Characters / Red Dead Redemption – Micah Bell III

Micah Bell III

"That's all there is: livin' and dyin'."

Voiced by: Peter Blomquist

"Sometimes, brothers make mistakes."

A career criminal and hitman, Micah fell in with Dutch's gang five months before the events of the game when he saved Dutch during a bar fight over some stolen gold. Wild, unpredictable and somewhat of a nihilist, he lives for the action and is dangerous in a gunfight.

Due to Micah's nature as a Walking Spoiler, all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

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A-D

• Abhorrent Admirer:
  • Can often be seen trying to make a pass at the girls in the camp, including Susan Grimshaw. He only evokes revulsion from them.
  • In the early chapters, he's a non-romantic version of this toward Arthur, making constant attempts to get on Arthur's good side, which mostly just irritates Morgan.
• Ace Custom: His guns are customized to a heavy degree, having carvings and a custom grip. John can take one of them by returning to Micah's corpse after killing him.
• Acrofatic: Not immediately evident, but it's clear he has a beer belly in profile when his jacket's open, though his clothes conceal it well; it happens to be most obvious in the Guarma chapter, where he spends most of his time either shirtless or with his shirt completely unbuttoned. He's still almost as versatile as Arthur though.
• Actually Pretty Funny: He reacts to Sean's joke that he met Dutch while crawling out of an outhouse with weirdly sincere sounding self-deprecatory humor that he generally doesn't show when insulted.
• Admiring the Abomination: He seems pretty impressed with the brutality and relentlessness of Albert Fussar while stranded in Guarma.
• Advancing Boss of Doom: In the final part of his fistfight in the "Go with John" part of the final story mission, you need to crawl your way to Micah's revolver while he is chasing after you. If he catches up to you, you're dead and you have to start over.
• Ambiguous Situation:
  • Just how long Micah had been selling out the gang to the Pinkertons is left ambiguous. While Milton states that he only started being his mole after the Guarma incident, there were a lot of hints dropped beforehand that Micah is deliberately leaving a trail for the Pinkertons to follow (see Foreshadowing below for specifics). It's even possible (if highly unlikely) that Milton was lying and there was never a traitor, and Micah's sabotage of the gang was done out of sheer stupidity.
  • There's circumstantial evidence that he might've been working with the O'Driscoll Boys as well — he kills a number of them in his usual savage way, but Colm is shown to care nothing for the lives of his gang and would've considered it an acceptable loss if it meant wearing down Dutch, taking out his right-hand men, and sowing dissent amongst the Van der Lindes. Micah's also the one to suggest that Arthur take point on the overlook, getting him captured, in the same mission that reveals Colm has cut a deal with the Pinkertons; if this were the case, Micah might have already been in contact with Colm beforehand, or used Milton as an intermediary to plan the ambush. Ultimately, Colm and Milton's deaths remove any chance at a reveal of how involved he was with the O'Driscolls, if he indeed was.
  • In a stagecoach robbery with him and Bill in Chapter 4, he can say he slept with Jenny at the camp in Blackwater; since Jenny is dead, she’s not there to give her side of the story, and it’s not clear if it was consensual, or if it actually happened at all. In context, it’s Micah comparing his treatment of the girls at camp (feeling that since they don’t go out and make money, he should be able to sleep with them whenever he wants) to Arthur’s (who respects them, appreciates their contributions to the gang, and doesn’t want to sleep with them) so he might just be saying to get a rise out of Arthur.
• Animal Motifs: It’s subtle, but near the end of the game he becomes associated with rats. Rats often represent treachery, and it's revealed that he's the one who has been selling the gang out to the Pinkertons. Right before he’s confronted by John in the epilogue, a rat can even be seen scurrying about near the cabin he’s hiding in. Rats can also represent a lack of ethics, something Micah has in spades.
• Arch-Enemy:
  • To Arthur Morgan. Micah and Arthur already loathed each other while working together in Dutch's gang, but it's finding out that Micah sold out the gang to the Pinkertons that causes Arthur to swear vengeance on him. No matter what path he chooses or how honorable a person Arthur is, he always faces down Micah in a fight, but is so sickly that he ultimately dies in the process.
  • To John Marston. Micah's involvement in Arthur's death and selling the gang out disgusts John so much that he's willing to risk everything he worked for in order to act on a tip from Sadie to ultimately kill him once and for all.
• Ax-Crazy: A homicidal maniac with a sadistic streak. Best highlighted when he needlessly shoots up half a town during a jailbreak in order to retrieve his revolvers. Years later, Micah has become as sadistic, homicidal and loathsome as Colm O'Driscoll, taking this trope to a new level.
• Bad Boss: In the epilogue, after he has his own gang, he tried to kill his former friend, Cleet, after he objected to Micah's murder of a little girl.
• The Bad Guy Wins: Downplayed. While he certainly doesn't get to enjoy his victory for long, given that John and Dutch get their revenge on him in the epilogue, Micah does successfully destroy what's left of Dutch's gang and either kills Arthur directly or indirectly.
• Bad People Abuse Animals:
  • He treats the camp dog Cain like shit, and is heavily implied to have killed him late in the game, for no reason other than to mess with little Jack.
  • It's implied that he's hardly any better with his own horse Baylock. As the game progresses and you check on Baylock, you will notice that he will look unkempt and his cores are drained. He's also much more skittish than in Chapter 2 before you break Micah out from Strawberry.
• Badass Longcoat: Will usually wear a double breasted, black, leather duster coat, or in the colder areas a dark brown one and is one of the best gunslingers in the series, right after Arthur and John.
• Barbarian Longhair: Has an unkempt shoulder length hair that adds to his feral, bloodthristy image.
• Better to Die than Be Killed: In the article detailing Micah's death after the end of the epilogue, it's reported that he said he would never be taken in alive.
• Big Bad: The main antagonist of the whole storyline. Not only is he the true informant of the Pinkertons, but he is also the one who is leading the gang to its imminent decline: manipulating Dutch, creating hostilities, and sabotaging the gang. And unlike the other antagonists in the story (unless you count Dutch as another antagonist in II), he is the only one who maintains a personal connection with the player and the gang throughout the story.
• Big Bad Ensemble: With Andrew Milton. While Milton is The Heavy and the active threat to the gang, it's Micah who is sowing the seeds of decay within the gang.
• Big Bad Friend: For the most part. While he's undeniably the main antagonist of the storyline and the true informer of the Pinkertons, he's also a major member of the Van der Linde Gang and an ally throughout most of the game.
