Selene (Underworld)
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Selene is a fictional character from Underworld and Underworld: Evolution. She is one of the two protagonists in the films and is portrayed by Kate Beckinsale.
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[edit] Background
Selene was born to a Hungarian family. Her father was a well-known architect who helped design the fortress for a general named Viktor. The fortress was actually a dungeon intended for the imprisonment of the Lycan Elder, William Corvinus, blamed and condemned due his bleedy and destructor behavior as a definite persona non grata for Viktor. After Lycans presumably killed her family, Selene was the only one left alive who had walked through the corridors of the fortress. However, she did not know that her family was slain by Viktor himself, and believed Viktor had saved her from the Lycans. The night her family was killed, she was made into a vampire by Viktor.
She became a Death Dealer, fighting against the Lycans for vengeance. She was an object of Kraven's, the Coven's regent, obsession, though she does not return the feeling. She also exiled the Official Historian, Andreas Tanis, on Viktor's orders.
Selene appears to be very serious and bitter as she rarely smiles. She is proficient with many weapons, both medieval and modern, and she is quite fond of the Walther P99. In both movies, she is seen jumping from a ledge from at least 100 feet in the air and landing without injury.
Considering Selene's physical powers, it is also shown she performing various other superhuman abilities, tying into her vampiric strength and such as using her super strength, to pin Michael against a wall, several feet off of the ground, perform spectacular leaps on numerous occasions, striking her enemies with tremendous force (for example, knocking and throwing four armed Hungarian Police Officers around like they were rag dolls; and killing two younger Vampires with just a strike or two),and after ingesting Alexander Corvinus' blood; being able to lift people with one arm and go toe to toe with Marcus in his Hybrid Form.
She also survived taking a shotgun blast to the torso, without being phased by it.
[edit] Underworld
After a confrontation with the Lycan hitman Raze, she discovered what was supposedly a Lycan lair. She was angry when Kraven dismissed her claims, not knowing that Kraven was in league with the Lycan leader Lucian in a bid to take over the control of the vampire realm from the Elders. She tracked down Michael Corvin, who she believed the Lycans had an interest in. Against the sacred rules of the covenant, she and Michael, who was infected with the lycanthropy disease, fell in love. She awakened Viktor from his deep slumber, believing that only he has the power to deal with the conspiracy between Kraven and Lucian. She then led a mass assault on the Lycans' underground bunker. After Michael was shot by a jealous Kraven, Selene was forced to infect Michael with her vampire strain, thus making him the first vampire-lycan hybrid. She also learned the truth about her family's killer from Kraven, and she struck Viktor down while the Elder was preoccupied with fighting Michael. She then retrieved Sonja's pendant, carrying on her legacy.She is a brave and strong and true warrior.
The love story surronding Selene and Michael, in some aspects, ressembles the drama built on the forbidden affair bursted between the Verona rivalry families, The Montagues and Capulets, when the young couple Romeo and Juliet decided to break the code of non-engagement for their passion's sake.
[edit] Evolution
After Viktor's death, Selene and Michael went on the run from both Lycans and Vampires. She was confronted by Marcus, the last surviving Vampire Elder. In order to find out why Marcus was after the pendant, she sought out Andreas Tanis. Tanis told her the truth about her family's slaughter and revealed to her that, contrary to popular belief, Marcus, not Viktor, is the original vampire. He then set up a meeting between her and Alexander Corvinus, Marcus' father and the first true immortal.
Selene was angered at Alexander for not removing the threat his sons, Marcus and William, posed long ago. Alexander retorted by asking her if she would murder her own son. An interruption by Marcus caused Michael to be seemingly killed and Selene's memories of the fortress to be taken by Marcus through her blood. Alexander, dying from his son's attack, told Selene that the only way to defeat Marcus and William would be to drink his legendary immortal blood, adding that she would become "The Future". Selene gained greater strength and new powers from Alexander's blood.
The mutual care and circle of protection spotted by the lovers Selene and Michael pervades the plot, allowing several chances of reciprocal rescuing gestures that both perform toward each other. Thus, Selene saves Michael from Marcus, and in his turn, Michael responds saving Selene from a group of Lycans, and so on. Their love survives every menace and resists Marcus and William threat.
She and a squad of Alexander's Cleaners invaded William's dungeon, trying to stop the threat. They arrived too late, however, and Selene was forced to fight Marcus. Marcus was shocked by smelling his father's blood coursing through Selene's veins. Locking Marcus in William's dungeon, Selene discovered that William had infected all the Cleaners, who became Lycans themselves. On the verge of being overwhelmed, she was saved by Michael, who was saved by his Hybrid powers. She fought Marcus once more, and the Elder drove his wing talon through Selene's chest. Selene, empowered by Alexander's blood, tore away the talon and drove it up Marcus' skull, before throwing him into helicopter blades and killing him.
After killing Marcus and William, she discovered that she was able to stand in the sunlight, the pure Corvinus Strain from Alexander Corvinus fused with her vampire Corvinus strain, thus phenomenally enhancing her strength and healing to a level equivalent to that of a Vampire-dominant Hybrid, even being able to withstand direct exposure to sunlight, qualifying the classification of a true immortal. In the last scene, after Selene beated down Marcus, Michael - astonished and gratefully - watches while Selene mildly smiles discovering she can now let be shed by sunlight without harmful consequences, understanding she indeed obtained an extaordinary evolution, now an immortal and powerful female vampire, as strong as their love that will help keep them, the rogue couple, together and safe in future confrontations against Lycans and Vampires.
[edit] Trivia
- Kevin Grevioux stated that Selene was loosely based on Selene, Black Queen of the infamous Hellfire Club of Marvel Comics.
- When in "Vampire Mode", her eyes turn from green to electric blue but when she drank Alexander Corvinus's blood she became the first female immortal and her eyes turned silver white.
- The timeline regarding Selene's age is confused by events portrayed in Evolution. Though her age is never specifically given in the first film, it is assumed by the plot (and supported by a scene where she is looking up details about the Lycan ruler Lucian) that she is considerably younger than Viktor and the other Vampire elders. The novelization states that she is 600 years old. She was turned into a vampire in 1402, exactly 200 years after William's capture.
- As a kind of combat dress, Selene wears a black rubber catsuit and corset in the corresponding scenes.
