Profile

Character: Alice Liddell
Series: American McGee’s Alice and Alice: The Madness Returns
Version: Near the start of “The Madness Returns”
Age: 19
Gender: Female
Sexuality: Generally uninterested, but presumably straight.
Appearance: Although she’s still a beautiful young woman, the hardships of Alice’s life show themselves in her appearance. Her once long, silky brown hair has been cut off, and now falls tangled and uneven about a pale and nearly gaunt face. Her large and piercing green eyes seem to have lost some of the light in them and are puffy and red at times, as though from crying, with dark circles underneath. Slim, pale and even sickly, Alice still stubbornly carries herself upright. Upon her arrival in Paixao, she wears vaguely proper Victorian clothing; buckled shoes, black stockings, a slightly tattered and dirty black skirt, a worn black and white striped shirt, and a tattered apron tied over herself, with a checkered border around the edge.


Personality: Despite her proper upbringing (until her parents’ death, that is), Alice possesses a sharp-tongue and a cynical, twisted mind. She is morbid and often pessimistic, though not one to give up easily (if at all). Despite (or perhaps because of) her insanity, Alice is incredibly determined. Whether it’s searching for her lost memories or fighting off her own insanity, she is not one to give up. When she knows something is wrong, she goes after it, seeking to end it by any means necessary.

As Alice’s appearance suggests, she is unwell. Her beloved family’s death has affected her deeply, to the point where she’s… not quite all there. Although she’s better off than she used to be in many ways, she’s arguably worse off, as well; when pushed to the breaking point, Alice has her hallucinations of Wonderland—while in the “real world”, she can be doing anything from wandering in seemingly aimless patterns to falling into hysterics to going catatonic, or even having a full-blown psychotic break, and only by running through the Wonderland in her mind and discovering the problems which lie within her subconscious can Alice return. Despite this, she has only been deemed a danger to herself by the authorities, so perhaps Alice still has some subconscious control over what she does.

Alice is a stalwart animal lover, and has an especially soft spot for rabbits and cats.

Abilities/Weaponry:Inside the twisted landscape Wonderland has become, Alice has become surprisingly adept with a variety of weapons. Her favored weapon is a knife, but she’s versatile when it comes to learning in survival situations. If it can be picked up, it’s a possible weapon, and Alice is nothing if not willing to learn. Of course, hallucinations obviously don’t equal reality, and should Alice ever find herself in a real fight, who knows what will happen?

Alice is quick-witted and tends to think on her feet (and speaking of feet, she’s really quite good at jumping). Whether it’s thinking up a quick lie to save her skin or brazenly confronting someone who’s done her wrong, it’s certain Alice will not simply take any situation lying down.

Weaknesses: Alice is insane, and perhaps even violently so. When things go badly enough for her, she snaps and finds herself in Wonderland, completely oblivious to the presence of the real world around her. Not only that, but she is completely incapable of making her way to reality again until she has dealt with Wonderland.

Despite her increased confidence when in Wonderland, Alice is well aware of her own mortality outside of it. When threatened, she tends to be fearful of her own safety and that of the few remaining she cares about. Rather than go on the offensive, Alice tends to back away. Of course (as mentioned above), if pressed far enough, there’s honestly no telling what Alice will do…

History: (SPOILERS) During most of her childhood, Alice was a happy, healthy and well-loved child with a knack for imagination. She liked tea and cake and her mother’s stories, and she enjoyed listening to her father’s history lessons and looking at his amateur photography. What Alice loved best, however, was to play with her cat, Dinah, and her elder sister, Elizabeth (or “Lizzie” as she was called). Despite the age differences of the two girls (Lizzie being a good several years older than Alice), they got along quite well. Of course, Lizzie being at that age when one began to transition into a young lady meant she couldn’t play with Alice as much as either of them would have liked. Regardless, Lizzie often confided in Alice, telling her of everything from simple things (such as her dislike of locked doors) to her contempt of the “toadies” that hung around their father, even complaining of the harassment she suffered from time to time. “I'm not a toy,” she once told Alice, who was as yet unable to understand such things.

When she was alone, Alice often drifted into daydreams, her favorite being a place called Wonderland, where she befriended several of the residents (the Cheshire Cat and the White Rabbit in particular). She often told her dear Lizzie of her adventures, and Lizzie, having a strong imagination herself, approved, perhaps believing that Alice could maintain some form of innocence as long as she could enter Wonderland.

