Ina way I'll never forget

While points in this video regarding James are a little weak, I'm inclined to believe he's not some peaceful and happy husband because while he may feel remorse _he still killed his wife._ And brutally at that, suffocation by pillow sounds like a horrible terrifying way to go. Caregivers feel taxed and exhausted and less than human, all of which are valid because it is a strenuous job with little reward. However there is about a hundred different ways James could've either gotten Mary out of his care or even (to put it crudely) pull her plug. I have been there and many others have been there (including professionals who don't have nearly as strong of an emotional attachment), when you truly love and want the best for someone you don't up and go murder them. You may have intrusive thoughts and at some point you do begin waiting for the end, but the mere decision to end someone's life _peacefully_ can take days, weeks, months to ruminate on and accept. Like I would never end my pet in such a manner let alone another human being whom I love. It doesn't matter if he feels guilty or if it haunts him, which is the bare minimum of empathy, because he still did it. There are times when saying sorry or that you feel so guilty isn't enough and times when you can't just move past a mistake.

Honestly, I saw this video and opened it up pretty much when it came out, but only now did I take the time to watch it instead of the other several tabs I have open. Even now, I've got maybe 15 tabs open, but I put off everything else that was begging for my attention so I could finally see what this title meant. And honestly? I just need to thank you for putting out this video. Sharing your experiences and allowing us to feel for you at your vulnerable points in life gives me a bit of hope. A concept that used to elude me as a child, but now at 25 years old... I find myself really appreciating what hope can do. Not denial or the refusal of current circumstances, but the notion that even at its worst; life is still worth living. Even if you disconnect from what your childhood was, you can always find solace and appreciation for all that you went through and all that's yet to come. Hope is what you've given me. Because when life feels like it's moving too fast, sometimes you just have to slow down and smell the roses, not worrying about being left behind because you know that *eventually* you'll get to where you need to be in life. That. Is hope.

I'm going off of the original Silent Hill 2 because I don't really like the remake at all, so our differing views might come from the disparity between the two games, but I think you have a problem phrasing some of your points around Silent Hill 2, that or you fundementally don't understand how the town works in Silent Hill 2, which might be down to the remake not explaining it properly. I understand your interpretation, but for me it reduces a lot of what I like about the games story and characters. My main problem with this interpretation is that you atribute a lot of stuff to being "what James wants us to see", and this doesn't fit with how the town works, nor with my perception of James as a character and I find it more reductive than it is interesting. James doesn't get to control what the town gives him, nor what we see, the town is basically just tormenting him using things from his own psyche. The idea that James can try to convince us of something using things from the town is straight up incorrect. Also "we" are not an entity in this story, so I'm not sure why you phrase it this way as opposed to James trying to convince himself. Maybe this barrier in how we see ourselves in the story comes down to the third-person camera perspective in the remake where we sort of embody James, while in the original game we are very disconnected from James, a fixed observer rather than James himself, just another reason I don't like the remake I guess. My take is that James and Marys relationship is a tragedy. James and Mary most-likely had a loving and caring relationship throughout most of their lives, but Mary's illness began to bring out the worst in both of them leading to abuse from both sides. We hear how Mary treats James during some of her darker times with the illness when we are in the Lakeview Hotel, and throughout the game we can see the the illness take a toll on James, having to constantly endure seeing the woman he loves rot and suffer. I don't even think you need to look into it that much to see that James becomes an abuser throughout the later years of their relationship, he did kill her after all so it's not far-fetched to assume tamer things were going on before that. Nothing excuses the things James has done, especially killing Mary as it wasn't his choice to make. Give a listen to the uncensored audio of him killing Mary in the original game, it is genuinely chilling. Him guilting himself doesn't make his murder of Mary any less bad, the dog that weeps after it kills is no better than the dog that doesn't. That being said, I love James as a character and what makes him work for me isn't whether or not he's a "good person", it's that we understand how he got to this point and that we can interpret a lot about him beforehand and his inner world by seeing what the town manifests from his mind. I also like his personality and voice acting in the original, he's weird, he's awkward, he's obviously not all there, but he's just interesting to me. The endings even give us perspective into the man James will become after. Will he be unable to overcome his guilt and do what he came to Silent Hill for in the first place? Will he try to move on despite the pain? Will he go all in into being a complete cunt and just grab a weird idealized clone of Mary? Will he try to revive her? Hopefully not, that ending sucks narratively and encorporates the cult elements of Silent Hill, and I'll always maintain that cults are boring in most media because they usually aren't interesting and take away agency from the characters. I'm not even sure what this whole spiel is anymore, but think the best way to phrase this for me is that this interpretation reduces the impact of Marys letter, and my favourite line in the whole series, that being: "The truth is... I hated you. I wanted you out of the way; I wanted my life back!" "James... If that were true, then why do you look so sad?" TL;DR I don't like the remake. I'd recommend watching Yahtzees "Silent Hill 2 and the Hidden Costs of Remakes", it's only about 8 minutes long and it's worth a watch.

