she’sjust a manifestation, …… a study on maria from keiichiro toyama’s silent hill : a woman written by a man , james sutherland’s fantasy dream girl constructed under the male gaze .
we are first introduced to maria as she is seen by james. noting how she has an eerie resemblance to his late wife, mary, yet there are differences that already pin-point what maria is : a manifestation of james’ desires, his fantasies, everything that mary was not.
maria’s in game dialogue: “ what? you mustbe joking. but i can be yours! i’ll be here for you forever. and i’ll never yell at you, or make you feel bad! that’s what you wanted! i’m different than mary!how can you throw me away?! ”
as an illusion, an externalization of james’ repressed wishes, maria is overly sexualized, which is typical for women written by men (i.e., characters created and existing for the male gaze). a number of tropes exist under this umbrella such as the ‘cool girl’ from gillian flynn’s gone girl, the 'manic pixie dream girl’ coined by nathan robin after observing kirsten dunst’s character in elizabethtown, etc. maria can be categorized as an amalgamation of both, on steroids when counting the horror elements of silent hill (i.e., maria’s continuous resurrection no matter how brutal her death, her designation as a monster keeping james on limbo). maria is created for male consumption; constructed under the male gaze. by definition, the male gaze is “a way of portraying women that empowers men while sexualizing and diminishing women” (vanbuskirk). the male gaze has created different female stock characters that represent different common fantasies a heterosexual male audience possesses, notably the ones mentioned above.
another recurring thread is maria’s apparent helplessness and inability to carry out a conversation without sexualized tones. this is exhibited through her in game dialogue: “come on, you’re supposed to be the big man around here. how’s a little girl like me supposed to help?” / “don’t you want to touch me? come and get me. i can’t do anything through these bars. hurry back, okay?” further solidifying her lack of agency in the story.
maria exists solely for james. she is literally, by definition, everything that james wanted his dead wife to be. maria is a fantasy: she is who you fantasize about, /but never want your girlfriend to be/, she is the woman you call a whore and a slut, and yet, you come back to her all the time.
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