''And at the center of the horror will be someone new. Someone you've never met before but long-feared. Someone who inflicts fear beyond comprehension.''
"COME INTO THE MIRROR, MY DEAR...THIS WON'T HURT A BIT"
Bloody Mary (aka Dr. Mary Agana) was a witch who served as the original event icon for Halloween Horror Nights Orlando's 18th event, Halloween Horror Nights: Reflections of Fear. Based on the legend of Bloody Mary, Universal created an elaborate backstory for her transformation from psychiatrist to Bloody Mary.
Bloody Mary was an unusual version of a licensed character in that while she is based on existing sources and her design was made by Bobbie Weiner, her backstory and personality is original. Thus, Mary Agana could be counted as the first (and so far only) icon that is both licensed and a Universal original at the same time.
As with the later Usher, she was a co-creation between Michael Aiello and J. Michael Roddy; the former handled her backstory while the latter handled her video presence and personality in the parks.
Background[]
Dr. Mary Agana was introduced on the HalloweenHorrorNights.com website on July 1, 2008. Website visitors entered her office and read her journal as it appeared in 1958. Her office was shown with a large mirror reflecting her desk, initially shown as clean and orderly. In her journal appeared a letter establishing her as a psychiatrist whose methods were rejected by the National Association of Mental Health (NAMH), and whose grandmother had died and left her many of her possessions in her will. Weekly, new pages were added to the journal as she took new cases and used her methods despite the rejection letter. With each case it became clearer that her sanity was waning as she tortured her patients with fear. Treating the patients with an immersion therapy for their fears, she sent her first two patients to asylums, however her third patient was inadvertently killed during therapy. Her next journal entry showed the excitement she felt over the patient's death, and was accompanied by a change in her office becoming more disheveled.
With her next case, her writing became sloppier and she scribbled many pictures on the pages. This patient and the next were both killed, although not directly by Mary herself. She began to question her own sanity in her journal, but continued to see patients. Her next two cases included one of the NAMH doctors who had rejected her and another man (Boris Shuster). She killed the doctor with her own hands and became insane.
In one of her last journal entries, Mary continually wrote August 27 on the page. Throughout that day, her office changed again, aging fifty years to bring the website to the present. Her final journal entry was revealed as the mirror broke open and she became Bloody Mary. A paranormal investigation team founded by Shuster, called Legendary Truth, investigated the incident in the office on August 27, 2008, the fifty-year anniversary of Agana's transformation into Bloody Mary. They revealed her as the inspiration for the urban legend.
Backstory[]
The Events of 1908[]
Mary Worthington (her name a reference to the original Bloody Mary legend in traditional folklore), a school teacher in the small town of Carey, Ohio, vanished on August 27, 1908 as a result of a Halloween prank orchestrated by the school handyman, Aldridge Kesterson. Six students (Louise Hatfield, George Von Stebler, Shawn McPherson, Jim Deedle, Alice Dodgson, and Jeremiah Kubsch) were also involved in the mysterious death of their teacher; one student, Thornton Kesterson, was not present due to the persistent goading by his father, Aldridge. The schoolmaster, Mr. Renshaw, found his schoolhouse in complete disarray with blood and shards of glass scattered across the room. Although suspected murdered, Mrs. Worthington's body was never found, and was classified missing.
The Events of 1958[]
Marie W. Agana, daughter of Mary Worthington, died on June 20, 1958. Dr. Mary Agana, daughter of Marie W. Agana, receives a letter from Alexander Pohl, her family attorney, who informed her of the wishes of her late mother. Mary would receive several valuable silver heirlooms that originally belonged to her grandmother, Mary Worthington. Most notably, Mary received a silver jewelry and music box, which contained a presence that seemed to possess Dr. Agana over time.
On June 25, 1958, Mary received a letter from the National Association of Mental Health that informed her that the board members of the NAMH had denied funding for her immersive fear therapy program. Dr. Gustav Heim, the director of the NAMH, stated within the letter that he was disturbed that Dr. Agana may have proceeded with her plan regardless. Dr. Agana did just that and opened up her own facility, "Living Fearlessly: Specialized Treatments for Fear Based Ailments", in 1958 in the city of New York to begin her immersive therapy program. She hired assistants from a local facility that were believed to be ex-cons or mental patients.
Over the course of a few months, Mary saw several patients to discover new ways to cure them of their fears and phobias. However, due to the disappearance of Charlie McPherson, a freelance photographer hired by private investigator Boris Shuster, Shuster began an investigation into Dr. Agana and her clinic. As patients began to disappear from the clinic, Boris began to wonder what really went on inside of Dr. Agana's practice. Mary began to suspect she was being watched, perhaps by Boris, as well as by creatures that lay within the mirror.
