Pop-Cultured Catholic #24: Saint Joseph the Terror of Demons and the First “Silent Hill” Game’s Harry Mason

With the Advent of Christmas, where we celebrate the Nativity of Jesus Christ and the events leading up to it, I have picked an unconventional work of pop-culture to tie into the occasion. For today’s post, I will be comparing the heroic qualities of Saint Joseph and the very first “Silent Hill” video game’s protagonist, Harry Mason. I came up with the idea while briefly pondering what video game characters could represent certain saints. While I have not played that 1999 game on the original PlayStation myself, I do know the game from watching walkthroughs and reviews of it.

Before I dive into the first game’s story, I will restate the franchise synopsis I wrote in my earlier post about “Silent Hill 2”. The Silent Hill video games center around a fog-smothered town in rural Maine. Over the course of many centuries, a dangerous witchcraft cult called The Order has turned the titular town of Silent Hill into a cursed place, where the spiritual realms of Purgatory and Hell can become one with the physical world. Due to this, some people visiting Silent Hill end up journeying through a nightmarish mirror of the town, akin to Dante’s Inferno. The imagery of Silent Hill draws inspiration from the 1990 psychological drama “Jacob’s Ladder”, and characters often face monsters tailor-made to symbolize their sins, traumas, etc. With these being Survival Horror video games, players are often tasked with exploration, puzzle-solving, fighting or fleeing monsters, utilizing an inventory of weapons and tools, plus managing limited resources like medicinal items and firearm ammunition. Players can also influence the unfolding story, based on how they play the game and the choices they have their character(s) make.

Now I will delve into the backstory of Harry Mason and his stepchild, Cheryl, leading up to the events of the first “Silent Hill”. While going on a roadtrip to Silent Hill with his wife, Jodie, Harry comes across a lost and seemingly abandoned girl. Taking pity on the child and being unable to conceive their own children, Harry and Jodie Mason decide to adopt the girl, naming her Cheryl. Over the years, Cheryl forms a deep loving bond with Harry and Jodie. Tragically, Jodie gradually succumbs to a disease and passes away, the same unspecified illness which left her unable to conceive. Amidst their grief, Harry and Cheryl grow even closer. Soon, Cheryl finds herself mysteriously drawn to Silent Hill. She suggests that they go on vacation there, and Harry agrees. Along the way, he meets a female cop named Cybil Bennet, who becomes important later.

While driving late at night on the final stretch of their trip to Silent Hill, Harry Mason suddenly spots a ghostly female figure in the middle of the street and panics, as he swerves to avoid hitting it and crashes his car. An unconscious Harry seemingly wakes up in his totaled car to find Cheryl gone, as fog and snow surround him. Looking around in confusion, Harry thinks he sees Cheryl disappearing in the distant fog and runs after her. From the fog emerges the town of Silent Hill, or rather an empty and paranormal mirror of the town. Amidst the vacant buildings, Harry witnesses signs of horrifying activity. Suddenly, the sound of an air raid siren blares, the town’s appearance changes, and he is set upon by demonic creatures. Harry is defenseless and falls unconscious again as they attack him.

Harry wakes up, seemingly again, in an abandoned tavern and finds himself watched over by the woman cop he met earlier, Cybil. Cybil Bennett corroborates the unnatural phenomena going on. Believing it is too dangerous for an ordinary civilian, Cybil warns Harry to stay sheltered inside, while she goes off to do her own investigation. Though, she lets Harry have a gun and teaches him how to use it, in case he needs to defend himself. As soon as Cybil leaves, Harry’s newly learned skills already come in handy. He hears a nearby radio go haywire, heralding the presence of a pterosaur-like monster, which bursts through the tavern window.

After killing the monster which attacked him in the tavern, Harry’s fear for Cheryl makes him go against Cybil’s advice and venture out into Silent Hill’s paranormal counterpart to search for Cheryl himself. His journey takes him through not only the haunted streets, but also a school, a hospital, sewer tunnels, a harbor, an amusement park, and other locations. He arms himself with his radio, a flashlight, various guns, other weapons, and whatever resources he can find to defend himself from a cast of additional Hell creatures. Along the way, he also pieces together various written notes to learn what is happening, comes across other people involved in the town’s activities, and occasionally meets back up with Cybil.

