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"Mature Content Warning!" |
| “ | Marriage is just a "tradition", right? Seriously, who wants to be tied down? As long as two people are together, it's okay, right? It's best to be free, don't you think? | „ |
| ~ Catherine to Vincent. |
Catherine is the titular secondary antagonist of the video game Catherine and its remastered version Catherine: Full Body.
She is a beautiful and seemingly mysterious woman who meets Vincent Brooks at the Stray Sheep and begins an affair with him. Over the course of the game's story, more is revealed about her true nature.
Catherine is voiced by Miyuki Sawashiro in Japanese and Laura Bailey in English.
Her Evil Ranking[]
Her Villainous Deeds[]
- Catherine was one of the people directly responsible for the Nightmares and thus the deaths of countless men who were unable to commit to a partner or procreate, even if some were innocent and/or remorseful.
- In The Mysterious Tale of Rapunzel, Catherine starts a relationship of sorts with programmer Freddie McGoohan while working at Fowles Electronics as a game developer. She eventually leaves him for refusing to give up his earthly desires despite being a human.
- She was sent to seduce Vincent and later tricked him into sleeping with her at his apartment, forcing him to participate in the Nightmares. The fact that Vincent doesn't exactly remember implies that everything outside of their first encounter at the bar was non-consensual, making her a rapist.
- Likewise, Catherine has no problem tricking other men, including Vincent's friends Orlando Haddick and Jonny Ariga, into sleeping with her and subjecting them to the Nightmares even if they are in a relationship with someone else, divorced or simply do not have a spouse yet.
- She isn't above threatening to kill Vincent if he's spending time with another woman or man in Rin's case and will resort to blackmail to get what she wants:
- For instance, Catherine delivered a death threat to him while in bed followed by physically and verbally abusing him inside the bathroom of the Stray Sheep.
- Similarly, she attempted to kill Katherine McBride or Rin in front of Vincent even boasting to him "I'm gonna kill someone you really care about!" with a sadistic, blood-stained expression on her face in the case of Rin himself.
- Finally, she manifests herself in the Nightmares as a giant demonic being ready to kill Vincent and Katherine/Rin.
- She falsely accuses Katherine of confusing Vincent despite being the one to lure him away from her.
- She likes to belittle her father Nergal, such as breaking a promise to play video games together and kicking him in the groin. In one ending, Catherine as Queen of the Underworld reduces Nergal to a mere object for her and Vincent to suffer for all eternity.
- Even though she is a demonic succubus, she has enough moral agency to comprehend her actions as evidenced by her telling Jonny in the novelization of Catherine that she feels bad that he will begin to have nightmares.
Why She Doesn't Stand Out?[]
- Most of her actions are done under Dumuzid's orders as well as Ishtar by extension. Because of this, while Catherine does pass the baseline through her personal villainy towards Vincent and others, she fails the Heinous Standards to the aforementioned Dumuzid (who also fails it to his consort Ishtar).
- Ultimately, the goal Catherine is part of can be seen as well-intentioned since she and her boss want to ensure the human race can produce more children.
- Despite her abusive behavior, she is shown to develop romantic feelings for Vincent and can actually end up as his new girlfriend in certain endings. In addition, she expresses genuine remorse for hurting Vincent in the new version of the True Catherine Ending, showing she isn't entirely heartless.
- Related to the above, Catherine chooses to redeem herself by using her time travel powers to not only become Vincent's high school sweetheart and wife but to prevent the events of the game from ever occurring which is shown to be beneficial for everyone with even Paul Miller (a friend of Vincent) alive and engaged to Katherine McBride.
- Similarly, Catherine marries Vincent in the official novelization out of true love.
- Even though she is a demonic succubus, Catherine isn't always malicious as evidenced by her above conversation with Jonny.
- She has comedic moments that detract from her villainy such as feeding Vincent a cupcake from the Underworld, turning on the faucet in the bathroom of the Stray Sheep, and asking if she could breastfeed him in public. Even her takeover of the Underworld with Vincent is played for laughs as well.
- As Ishtar herself notes, the choice between Catherine and Katherine McBride does not represent good and evil. Rather, it is Order vs. Freedom and both women have their flaws and merits. As such, Catherine is meant to represent Freedom and thus is intended to be a Grey Zone villain.
Trivia[]
- Catherine's Japanese VA Miyuki Sawashiro also voiced Chidori Yoshino, another Villainous Benchmark in the Shin Megami Tensei series.
External Links[]
- Catherine on the Villains Wiki
- Catherine on the Catherine Wiki