• Blood Knight: Micah is many things, most of them bad. But nobody can accuse him of being a coward.
• Boisterous Weakling: Micah fancies himself a real tough guy, but when the fists fly, he drops like a sack of rocks. Charles and Javier both drop him in one move when he tries his bullying routine in camp, and he can barely beat Arthur, who is mere minutes from succumbing to his TB. While he still can hold his own in physical combat, he still gets overshadowed by absolute beasts who prove to be real strong compared to him.
• Brief Accent Imitation: In one camp interaction, he makes a mock heavy Mexican accent when he tells Javier to "fuck off back to Me-HEE-co, eh?" Javier doesn't take this very well.
• The Bully: As a grade-A asshole, Micah loves bullying the people of the camp, especially women and ethnic minorities.
• Cain and Abel: He has a brother, Amos, who lives in California and is trying to go straight. Micah holds him in contempt, and while Amos says he still cares for Micah, he still doesn't want the lunatic anywhere near his family.
• Card-Carrying Villain: He knows how much of a rotten lunatic he is and how many lives he’s taken and ruined yet he loves it, calling himself a survivor who only believes in living and dying and winning and losing.
• Casanova Wannabe: He makes moves on most of the women in camp, especially Abigail. All of them turn him down for the most obvious of reasons, and Abigail wants to repair her relationship with John in hopes of making a family.
• Catchphrase: Whenever someone insults him or makes a joke at his expense and he's unable to retaliate, he tends to say some variation of "I'll have to remember that one", usually feigning laughter but with a tone that makes it clear he's filing it away to use for some future grudge against them.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: While we never see him torture someone, he led a gang of psychopaths who occasionally committed torture and/or dismemberment.
• Composite Character: He is a combination of Javier and Bill from I - Javier was described as a creep around women who fully enjoyed the outlaw life, and Bill was an Ax-Crazy weirdo. Micah takes all of these traits while the two are given Same Character, But Different treatment.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: To Edgar Ross, to the point where both are almost complete opposites. Edgar is a man of law who, despite his ruthless and corrupt methods of justice, actually has pretty good points for bringing justice to such a dangerous environment as The Wild West. Contrasting this, Micah is chaos personified and a murderous monster who believes in no other goal than to steal, kill, and destroy all those around him. What they do have in common, however, is that they're both treacherous snakes who are loyal to no one but themselves, and don't pay for their actions until the epilogue of their respective games.
• The Corrupter: Downplayed as Dutch was gradually going down a downward spiral already, but what was not helping was Micah playing "devil on the shoulder" throughout all of this, encouraging Dutch to make otherwise suicidal decisions that only brought more trouble for the gang. What's worse is that it's implied he's doing this to help out the Pinkertons as part of their deal.
• Coup de Grâce: If you went with John during the final part of the "Red Dead Redemption" mission, there are three of these that are unavoidable if you lose to Micah in the fistfight (1. he will punch Arthur until the latter falls to his knees before the former delivers a final blow; 2. while struggling on the ground, he will punch Arthur until he (Micah) says he's had enough of his "yapping" before killing Arthur with a Finishing Stomp to the face; 3. while pinning Arthur to a wall, Micah will toss him to the ground and say that he will go after John next before choking Arthur to death). If you went for the loot, he will pin Arthur to the ground during the final part of the knife fight and perform a few of these, all of which can be thwarted, and all depending on your honor (a few cuts and stab wounds plus one In the Back vs. multiple stab wounds in the chest if low; no cuts or stab wounds vs. only one in the chest if high).
• Crippling Overspecialization: Micah's an immensely skilled gunslinger, no doubt, but isn't good at providing for the gang, his plans pretty much never work out, and interestingly, compared to the rest of the gang, is not very competent in hand-to-hand combat.
• Cutscene Boss: The final confrontation with Micah involves John convincing Dutch to shoot him while the three are in a Mexican Standoff.
• Dark Is Evil: With the exception of his hat, he primarily wears black and red clothing. His horse, Baylock, is also black.
• Dead Guy on Display: His body remains where John leaves it, even though the various newspapers confirm he was found. No-one felt the bastard actually deserved a proper burial and just left him to rot.
• Death by Irony:
  • He causes several deaths by willingly leaking Dutch's plans to the Pinkertons, betraying maybe the only man who ever trusted him in his life, or saw good in him when there was none. Eight years later, John & Co. find and kill him because Cleet, one of the two lieutenants who managed to stick by him all this time, was ousted from the gang over the moral objection of killing a child, and later reveals his location after cracking under pressure.
  • His customised guns are inscribed with the words "VENGEANCE IS HEREBY MINE". His death is brought about by those who pursued him in revenge for his actions.
• Didn't See That Coming: Micah clearly wasn't expecting Dutch of all people to turn around and shoot him while dealing with John Marston in the epilogue. He openly lampshades this, admitting that Dutch got him pretty good.
• Dirty Coward: Downplayed. He's not the man to run away from a gunfight, preferring to stay and cause as much mayhem as possible, but a lot of Micah's behavior at camp shows him to be a self-serving bully at heart who doesn't provoke anyone he can't win against in a fight — he often picks on those who he believes are weaker than him, like Lenny, Javier, and the girls, while trying to avoid conflict with stronger people. His betrayal also stems out of concern only for his own skin, damning everyone else to endless running from the law and eventually death.
• Dissonant Serenity: Although this is a downplayed element of his personality, part of what makes Micah so scary is how he almost always remains chillingly calm, even at his worst.
• Distinguished Gentleman's Pipe: Inverted. Micah is a classless thug who occasionally smokes from a calabash pipe.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Horrifyingly enough, he does give off some strong vibes of being a sexual predator and a presumed rapist, if his interactions with women are anything to go by.
• The Dreaded: It's strongly implied, particularly by Chapter Six, that some members of the (then dwindling) gang have become wary of him before he is revealed as the mole, and with good reason. In full effect for anyone that isn't looking to arrest or kill him by the epilogue, when he has grown in notoriety thanks to his gang's reputation for cruelty, violence and opportunistic brutality.
• The Dying Walk: When John finishes him, he simply turns around, takes a few steps and shrugs before falling dead.