Shuster made an appointment with Dr. Mary Agana on August 27, 1958 to discover the truth behind the mysterious psychiatrist. On this night, Dr. Agana was brutally murdered, supposedly by Boris Shuster, but her body was never found (it was later discovered that the murderer was a man named David Gronoll, a boxer and ex-con who was either one of her patients or one of the orderlies who worked for her). Just like her grandma, her body also vanished. Some believe that the spirit of "Bloody Mary", none other than Mary's grandmother Mary Worthington, had been gradually possessing Dr. Mary Agana since she inherited her heirlooms in June of 1958.
After 1958[]
In 2008, Legendary Truth: The Collective, a paranormal investigation organization started by Boris Shuster and researchers from Princeton after the events of 1958, began an investigation on the disappearance of Mary Agana. Collective field operatives collected information and visited Dr. Agana's office in New York, which was still in utter disarray since her brutal death. At 11:03 pm on August 27, 2008, a manifestation of "Bloody Mary" was detected by the field agents- and they vanished too.
For at this moment of time, Mary Agana having become a witch with powers of the gods, has broken out of the mirror and most likely slaughtered the team. Somehow with the aid of her court consisting of The Evil Queen, Samhain, the Wicked Witch of the West, and the former workers from Gorewood Forest, they used Universal Studios Florida to create a portal to her mirror world under the guise that there was an event called Halloween Horror Nights. Mary possessed Universal itself to advertise her image of her and her minions to enchant visitors to attend her own Halloween event inside The Mirror- comprising of the 5 realms Fears, Tales, Urban Legends, Nightmares, and Myths.
Calvin Thorncastle, CEO of Legendary Truth: The Collective, uncaring of the potential casualties, quickly dispatched new operatives into Mary Agana's world to collect additional information on the doctor and her relationship to "Bloody Mary", as well as the seven patients that fell victim to her treatments. The case was also crowd-sourced online to scour the internet for as many clues and fragmentary information as possible.
After 2008[]
While many characters in Horror Nights returned, Mary didn’t attend to celebrate the arrival of Adaru the Sumerian God despite her prominent role in 2008. It’s highly likely that Mary was NOT one of the Heralds under Adaru’s command, and that her Halloween event was not approved by the Sumerian God. Some of her minions were allowed to run loose in the anniversary zones and it appeared Fear has forgiven the Gentlemen for “betraying” him.
However a Legendary Truth investigation in 2015 was investigating the hows of that particular event, and lots of evidence featuring Mary Agana was shown. It shows most likely that Mary, shrouding herself in mystery so that her presence would not be spoken about by others, unlocked the Lantern and allowed Jack to take control of that event and bring back the Carnival of Carnage. Again Mary’s whereabouts and that of her Mirror were unknown.
Perhaps Bloody Mary was just trapped in her Mirror and that the forces at Horror Nights didn’t or were unable to open the portal somehow.
But one other possible reason for Mary’s disappearance could be found in one of the commercials that Mary had filmed for her own year, which showed that a woman didn’t call her name when she was gazing at herself- and yet she still showed up screaming at her. The uncut version even showed her strangling the woman. This suggests that Bloody Mary can come out of her mirror whenever she fells like it and able to kill. It is only when chanting her name that she draws victims onto her world.
This suggests that perhaps Mary Agana, for whatever reason, decided to simply walk out of her mirror and walk among the Earth (or maybe even other realms), maybe doing an atrocity or two. The reason for this is uncertain. Perhaps she got bored of her Mirror, perhaps she retired which explains why she didn’t show up at further Horror Nights. Only one thing is certain: she broke Jack out who denounced what Horror Nights has become suggests that she and Jack have a vendetta against Adaru (which explains why Jack kept references of her in 25 and the tribute store for 2020); either way she is still a very strong magic user.
In 2021, it was revealed that she has a mirror realm within Fear's Lantern.
Appearances[]
As the event icon, Bloody Mary made a number of appearances before and during the event. She was the main advertising tool in commercials, and appeared in some of the houses in the event. Her main leitmotifs was "Weeping For A Child's Loss" by Faithful Fathers and "Musical Offering, BWV 1079: Sonata a 3 - I Largo -" by Karl Münchinger & Stuttgarter Kammerorchester and this background noise from this file.
Prior to the event[]
After the revelation of Bloody Mary as the event icon, the website was updated with her appearing to crash out of a mirror after her name was said three times. A number of billboards appeared in the Orlando area featuring her face and glowing eyes with the word "Bloody" written in what looked like blood. Additionally, a commercial featuring her mirror world was shown on television. In the commercial, Mary was sitting at her mirror with a man on the other side. He continually said her name, and on the third time she broke out of the mirror, lunging at him screaming.
