Mal is Cobb’s dead wife. Years earlier Cobb implanted the idea in her mind that their world wasn’t real (to help them escape “limbo”); that idea persisted into her waking life and ultimately led to her death. As a result Cobb is wracked with guilt, and Mal keeps appearing as a recurring projection in his dreams—both a reminder of what he did and an obstacle he must stop treating as real in order to move on.
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