E-G

• Enemy Mine: Arthur and Micah only get along in Guarma, when they both agree they need to work with each other in order to get off the island.
• Establishing Character Moment: He has two based on separate chapters early in RDRII which would define certain aspects of Micah's character and personality.
  • Outlaws from the West showcases Micah to be a ruthless gunslinger much like most members of Dutch's gang, only he's far more caustic and demeaning than anyone else. Then he starts to hound and assault Sadie Adler for no other reason than amusement to further assert that yes, Micah is a massive asshole who doesn't get along with anybody.
  • Blessed are the Meek? is the first chapter to be focused on Micah, taking what was already established about him in the game's opening and expanding on them. Micah being a mean-spirited asshole isn't enough; the very first thing he does upon being broken out of prison is to cause a mass shootout in Strawberry partly to get back his favorite gun and just to get a sick thrill for amusement. If Outlaws from the West affirms Micah as the most hated member of Dutch's gang, Blessed are the Meek? firmly establishes why Micah is the most evil member of the gang; a rabid, sadistic madman who doesn't care about consequences and will kill anything for the sake of entertaining himself.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: Played with. A letter from his brother Amos can be found in which Amos says that he loves Micah and is glad he's not dead, but that he will kill Micah himself should he come within 50 miles of him and his family, because he's trying to put his old life behind him. He also tells Micah to never write to him again.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Subverted. Micah thinks Strauss' moneylending racket is cowardly and "unseemly", and says that he has "the good grace to shoot a fella full in the face, not call myself his friend, then shoot 'im in the back" — a profoundly hypocritical choice of words that fits his own duplicity perfectly. He also quickly changes his tune after Arthur throws Strauss out of the camp, berating Morgan for throwing out the gang's last guaranteed source of income.
• Evil Counterpart:
  • To Sadie Adler. They share almost equal levels of bloodthirst, but their core values is what separates them apart. Both tend to not listen to orders and gun anyone in their way, and they have similar levels of recklessness. However, Micah kills anyone he pleases, whether they are in his way or not, while Sadie mainly focuses her rampage on people who've caused her pain, like the O'Driscolls and Micah himself. Unlike Micah, Sadie is also fiercely loyal to those who trust and respect her, and is quite moral whenever she's in a good head-space, and while Micah has no qualms sucking up to the boss to gain favor, Sadie refuses to change her personality to make others comfortable (see her refusing to do kitchen work "like a lady" at the beginning of the Clemens Point chapter). Their opposition is made most manifest in the epilogue, where after the gang breaks up, Sadie becomes a bounty hunter in service of the law, while Micah becomes an even more unhinged criminal (and puts himself in Sadie's crosshairs). And ultimately, while Sadie has an excuse in being a victim to the O'Driscolls, having lost her husband and possibly been raped for days by them, Micah has none.
  • He's also this to Arthur Morgan. Both Arthur and Micah are two of the Van der Linde gang’s primary gunmen, serve as Dutch’s right-hand men, are capable of dual wielding sidearms, and, in Micah’s words, “always get the job done”. Additionally, both men have a propensity for violence, even if Micah’s far exceeds Arthur’s. However, Arthur still has plenty of standards and will go out of his way to help those he cares about (such as the gang and Mary Linton) or even the many strangers he encounters… unlike Micah who is a deranged sociopath that’s more than willing to massacre half a town’s worth of people to get his guns back and puts himself before anyone else (including the gang). Arthur having Low honor will result in the two being similar, but even then he’ll still be at least somewhat more principled than Micah. This is especially evident in their appearances. Both men have a prominent scar on their chins, but Micah's is much larger and nastier than Arthur's. Both men have similar default outfits, but with totally opposite colors: Arthur's default outfit is his tan jacket, blue shirt, black pants and black hat, Micah's default outfit is his black duster coat, red shirt, white pants and white hat. And, no matter what you do tuberculosis causes rapid weight loss, as such, Arthur's sickness will always result in him being the skinny to Micah's fat in their final battle. In other words, while the player can play a low-honor Arthur, Micah is a no-honor Arthur.
• Expy: Perhaps intentional on the part of Rockstar Games, Micah seems to be an extreme version of a mix between Michael DeSanta and Trevor Philips. In many ways, Micah is a Shadow Archetype, Foil, or even an Evil Counterpart to both characters — a dark mirror of their worst traits turned up to eleven, having all of Trevor Ax-Crazyness and all of Michael's greed, ruthlessness and individualism but none of the charm and redeemable traits that Trevor and Michael were best known for. Ironically, Trevor and Michael were two of the main protagonists of Rockstar's previous game while here, Micah is the main Big Bad. It's almost as if the company has created an antagonistic, evil, unsympathetic version of both characters.
  • To Trevor Philips. Both are chaotically Ax-Crazy members of their respective game's main gang/family unit, and are more than likely to kill on a whim. Additionally, Micah starting his own gang after selling out Dutch mirrors Trevor's small criminal empire, Trevor Phillips Enterprises. That's where their similarities begin, and they quickly end with Micah lacking many of Trevor's redeeming and/or comedic traits. Trevor has many Cloudcuckoolander tendencies and a Hair-Trigger Temper while Micah is more well-composed and is rather serious in his acts. Trevor is The Pig-Pen while Micah keeps a well-groomed gunslinger image. Both are also opposites in regards to racial views and moral codes in their respective stories. Trevor is Equal-Opportunity Evil and cares little for the ethnicity and gender of those he works with or hurts, while Micah is an unapologetic bigot. And most of all, Micah lacks Trevor's main virtue: Loyalty. He sells out his gang, friends and surrogate family to the Pinkertons so he can branch out on his own.
  • To Michael DeSanta, which is fitting since Micah is just two letters away from Michael. Like Michael, Micah is a malignant narcissist who grew up in a life of crime, and played a major role in the running of a gang, while being excellent shooters. Both also made deals with federal agents that led to the disbandment of their respective gangs. Micah talking about being a survivor and only believing in winning and losing during his final confrontation with Arthur closely parallels Michael's own justifications of his betrayal. That is where their similarities end and their differences could not be any starker. Michael will never commit wanton violence for the fun of it, and many of his plans usually try to avoid unnecessary violence, whereas Micah never plans and commits violence for his own amusement left, right, and center. While Michael made a deal with the FIB to protect his family, and he would do anything for them, Micah made a deal with the Pinkertons that only he would benefit from, and he couldn't care less for the gang he destroyed. Their arcs also end differently, at least by player choice. While Michael can ultimately reconcile with his family and begin to move on from his life of crime, Micah remains an unrepentant criminal and dies because of it.
  • Much like Brian Jeremy, he's an ass-kissing, xenophobic slimeball who sucks up to an increasingly deranged leader and whose actions lead to the destruction of the gang.
• Eye Scream: If Arthur has high honor when he goes for Dutch's loot, he will give Micah a slash across his left eye during their knife fight. By the time of the final epilogue mission, he's still got a scar from it.
  • And you can blow his eye-socket clean open as John.
• Face Death with Dignity: After being shot by Dutch he's initially shocked, but then he laughs. When John finishes the job, Micah manages to take a few wobbly steps, then throws up his hands in a shrug as if to say "Guess that's it" before falling over dead.
• Failed a Spot Check: He really should have noticed that Dutch was planning something when his answer to John's question of what he was doing with Micah was "same as you, I suppose."
• False Friend: Despite being a very transparent sociopath he seems to try to get into the gang's good graces, but few are fooled and over time it becomes increasingly obvious to everyone (except Dutch) he has no actual loyalty to them. And of course, he's the one ratting out the gang to the Pinkertons.