I think the take that most people analyzing James’ character and behaviors don’t identify aspects of his abuse is disingenuous. I am willing to concede that they do not label him explicitly as an abuser but there is no mass group of people shying away from the fact that he is a killer and undoubtedly a shallow and selfish person. I think that it makes sense that people want to defend him when you take into account game design and that you and he go on this amnesiac journey together only to find out at the very end that he is the cause of all of his suffering as his wife’s killer. I do really like your overall take that what we see is what he wants us to see because it is innovative but most people will agree what he sees is the hell that reflects his own guilt and anguish as is true for Angela and Eddy. Had to stop before the mouthwashing part though because I haven’t played it yet so if you mentioned something relevant to that portion of the video mb.

I love the use of the Diamond Dogs, having a group of men listening, sharing and encouraging without judgement. It was great to see this ideal and method represented on the show. Each of the men manly in their own way, each open and vulnerable at some point. Each supported and supporting in turn.

Wow. Great retrospective. ❤❤❤ You helped alot of us with this.

@ratelrock Je ne sais pas si l'identification va fonctionner, mais je me permet de te tagguer sur cette vidéo car je trouve que la clé de lecture pour Silent Hill 2 super intéressante, et que ça développe déjà quelque chose que tu avais toi même soulevé dans la vidéo essay sur silent Hill 2 !

I feel like the comments only take physical abuse and the stereotypical image of the drunk wife beating husband seriously. James’s caretaker fatigue could EASILY lead to an abusive dynamics (emotionally, physically, mentally, etc.), especially with the power imbalance since Mary was in his care… and we know how that ended. An established, healthy relationship can BECOME abusive.

The In Water makes so much sense now. That’s the favorite of the creators for a reason, they even cited that having Mary’s body in the back seat was akin to a murder-suicide. Oh god, can’t un-think that now. Thanks for the video, I’m gonna read that book.

Thanks for your insightful take in this video and for sharing this book with us. To understand why some people behave this way, we need to remove our standard value judgment from the equation and realize that people learn behaviors that get them rewards. Their experiences and backgrounds do not really matter. People who use abusive tactics have learned that manipulation is effective in getting them what they want, AND they don’t care that this is at the expense of others because they feel they are more important than others. It is the last piece that differentiates a normal person from someone who routinely engages in abusive behavior. The best defense is to realize that people who abuse you don’t care about your feelings, and to recognize what they want and do everything in your power not to reward them. Stay strong!

Remember that even Maria is part of sh (or James mind), she was created only to meet James (at least in the original game). The monster's design also tells a lot about how he saw his visits to sh, the hospital or maybe even Mary, from a vomiting monster, pairs of legs, a living bed, etc.

One of my friends from highschool, in my closest circle of friends whom I shared many things with in the years we were friends, suddenly dropped out of my group's lives in the first year of college with no explanation and only a "goodbye". To this day I will never know their reasoning for dropping our group so suddenly like that, especially when they had been friends with some of us since middle school. There's a very specific pain that comes with mourning someone who is still living, especially when you had little choice in losing them (and don't know why you lost them). I hope you are overall better these days, I am happy to hear that you are in a good relationship. Sharing this essay has helped me process my lost friendship in ways I haven't for well over a year now.

lol is that the Outer Wilds OST slowed?

I really like your views in this video. Silent Hill 2 is one of my favorite games but I've never thought it from this perspective. Really insightful.

Using the hollow knight score behind the commentary is a stroke of genius to bring a soothing yet down beat feel to the context ❤

