How did James get the letter in the first place?

James got a letter. From a dead person. Oh dear.

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Glazarus
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Post by Glazarus »

He read the letter after he killed Mary. After the breakdown, James repressed all memories about him killing her. The only thing that got stuck in his mind was a part of the letter, talking about the "special place".

The letter in his inventory isn't real, but there is a real letter. In the letter, Mary says that when he reads it, she is already gone. So, he was meant to have it after her death, nurse or no nurse involved.
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Post by SilentSteven »

Hi folks, sorry for the delayed response here.

Just from what Black Vault was saying. I agree partly with what you are saying, but I think it was poor explanation on my behalf when I used the phrase 'hooks into James'. I don't think there are parasites or zombies or anything like that. What I meant was the power of the town had worked its magic and drawn James into the town by giving him hope Mary was alive.

I think we all seem to agree that all the main characters are seeing something different in the town. It would be different for each person. When James went to SH because of what had just happened to him, that shaped what he saw in the town. Personally I don't subscribe to the sex-maniac theory of James but I do think that there was a lot of sexual frustration there hence the Pyramid Head 'sex scenes' (and no I don't want to open the sex/rape argument here again!), the suggestively clothed Nurses and of course the lovely Maria. All this shaped by James's subconcious and the towns power.

I personally believe that its the place of Silent Hill that possess all of the power and, like BV said, it just influences what people see when they go there. I think Juri Dawn is smack on the money by saying that Alessa isn't a puppetmaster (neither is Christabel in the bloody awful comics for that matter!). I think Alessa was just an incredibly powerful person who was able to manipulate the towns power thanks to her link with God. It might not have been as powerful before her birth but that power was there before Alessa and is still there now after her death...........which should start some nice arguments about whether Cheryl/Heather can now control the town!

Anyway thanks for the nice comments about my little theory - its nice to know that not all of you think I'm a rambling pillock!

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Post by overachiever547 »

When I die, I've arranged so that you will receive this letter. The Japanese script makes no mention of Mary giving the letter to a nurse.
I have the audio of the letter being read, and Mary precisely says, "I told the nurse to give this to you after I'm gone. That means as you read this, I'm already dead. I can't tell you to remember me, but I can't bear for you to forget me."

Also, didn't Laura say something about stealing the letter from some mean nurse that wouldn't let her have it?

Near the end, she's about to give the true letter to James when she realizes that she dropped it. The game never tells us if she gets it back, but when the letter is read at the end, I think it's sort of an aside in that James never actually gets to read it himself, but the viewer knows how Mary truly feels, thus heightening the emotional element of the final scene.

You must also remember that the "true" letter's beginning is exactly like Jame's "imaginary" letter, but continued, thus changing the meaning of the letter in entirely.

Both letters contain:

"I'm alone there now... in our special place... waiting for you..."

But only the true letter continues, saying:

"Waiting for you to come to see me. But you never do. And so I wait, trapped in my cocoon of pain and loneliness... (cont'd) I feel so pathetic and ugly laying here, waiting for you... Every day I stare up at the cracks in the ceiling, and all I can think about is how unfair it all is..." she writes as she lies dying in her hospital bed.

The true letter says that Mary wasn't waiting for him in Silent Hill. She was waiting for James to visit her in the hospital. James's mind twisted the first page of the letter into an imaginary invitation to Silent Hill.
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Numboy
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Post by Numboy »

I think the letter exists... Correct me if Im wrong, but, Laura said something about Mary giving a letter tu a nurse.
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Post by The Adversary »

>I have the audio of the letter being read, and Mary precisely says
So do I. But that's not what the Japanese script says, now does it? No, it doesn't, as I've offered you in what was provided.
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Post by Numboy »

St. Thomas wrote:>I have the audio of the letter being read, and Mary precisely says
So do I. But that's not what the Japanese script says, now does it? No, it doesn't, as I've offered you in what was provided.
Could you explain that???
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Post by AuraTwilight »

The Japanese script says something different. Duh.
[quote="BlackFire2"]I thought he meant the special powers of her vagina.[/quote]
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Post by Numboy »

Damn! Im so Dumb! jajaja
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Post by JhonEN_C »

I Belive These 2 Theries, Its Part Of His Mind, Or The One, I Realy Think Is True, He Wrote It. It Exsist, But James WRote It So His Fantsty Would work Out, James Needed Closure, So He Made His Own





Mini Spoiler



And The Letter He Gets At The End Is Fake.







End Spoiler
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Post by AuraTwilight »

Other way around. The letter he gets in the end is the real ending and the one he starts the game with is the fake.
[quote="BlackFire2"]I thought he meant the special powers of her vagina.[/quote]
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Post by jthomp1286 »

That wouldn't make sense in terms of it needing closure. The letter at the end brings closure to the overall reason he's there in the first place. It's the final piece of the puzzle. To say the letter at the end is fake, is to say that the beginning is fake, therefore rendering the entire story false.
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Glazarus
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Post by Glazarus »

To answer, I could actually quote myself...
Glazarus wrote:He read the letter after he killed Mary. After the breakdown, James repressed all memories about him killing her. The only thing that got stuck in his mind was a part of the letter, talking about the "special place".

The letter in his inventory isn't real, but there is a real letter. In the letter, Mary says that when he reads it, she is already gone. So, he was meant to have it after her death, nurse or no nurse involved.
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Post by Numboy »

OK. but James said something about this letter that was written by Mary's own handwritting; how could possibly be James the one how actually wrote that letter?
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Post by AuraTwilight »

He didn't. He created it with his mind. It's a hallucination. An illusion. A mirage.
[quote="BlackFire2"]I thought he meant the special powers of her vagina.[/quote]
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Post by JuriDawn »

Think of it as James's distorted memory of the real letter.
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Post by Shalott »

overachiever547 wrote:
Both letters contain:

"I'm alone there now... in our special place... waiting for you..."

But only the true letter continues, saying:

"Waiting for you to come to see me. But you never do. And so I wait, trapped in my cocoon of pain and loneliness... (cont'd) I feel so pathetic and ugly laying here, waiting for you... Every day I stare up at the cracks in the ceiling, and all I can think about is how unfair it all is..." she writes as she lies dying in her hospital bed.

The true letter says that Mary wasn't waiting for him in Silent Hill. She was waiting for James to visit her in the hospital. James's mind twisted the first page of the letter into an imaginary invitation to Silent Hill.


Actually, at the end of the game, Mary tells James in her letter, that she could see how hard was for James all this "issue", when he visited her at the hospital.
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The Necronoir
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Post by The Necronoir »

There is a physically real piece of paper though. The fact that it later turns blank just shows that he projected the words onto the page as part of his delusion.

Just to clarify- James carries a blank piece of paper around for the whole game, believing it is a letter from Mary.
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Post by AuraTwilight »

Yea, and then the piece of paper ITSELF dissapears. The entire letter is a delusion.
[quote="BlackFire2"]I thought he meant the special powers of her vagina.[/quote]
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The Necronoir
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Post by The Necronoir »

Really, when? I must have missed that.
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Post by Shalott »

After you watch the video I believe.
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