• The Family That Slays Together: Prior to the game, Micah ran with both his father and brother as outlaws. Micah seems to have inherited his viciousness from his father, but his brother Amos, at least, is trying to go straight. He lives in San Fransisco with his wife and daughters. You can find a letter from Amos saying that while he loves Micah and is glad he's safe, he will kill Micah if he comes within fifty miles of them because he's trying to leave his past behind him and wants to protect his family.
• Fastest Gun in the West: He's able to fire his guns with such speed that he's able to No-Sell Dead Eye of all things.
• Faux Affably Evil: He proves himself to be chillingly capable of hiding his deranged nature under a civil veneer, often trying to frame his nasty ideas as perfectly reasonable propositions. This even extends to his appearance in the epilogue, where he politely asks John to join him, and seems eerily calm when he realizes Dutch shot him.
• Fat Bastard: Acrofatic and an irredeemable sociopath.
  • Averted by 1907; he's lost most of the weight, but he is no less a bastard. In fact, he seems more of a bastard now.
• Fearless Fool: Micah doesn't really get scared much and tends to perform risky actions that put others, including himself, in danger. Just look at the Strawberry Shootout he causes where he enjoys himself and does not even show the slightest bit of fear during the chaos. This is also shown when he gets shot by Dutch as he seemed bewildered at getting shot at first, but later shows he doesn't give a shit by laughing and admiring the shot, yet he takes his sweet time to whip out his gun and shoot Dutch. Once John shoots Micah, he even shrugs indifferently right before he finally kicks the bucket.
• Final Boss: For both Arthur's story and the epilogue. The former is a fist/knife-fight while the latter is a Mexican Standoff with John, Dutch and Micah.
• First-Name Basis: Almost always addressed as "Micah".
• Fisticuffs Boss: If you choose to abandon the money to ensure John's escape, the final showdown of the main story is a fistfight between Arthur and Micah.
• Finishing Stomp: If Arthur loses to him while struggling on the ground during their final battle, Micah will finish him off with a stomp on the head.
• Foil:
  • To Charles Smith. Both joined the gang a few months back but their personalities cannot be any different. While Micah is a despicable loud mouth who antagonizes everyone, Charles is a quiet man but a Nice Guy who gets along with nearly everyone. This also extends to their loyalties; whereas Micah acts as if he is loyal to Dutch, he is actually a mole to the Pinkertons. Charles on the other hand is loyal to the crew and even returns to bury Arthur and Susan after he left the gang.
  • To Bill Williamson, whose psychotic behavior in the first game mirrors Micah's in the sequel. Other similarities between the two include them having a shared racist streak, being on the heavier side, and possibly getting their insanity from their fathers (Bill fears the idea of inheriting his father's dementia while Micah's nastiness is implied to be inborn, as his father was also a murderous outlaw). However, Bill is generally surly and unpleasant, but also very loyal to Dutch and occasionally chummy with other members of the gang. In contrast, Micah will occasionally present himself as a civil and dedicated member of the gang, but in truth is more than willing to sell Dutch out to the Pinkertons and only cares about himself. Additionally, while Bill served in the US Army prior to joining Dutch, Micah has been an outlaw for most of his life (at least since he was 17). While Bill is usually the Dumb Muscle whose plans are often short-sighted, Micah is at least cunning enough to both manipulate Dutch and hide his cooperation with the Pinkertons from the rest of the gang. Even their preferred firearms add to the contrast, as Bill almost exclusively uses a bolt-action rifle (a two-handed long range weapon) while Micah's signature weapons are a pair of customized double-action revolvers (two one-handed short range weapons).
  • To Colm O'Driscoll. Both are equally sadistic maniacs whose favourite hobbies are killing and slaughtering people for the sake of it. However, while Colm has his own gang and serves as Dutch's arch-nemesis, Micah is part of Dutch's gang and the most despicable member. Colm is primarily a Non-Action Guy who prefers to leave the gunfights to his expendable men, whereas Micah actively takes part in the gang's gunfights.
  • To John, at least to who John was in the beginning. They are both immensely skilled gunslingers, possibly the best in the gang, but don't contribute much in other ways. Both are close to Dutch, but have a strained relationship with Arthur, and some of the others at camp. The difference is that John tries to become better as a person, while Micah revels in being as horrible as possible. In many ways, Micah is what John would become if he didn't have a conscience or a family.
• For the Evulz: Most of his murders are pretty unnecessary and driven by an uncontrollable urge to kill people, sometimes to disturbing levels.
• Foreshadowing:
  • There are a lot of hints that point to Micah's traitorous nature. If the player returns to Micah's camp near Strawberry, they can find a wanted poster of Dutch with a thousand-dollar bounty. This implies that Micah intends to betray Dutch in some point in time and collect the bounty for himself. Micah also always wears a white cowboy hat, a color traditionally associated with morally good protagonists in the western genre. While Micah is far from good, it can foreshadow his associations with the Pinkertons, who are often seen as the "good guys".
  • Lenny once comments that if Micah dies, there will be a party. After John kills Micah in the epilogue, he returns home to celebrate his wedding.
  • In one camp encounter, Micah voices disgust for Strauss's money lending operation, saying that he's "not one to pretend he's a man's friend and then shoot him in the back." When Strauss asks if that's so, he responds with "usually."
  • In the same encounter, Micah threatens Strauss saying that there's nothing better than killing someone who thinks he's their friend. Guess what Dutch does to him at the end of the epilogue.
  • At one point, John insults him by telling him that he’s too rotten for animals to eat. If you return to Mount Hagen after completing "American Venom", his corpse is still there and hasn’t been feasted on and devoured by a bear or a pack of wolves. It is a case of Truth in Television, however, as corpses on tall mountains like Mt. Everest remain untouched as well.
  • Right at the very start of the game, Arthur can ask him if he met anyone else out in the storm. Micah is noticeably and uncharacteristically nervous when he replies.
• Formerly Fat: By 1907 Micah has managed to lose that big bubble gut of his, but he still keeps his monstrous personality.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: While Sean, Bill, and Uncle all irritate the other members of the gang to varying degrees, Micah is the only member whom everyone but Dutch seems to universally hate. Arthur openly says to his face while breaking him out of the jail in Strawberry that the only reason he's not leaving him to rot is because Dutch wanted him back. This is because unlike the aforementioned members, who are either some combination of obnoxious, stupid, or lazy, Micah is genuinely mean spirited and cruel. Some gang members like Javier and Charles can even be seen attacking Micah in camp once he pushes their buttons too far.
  • Hilariously, in the epilogue, you can encourage Charles in a fist fight by suggesting he pretend the opponent is Micah.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: While he isn't the only character sporting leather, Micah stands out by having a particular attachment for the material, sporting a classic black leather jacket in his main attire and including a brownish red variant of the jacket in his winter outfit. His choice of clothes are also implied to be an invocation of the trope : same as with his customized guns, Micah wants to project the image of a badass outlaw through his clothing.
• Giggling Villain: He loves to chuckle to himself whenever he says something particularly dickish, or just for the sake of being creepy. Even in his final moments, he's chuckling over how Dutch just shot him.
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: Has a very prominent scar across his chin that curls into his bottom lip. He can potentially get another one if a high honor Arthur returns for Dutch's money, getting his left eye slashed in the ensuing knife fight at Beaver Hollow
• Greater-Scope Villain: His death at the hands of Dutch and John results in the Bureau tracking down John Marston, kickstarting the events of the first game.
• Guns Akimbo: His signature weapons are a pair of customized double-action revolvers.
• The Gunslinger: Evil and repulsive he may be, you cannot deny that Micah can shoot. One cutscene has him draw and shoot three men (one of whom is behind him) in less than two seconds.