But such happiness could not last forever. One night, as the family slept, Alice heard her big sister Lizzie having a terrible dream. Alice opened her eyes and saw a strange figure at the top of the stairs, near her elder sister’s room. In the way that only children could, she closed her eyes again, having immediately come to the conclusion that centaurs lived in Oxford. It turned out to be the last relatively sane thought she would have for a long time. The family library, which Alice’s mother had often described as a firetrap due to her father’s photographic materials (all very much flammable), caught fire, and the entire house was consumed, along with the Liddell family. Alice and Dinah only just managed to get out the window, but Alice was terribly burnt and required long hospitalization.

The effects that such an unforeseen (to Alice, at least) tragedy had on the girl was palpable. Alice went immediately and irretrievably mad, babbling about the flames and her loved ones vanishing. “All my fault,” she’d cry, “I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t save them!” Such was her state that even intensive treatment in Rutledge Asylum couldn’t help her. She would often stare at the ceiling and walls of her cell in a catatonic state, and when she wasn’t, she was babbling, lashing out at anyone who dared come near her. Even apparently lucid moments could be broken at any moment by the tiniest triggers. For instance, upon being offered tea by her well-meaning psychiatrist, Alice immediately turned the tray over, shrieking “I only take tea with friends!”

For several years, Alice received intensive treatment at the asylum, from phlebotomy to electroshock therapy and even—when Alice was at her worst—preparation for a lobotomy. Unbeknownst to her caretakers, however, Alice was not idle. She was journeying through the very depths of her psyche in an attempt to fight the Queen of Hearts and thus regain herself and win another chance at life, a fight which was triggered simply by the return of her favorite toy, a stuffed white rabbit. Just when things seemed hopeless, Alice defeated the dreaded Queen—that is, the personification of her own madness—and came to, much to the astonishment of the doctors and nurses. Barely acknowledging them, she simply said, “it’s late! It’s time to go.” As further treatment was deemed useless at this point and she was seen to be a threat to no one but herself, she was simply allowed to leave by the baffled staff.

A mad girl with little education doesn’t lend herself well to gainful employment, at least not in the eyes of judgmental Victorians, sadly. Alice once again found herself in dire straits, with a nurse, Pris Witless, blackmailing her out of what little inheritance she had and her childhood nanny working at a brothel and unable to help her much, aside from company and the occasional bit of advice. Not one to give up, especially after her struggles, Alice managed to find a job and a home (of sorts) at the Houndsditch Home and Refuge for Wayward Youth, courtesy of a man called Dr. Angus Bumby, who was even kind enough to supply her with treatment—hypnotic therapy. He constantly tried to convince Alice to forget—something she very much wanted to do, but hung back on, for some reason. “I’ll set you free, Alice,” he promised her. “Memory is a curse more often than a blessing.” The doctor even learned about Wonderland and convinced Alice to go there through hypnosis, despite the young woman’s protests. At first, Alice was relieved to see that Wonderland had indeed changed for the better, finding herself sailing down a river on a large leaf and taking tea with the White Rabbit. But things were not so simple, and Alice was forced to watch in horror as the White Rabbit suffered a horrible death. “Something wrong? … Rather!” were the Rabbit’s words, and trailing behind them came the sound of a hellish train, thundering along and turning Wonderland to ruin, along with Alice herself. Dr. Bumby was sympathetic, encouraging Alice to embrace the new Wonderland; surely things were as they should be?

Alice shook off her doubts and went towards the pharmacy in order to get the medication Dr. Bumby sent her for. On the way, she saw a little white cat, similar to Dinah’s mother, and trotted after it, glad of a distraction from her misery. “Following strange animals into small holes has become something of a habit,” Alice noted to herself. “I hope it’s not a vice.”

Unfortunately, Alice’s deteriorating mental state took a turn for the worse, and a burgeoning hallucination was only interrupted by Nurse Witless, who convinced her to go and say hello to her pigeons. Of course, it was only a front, and when Alice inquired as to whether the nurse would attempt to hurt her or try to send her back to the asylum, the nurse agreed. “I’ve a thirst you could photograph,” she chuckled—but Alice was too busy watching the nurse’s face morph into that of the hated Jabberwock to listen very well. Horrified, she backed away, only for the floor beneath her to crumble and break, sending the girl spiraling into Wonderland… or so it seemed.

Instead, a very confused Alice found herself in Paixao.

Disclaimer: I do not own Alice Liddell or the the Alice series, nor do I own the images. Those belong to American McGee, EA Games and Lewis Carroll's estate. I'm making no money off of this; this journal is for entertainment purposes only.