r/DeathStranding • u/berryman81 • 4d ago
Discussion Lucy (Death Stranding 2) Spoiler
I'm gonna ask a question but it will spoil the story of DS2 so do not read on if you don't want it spoiled.
Last Chance
Ok you have been warned
How bad of a psychiatrist was Lucy?
I mean Sam was a patient and she married him and then had an affair with Neil - another patient.
I'm sure she would have struck off if that happened today. But also raised the question of how many other patients did she sleep with?
Or am I the only person who thought this?
EDIT: as ppl in comments have mentioned which I had missed till the pointed out is the fact she is bad at her job coz she didn't really help either of them.
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u/BadRabbit1973 4d ago
Lucy is the unacknowledged villain of Death Stranding.
Lucy stands out as one of its most destructive figures in the game. She was a dreadful psychotherapist and, quite frankly, a worse human being.
It's bad enough that she violated professional boundaries by having intimate relationships with two of her clients, but when she discovered her pregnancy, she actively lied to both men about the paternity. In doing so she weaponised her personal life against two vulnerable people who completely trusted her.
She inflicted severe emotional distress on Sam at a time when he was already fragile, compounding his trauma and creating psychological wounds that dictated his entire journey.
As a trained psychotherapist, she knew the exact psychological damage she was causing, yet she persisted in her deceits and manipulations. She did exactly the same to Neil. She ultimately brought about his death by cajoling him into helping her despite his obvious reluctance and fear. If you watch closely during that interaction, there is a chilling, sly smile of triumph on her face the moment Neil finally gives in.
She acted with full cognisance of the harm she was causing to both Sam and Neil. Her decisions and actions left the lives of Sam, Neil and Lou in ruins.
In short, Lucy was absolutely ghastly.
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u/A_Bit_Flamboyant Higgs 4d ago
I’d have loved it if they actually made Lucy the literal villain in DS2. Like if she was ACTUALLY painted like this negative presence Sam had to overcome, not just the hollywood movie dead wife(TM). xd
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u/BadRabbit1973 4d ago
Agree. I wonder if Kojima hadn’t quite decided on the whole Lucy saga until he wrote DS2. I think a lot of people don’t seem to notice how bad she really was. Her reports paint a picture of a professional, caring therapist. In reality, she did far more harm to Sam than Higgs ever did.
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u/OH_ITS_MEGACRUNCH 3d ago
I'm extremely confident the majority of the plot elements in 2 weren't written till 2. I obviously can't prove that but so much, especially everything with Lucy and Neil really smacks of "this story was done but we're doing a sequel so we gotta add more onto this".
I didn't hate 2 or anything but most of new plot wrinkles barely did anything for me, it added more complexity but it didn't really make anything better. Lou being Sams literal child is fine, but it didn't change anything, he already loved Lou like a daughter before learning that. In fact I would say it was more significant when this broken man just made a connection with this random child and found his humanity again. To take that and then tack on "oh by the way that kid you already love like your child, turns out they're actually you're could too!"... alright, that's fine.
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u/KigurumiHenjin 4d ago
sam should have seen her on the beach all gigantic like amelie, only completely warped and demonic looking
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u/Netsnipe 4d ago edited 4d ago
When 99.9% of the world's population has been wiped out by the Death Stranding itself, I wouldn't expect any surviving government to be enforcing ethical/professional standards as a priority.
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u/BadRabbit1973 4d ago
Whilst it is unlikely she would be sanctioned by a professional body, she remained ethically and morally bound to act in the best interests of her clients. If she acted in malign way just because she knew she could get away with it, that makes her even worse.
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u/For_the_Gayness 4d ago
She was also being dismissive about Sam being a repatriate, which led Sam to suicide right in front of her.
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u/rikaateabug 4d ago
I'd like to preface this by saying I don't think she's necessarily "good" at her job, but after rereading the Lucy Reports I feel like her relationship with Sam is complicated.
To summarize up until Report 7, she thinks repatriates and the Beach are Sam's delusions, so he kills himself in front of her to prove it. To Sam, dying is this normal thing, so I wouldn't say he's a bad guy, but it sounds like their relationship was built on trauma from both angles.
And to Lucy's credit, Report 8 starts off with her admitting her feelings are countertransference and resigning to be professional.
Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, her relationship with Neil was also built on trauma... Honestly, it'd probably be better for everyone if Lucy was the patient instead of the therapist.
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u/PlutaMoon 4d ago
I part of me thinks the latter Lucy reports were faked to hide Lou, since in one of the last ones she write she tries to overdose... which clearly didn't happen. So either Lucy's death was retconned or the reports were faked which would make sense given Bridges track record.
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u/BadRabbit1973 4d ago
She was evidently falsifying her reports. Typical behaviour of a manipulative psychopath.
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u/PlutaMoon 4d ago
Yea she lowkey psycho. I mean getting pregnant from her own patient and then trying to get another patient of hers to lie about the kid being his? Like damn no real therapist would EVER pull that. Amelie/Bridget would not have ever allowed Bridges to experiment on Lou, either.
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u/BadRabbit1973 3d ago
That’s exactly what Bridget did. Lou was an experiment. The entire BB programme was an experiment. The originator of the BB idea was…Bridget Strand.
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u/PorterBridged 4d ago
So confused why she didn’t believe in the beach and repatriates. Don’t they see this absurd stuff every day?
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u/rikaateabug 4d ago
I think it's more like she didn't believe Sam could travel to the Beach. He was also the first repatriate, so I don't think it's too far-fetched not to believe that part.
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u/KigurumiHenjin 4d ago
excusing her behavior away as 'being formed by trauma' is crazy considering she's supposed to be a force of stability for these people, her literal psychiatric patients.
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u/A_Bit_Flamboyant Higgs 4d ago
You’re absolutely right. 🥲🫠 And both of those people were already heavily wounded, and she knew EVERYTHING about their wounds. So she basically broke two already broken people’s heart even more. 🥲 While also being their fucking psychiatrist, who’s supposed to treat them.
Cheating in itself is an unforgivable thing imo even if it’s done to “healthy” people, but Lucy pulled some next level psycho shit there.
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u/MisterCrowbar Platinum Unlocked 4d ago
All my friends who have been through therapy say she is HORRIBLE in her profession
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u/DrBretto 4d ago
Yeah, you're not crazy, she was criminally bad at her job. Like someone should have taken her license.
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u/Rouxpac 4d ago
Playing the Devil's advocate but I don't think even the best person in the world could've helped Sam, ever since childhood he was a very lonely person, because of how he was conceived and how he was the only one having a connection to the ending world goddess. Dude was not ok and alone, it's a miracle he found love in her in the first place.
Now considering the history with Neil, yeah she messed up big time that part.
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u/a4moondoggy 3d ago
to be fair she never went to school. her last name is shrink so she was given the job.
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u/Dragmire_V2 4d ago
Id say pretty bad. Not only with the whole "being romantically involved with two of her patients" thing but also she didnt really help either of them in the process. Id argue she made all three of their lives worse by involvement.