Best known for its terrifying designs and unnerving symbolism, Silent Hill houses many monsters, but not all of them have subtlety in their appearance and meaning, and some don’t mean anything at all. While in more modern Silent Hill entries, the monsters seem more generic, like their intention is purely to scare you; Team Silent crafted truly horrifying stories through symbolic imagery, monster design, and enemy characteristics/attack patterns that made Fog World and Otherworld a place where your nightmares meant something and they’d come to life to punish you for your sins.
The scariest monsters may be different for you, especially when you think back to their behavior, look, and sound design. But only a handful have subtle designs that hide their dark truth. It’s only by taking in everything you’ve learned about the monster that you can truly understand why this evil manifested this way. Here are the scariest Silent Hill monsters with symbolism and backstory so disturbing, we’ve never forgotten them.
Warning for spoilers and dark themes of sexual assault, abuse, rape, and disturbing imagery relating to children.
6) Asphyxia (Homecoming)
On the surface, Asphyxia is a terrifying monster that resembles The Human Centipede and Junji Ito’s My Dear Ancestors short story. Made up of human bodies joined together from front to back, hands act as a means of travel, but also to cover the surface of the main body. This monster represents Nora Holloway, a young girl who was murdered by her mother to keep Shepherd’s Glen from falling into the Otherworld. Nora was suffocated, indicated by the hands smothering Asphyxia’s mouth. The design of her body links to the caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland, Nora’s favorite book.
It’s open to interpretation but the pulsating walls in the boss arena could be viewed as sexual or a direct link to her death. She swallows Deputy Wheeler whole, but his death isn’t immediate. This is what it would have been like for Nora, who was desperately looking for a chance to escape, to breathe. The hands around her body and mouth are that of her mothers, not her own. The movement of this monster could be seen as seductive, but I view it more as her squirming. Homecoming‘s monsters are all equally devastating for their lives were taken too soon as their birthright was sacrificial. But Asphyxia is both disturbing for its appearance and less subtle symbolism when compared to other games.
5) Lying Figure (Silent Hill 2)
On the surface, the Lying Figure isn’t much to be scared of. It is the first monster you see in James’s Fog World and acts as the default enemy design as you’re progressing throughout the game. These creatures spew vomit, walk around slowly, and crawl erratically along the ground. The terrifying part is what these creatures represent. In fact, the horrifying truth was hidden in plain sight—its name. You can theorize that the Lying Figure is James’s inability to control his fate, squirming in pain from his denial, and feeling confined. But there’s a more haunting explanation.
The Lying Figure is Mary. It makes sense that this is the first thing he sees as he ventures into the town and is tasked to immediately kill it, not given a choice in the matter. It is immediately telling James and us that this is who he is and what he has done. Lying Figure refers to how sick Mary was that she couldn’t get up. Mary spent her final days in the hospital, throwing up, unable to crawl out of bed, and likely in so much inconceivable pain.
But the image of the Lying Figure is purposely distorted to have a smooth appearance of mass because this is what Mary looks like now—a body bag in the backseat of James’s car. We know that James read Mary’s letter, so perhaps he initially came back to Silent Hill not to find his late wife, but to bury her body at the cemetery, as this is the first place we visit in Silent Hill 2. But upon entering Fog World, his denial over his wife’s death and his actions overwhelmed all other thoughts, and Silent Hill proceeded to punish him for what he’d done. A cruel, gruelling reminder of Mary’s death.
4) Nurse (Silent Hill)
While there are multiple variations of the Nurse, as this is Alessa’s manifestation, there are some versions that are more disturbing than others. The first are the Nurses in Silent Hill 2, whose shaking heads represent Mary’s struggle when James took her life by suffocating her with a pillow. But the Nurse is on this list for Lisa Garland’s story. Lisa is the first character to transform into a monster in the franchise, having a heartbreaking moment as she realizes why she cannot leave the hospital even if she wanted to.