“Abuser”, you say? Yeah, well, killing your wife because she’s ill and it’s made her deeply unsexy and emotionally volatile _is_ kind of a dick move. Femicide is never cool, even if you’ve got cozy altruistic reasons (“this will end her suffering!”) to pat yourself in the back. But the thing is, in bringing up Bancroft, you have reframed the story, skipping an important device within the narrative. Silent Hill 2 might be about abuse, among other things, but the place operates like an Id-machine. That’s a trope built on psychoanalytic lingo. The place shows whomever traverses it their repressed feelings/thoughts. What they don’t want to acknowledge within themselves. For little Alessa it was all the harm her loved ones and random-ass people seemed to gratuitously dump on her, maybe even SA (because how do you put a terrible deity inside a little girl?). For James, what comes back (the return of the repressed) is all what lies below his apparent refusal to accept he’s in a delusional state: “I seem to keep getting these letters from my dead wife… huh!” Like the Wish Granter at the end of Roadside Picnic (the book not the game), the Id-machine shows you what you refuse to acknowledge/are oblivious about yourself. James is attracted by SH’s magic-ass spiritual energy to untangle the mess of the psychotic episode that murdering his wife triggered within him. To say that he’s manipulating the narrative to trick us would miss the point that the town forces him to acknowledge his misdeeds, his guilt and most importantly the suffering of others. He is a bad person, fo sho, but he’s put in a maze “of his own device” that will allow him to see himself for what he really is. And he’s guilty, but he can be more than that. There’s a cool-ass expressive resource in the beginning of the game. The use of specularity. James is looking at his mug in the mirror like someone’s who’s just woke up or is in disbelief that _that_ is their face. He thinks that person is himself, but something’s off. And what shape does the manifestation of his guilt and most base impulses take? Mr. Pyramid Face. His is a face you *cannot* see, because you wouldn’t. You couldn’t bear it. But somehow he seems omniscient. James can run from him, but not hide. Below that heavy chunk of metal lies the horror that James cannot recognize within himself. He functions as a psychopomp of sorts. Like Virgil leads Dante to his self-congratulatory depiction of hell (where everyone he didn’t like was having an awesome time), Pyramid Head (Jame’s guilt) leads him towards the truth. He can accept it and move on, or not. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not saying being an abuser is something that shouldn’t be talked about, corrected or even punished. My point is that SH2 is greater than that. James could end his pain by committing suicide (navel-gazing, if from a sympathy-inducing, forlorn place). Or shape up, accept his guilt, maybe go to the cops and tell them “yo, I murdered my girl” and take care of Laura. Laura is his chance at redemption: he took a life, now take care of this little girl who apparently is also lost in this town full of monsters. (I’ll admit, even if we’re constrained by dream-logic within the town of SIlent Hill, that redemption arc would be kinda funny in real life: “You killed your wife and went insane and now you’re gonna be my daddy?). I like the abuse angle. I also like TLP’s ideas on narcissism. It’s great that horror gives us such a fine way to explore these subjects. Thank you for the video and I hope you like my critique (:

Lads, is it abusive to murder your wife with a pillow??? Serious responses only

I completely agree with your assessment of James. Every abuse story is two stories. People aren't abusive without reason, and an abuser's behaviors are often rooted in extreme, difficult emotions. Building off what you said at 30:37, sometimes not even the abusers are aware their actions are harmful. They often refuse to confront that, even years later. To James, he's gone through something difficult and you should feel bad for him. He did what he had to do, and it's a tragic end to a sad story. To others, the story could have gone very differently and had a more bittersweet ending. But to get there, James would need to confront himself first.

I'm really glad you mentioned that the exploration of James' abuse is rare, because I have been in SH circles for almost two decades and the take is SO rare I've barely seen it. It's always been ridiculous to me the length people will go to defend James' action as the abused, because they can only do that by dehumanizing his victim. It's especially bleak when they use the letter as an excuse; 'Mary wanted it, he did it out of love' like his wife wasn't going through the worst moment of her life and James chose the one time where she was in what should've been a safe, comforting place to get rid of her in one of the most violent, excruciating ways possible. Great video man, I'll be checking that book out!

I wish every human could see this video

Beautifully said

Okay I have tried to comment my in depth take which debunks the video in a satisfactory manner but it keeps getting deleted, so frankly, this video is a perfect example of how media literacy has gone down the drain.

I don't get the impression that James was an abuser, and I think your take is weird for a few reasons. The biggest is that you seem to take away the idea that James is trying to convince the player that James is a good person when nothing suggests that there's some kind of 4th wall, meta narrative going on. He's not trying to portray himself as a victim to anyone because he's not aware that anyone's watching. Within the narrative of the universe, he's going through his journey alone. Never in any of the Silent Hill games is it implied that there's some kind of awareness of the player going on (aside from easter eggs, of course). Second, if you take James stomping on monsters as his finishing move being a sign of him being an abuser, then I guess that means Harry and Heather from SH1 and SH3 must also have been abusers too, since they do the same thing when they finish monsters. Also, James only "repeatedly" stomps them if you, the player, make him stomp on them repeatedly. This is like saying Mario is a dinosaur killer because of how many Yoshis he's dropped in bottomless pits. Third, I grant the Maria ending does make James an abuser, but he only turns out that way if you, the player, make him that way. In a sense, James' personality is applied depending on how the player takes him through the game. Many games have characters that can end up with vastly different personalities depending on how the player plays them. James is not a good man, but the biggest thing the different endings ask us is "is he irredeemable?" The Maria ending would suggest the answer is yes, but the other endings would suggest the answer is no. James doesn't control what the town manifests, so what ending you get is a true manifestation of what's in his heart. The Leave ending even has Mary challenge James on his belief that he hated Mary, meaning that he didn't hate her after all. "James...if that were true, then why do you look so sad?" That is not James trying to manipulate the player, that is himself trying to come to terms with what he did.