An alternative version of the hotel commercial has her suddenly appear behind a woman and strangle her.
At the event[]
According to Mary's story and Roddy, it is painful to her every time she breaks out of a mirror, which is why she screams. For this reason, there was not a main, opening show featuring her. The only show she in which she appeared was the media-only Opening Scareamonies. In this show, an investigator brought a mirror and placed it on the stage in front of the audience. With the audience chanting her name, and a flicker of the lights, Mary crashed out of the mirror and was interviewed by the media.
The general public also experienced Mary during the event. A large LED screen was placed in the entrance to the park. Looking like a mirror, Mary would talk from it, taunting guests to enter her world. Periodically she would break out of the screen like a mirror, screaming as she did so. Additionally, Mary appeared in a number of the haunted houses. A ghostly apparition of her appeared in The Hallow and Scary Tales: Once Upon a Nightmare, and her picture appeared in the static of a television in Creatures! and a monitor in Interstellar Terror. A picture of her could be seen on McPherson's desk in the first scene of Dead Exposure. Finally, Dr. Agana's office was visited in the Reflections of Fear house, where both of Mary's personalities made appearances.
In the MIB/Waterfront area, large projections of Bloody Mary would play. This same technology would be used for the Usher the following year.
In 2009's event Ripped from the Silver Screen, Mary's decapitated head could be seen in the house Leave it to Cleaver.
References after Halloween Horror Nights: Reflections of Fear[]
During Halloween Horror Nights: Ripped from the Silver Screen, her head appeared in the Leave it to Cleaver house as an easter egg.
Bloody Mary was featured as part of the VIP Lounge area at Halloween Horror Nights: Twenty Years of Fear as a mannequin wearing her doctor's coat.
During Halloween Horror Nights 23, she made a cameo on a monitor in Havoc: Derailed.
In the 2015 Legendary Truth investigation (which was held during the event's last three nights), it was strongly implied that she played a major role in freeing the icons from Fear's lantern. Also, during the event, the chalkboard with her poem from The Skoolhouse scarezone had her name erased, a reference to the legal issues regarding Bloody Mary's use in entertainment (and maybe for reasons more sinister...).
During Halloween Horror Nights 27, an Easter egg in Ash Vs. Evil Dead made a reference to her in a poster, suggesting that she used to babysit.
Bizarrely, there was absolutely no reference made to her in 2018, Mary Agana's 60th birthday. While obviously she couldn't have a house of her own, it's quite strange that she didn't make even a cameo, either in person or in name.
In 2020, a vague reference to her appeared in the Halloween Horror Nights Tribute Store in the form of a cracked mirror.
In 2021, Bloody Mary would have her own section in the HHN Icons: Captured haunted house, though she would not appear in it. Only her scream could be heard.
Design[]
In the Dean Karr-directed commercial, she wore a white dress similar to Sadako/Samara from the Ring movie series, had long fingernails, and wore a full head of ebony-black hair. She had multiple scars on her face, completely blank, corpse-like white eyes, and used blood for lipstick, giving her a slightly Joker-esque impression.
The other promotional tools had Mary in more or less the same look, but with purple lips, and a more elaborate dress, with a thorn design and black roses below her chest and at the bottom of the dress. Aside from the archway video, her hair is straight.
As Dr. Agana she wore a plain black robe though the color was changed to silver in her house.
Personality[]
Mary Agana bears many similarities to Dr. Albert Caine a.k.a The Caretaker. Like Albert, she was formerly just doing research on the emotions and minds of human beings, specifically on the subject of phobias. However, after she accidentally kills her third patient, she finds herself more interested in torturing her patients to death with fear. This was also due in part to her own crippling fear of death; by killing her patients, she was treating herself with the very form of therapy that she practiced.
Mary tends to behave erratically, constantly fidgeting with her clothes and hair, and she often speaks rather stiltedly in many increasingly high and overlapping voices. She ricochets between a calm, cool, almost smug attitude and being outwardly unstable, whether through twitching violently, hissing and growling like a feral animal, or cackling manically. Her Opening Scaremonies were a slight exception though, where she displayed a peculiarly bubbly and trollish attitude.
While bursting through the mirror is described as painful for her, leaving many scars on her face and body, she continually tempts guests at Halloween Horror Nights: Reflections of Fear to "give [her] the power to show [them her] world" through summoning her and "set her free." She is also shown taunting the guests by singing "I'm going to get you."
Based on her journal entries and video from the event (specifically that inside her "mirror"), it is implied that she may be suffering from a form of dissociative identity disorder.
She initially was very professional with a clinical, no-nonsense attitude, and cared very little for making herself look pretty, as she found it a distraction from her work. As she began to lose her mind, she began to use makeup (albeit messy) and started dressing more femininely.