H-N

• Handicapped Badass: He can come across as this in the final epilogue mission if Arthur went for the loot in High Honor mode and managed to slash his eye during their knife fight.
• Hated by All: With the exception of Dutch himself, nobody in the Van der Linde gang thinks highly of Micah. And it's not hard to see why: even before we find out that he betrayed the group to the Pinkertons, the guy is a self-serving creep who makes passes at and insults everyone around him, does reprehensible and stupid things that get the gang into huge trouble For the Evulz, and is generally just a toxic and cruel bastard to be around. Not even his own family wants anything to do with him, with his brother Amos Bell (the one person who explicitly genuinely loves Micah) openly acknowledging how dangerous his brother is in a letter he writes to him.
• Hate Sink: By far the most unpleasant member of Dutch's gang. Boasting a mean streak a mile wide with his smugness, bigotry, and Lack of Empathy, he is loathed by almost everyone around him. In addition, he's a murderous sociopath who makes Bill and Dutch in the previous game look tame in comparison. Unsurprisingly, he is the one who betrays the gang and later ends up being the Big Bad and Final Boss. The one upside is that the very final mission is John Marston getting to pump him full of lead.
• Hellish Horse: His personal horse, Baylock. Baylock strongly resembles the Dark Horse from the first game, a horse that is only available if the player's honor is at it's lowest level. This unsurprisingly fits Micah's nature.
• Hero Killer: Will kill Arthur if the latter is low on honor. The final fight against him as John Marston is very difficult because Micah is not only incredibly deadly, but he can No-Sell Dead-Eye and dynamite.
• Hypocritical Humor: During his rampage in Strawberry, he breaks into an old friend's house, kills him, and calls him a fat sack of crap afterwards. Later in Guarma, we learn that Micah is actually fat himself.
  • If you went for the money with High Honor, Arthur will slash one of Micah's eyes off and Micah will still call John Scarface in the epilogue, which John throws back at him.
• I Fight for the Strongest Side!: All in all, Micah's allegiance is to whoever is the strongest. He only joins the gang out of opportunity, knowing its infamy and success will get him far in life. When things go south after the botched Saint Denis bank heist, Micah sides with the Pinkertons to save his own skin.
• Informed Flaw: Arthur frequently insults and belittles Micah's combat skills, his only unwarranted criticism of him. While he's poor at hand-to-hand, Micah is actually one of the gang's best gunmen up with Arthur, John and Dutch, as shown when he guns down three men in the Rhodes ambush and when he fights John in the Epilogue.
• Insane Troll Logic: According to one of his stories he can tell while he's around the campfire, he believes no man would live next to the sea unless his wife forced him to.
• Ink-Suit Actor: Bares great resemblance to Peter Blomquist, except he has blonde rather than brown hair.
• It's All About Me: When Arthur calls Micah out on selling out the gang to the Pinkertons, Micah justifies himself by saying he's a survivor, and that all that matters is living and dying.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • After taking out a gang of O'Driscolls who tried to rob the wagon they just robbed, Arthur asks him why every job he has with him always ends up with dead bodies. Micah asks him since when has he had a problem with killing O'Driscolls, to which Arthur chuckles and tells him he has a point.
  • When Arthur argues with Micah about him not doing anything around camp, Micah retorts that neither do Swanson nor Molly and Micah at least brings income outside camp. Arthur can't deny it.
  • Social Darwinist take on the situation aside, Micah has some valid criticisms of the gang. Namely; the Van der Linde gang is simply too large to evade the law effectively or for any One Last Job, no matter how big, to provide enough money for the nearly two dozen people to escape the country.
• Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: Even without his wild, unpredictable personality, he is still a grade-A asshole towards his own comrades, although there are a few moments throughout the game that imply Micah isn't a complete dick. The most notable examples include him giving Arthur a second holster after being broken out of Strawberry, apologizing to Arthur for causing him to be caught and tortured by the O'Driscolls, and becoming temporarily nicer when he and the gang are stranded on Guarma. Then it's revealed he's more than willing to become The Mole for the Pinkertons.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: Was able to get away for years with betraying his gang/family unit, corrupting Dutch, killing numerous innocent people, and went on to form a gang of his own, essentially becoming a new Colm O'Driscoll. Eventually after he and his boys murdered a young girl, John, Sadie and Charles finally hunt him down.
• Karmic Death: Shot to death by Dutch and John, both members of the gang he ratted out eight years ago.
• Kick the Dog: It's practically one of his favorite hobbies. He never stops:
  • His Establishing Character Moment is him terrorizing a traumatized Sadie when Arthur and Dutch first rescue her. There is also the disturbing implication that he was trying to rape her.
  • He's the only member of the gang to have any problem with Lenny, and Charles based exclusively on their race. This is including Bill, who's arguably the most foul and surly one next to him.
  • In stark contrast to everyone else in the gang (who believe in, or least admire, Dutch and look up to him as a father figure or life-saver), Micah brags around the campfire that he was the one who saved Dutch's life in Crenshaw Hills, not the other way around. He even mocks the rest of them for "sound[ing] foolish" — in other words, showing gratitude — and Bill specifically for washing out of the Army when he tries to confront him.
