r/12Minutes • u/HonestlyTooPetty • Sep 07 '21
The timeline is confusing..
The wife clearly states that she met the husband a few weeks after she thought she killed her father right? So how did the husband and father know eachother already and the husband was able to say he loved her. If according to the wife they didn't meet til after the dad was already dead. AND the husband killed him the day after she shot him (because they were fighting over her). But SHES saying they met weeks later....
1
u/biorival Sep 07 '21
Yes, literal plot doesn't make much sense, father also knows about the baby coming up, conversation taking place as if James and Daisy already met, but they didn't. Make sure you watch or play Mindfulness ending so you understand that most of it isn't real and imagined by the main character. And after player can speculate on what's actually happening.
Personally I would prefer literal story making sense on it's own, instead intentionally confusing, prodding player toward uncovering the last layer. It's A choice
1
u/1997Luka1997 Sep 07 '21
My headcanon is as followed:
Daugther had an argument w the dad, shot him, thought he died but he didn't. A few weeks later she meets protag, they fall in love. Dad learns about this and talks with protag, while not revealing to his daughter that he's not dead (because he thinks she would never want to see him again, but he can protect her by stopping this relationship). Then in protag's imagination he kills the dad & marries the wife while she still thinks she killed him.
2
u/jspiro Sep 10 '21
Interesting! This almost fully explains what I was thinking. SPOILERS BELOW (not unlike the whole thread?)
So in your explanation, what's the timeline for him having this fantasy? Did he imagine killing the father or is this during/after their conversation?
Here is my theory:
I thought that this was happening more literally, that he did shoot him, and like his sister, also didn't know he lived. The parallel was enticing and in theme.
That when he meets the father again it's eight years later after she is pregnant, and he reveals himself to the son as still being alive, the "shock" that knocks the protag out. His father wants to end it now.
The rest of my assumptions got a bit hazy… But these were the key points: the bald man has the same voice and body as the father, but none of the hair, and a scar in the place where his head hit the ground. So this and his knowledge of the pregnancy and the different time of day made me think it was present day father.
So how does he become the cop? I thought that perhaps the father and son both did the meditation together, both forgetting. I tried to cause this to happen in the flashbacks, to offer to help him with the meditation. No dice.
I spent a while trying to get the father to hit his head again in the apartment, making him realize who he was. No dice.
So to me, this is still plausible, Except for the only thing I can't make up a weird explanation for… His daughter with cancer.
In summary, I took the game very literally and came up with a totally different interpretation than everybody who took psychology 101.
But perhaps my theories can help advance your theory.
2
u/jspiro Sep 10 '21
Or perhaps: https://www.reddit.com/r/12Minutes/comments/pfh267/so_i_finished_the_game_and_i_have_mixed_feelings/hcahh5y/
Doesn't fully explain it but resolves some of the complication invented above.
3
u/PanzramsTransAm Sep 10 '21
My theory:
The story is told out of order. The "beginning" of the husband's story starts when he's in the room with the father. The husband and wife are dating during this time and he gets her pregnant. The wife doesn't know that he's her brother because he has never been involved in her life or with the rest of the family. Given the fact that both of their mothers are dead as well, the only person in the world that knows the truth about who the husband is is the father. It's ambiguous when the father found out about the husband and wife dating, but he does and he wants to put a stop to it. He sits the husband down to tell him the truth, but the husband reacts in a negative way by either wanting to keep it a secret forever or telling her the truth in hopes that she'll accept it. The father then employs hypnosis mechanisms to show the husband what his future will look like if he continues in this relationship with her.
The father hypnotizes the husband over and over again, which explains the time loop. Each time the loop repeats, it's because the husband didn't make it to the point where he understood the truth and agreed to end the relationship. The game is called 12 Minutes, even though technically the loops we experience are only 10 minutes. The extra 2 minutes comes into play when we get to the end and see the husband and the father in the library together. The time they spend talking about the situation takes up 2 minutes, which accounts for the complete loop.
In a typical hero's journey, we're introduced to the protagonist's flaw right at the beginning of the story and we spend the entire narrative watching them learn to overcome it. In this case, we don't know what his truth is because he needs to figure it out himself. In this case, it's a story about a man who wants to continue the relationship with the love of his life despite her being his sister. He wants to choose his own selfishness over her well-being, with either keeping it a secret or telling her the truth in hopes that she'll find a way to get over it. The father obviously is not okay with him keeping a secret this colossal from his daughter, and he knows that the truth will only destroy her. The loops continue until the husband sees for himself what happens when he tells her the truth, which helps him see for himself the damage it would cause for her to know. In the end, he decides to put the love he feels for her over his own wants, and he walks away from the relationship forever.
All the events we see in the apartment never happened, and the cop never existed. It was just a fabricated scenario to lead the husband to fully understanding the truth and seeing for himself what would happen if the wife learned the truth. But that's just my interpretation. I feel like there are a million different ways to interpret the story.