In video games Mona Sax is a mysterious professional assassin, living in a derelict
theme park on
Coney Island that she set up as her base. She is introduced in the first
Max Payne game as the "
evil twin" of her younger sister Lisa, the abused wife of the
Mafia boss Angelo Punchinello. Mona is captured by Punchinello's assassins before she could kill him, but manages to escape. It is revealed that she was employed by Nicole Horne, the renegade member of the
secret society calling themselves the Inner Circle who has left the organization and manages Aesir Industries, a mysterious corporation that is behind the drug Valkyr. Horne ordered Mona to murder Punchinello since he wanted to act independent and out of her orders, a job Mona took because it was personal to her. By the end of the first game, Mona disappears in the Aesir headquarters elevator after being shot in the head by mercenaries for refusing an order to kill
Max. In
Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, more focus is given to Max and Mona's relationship, and she becomes one of the game's two
protagonists. Mona reappears as a suspect in the murder of the
U.S. Senator Sebastian Gate. The case is assigned to Max Payne's new partner, detective Valerie Winterson, but despite their past, Max does not inform the authorities that he knows Mona nor does he inform them of her visit to his apartment. During the course of the game, it is revealed that Mona is indeed the killer of Senator Gate. To save her, Max is forced to shoot the corrupt Winterson before she can execute Mona. Mona and Max work together to prevent shadowy hitmen known as Cleaners from eliminating both of them. Eventually, it is revealed that Mona's employer was Alfred Woden, a U.S. senator and a member of the Inner Circle's faction warring with the faction of the
Russian mob boss Vladimir Lem. In the end, she is shot in the back by Lem, whom Max kills. She dies in Max's arms as he kisses her, but lives on the game's hardest
difficulty level, "Dead on Arrival". Mona does not appear in the
gameplay of the first
Max Payne game, but appears only in its cutscenes. She became
playable in four chapters of the first sequel,
Max Payne 2 ("Routing Her Synapses", "Out of the Window", "The Genius of the Hole" and "A Losing Game"). In it, Mona's moves are more acrobatic than Max's, and her sections involve several sniping sequences where Mona is equipped with a
Dragunov sniper rifle to provide cover fire for Max. Her signature weapon is a
Desert Eagle. Mona was also included as a playable
multiplayer character in the Classic Multiplayer Character Pack of
Max Payne 3 Special Edition.
Other appearances as Mona in the film Mona was portrayed by
Mila Kunis in the
2008 film Max Payne, whose role was described as "an assassin who teams up with the title character to avenge her sister's death." In the film, she is a Russian mobster and Max is the main suspect in the death of her sister Natasha (an original character similar to the game's Lisa and portrayed by
Olga Kurylenko). Eventually, Max and Mona join forces to uncover the vast conspiracy behind the Valkyr drug. She also appears in the flashback sequences in the
Marvel digital comic book
Max Payne 3: After the Fall. Her clothes for the
Xbox Live Avatar were released by Rockstar Games on the
Xbox LIVE Marketplace. ==Portrayal==