  • When Arthur breaks Micah out of jail, Micah proceeds to go on a killing spree during which he massacres the town and kills an old friend of his, as well as said friend's wife just so he could get his favorite guns back.
  • Invoked quite literally when Cain the dog joins the camp; Micah gives the poor mutt a swift kick. When Cain disappears from the camp at Beaver Hollow, it's heavily implied Micah killed him.
  • At one point he can be seen menacingly teasing Jack, also having the audacity to do it in front of John. He ends up backing down from it following John's response.
  • In the final mission of chapter six he beats up Arthur, not caring that he is weak and suffering from tuberculosis. If the player has low honor, he'll finish him off, but it's only out of spite.
  • He also kills Ms. Grimshaw earlier in the same mission because she stood up to him.
  • In the epilogue, he is wanted for killing a family, including a little girl who Cleet tried to save. He also gleefully tells John that he'll be "paying a visit" to Abigail and Jack once he's finished with him.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: After Arthur contracted tuberculosis and his condition begins to worsen, Micah begins to constantly mock Arthur with names such as "Black Lung" Morgan.
• Kubrick Stare: If you play five finger fillet with him while in first person view, he'll be giving Arthur (and by extent, you) one of these. It's chilling, to say the least.
• Kung Fu-Proof Mook: Well, Kung Fu Proof Boss Battle by the end. He's the only person in the entire franchise who Dead Eye doesn't work on.
• Lack of Empathy: Even as things go worse and worse for the gang, and Sean, Hosea and Lenny die right in front of him, Micah doesn't give a damn.
• Large Ham: Has a flair for the dramatic and grandeur.
• Laughably Evil: Though his actions are generally not Played for Laughs, his petty taunting of other members in the camp, which includes childish nicknaming, and his tendency to provoke his enemies in a extremely hammy manner makes him pretty entertaining to watch at times.
• Lean and Mean: When he shows up again in the epilogue, he's noticeably skinnier, but no less unpleasant.
• Like Father, Like Son: A newspaper scrap reveals he was his father's partner-in-crime. They even share first names, a tradition which started with Micah's paternal grandfather.
• Likes Older Women: As mentioned under Abhorrent Admirer above, one of the camp's women he occasionally flirts with is Miss Grimshaw. Played with, however, as he also mocks her advancing age to her face, stating she must have been "quite something" before getting older.
• Light Is Not Good: Although his most representative colors are red and black, Micah is almost never seen without a white hat on his head, which is typically used to represent the "good guy" in classical Westerns. He also wore a light-coloured suit during the Saint Denis bank heist, which is a sharp contrast from the dark suits of his fellow gang members. He's anything but good.
• Long-Range Fighter: It's quickly made apparent that Micah isn't very skilled at unarmed combat, as he winds up jailed in Strawberry after a failed altercation with an enemy outlaw, several of the gang members like Javier and Charles are able to knock him to the ground with relative ease, and when he fights Arthur Morgan, he can barely manage that much despite Arthur dying from tuberculosis (though he does get some hits in). Where Micah does shine however is his marksmanship, as he is able to kill 3 men during the Rhodes shootout, and during his final fight with John, is able to counter Dead Eye.
• Major Injury Underreaction: Even after being shot in the chest by Dutch and then having John seal his fate with further bullets, he seems more amused than anything, walking away with a shrug before dying.^note If the player is feeling cruel, anything that racks up just enough damage will do, from a pair of explosive slugs (which sends his hat flying against the wall and leaves his upper body smeared with soot and gore) to enough Dead Eye shots in the head to leave his face unrecognizably mutilated and blown apart; he'll still stay on his feet for a second or two.
• The Millstone: Micah often gets the gang in trouble with his sadism and poor judgement, though given the revelation that he's working with the Pinkertons, it becomes questionable how much of that is millstoning and how much of that is active sabotage. In the epilogue, he has one last millstone moment with his death, as hunting down Micah tips off Edgar Ross about John, resulting in the first game. Not even ten minutes in the game tells you he is gonna drag the gang down as he accidentally sets Sadie's house on fire just because her panic amused him.
• The Mole: He's the rat who betrays Dutch's gang to the Pinkertons.
• Multiple Gunshot Death: How he ends up dying. First, Dutch shoots him in the stomach out of nowhere and then John peppers him with bullets which finally puts him down for good.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: On his own, he will find the most petty reasons to kill people, such as intentionally trying to go after the lawmen in Strawberry after his jailbreak and killing as many as he can. This pretty much becomes his modus operandi when he forms his own gang, murdering anyone he and his thugs manage to rob.
• Narcissist: This is pretty much all you can say about Micah, given how his schemes only benefit him and he's the only person that matters in his eyes.
• Never Found the Body: Zig-Zagged. While the various newspapers do mention his death suggesting he was found, his body remains on the top of Mount Hagen for the rest of the game, implying that people hated him enough to feel that actually burying his body would be too good for the man. A scene in the credits actually show Micah's body being discovered by none other than Edgar Ross, which puts him on John Marston's trail.
• The Nicknamer: Among other things, he often calls Arthur "Cowpoke" and later "Black Lung" after his tuberculosis becomes apparent. He also calls John "Scarface" for obvious reasons, and Sadie "Hellfire".
• No-Sell: During John's final confrontation with him, he is able to counter Dead Eye by laying down a barrage of fire to pin him down.