Omg, Mr, Johnsons scene got me too. It honestly made me cry and realize not having one dream is OKAY. :') Love your analysis, this show changed my life for the better too.

I forgot how old fire watch is.

It ain’t good

I wouldn’t say James is an abuser, he is selfish and unempathetic, a shitty person in a mundane way. But I still wouldn’t classify him as an abuser. At least not the definition as I understand it, maybe in the more broader term. There’s definitely a distinct difference between him and Jimmy from Mouthwashing, but to be fair we don’t really see James interact much with his real wife so it’s up for interpretation.

completely missing the point of James and silent hill

❤

Great video man! Lots of great points made. I have one gripe - the part about how James treats the monsters. Stomping on them repeatedly is something he does if the player chooses to, you can make it through the entire game without stomping on an enemy once. It’s just a game mechanic to prevent enemies from getting up and attacking you again. And the part about the mannequins - they don’t hide from you, they hide so they can ambush you; and the only time they actually try to get away, is in the final part of the game after learning the truth from the tape, all pretenses are dropped, and you see one type of monster after another powerlessly fall to the ground and die. Since they serve no purpose anymore, and James is ready to face his desired punishment. Again, I REALLY like this video, except for that part because that was taking visuals and scenes from the game out of context. Cheers!

I disagree a lot with your analysis of Silent Hill. In order to push the idea of James being manipulative, you misconstrue a lot of elements of the game, the biggest example making it seem as if James had any agency over what is manifested in the town and shown to us, going as far as to say he "has all the power" over what we see. That's not how it works, the town reflects one's subconscious, none of the protagonists in the series have any agency over how that happens. James is so broken by what he did that he spends most of the story delusional about Mary's death, even when her body is in the backseat of his car all along, and yet you make it seem as if it all was some convoluted plan to trick us into liking him. You also blurs the players actions with the characters personality. "In the act of what we see sometimes as 'self defense', he often stomps the light out of them, repeatedly, after they are gone, for no purpose, other than assert his own power and control" That's on you, the player, mashing the buttons non stop, not the character I also disagree when you make it seem that James having committed a monstrous crime and him being a good person at heart are mutually exclusive. People are complicated, and oversimplifying these issues through vilification help no one. My dad is an abusive and controlling man. He also is a good person. He hurt me a lot during our life. He also did his best to give me a good life and to be a better parent than his own dad was. I know its for the best if we only see each other once in a while and never live together again. I also still love him dearly, and know for a fact he truly loves me back. Sometimes, I catch myself doing the same kind of bad stuff he did to me. That's scary. I try to be better. He tries too, and improved a lot over the years. Grandpa, however, hanged himself when I was 7. People are complicated But all of that is fine. Silent Hill is a highly subjective game open to a lot of possible interpretations, and people are complicated. It's okay if we disagree. What I found particularly offensive, though, was "Experiencing this story for the first time this year has me interpreting James as a deceptive abuser, which can be entirely different from what you believed. There is no need to blame yourself for being fooled or manipulated" Fooled? Manipulated? How about we just having different interpretations? Why do you need to disrespect my intelligence and victimize me in order to push your point? For a video about abuse, its pretty rich to gaslight your audience into sharing your own point of view

I doubt any of this wouldve happened if james had any good friends who actually paid attention to him, his life, and his relationships.... a sad reflection of the hyper common self importance, apathy for others without reward for emapthetic behavior, and enthusiasm for removal/constant shuffling of moral values in relationships as a whole in modern western relationships. Seen people way too close to becoming james way too many times. Watch your friends and hold them accountable. Its the best way to care for those you love and your community.

This is all (as far as I know) the remake. If so, hats off to the writers for the evolution in character writing. Both stories can and should exist in my opinion. There are genuinely good people tormented by a hard decision in a hard situation, and monsters who try too hard to justify their behavior.

The flaw with the interpretation of Silent Hill 2 here is framing it explicitly as James wanting to affect the player's perception. I think that perspective is fourth wall breaking in a way that doesn't keep to the intent of the series. Although the developers clearly have an interest in obfuscating things for us and making several interpretations possible, in the story Jame's experiences in Silent Hill are tailored to him, FOR him. As far as the story is concerned, we do not exist for him to manipulate us, and thus everything has some truth to it in terms of what he temporarily feels or believes, twisted by varying degrees of mania. Presuming that these are deceptions for us twists the logic of Silent Hill's supernatural elements in an way that lacks consistency with Angela's storyline, for instance.

I hadn't seen this game in a while. It's wild to realize Eddie could've been what James looked/acted like in real life. Which is why he was so conflicted