Among the other people Harry meets, the most significant is Dahlia Gillespie, a strange woman who warns him about the spirit of a supposed witch named Alessa. Standing before a large crucifix hanging in the local church, Dahlia presents herself as a holy woman and claims that Silent Hill is being swallowed up by an evil force conjured by Alessa, the ghost whom Harry saw while driving. According to Dahlia, Alessa seeks to spread the town’s “Otherworld” across the globe, bringing forth the Apocalypse. She instructs Harry and Cybil to help her stop and imprison Alessa, telling Harry in particular that it is the only way he can hope to see his stepdaughter Cheryl again. However, there are signs that Dahlia may not be who she claims. And whenever Harry spots Alessa, she looks suspiciously like an older doppelgänger of Cheryl.

As the plot unfolds, it turns out that Dahlia Gillespie is not a holy woman but the high priestess of a Satanic cult called “The Order”… and that Alessa is her biological daughter, who is actually trying to thwart the spread of Silent Hill’s Otherworld. Unlike “Silent Hill 2” which I previously covered, the first “Silent Hill” game has the Order take a front row seat in its plot. This doomsday cult awaits the birth of their “God” (more like Antichrist), who will destroy the world and form a “utopian paradise” on top of it. When Dahlia gave birth to Alessa, her daughter displayed supernatural abilities like astral projection, telekinesis, and otherworldly perceptions. Being a fanatic for the Order and caring only about Alessa as a means to an end, Dahlia believed her daughter’s power and sufferings could be harnessed to birth the Order’s “God”. And so she abusively raised and indoctrinated Alessa, grooming her to eventually be offered as a sacrifice, which brought about the Otherworld pervading Silent Hill. By the time Harry Mason has entered Silent Hill, Alessa’s ghost tries to fight its spread. And the Hell creatures Harry encounters take on appearances that either symbolize Alessa’s fears and traumas or mock the few things which brought joy to the child Alessa.

Another plot twist is soon revealed: Harry Mason’s adoptive daughter, Cheryl, and Alessa were once the same girl. Years ago, on the day that Dahlia and her fellow cultists began their sacrificial ritual on Alessa to bring forth their “God”, Alessa miraculously gained the additional powers of bilocation and reincarnation. She fought back with her powers Carrie-style, then split herself in two. Amidst the struggle, a fire spread and Alessa was fatally burned, but her other half escaped… reverting to a younger child and finding herself in the loving arms of Harry Mason, who named her Cheryl. Enraged that the ritual could not be finished without Alessa’s other half, Dahlia eventually figured out a way to beckon Cheryl to Silent Hill, so she could be kidnapped and rejoined with Alessa.

By the time Harry and Cybil learn of Dahlia’s deception, the priestess has already entrapped Alessa’s ghost, conjured a demon to possess Cybil, and initiated her plan to rejoin Alessa with Cheryl so her doomsday cult’s “God” can be birthed… but if players earn the best ending, Harry saves both Cybil and Alessa/Cheryl. The player can discover a way to exorcise Cybil rather than be forced to fight her. Afterwards, Harry braves one last gauntlet of Hell creatures to confront Dahlia, with Cybil by his side. Harry can cause Alessa to be exorcised too, when he witnesses the recombined Alessa becoming possessed. The expelled and weakened demon makes one last desperate assault. It materializes into a winged Incubus monster and conjures red lightning to burn its failed servant, Dahlia. It then sets its sights on Harry. But by now, Harry is so accustomed to facing Silent Hill’s monsters that he battles it head-on, turning the tables and victoriously slaying the Incubus. Afterwards, the Otherworld starts to collapse, and the freed Alessa reverts to Cheryl’s previous self. Harry carries his daughter to safety as Cybil escorts the pair.

Although “Silent Hill 2” centers around a completely different set of characters, “Silent Hill 3” continues and concludes the story of Harry and Cheryl Mason. In his continued devotion to keeping Cheryl safe, Harry renames her to Heather Mason and raises her in hiding from the Order. By the time Heather reaches adulthood, Harry dies defending her from the Order’s surviving cultists. But the memories of her loving adoptive father motivates her through the events of “Silent Hill 3” and helps to give her the strength to finally defeat the Order for good.