Powers and Weaknesses[]
- Strengths: Is implied to know everything about you just by looking at you through a mirror, controls the realms inside her mirror, as well as several high ranking minions, trapped Charlie McPherson into the galaxy of Nightmares submerging him in sleep, is fearless.
- Failings: apart from her only appearing when saying her name, none. And even then the Hotel Commercial (Unedited) shows that she can actually show up anytime she damn pleases and strangle you.
Pictures[]
Videos[]
Quotes[]
- "I know why you're calling... But you see he's not with us any more. Hahahaha... Now I know other things too... I know where you are... I know who you are... and I know you'll be calling me again."- Phone message
- "YOU'RE ALL IN MY WORLD NOW!!! I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU!!!!!"- Opening Scaremony
Front Gate monologue[]
"Ah the darkness brings all manner of mystery. Your eyes look away from my beauty… do you not like what you see?
This mirror is but a shadowy reflection of your darkest fears. That is what I crave the most- I hunger for your darkest secrets. Reveal them to me- share your pain with me. I will show you such amazing things. There is a world with no rules. Where all the stories that thrilled you- and chilled you- as a child are waiting to show you their darker side.
I DARE YOU TO CALL OUT TO ME! GIVE ME THE POWER TO SHOW YOU MY WORLD!
From the polished obsidian to the looking glass I have watched and waited, learning exactly what scares you! They are all inside here with me. Just pass through. Say my name three times and I will show you…
MANY HAVE COME BEFORE, MANY HAVE CALLED TO ME, ANTICIPATING- Fear can imprison many personalities in a single superior mind. Trapped by the screaming sounds of a frightened and uneducated sensibility.
I have watched and listened. They begged for me to hear them, those poor unfortunate.. they say my name over and over and over and over- their deaths unlock the door AND SETS ME FREE!
Have you ever been cut by a shard of mirror? It’s quick and precise. It opens and then the crimson appears. Freed from its confines... Say my name. Allow me to feel the warmth once again. My face is a canvas and YOU are the artist.
I’m going to get you. I’m going to get you. I’m going to get you.
You’ve come here to seek the truth. Are the stories, the legends you’ve heard true? What do you want to believe? That I’m nothing more than a child’s game… conjured for the amusement of the innocent? Then defy your fears! I will show you a world where there is no happily ever after- for that is where I reside, deep within your subconscious. Feeding on the fears of those little moments. The unexpected sounds in the dark, the footfalls on wet pavement, the slimy tendrils that slap at your feet from under the bed. Call to me.
I see all of your secrets, your desires, your vanity, and your shame. And when the mirror cracks I SEE YOUR SCREAMS!"
Articles[]
- Universal crafts Bloody Mary bio for Halloween Horror Nights
- Universal's Bloody Mary: Eyes that chill
Trivia[]
- Interestingly enough, a bottle of Sleepwell can be found in her house. With this and the Sleepwell cameo in The Spawning/PsychoScareapy: Echoes of Shadybrook, it could be speculated that Agana, Shadybrook, The Carey Sewers, and the Sculders have connections with another nightmarish entity.
- She is the only icon that has been shown with a "pre-icon" look.
- In the website and phone message, she was voiced by Susan Saddler, who also voiced PS in 2013.
- According to this, comedian Laura Clery played Mary in the commercial, and a friend of Roddy named Julia Riley played Mary in the video such as projections and the Main Gate.
- Mary Agana is canonically 37 at the time of death, so this means that; regarding Laura Clery’s age (21) at the time she did the photo shoot and commercial, a 37-year old character was played by somebody who could have been in her last year of college.
- Mary and Julian were the only two icons to have an additional presence with a projection system in San Francisco and MIB.
- In 2012, it was revealed that she's a member of The Baccanoid Legion, most likely due to her intellect and her love of "experimenting" on her patients.
See also[]
Halloween Horror Nights: Reflections of Fear |
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Characters: Bloody Mary (Event Icon) • Boris Shuster • Alice • The Gentlemen • Charlie McPherson • Samhain • John Michaels |
Haunted Houses: Body Collectors: Collections of the Past • Creatures! • Dead Exposure • Doomsday • The Hallow • Interstellar Terror • Reflections of Fear • Scary Tales: Once Upon a Nightmare |
Scarezones: American Gothic • Asylum in Wonderland • Fractured Tales • The Path of the Wicked • The Skoolhouse • Streets of Blood |
Unofficial Scarezones: Dark Reflections • Doomsday: The Infected • The Harvest • Zombies! |
Shows: Bill & Ted's Excellent Halloween Adventure • Brian Brushwood • The Rocky Horror Picture Show Tribute |