Village Of Shadows & Yearning For Dark Shadows
– A Closer Look
At the end of the game, it is clear that the folktale story “Village of Shadows” told in the very beginning was about Mother Miranda and the Four Lords all along. Even though the characters in the folktale are different in appearance and behaviour, the key features of the legend stay the same.
The girl in the folktale is presumed to be Rose, the four monsters she encounters represent the Four Lords and the Witch is supposed to be Mother Miranda. The mirror in which the girl has been trapped in by the Witch could represent the four flasks Rose’s body has been sealed in.
This gets confirmed by the revealing of the folktale’s ending, where the father shows up to fight the Witch and sacrifices his life to save his daughter. The concept artwork also confirms that the family in the folktale is based on the Winters family:
However, there are certain things happening in the folktale that are incompatible with the actual role Rose has in the game’s story.
Rose and Ethan:
The problem is that Rose has a completely passive role in the story, since she is a baby and defenseless. She can’t think for herself and is in need of protection, she is the one that needs to be saved.
But the girl in the folktale is an active character who decides her actions. This is more similar to the active role of Ethan in the game’s story. Ethan meets and fights the Four Lords, in the same order as the girl meets the monsters in the folktale:
1. The Bat Lord = Alcina Dimitrescu
2. The Dark Weaver = Donna Beneviento
3. The Fish King = Salvatore Moreau
4. The Iron Steed = Karl Heisenberg
In the folktale, the Bat Lord, the Dark Weaver and the Fish King all willingly give gifts to the girl, in order to save her or to help her endure her harsh environment. The Iron Steed though, is the only one that does not give a gift to her.
Instead, the girl apparently has become greedy and starts to take things for granted. She takes something from the Iron Steed what she thought was supposed to be another gift for her. This action in turn angers the Iron Steed:
Then an Iron Steed appeared, bearing a beautiful, golden gear.
The creature said nothing as the girl approached
and snatched what she thought was another gift.
The horse grew angry and summoned the other monsters.
This is also testified by the Witch saying to the girl:
“Gifts we gave, but more you took,” she snarled. “So more, in turn, is due.”
The narrator of the folktale and the Witch claim that the girl has become greedy. In the credit song “Yearning for Dark Shadows”, which is told from the girl’s POV, she confirms this:
Warm and full, I approached an Iron Steed adorned with gold,
and I grabbed what I thought was mine.
Mine, Mine, Mine!
The repercussion and punishment of the girl’s actions and greediness is to be trapped inside a mirror. This could be taken as a classical lesson that folktales sometimes try to teach children: Do not stray away from your parents. Do not trust strangers. Do not assume that everyone you meet will give you something for free.
Assuming that the active role of the girl represents Ethan, then his interactions with the Lords is in contrast to girl’s interactions with the monsters. The first three Lords did not give Ethan a gift (Rose Jar) willingly, like their counterparts in the folktale do. The only one who gives Ethan a Rose Jar back willingly is Heisenberg (even though not without further work), whose counterpart in the folktale was the only one to not give a gift.
The gift giving of the Lords is reversed in the game’s story. The same goes for their behaviour, as their folktale counterparts seem to be worried about the girl’s condition, while in the actual story neither of them cares about Ethan or Rose.
The girl in the folktale represents on one hand the passive role of Rose’s situation in the game (getting trapped by the Witch in the mirror = getting trapped by Mother Miranda in jars). But on the other hand the girl also represents the active role of Ethan throughout the game’s story (meeting and fighting the Four Lords Lords in the same order; the reversed gift giving situation).
At the end of the folktale, Ethan’s active role of the girl is now given to the father’s role, who shows up to fight the Witch and sacrifices himself:
- But the Witch was strong and Father yelled, “Save our daughter!”
- Even now, the burnt forest is a grim reminder of Father’s sacrifice.
Rose fully takes now over the role of the girl, who has been freed from the mirror (jars). This also means that the active role her father had before is now passed on to her. This is confirmed by the last sentence appearing:
- The father’s story is now done.
In the “Yearning for Dark Shadows” song, new lines are added to the folktale story and to the POV of the girl:
Hello, my tears, because of you, I am who I am.
Hello, sorrow, because of you, I am who I am.
Long, long, ago I did not know who I was.
And in the deepness, I was lost and now...
These lines are fitting for both Rose and Ethan. The girl talks about her journey seen through her own eyes, which could allude to Ethan talking about how he met and fought the Four Lords. The lines of the chorus specifically could be an expression of his emotions, the moment he found out about his true nature (having died and turned into a Molded).
Because Miranda’s discovery of the Megamycete, her studies and experiments in the village are ultimately the source for everything that happened to Ethan during the Baker Family Incident and the reason why he is no longer a normal human.
From Rose’s POV the lines could allude to her feelings about her father and also about the troubles of her own origins, as it is shown in the post-credit scene.
