Felon's Femme Fatales: Eve

Speeder recently showed me a video of a panel had been held at last year's PAX East (Penny Arcade Expo), one of the largest videogame conventions in the US right now. The panel was women on female game characters. They mainly talked about different female characters from video games, both good and bad, and how they felt about these characters from a woman's perspective. This gave me the idea for a new segment: Felon's Femme Fatales. By definition, a Femme Fatale is usually a deadly female character most often in the Film Noir genre of films. But in this case, I will be discussing both antagonist and protagonist game characters. *Warning! There are some spoilers present in this article. If you want play the game, do so and THEN read this!

Eve in her first form, after transforming her host body.

I'm going to begin with the character Eve from Parasite Eve for the Playstation 1. Parasite Eve is one of my favorite horror-RPG type games and it is very largely because of the antagonist by the name of Eve. She is essentially the voice and consciousness of the rebel mitochondria that are wreaking havoc in their attempt to free themselves from "slavery" in the cells of humans.
Eve is a deadly villainess. I mean, she can make people spontaneously combust at will and mutates animals into monsters through-out the game. Despite her unusual appearance, Eve also has a seduction element, making her truly live up to the persona of the Femme Fatale. Her determination to reach her goal is unconquerable. And she's always one step ahead of Aya and the other protagonists in the game. However, one thing that is particularly fascinating about this character is that despite the fact that she is clearly labeled as a destroyer, she is also placed in the position of motherhood, or creation, as well. Eve's ultimate goal is to create the Ultimate Being: a creature that is wholly descended from the mitochondria and is thus unbelievably powerful. She becomes pregnant with this creature in the later half of the game and takes on a form that is very reminiscent of a pregnant woman. There is even one point where Aya discovers Eve in this state and points her gun at Eve, to which Eve calmly responds with a shooshing motion, almost as if to say "don't wake the baby". The birth of the Ultimate Being is, of course, part of Eve's agenda to conquer humanity and is therefore part of her villainy, but it still gives an interesting twist to the character archetype.

Eve's pregnant form. This is when she quiets Aya.

Eve is one of my favorite female characters because even though she is a villain, she still has the traits of a powerful female figure: determination, intelligence, resourcefulness, and strength. And she makes Parasite Eve an excellent game.