Bloody Mary (aka Dr. Mary Agana) was the original event icon created for Halloween Horror Nights Orlando’s 18th event, Halloween Horror Nights: Reflections of Fear. Based on the legend of Bloody Mary, Universal created an elaborate backstory for her transformation from psychiatrist to Bloody Mary. Mary made appearances in the advertising and other aspects of the event.



Background

Dr. Mary Agana was introduced on the HalloweenHorrorNights.com website on July 1, 2008. Website visitors entered her office and read her journal as it appeared in 1958. Her office was shown with a large mirror reflecting her desk, initially shown as clean and orderly. In her journal appeared a letter establishing her as a psychiatrist whose methods were rejected by the National Association of Mental Health (NAMH), and whose grandmother had died and left her many of her possessions in her will.

Weekly, new pages were added to the journal as she took new cases and used her methods despite the rejection letter. With each case it became clearer that her sanity was waning as she tortured her patients with fear. Treating the patients with an immersion therapy for their fears, she sent her first two patients to asylums, however her third patient was inadvertently killed during therapy. Her next journal entry showed the excitement she felt over the patient’s death, and was accompanied by a change in her office becoming more disheveled.



With her next case, her writing became sloppier and she scribbled many pictures on the pages. This patient and the next were both killed, although not directly by Mary herself. She began to question her own sanity in her journal, but continued to see patients. Her next two cases included one of the NAMH doctors who had rejected her and another man (Boris Shuster). She killed the doctor with her own hands and had become insane.

In one of her last journal entries, Mary continually wrote August 27 on the page.

Throughout that day, her office changed again, aging fifty-years to bring the website to the present. Her final journal entry was revealed as the mirror broke open and she became Bloody Mary. A paranormal investigation team founded by Shuster, Legendary Truth investigated the incident in the office on August 27, 2008, the fifty-year anniversary of Agana’s transformation into Bloody Mary. They revealed her as the inspiration for the urban legend.

Backstory

The Old Urban Legend

The Urban Legend of Bloody Mary goes back as far as anyone can remember. Everyone knows it, yet no one knows it’s true source. According to the legend, the ghost named Bloody Mary is said to appear in a mirror when her name is stated three times, though there are many variations as to what happens afterward. It is believed that legend stretches as far back as Queen Mary I of England. However, the most recent and historicaly accurate version concerns a doctor named Mary Agana & Bloody Mary’s Music Box. There is/was this charm to see her through your bedroom mirror however, a lot of people think it as less likely.

The Events of 1908

Mary Worthington, a school teacher in the small town of Carey, Ohio, was killed on August 27, 1908 as a result of a Halloween prank orchestrated by the school handyman, Aldridge Kesterson. Six students (Louise Hatfield, George Von Stebler, Shawn McPherson, Jim Deedle, Alice Dodgson, and

Jeremiah Kubsch) were also involved in the mysterious death of their teacher; one student, Thornton Kesterson, was not present due to the persistent goading by his father, Aldridge. The schoolmaster, Mr. Renshaw, found his schoolhouse in complete disarray with blood and shards of glass scattered across the room. Although suspected murdered, Mrs. Worthington’s body was never found, and was classified missing.

The Events of 1958

Marie W. Agana, daughter of Mary Worthington, dies on June 20, 1958. Dr. Mary Agana, daughter of Marie W. Agana, receives a letter from Alexander Pohl, her family attorney, that informs her of the wishes of her late mother. Mary will receive several valuable silver heirlooms that originally belonged to her grandmother, Mary Worthington. Most notably, Mary receives a silver jewelry box/music box that seems to possess her over time. On June 25, 1958, Mary receives a letter from the National Association of Mental Health that informs her that the board members of the NAMH have denied funding for her immersive fear therapy program. Dr. Gustav Heim, the director of the NAMH, states within the letter that he is disturbed that Dr. Mary Agana may proceed with her plan regardless. Dr. Agana opens up her own facility, Living Fearlessly: Specialized Treatments for Fear Based Ailments, in 1958 to begin her immersive therapy program. She hires assistants from a local facility, that are believed to be ex-cons or mental patients.