The gifts of the Four Lords:
However, there is an interesting note to make on the gift giving situation of the four monsters in the folktale. It is a big focus there and the turning point of the folktale’s story. The Iron Steed stands out compared to its companions, because it does not give a gift to the girl and is the one to cause her entrapment.
The same goes for Heisenberg’s role in the game’s story. Like the Iron Steed, his role in the game stands out from the other Lords, because he is the only one of them who reaches out to Ethan and honestly wants to team up with him. His backstory and motives are also different to them, since he is the only one to have seen through Miranda’s manipulation and schemes, and wants to be freed of her.
The other Lords are loyal to Miranda, fully believe in her and take actions to get her approval and love. Some time ago, Miranda approached the Four Lords, took them in as their children and infected them with the Cadou. This action is seen by Alcina, Donna and Moreau as a form of gift or recognition.
Alcina believes that she must be Miranda’s favourite child due to her generousness:
“She gave me this castle, obedient daughters, everlasting life, did she not?
Am I not her favorite? Am I not special?” - Alcina Dimitrescu’s Diary
Donna is happy to be able to make her doll come to life, thanks to the Cadou infection and is excited about the effects of the flowers, that she probably received from Miranda first:
“Mistress Donna seems happy. It might be my imagination, but I feel like her doll Angie is even more lively than before. [...] We had a mighty fine conversation.
Something about receiving a gift of power from Mother? [...] I mentioned this to Donna and she seemed thrilled by it.” - Gardener’s Diary
Moreau still utterly believes in Miranda and seems to see her as his actual mother. Even though he is ashamed of his mutated appearance, for which she is the source of, and despite himself noting that Miranda seems to not really care about him. But the thought of her abandoning him still frightens him:
“But if Mother does then... what will happen to me?
I'm not her real child... Would she abandon me?
No! I don't want that!” - Moreau’s Diary
The only one who does not see his powers as a gift is Heisenberg:
“We’re merely a bunch of failed Cadou experiments to her. [...]
What a joke. I’ll never forgive her for what she did to me. [...]
Miranda just didn’t change my body, she took my dignity.” - Heisenberg’s Diary
The four monsters in the folktale, who give a gift to the girl could be a representation of Mother Miranda, handing over the Cadou to the Four Lords and with that their future powers. Each Lord’s unique power is already depicted in the form of the folktale monster. The girl in that moment, could be a stand-in of each one of the Lords, thankfully accepting the gift:
- “So, she clothed herself and smiled with joy.”
- “So, the girl ate and smiled with joy once more.”
Village of Shadows:
Then the Bat Lord appeared! He greeted her warmly and bit his own wing.
“Come, child. Quench your thirst,” he said.
So, she drank the thick, dark blood and smiled with joy.
Yearning for Dark Shadows:
Within the darkness, cold and silent,
A voice called out to me:
“Hello, lost child, come quench your thirst and drink this pint, to bring you joy”.
It’s interesting that the Bat Lord exactly suggests what Alcina has to do, in order to control her mutation and due to her blood disease. She needs to drink blood; the girl in the folktale does the same:
The girl also gets called “child” by the monsters, which is what Mother Miranda calls the Four Lords.
Again, the part that stands out is the role of the Iron Steed aka Heisenberg:
Village of Shadows:
Then an Iron Steed appeared, bearing a beautiful, golden gear.
The creature said nothing as the girl approached,
and snatched what she thought was another gift.
The horse grew angry and summoned the other monsters.
Yearning for Dark Shadows:
Warm and full, I approached an Iron Steed adorned with gold,
and I grabbed what I thought was mine.
Mine, Mine, Mine!
As explained above, the girl has gotten greedy and now assumes something that was not yet given to her, which marks the first step into her entrapment. The growing greediness of the girl could be an allusion to Mother Miranda herself. Just like the girl, she has become greedier and more selfish over time.
In her pursuit, she took in Heisenberg as another one of her children and experimented on him. His anger and hate for her stem from this trauma and is the origin of his antagonizing side towards her. Just as the girl took something from the Iron Steed without asking, and how its anger towards her is the result of her action.
The line about the Iron Steed summoning the other monsters may be interpreted as a hint to Heisenberg’s Soldats that he creates in his factory to fight against Miranda’s lycans.
Ultimately, everything leads to Miranda still not stopping there, but taking away yet another child (Rose), tearing her body apart and sealing her in jars. She abandons an entire village that was dedicated to her, and people who were loyal to her, only to get what she is truly after. She also calls Rose “her daughter” throughout the game, and even at the end she believes that Rose is Eva Reborn.
Conclusion:
The girl and the monsters of the folktale may represent more than just one side of the story. Or they can be a metaphor for more than just one character.
Everyone’s side of the story in the game is assembled in the characters of the folktale. Together they all represent the themes of “family” and “greed”.
I am most certainly overanalyzing things, as I do not believe myself that this much thought was put into the folktale story or the song lyrics.
But who knows...
