What if Diana wasn't *real?

Hitman General
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Here’s something to ponder.

What if Diana was figment of 47’s imagination? Like if she were a feminine aspect or manifestation of his personality, or like a split personality that was always (more or less) taking a backseat to the dominant or main personality of 47?

I know such an idea would make missions like Mendoza impossible… Or perhaps very weird.

But that would explain how and why she seems to be omnipresent, commenting in real-time when things happen. I mean, assuming 47 doesn’t have some ultra-advanced tech like an ocular camera that sends a feed back to Diana. There certainly wouldn’t be hidden cameras all over a mission or the ICA using powerful satellites that let Diana see everything that’s happening, even underground.

And of course (the stick-in-the-mud view) that it’s just a game and we’re just supposed to accept that it’s happening and not to ask how and why. :laughing:

But I had to laugh thinking that what if Diana was never there? Or (not funny) it was 47 carrying the idea of her with him in his mind due to the guilt of killing her parents?

Then you have instances where 47 hears from Diana things that he couldn’t know. Such as “47! The target is escaping!” When they’re on another part of the map. But how would Diana know that outside advanced technology?

There’s even the (sorta) joke, like when you kill the Maelstrom before you’ve verified his identity and Diana just knows it was him.

So that could be chalked up to either Diana being in a remote location but still having intel somehow… Or that it’s a voice inside 47’s head.

Anyway, this idea made me wonder how the story would appear if you made Diana a ghost or figment of 47’s imagination.

“Real” You could still have a real Diana in certain scenarios, but 47 could still have such a strong mental manifestation of her in other instances where she couldn’t be there.

Anyway, what do you think?

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It would definitely make the story less enjoyable, if that turned out to be the case.

The idea WoA establishes is that handlers have begun following along with their agents, so 47 likely is wearing some kind of small camera that probably looks like a button or a pin or something, and when something happens and 47 is not in the room to see it, Diana is still following along through a combination of hacking security cameras and watching from infrared satellites which, yes, is confirmed to be a regular thing from Colorado.

This wasn’t a thing in the older games when ICA operated in a more analogue way and left the agents to do their thing and report in after, not micromanaging them as much as it does now. Only when doing the initial training were such tactics used, and it’s implied that even that isn’t normal, that Diana arranged that to follow along with 47’s tryouts when she wasn’t supposed to and that that’s how they “cheated” to offset Soder’s cheating.

ICA’s restructuring in 2012 after Diana crippled it is probably when they decided to go Big Brother and follow their agents, or at least the top tier ones like 47 and Montgomery while they were on assignment, acting not only as handlers but as Mission Control. 47 having an earpiece on and staying in direct contact with Travis as the mission proceeded instead of simply contacting him by phone before and after, or during in the event that new information needed to be relayed, like we saw in Contracts and Blood Money, lends credit to that theory.

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Just seems a bit sad. If Diana wasn’t real then 47 really would be completely insane. Or just extremely lonely to have to create some sort of companion personality so he’s not all by himself. That’s just really depressing.

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That was from an official IOI staff

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what if it was in fact 47 who was the revenge fantasy conjured up by a distraught young girl who lost her parents in a freak car bombing incident? :thinking:

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:hushed:

I’m sure I never read that before… If I did I must’ve forgotten, then some post I’ve read recently made me think of the idea, or conjured up the thought. :thinking:

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the actual most absurd twist would be… they were both figments of each other’s imaginations.

i take cheques, io

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Everything was the imagination of one of the patients at the asylum. :yellow_duck::closed_book: :teddy_bear:
545

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47 be like

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This some real Tyler Durden stuff, but I’m 100% sure Diana is real.

I did think long and hard about Ortmeyer being Diana in the begging and then when 47 killed him he had to imagine what it would be like if she had been real. That would mean there is some fancy house with tennis courts and cliffs overlooking Chicago somewhere with a good looking dead lady not named Diana in it. Nah. She’s real me thinks :joy:

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If anything, it’d be easier to believe that 47 is the figment; an alternate personality of Diana who kills people she thinks deserve to die and the whole handler voice/killing for money thing is just the framing device that allows her to cope with what she does. She imagines herself as this strong, imposing, deadly man, who nonetheless is nondescript and secretive, to mentally justify her brutal acts, so that the prim and proper lady who grew out of the sweet girl her parents tried to raise doesn’t have her image sullied. So “Agent 47” is what her mind came up with to portray the exact opposite image of a small and helpless girl; a tall and deadly man. I’d buy that as more likely to be happening than 47 imagining Diana.