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It is only because Lisa gained her memories that she realized what she truly was. The reason she hadn’t transformed before was because Lisa was the only nurse Alessa liked. Lisa was trapped inside Nowhere, a separate entity to the Otherworld, likely linked to Alessa’s subconscious (although it’s not confirmed). Lisa’s memories came flooding back and she realizes she’s been dead all along. This caused her to transform into one of the Nurses. Petrified, she cried for Harry, but he was too scared himself to comfort Lisa in her final moments. It is a disturbing scene that is also incredibly sad. I still listen to Not Tomorrow to be reminded of this cruel moment with a song that’s full of despair, loneliness, and melancholy.
3) Colin (Silent Hill Movie)
Exclusive to the first movie, Colin was a janitor at Midwich Elementary School. His story is linked to Alessa and the bullying she endured in middle school. Colin was a paedophile who preyed on Alessa and sexually assaulted her. Transformed into a monster, his punishment was to spend eternity dragging his genitalia across the ground as his feet were bound to his head. His tongue was blackened to indicate what he used when committing disgusting and wickedly evil acts against the innocent, his eyes gorged out by barbed wire, probably because he was voyeuristic.
Colin is seen in the female bathroom in the school, telling us that this is where he mostly spent his time when he was working there. Everything about Colin is pure evil and it’s incredibly difficult to look at or read about this monster without wanting to throw up at his design and symbolism.
2) Abstract Daddy (Silent Hill 2)
Abstract Daddy is one of those monsters you don’t really know what you’re looking at until you stop and take a moment to “appreciate” its design. This is Angela’s father, but it’s not entirely how she perceives him. It is a manifestation of her trauma from years of sexual abuse. It isn’t just Abstract Daddy that’s horrifying, either. It’s the boss arena from the original game that really sends this disgusting message home. Pistons thump continuously in the holes spread out across the room where James must fight off Abstract Daddy. It is a clear visual euphemism of the abuse Angela had to go through on such a frequent occurrence that it spread out across the room, covering every wall.
When we study the enemy design properly, you can see how Abstract Daddy is a humanoid figure morphed into a second, smaller figure, trapped between the back and frame. The frame symbolizes a bed, the back being Angela’s father, and the mass in the center being Angela. The back of this monster is stretched across the canvas, showcasing the two arms pinning Angela onto the mattress. It is a revolting design that is enough to disturb and disgust anyone paying close enough attention. It’s highly likely Angela’s version of her father is far worse than what James imagined.
1) Twin Victim (The Room)
The Room may not have the same disturbing symbolism like SH2 and SH3 did, but it sure had the scariest monsters. When I think back to the fourth game, my mind immediately goes to Eileen’s giant head and the Twin Victim. These were Siamese twins purposely fused together to create a horrifying beast that resembled a silverback gorilla. For something that’s meant to be sweet and innocent, the twins were incredibly hostile. They fit in with the other intense entities in The Room and Walter Sullivan, who chased Henry Townsend whenever he set foot in a new world.
Knowing that these entities are two little girls just makes the imagery revolting and saddening, but you don’t have time to truly take it in because they’re honing in on you like a bull that’s seen red. You don’t even want to fight back because they’re children. So running, screaming, and crying are all perfectly valid options when this horrifying creature appears in the Water Tower. It’s such a great scare because no one was expecting it. The Twin Victim was a new monster and the Water Tower location is towards the end of the game. The design of the Water Tower is made up of bending corridors, so the uncertainty of what’s around the corner is at its highest.
The Twin Victim is a horrendous enemy design that will haunt me not only for the absolute jumpscare I had when I first encountered them, but how they’re two girls, stripped of their innocence, where only an animal remains. It’s the way they lift an arm towards Henry as if they’re calling for help, to then run at him and lunge, producing a masculine grunt with every attack. They’re unnatural, making them easily the scariest Silent Hill monster to me.
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