Marie Anderson

"*I asked myself...while I was smashing my skull against the wall for hours on end...**why**? Why me? What did I do to deserve it? All I wanted was to **fuck**. Why did that mean I had to lose **everything**? [...] Why should **they** have...what I **lost**?*"
—Marie Anderson explaining her motives[src]

**Marie Anderson** was the secretary to N.Y.C Mayor Andrew Ramsay and a colleague of Joseph Hertford. Through Joseph, Marie became involved in the case of the Empire Killer and came to meet the Nobody vigilante. While she appeared to be only a minor player in the investigation, Marie possessed her own dark secrets. Following the reveal of her secrets, she became known to the media as the **"Succubus"**. She ultimately serves as the primary antagonist of *Season 2*.

## Biography

### Early Life and Background

Not much is known about Marie's early life, other than she started a relationship with Darren Anderson in high school and eventually married him. The two of them settled in Manhattan and Marie became the secretary to local councillor and future N.Y.C Mayor Andrew Ramsay. Marie and Darren had two children, Rebecca and Kenneth, and appeared to be an ordinary happy family. However, Marie eventually grew unsatisfied and began a string of affairs, including a particularly favoured affair with Jake Hendrik, a registered sex offender who could completely satisfy Marie's sexual needs even after she discovered his secret. However, while almost all of these men - all of whom were unaware of the existence of the others - fell in love with Marie, she herself felt nothing for any of them.

Darren Anderson, succumbing to his paranoid schizophrenia, eventually murdered his son and daughter by suffocating them with plastic bags before slitting his own throat in an act of murder-suicide. The deaths of her family, coupled with the guilt over her affairs, drove Marie Anderson to the brink of insanity; when she was confined to the Manhattan Psychiatric Center, under the supervision of Anatoly Sergeyev, her sanity broke completely. She began keeping a diary, in which she wrote that she felt like she had lost "her face", i.e. her sole identity as a mother. She devoted herself to a twisted quest for revenge by destroying young families so others would know her pain, and was willing to do anything to accomplish this.

Fooling the doctors at the MPC, Marie was discharged and eventually joined a support group of other women who had also lost their families. Upon forming friendships with the other members of this group, Marie decided to extend her revenge on their behalf: she would destroy the families of the friends of the women in the support group so they would know the group's pain. Knowing that she could not do this alone, she enlisted the help of a list of past lovers, including Jake Hendrik, all of which were obsessed with her. She manipulated their love for her to act as her proxies in her revenge, and these men would collectively become known as the Empire Killer. Following Marie's instructions, the Empire Killer's M.O involved killing an entire family at once: suffocate the children; slit the throat of the father; and mutilate the face of the mother, the latter being a representation of what Marie felt she lost following the death of her family.

### The Empire Killer

#### Final Confrontation and Death

"*You won't kill me. That's not who you are!"
 "No. I won't kill you...**but I'm not going to save you**,*"
—Marie and Nobody during their last conversation, also Marie's last words[src]

Michael's team eventually deduced that Marie and Jake had taken their hostages to the abandoned Manhattan Psychiatric Center, the same hospital where Marie had lost her mind.

## Overview

### Personality

On the surface, Marie appears to be damaged but kind, witty and resourceful, completely dedicated to her job and the success of her boss, crediting both with improvements in her mental and physical health. She is extremely charitable and empathetic, involved in several movements to improve the lives of N.Y.C's poorer residents.

However, this personality is merely a mask, for Marie Anderson is anything but how she first appears. Her true self is cunning, cruel, callous, remorseless, brutal, sociopathic and calculating, all arising from extreme mental health issues arising from the deaths of her husband and children and the guilt she holds over her perceived role in it. Her twisted morales led her on her quest to avenge both her family and those of her friends by destroying entire families through her proxies: the several men who were all obsessed with her and were collectively known as the Empire Killer. Marie is the ultimate mastermind behind the brutal, depraved crimes committed by the Empire Killer, with each man acting on her every wish and demand in an attempt to earn her love and favour. In truth, Marie cares little to not at all for these men - with the possible exception of Jake Hendrik, albeit only sexually - and is more than willing to manipulate them for her own ends.

## Associated Deaths

### Deaths connected to Marie

* Sophie Dawes - committed suicide following facial mutilation at the hands of the Empire Killer

## Relationships

### Jake Hendrik

Marie cares little for Jake Hendrik, although she appears to be more affectionate towards him as he is the only one of her many lovers that is able to sexually satisfy her. She appears to enjoy encouraging Hendrik's homicidal urges.

### Blake Charles

Marie appears to care nothing for Blake, and has no issue with manipulating him to carry out her twisted quest for revenge.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Tombstones in "*Punishment*"