Preventability, Accountability and Fatality - An Edith Finch Analysis.

The truth is hard to accept. Sometimes, we feel the need to blame everything we possibly can in order to avoid taking accountability for our own actions. The lies we make up are often to distract us, and others, from the harsh realities. In ‘What remains of Edith Finch’, we see an exaggerated example of this. We are reminded of the inevitability of life, and this beautiful game hides so much under the surface, making it impossible not to replay. On the first play through of the game, we learn of a ‘curse’ that had haunted the Finch family throughout decades. We see the curse take place through seeing the deaths of the family members in their own eyes, and we often play as the force that kills them. This article contains spoilers for ‘What remains of Edith Finch’. 

One of the subjectively best deaths in the game is the first. We play as a child, Molly, who has been sent to bed without any dinner. We see her beg at the door, but her mother, Edie, will not give her anything to eat. So, what would a child that is starving do? She looks for any resemblance of food, including gerbil food, toothpaste, and poisonous berries. We watch as she goes through a series of animals, hunting for her prey. This is symbolistic of her state in the actual world, with her being portrayed as an animal. Eventually, a monster (presumably a visual representation of the poison from the berries, or a hallucination by Molly) climbs up the sewers, and sits under her bed.  She writes that she doesn’t know what it is, but she knows that it is ‘hungry, and she smells delicious’. This memoir written by a child who was in a heavily hallucinogenic state is proudly displayed by her mother in her room, open as a ‘story’ for all to read. It is very telling in Edie’s display of the book that she is using Molly’s description of events to distract from the role she played in the murder. She cannot deal with the preventability of the death, and uses her child’s story to convince her that it wasn’t her fault. 

This story becomes the first of many similar stories. For example, Calvin dies from flying off a swing into the sea. The preventability is truly shown in this story, as not only is a boy with an injured ankle playing outside alone, but the swing that he is playing on is on the very edge of a cliff. We, as the player, can only watch as the futile situation starts to dawn on us, as we push higher and higher, as we realise what is happening. His story is written by his brother Sam, which makes it even harder to read. However, one of the more interesting stories to me is Walter. Walter has seen three of his family members die, and having listened to Edie about there being a ‘curse’ he hides in the basement to escape from it. The acceptance of the curse keeps him hidden for years, until he decides to leave, and gets hit by a late train. What is so interesting about this story is that this is the first story that actually feels like the force of a curse. The sheer unluck of it really hits, how it is the only day that the train comes late. It is such a perfect example of the curse manifesting over time with fear and paranoia, until a curse actually could have manifested into their lives. Walter’s death doesn’t feel preventable, it feels as if fate has chosen to take him at that specific moment.

The next section of the game, after you exit the graves, is an interesting mix of preventability and fatality that the game flicks between incredibly well. This is seen especially in Sam’s death. It feels especially unpreventable after the previous story, as it all seems too unlikely to just be a coincidence. However, there are so many actions that either Dawn or Sam could have taken in order for this not to have happened. It’s similar to the way that Gus dies, or even Gregory. For Gus, if someone would have remembered him, he would probably have been safe. It’s the same story with Gregory too, who would probably have been safe if he was remembered. An interesting detail in Gregory’s story, however, is the line ‘What happened wasn’t your fault’. The line particularly struck me, because what happened was objectively Kay’s fault. The death was entirely preventable by watching over her child more. However, Sam is so convinced that there was a force dooming Gregory that he himself is convinced that it was not Kay’s fault. He does not think Kay is accountable at all for what happened, and instantly blames a concept instead. 

Milton and Lewis’s stories are probably my personal favourites in the game. The combination of worlds reflects Edie’s own confusion of reality, the distortion and horror that comes with seeing the supernatural in your daily life. Lewis’s death is so incredibly haunting, and the sensation that hits when you see the guillotine is so shocking and horrifying that I don’t think another game could ever replicate. Lewis feels truly doomed. From the first time you play as his consciousness, to the slow realisation that you, like Lewis, are chopping the fish mechanically as you become immersed in his world, you truly realise how real the curse has become. The ending feels inevitable, it feels fatale, it feels like something that was destined to happen since the start of his story, when you were struggling to chop fish. For the first time, there is nobody that can really be blamed for his death other than himself. The choices that you make only make his death more personal to you, and the choices that you make are inevitably thrown to the side for one last hit from the guillotine. 

And at last, we have Edie, Dawn, and Edith. Their section of the story starts with an incredibly foreshadowing argument, where we learn Edie’s cause of death, mixing alcohol and medicine. This, in complete contrast to Lewis, was an entirely preventable death. It is a choice to drink, to mix this medicine, and yet it feels as if Edie doesn’t care. She takes it anyways, maybe as a sign that she knew she would die, and wanted to do it by her own hands. When we are reading Edie’s story, we are immersed as it as usual. Dawn, ripping the book away, makes us realise that we are imitating Edie’s own behaviour of obsessing over the deaths of ehr children, and using the stories to cope with any parts we played in them. It’s an incredibly strong feeling of despair, and Edie as a character suddenly feels so real. The two remaining characters die in incredibly natural ways, with Dawn dying in illness and Edith dying in childbirth. This contrasting display of life and death really symbolises the end of the curse, showing that with the death of Edie, the perception of a curse died along with her. Nothing feels preventable, nothing feels odd about the way they die. It’s natural, it’s fatal, it’s truly the way a life should be ended. And the best part is, nobody is to blame. 

Overall, the game is incredible. The gameplay is so stunning, the art is gorgeous, the story has some of the most incredible elements ever seen in gaming, and I fear that we may never experience a game truly like it again. The fighting between realism and surrealism, between life and death, between accountability and preventability, is something I could only dream of experiencing again. In the end, only one thing is presented as truly inevitable, and that is death.