Harry Mason’s character has resonated with many Silent Hill fans, who find that he exhibits the more underrepresented qualities of a good masculine role model, as well as being one of fiction’s best stepparents. Harry is not this stereotypical big and macho soldier, but rather a simple civilian who works as a novel writer and gets thrown into a desperate situation. While not exactly being the physically strongest and most skilled in combat, his courage carries him through the nightmare of Silent Hill. Said courage is all fueled by the love he has for Cheryl. And none of his strength is compromised by him showing more emotional and vulnerable sides. While the story does illustrate the sad truth that some children can be treated horrifically by their biological parents, even their own mothers, it is counterbalanced by an uplifting truth that adoptive parents can still give that love a child deserves. And a father’s tender love is also powerful for a child, not just a mother’s. While Dahlia was willing to put her child through Hell to serve her own goals, Harry was willing to put himself through Hell to save that same child… almost like a Christ figure.

In fact, when the game was rather unfaithfully adapted into 2006’s “Silent Hill” movie, one aspect which especially drew fans’ criticisms was the director’s attitude towards Harry Mason. The film infamously replaced Harry Mason with a female protagonist named Rose Da Silva. Director Christophe Gans rationalized his decision with reported statements like this: “It quickly became clear however Harry never acted like a masculine character. He was constantly dizzy, fainting, talking to himself, screaming and in fact was very vulnerable. We didn't want to betray the nature of the game by changing the character's feelings and motivations, so we felt it was better to change to a female protagonist and retain all those important qualities”. Elsewhere, Gans also seemed to imply that men inherently love their wife most and women their child. Fans found these insinuations disrespectful to the game's writers and both men and women alike. To make matters messier, studio executives reportedly mandated that the film still have a male lead, so the filmmakers gave Rose Da Silva a husband played by Sean Bean, who is relegated to being a shoehorned narrative-interrupting background character. Other criticisms involved the filmmakers turning the cult into generic Puritan witch-burners, among other plot changes, in order to push their own messages. That is, when they could have just made an original story set in Silent Hill’s world, rather than warping the first game’s story to fit their agenda. And the movie threw in monsters from “Silent Hill 2”, most notably Pyramid Head, divorcing them from the unique symbolism and story significance which made them impactful in their respective game. Internet reviewer Phelan Porteus (a.k.a. Phelous) did a couple videos highlighting these criticisms, while also acknowledging the film’s positives he appreciated. 

Finally, it is time I compare Harry Mason to Saint Joseph, stepdad of Jesus Christ and the “Terror of Demons”. From the time of his very birth, the forces of evil are out to get the Baby Jesus. We all know King Herod’s Massacre of the Innocents. Revelation 12 describes Satan as the dragon that “stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her Child as soon as it was born”. Coincidentally, both King Herod and Dahlia Gillespie try to deceive good people into bringing the targeted child into their hands. Yet Jesus’ guardian was Saint Joseph, a simple carpenter willing to do whatever it took to nurture and protect him as a loving father. Both Joseph and Harry Mason become devoted to a miraculous child, who is not of their own flesh and blood. Both of them also die, before their stepchildren go on to complete their work against an evil force. Joseph’s closeness and devotion to Jesus has made him “Terror of Demons”, with Venerable Mary of Agreda even writing “The intercession of St. Joseph is most powerful: For filling the demons with terror at the mere mention of his name by his clients”. Meanwhile, Harry Mason’s devotion to Cheryl empowers him to confront and defeat Silent Hill’s machinations, with the final Hell creature resembling depictions of the folkloric demon Baphomet. Overall, if Saint Joseph were to be represented by a video game character, Harry Mason would be a strong candidate.

With that, I would like to wish a very unconventional Merry Christmas, especially for fathers and stepparents striving to emulate the same virtues displayed by Harry Mason and Saint Joseph. As supplementary materials, I will provide links to a full walkthrough of the 1999 game (which has it own convenient chapter divisions), Phelous’ reviews comparing and contrasting that game with its loose 2006 movie adaptation, plus my earlier post on “Silent Hill 2”…

1.) SH1 Game Walkthrough
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci1F_JIUBOA

2.) Silent Hill Film - Phelous
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5olgHarLLbY

3.) Silent Hill Again - Phelous
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxZ58t7BQOg

4.) Pop-Cultured Catholic: “Silent Hill 2” and a Soul’s Journey Through Despair, Repentance, and Forgiveness
https://mattfradd.locals.com/post/6250379/pop-cultured-catholic-silent-hill-2-and-a-soul-s-journey-through-despair-repentance-an