O-Y

• Obviously Evil: Established early on as the least nice guy in the group. Who'd have thought he was the rat?
• Odd Friendship: With Sean. Micah genuinely enjoys Sean’s ability to mock him, and at one point verbally states it to him in camp without so much as adding any return insults. Before the shootout in Rhodes, they can both be heard sneering about Arthur if he hangs backs and listens to them before arriving. Of course, he isn't at all torn up about Sean's death.
  Sean: "Micah? He crawled out of the outhouse one day and Dutch was so impressed, he asked him to stay."
  Micah: "*laughing* I like that."
• Opportunistic Bastard: It's implied that he joined the gang out of opportunism and nothing more. Once they are no longer useful to him, he's quick to cut a deal with the Pinkertons.
• Pet the Dog: Surprisingly, Micah is capable of performing genuine acts of kindness, even if it doesn't stop him from being a dick to or backstabbing the recipient later on.
  • A really minor one, but even as he rants about how the gang sucks and makes a racist remark about Lenny, he passes Arthur a whiskey bottle at the start of the mission "Old Friends".
  • After Arthur rescues him from the Strawberry jail and helps him shoot up the town and retrieve his pistols, Micah gifts him a second pistol holster. Later on, he gifts Arthur a Lancaster Repeater he found during their coach robbery, stating that it’s more his style.
  • After their wagon crashes during the O'Driscoll ambush, Micah asks Arthur if he's okay once they get into cover.
  • After his triumphant return to camp, Micah may approach Arthur to thank him for rescuing him at Strawberry, although Arthur is rather apathetic to it.
  • Even though Bill is one of his most frequent bullying victims, he sticks up for him when Arthur berates him for getting Sean killed as he was just trying to find a lead like him and everyone else. Unfortunately, this just pisses Arthur off more as Micah is the last person that should be saying all of this.
  • At Clemens Point, Micah may approach Arthur and offer a sincere-sounding apology to him for accidentally getting him captured by O'Driscolls.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: If being a murderous outlaw who’s generally a complete asshole isn’t enough, Micah also takes issue with the ethnicities of his fellow gang members. He complains about having to share a room with “darkies” (Lenny and Charles) and Bill Williamson in Chapter 1, and in camp he can be seen ordering Charles to fetch him something to eat while calling him “redskin”, as well as telling Javier to “fuck off back to Mexico”. He also complains that the none of the gang's women will sleep with him even when his gun is to their heads. Also not a huge fan of the Irish apparently.

  Sean: "I thought you hated us Irish, Micah."

  Micah: "Whatever gave you that idea?"

  Sean: "Oh, you... repeatedly saying "I hate you Irish" kinda gave me an inkling."

• Predecessor Villain: He's one in the first game, even though he's long since dead by then. His treacherous actions here was what contributed to the gang's downfall and Dutch's Sanity Slippage, and more importantly, Edgar Ross finding his body was what allowed him to track John Marston down.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner: If Arthur went for the money while in Low Honor mode, after he stabs Arthur in a frenzy:
  "I must say, Arthur... it's been a lotta fun." [performs a Coup de Grâce on Arthur by knifing him In the Back]
  • He can also say, "Bye bye, Arthur... it's been quite a ride," and stab Arthur in the chest multiple times before bumping the knife deeper into him as a Finishing Move if you fail to dodge it while Arthur's honor is low.
• Professional Butt-Kisser: Whenever in Dutch's presence, Micah will always try to stoke up Dutch's ego with flattery and support whatever decisions he makes, much to Arthur's disgust. This allows him to supplant Hosea and Arthur as Dutch's Number Two after the former's death and Dutch's growing mistrust towards the latter.
• Psycho Party Member: Micah is the most psychotic and deranged member of the Van der Linde gang by a pretty wide margin. Perhaps best illustrated when Micah turns his prison break into a killing spree that ends with half of Strawberry dead. Arthur hates and mistrusts him for this, and his suspicions end up proven right when Micah is revealed to be the Pinkertons' rat and the cause behind the Van der Linde gang's destruction.
• Punctuated Pounding: If the player went with John, Micah ambushes Arthur while he's fighting off the Pinkertons and starts choking him. When Arthur calls him out on his treachery, he responds with a few socks to Arthur's face, shouting out a few words with each punch:
  Micah: I'm a... [punch] survivor, Black Lung! [punch] A survivor! [punch] That's all there is... [punch] living, and dying!
• Rape, Pillage, and Burn: After the decline of the Van der Linde gang, Micah leads a gang of monsters who kill anyone they meet. The gang committed many crimes over the years such as robbery and murder - some of which involved dismemberment. In fact, Micah himself was estimated to have killed around two dozen people while leading his gang.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: His most representative colors are red and black, and he’s undoubtedly the most evil character in the entire game.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The red to Arthur's blue. While Micah is wild, violent, unpredictable, sadistic and homicidal, Arthur is a Byronic Hero who tries to be rational, cordial, polite, empathetic and compassionate, especially after he is diagnosed with turberculosis. This trope is even represented on both men's shirts: while Micah's shirt is red, Arhur's shirt is blue.
• Riddle for the Ages: How long had he been working with the Pinkertons? Milton says he only turned mole after Guarma but there are implications that it could go as far back as before Blackwater.
• The Rival: Throughout the game, Micah and Arthur compete with one another for the position of Dutch's right-hand man and advisor. Micah becomes Arthur's nemesis as Dutch ends up siding with Micah, leading to the gang's ultimate destruction.
• Sadist: He enjoys killing people and takes pleasure in hurting others, and sees practically zero difference between innocent civilians and criminals.
• Satanic Archetype: He has several traits associated with Satan: his primary colors in his clothes are red and black, is an exceptional corrupter, manipulates others to lead them to perdition, there is not a single feature of humanity in him, and creates senseless violence and evil wherever he goes.
• Sentimental Drunk: Surprisingly enough, Micah actually gets nicer when he's had a few drinks. One camp scene has Micah get plastered with Javier, where the two lightheartedly insult each other before the former promptly collapses asleep on the table.
• The Sleepless: Unlike the other gang members who have all programmed 'go to sleep/wake-up' times, Micah is always awake. Arthur even points it out:

  Arthur: "You know... I don't think I've ever seen you sleep."