Over the course of a few months, Mary sees several patients and discovers new ways to “cure” them of their fears and phobias. However, due to the disappearance of Charlie McPherson, a freelance photographer hired by private investigator Boris Shuster, Shuster begins an investigation into Dr. Mary Agana and her clinic. As patients begin to disappear from the clinic, Boris begins to wonder what really goes on inside of Dr. Agana’s practice. Mary begins to suspect she is being watched, perhaps by Boris, as well as by her grandmother Mary Worthington through the mirror. Shuster makes an appointment with Dr. Mary Agana on August 27, 1958 to discover the truth behind the mysterious psychiatrist.

On this night, Mary Agana is brutally murdered, supposedly by Boris Shuster, but her body was never found (it was later dicovered that the murderer was a man named David Gronoll, a boxer/ ex- con who was either one of her patients or one of the assistants who worked for her). Some believe that the spirit of “Bloody Mary,” none other than Mary’s grandmother Mary Worthington, had been gradually possessing Dr. Mary Agana since she inherited her heirlooms in June of 1958. In 2008, Legendary Truth: The Collective, which was started by Boris Shuster back in 1958, begins an investigation on the disappearance of Mary Agana. Collective field operatives collect information and visit Dr. Agana’s office, which is still in utter disarray since her brutal death.

At 11:03 pm on August 27, 2008, a manifestation of “Bloody Mary” is detected by the field agents, whom were never heard from again. Calvin Thorncastle, CEO of Legendary Truth: The Collective, quickly dispatches new operatives into Mary Agana’s world to collect additional information on the doctor and her relationship to “Bloody Mary” and the seven patients that fell victim to her treatments.



Appearances

As an event icon, Bloody Mary made a number of appearances before and during the event. She was the main advertising tool in commercials, and appeared in some off the mazes in the event. Her main motif was Weeping For A Child’s Loss by Faithful Fathers.

After the revelation of Bloody Mary as the event icon, the website was updated with her appearing to crash out of a mirror after it said her name three times. A number of billboards appeared in the Orlando area featuring her face and glowing eyes with the word “Bloody” written looking like blood. Additionally, a commercial featuring her mirror world was shown on television. In the commercial, Mary is sitting at her mirror with a man on the other side. He continually says her name, and on the third she breaks out of the mirror lunging at him screaming.

In Mary’s story, it is painful every time she breaks out of the mirror, which is why she screams. For this reason, there was not a main, opening show featuring her. The only show she in which she appeared was the media-only Opening Scare-a-monies. In the show, an investigator brought a mirror and placed it on the stage in front of the audience. With the audience chanting her name, and a flicker of the lights, Mary crashed out of the mirror and was interviewed by the media.

The general public also experienced Mary during the event. A large LED screen was placed in the entrance to the park. Looking like a mirror, Mary would talk from it taunting guests to enter her world. Periodically she would break out of the screen like a mirror, screaming as she did so. Additionally, Mary appeared in a number of the mazes. A ghostly apparition of her appeared in The Hallow and Scary Tales: Once Upon a Nightmare, and her picture appeared in the static of a television in Creatures! and a monitor in Interstellar Terror. Finally, Dr. Agana’s office was visited in the Reflections of Fear maze, where both of Mary’s personalities made appearances.

In 2009’s event Ripped from the Silver Screen, Mary’s decapitated head was put in the house Leave it to Cleaver.

In the 2015 Legendary Truth investigation (which was held during the event’s last three nights), it was strongly implied that she played a major role in freeing the icons from Fear’s lantern. Also, during the event, the chalkboard that has her poem from The Skoolhouse scarezone has her name erased, a reference to the legal issues regarding Bloody Mary’s use in entertainment.