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Actually, after sleeping on it, this one makes the most sense to me. If 47 is still in the asylum then Diana could be a doctor or a nurse who is kind to him so he feels like he can trust her, hence her seeming omnipotence and knowledge about his “targets”. With, at least the main story targets, being other doctors, nurses and orderlies who work in the asylum, who perhaps where not so kind to 47 and so he fantasizes about killing them in multiple creative ways. With Grey and Olivia being fellow patients and Providence being the name of the place with Janus, Edwards, Carlisle, Ingram and Stuyvesant being like the board of directors, which is why it so difficult to know who they are and why they are doing what they are doing.

Kind of like the plot of Shutter Island.

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What if… The OG Diana (Vivienne McKee version) was REALLY killed in Absolution by 47? We know that 47 was drunk and suicidal in that game (the latter in a deleted scene) so maybe he actually hallucinated that ending scene where he looks at Diana & Victoria through the rifle scope…

What if… 47 went insane in the intervening years and invented a new Diana in his mind to replace the original. That would explain her sudden voice change, her more theatrical and talkative personality (a way of 47 to enact his own repressed emotions), that ridiculous and highly-coincidental story about carbombing her parents (which symbolizes the exploding guilt of A Personal Contract), and why Diana now speaks without a radio filter (hint hint, because she’s a fragment of his mind).

What if… Lucas Grey isn’t real either. The real Subject 6 actually died when Hitman strangled him in the Asylum bathroom when they were twelve. After inventing a new Diana, 47’s twisted and deluded mind also invents an Enemy Within his mind, in the shape of his brother who died decades ago, nicknaming him “Lucas Grey” to represent 47’s nihilistic and graying state of mind…

What if… this is the torment of a Hitman… Absolution is what he’s seeking after killing OG Diana and 6… so he puts his conscience in these fake personalities he created, to justify his continued violent lifestyle at the ICA under the guise of being on a major vigilante crusade with his brother and his beloved handler / friend…

What if… the events of ** Freelancer** happen, where Hitman must now futilely decorate an empty Safehouse, while deep inside knowing that this beautiful post-modern home will forever lack the warming presence of a beloved Handler, of a trusted brother, of his cherished Dual Ballers, and of the emotions he formerly possessed (because in this continuity he never took the Ether serum). Good luck 47, you’re on you’re own now…

Roll credits: Directed by Tore Blystad

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Uh… when were either of these ever a thing? And please don’t point to the deleted scene; there’s a reason why the most important aspect about them is that they were deleted. That means they didn’t happen.

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I’ve got to say that this topic did make me think of this vid. And then 47Agent posts this pic…

:joy:

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I never even would have got anywhere near that possibility. Well done :joy:, but nah I’m still on board with 47 and Diana being real people.

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Yes, this was once a thing

1:33 (don’t know how to leave timestamps)

You can see this is definitely a late-stage development cutscene, not some early brainstorm idea that was immediately considered ill-fitting. It’s also never got deleted completely as only the “important” bits got cut - imho most likely due to fear of (even bigger) fan backlash, not really because of them appropriately treating 47’s character. Then again, what is left in the release version looks incomprehensive and incomplete, with 47 going through a guilt-inspired psychotic trip, cutting his own barcode… Alcohol being in play makes a little more sense (not for 47’s character though)

As for the canon issue - I know your stance on this and you probably know mine :slightly_smiling_face: And yes, I would consider the full cutscene more of a director’s cut scene that didn’t make it in the theatrical cut. Not everyone saw it, but it’s been there and was strongly being considered to be included fully in the narrative - otherwise it would never have gotten made in the first place.

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Yeah, no. Never even mind 47 getting drunk is something he’d never do, I highly doubt alcohol even works on him to that degree. He was designed to have the most efficient system possible, shown as a limited healing factor from Contracts, and we now see it even slows his aging in WoA. It takes neurotoxins of the kind Diana used on him to be strong enough to affect him. Such an idea as 47 getting drunk is ridiculous on several levels, and cutting it was the right decision. I interpret that scene, not as 47 suffering under chemical influence, but rather going through confusion and despair for the first time; some of his latent emotions leaking out, giving him a sort of midlife crisis. 47 being inebriated… nah, that ain’t happening.

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They didn’t cut all his drinking though. He drinks whiskey at the motel in the bath robe cutscene. All the indications are that he needs a drink after a long day of work the same way any of us would.

I’m glad they cut the part where he contemplates shooting himself though.

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It was in Contracts tho :smiling_face:

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