  Micah: "It's overrated."

  • That said, there are times where he does sleep, rare as it may be. At times he can be found sleeping while sitting with his feet on a table (strangely enough, he only does this during the day). The only time he sleeps at night is when he gets drunk with Javier and he rests his head on the table they're sitting at.
• Shadow Archetype:
  • Micah is essentially the personification of everything Arthur either hates about himself or wants to avoid being (especially the latter). He has a violent streak a mile wide, cares far more about himself than he does the gang, expresses racism towards even his own allies, and, most of all, serves as The Corrupter to Dutch who hastens his Sanity Slippage rather than encouraging him to see reason.
  • To Bill Williamson as well. Micah is ultimately the personification of what Bill is afraid of becoming: sociopathic, amoral, ruthless, and prone to random violence. By the first game, Bill's Sanity Slippage makes him act very much like Micah in almost every aspect. In the end, without a moral guidance and people who care about him, Bill became the exact thing he was afraid of becoming, eventually becoming just as nasty as Micah.
• Slimeball: One of his defining qualities is his passion for throwing his weight around and picking on weaker members of the camp (especially women) for kicks. Also, he's the epitome of a self-serving rat, as he eagerly throws his own gang under the bus when it suits him.
• Small Name, Big Ego: During one camp interaction Micah will contribute to the gang's collection box then loudly announce how generous he is 'providing for all of you'. He also tends to over-inflate his importance to the gang and to Dutch despite only riding with the Van der Linde gang for a few months and openly looks down on various members, specifically the non-combat oriented ones. Micah also vehemently refuses to do any chores around the camp.

  Micah: "I make the money, not wash the clothes."

• Smug Snake: Good Lord, yes. Micah knows he's in tight with Dutch and treats everyone else - and we mean everyone - like absolute shit, because he knows he can get away with it.
• The Social Darwinist: He brags about how there are only winners and losers in life and justifies his selfishness as him being a "survivor".
• The Sociopath: Micah is a very accurate depiction of a true sociopath/psychopath. He is very good at putting on a facade of confidence, has a grandiose sense of self-worth, a need for stimulation (as exemplified when he shoots an entire town), is a pathological liar, an exceptional manipulator, lacks remorse, guilt or empathy, possesses promiscuous sexual behavior, is a cold-blooded murderer from an early age, lacks fear, is irresponsible, impulsive, and absolutely lacks realistic goals or objectives, as living day to day harming others for the sake of it without goals for their life is quite common for sociopaths. Unfortunately for him, he's also completely unaware of how far people will go to hunt him down in revenge as shown in the epilogue, which perhaps also speaks towards his Lack of Empathy.
• Spanner in the Works: His death was what helped to kickstart the events of the first game. Because John came out of hiding to hunt Micah down, he once again brought himself under the radar of the Pinkertons, and allowed Edgar Ross to track him down.
• Speak Ill of the Dead: Micah is the only member of the gang to never grieve for any member in the event they die. If anything, he'll say something mean-spirited or demeaning about their outcome just to further the fact that he's a repugnant piece of shit.
  • After Horseman, Apocalypses, while everyone is mourning Kieran's death, Micah not only doesn't bother to pay respects but also immediately speculates that Kieran ratted out the gang by going and telling information to the O'Driscoll gang.
  • After the failure of the Saint Denis bank robbery, Micah brushes off Hosea's death by claiming that he was "dying anyway" and when trying to converse about Lenny, he mocks him for being too confident for the job, stating "You know what they say about pride before a fall..."
• Spiteful Spit: If Arthur went with John in Low Honor mode, then Micah spits on the former's corpse after shooting him dead.
• The Starscream: Downplayed. Throughout the game he works closer and closer to Dutch to rise up the gang hierarchy and acts as a rival to Arthur in regards to being The Dragon to Dutch. All the while he's playing the role of a negative influence on a Dutch and is ultimately revealed to be disloyal to the gang as he's the one who's been ratting them all out to the Pinkerton's leading to some of their deaths or near deaths, and the gang ultimately disbanding. As we see in the epilogue, Micah went on to start his own gang even taking over from Dutch and replaces Colm O'Driscoll. He still enters a Villain Team-Up with Dutch, who by then is but a shell of his former self.
  • Players can find a wanted poster of Dutch in Micah's old camp near Strawberry, implying that Micah does intend on betraying Dutch.
• Straw Nihilist: At one of the camp's parties he goes on a lengthy rant about how life is a meaningless series of events and sensations between birth and death, with no hope of salvation or point to doing good.
• Stupid Evil: If Micah only started selling out the gang after Guarma, as Milton says, then all his actions that brought more trouble for the gang are this. His bloodthirsty nature makes it difficult, if not impossible, for the gang to lie low. For example, he forgoes a quick escape from Strawberry to instead shoot up the entire town all so he could get back his guns. Which, admittedly, are heavily customized and obviously quite important to him, but still. Even if he did work for the Pinkertons from the very start he influenced Dutch to kill the guy that signs their cheques among other bloodbaths the Pinkertons couldn't benefit.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Due to his Ax-Crazy behavior, his role as a Hate Sink, and how he starts his own gang following the disbandment of Dutch's gang, Micah appears to be one to Bill Williamson from the first game, whose appearance in the prequel shows his nicer side and Hidden Depths.
• Teens Are Monsters: A newspaper excerpt from 1877 documents a crime committed by a 17 year old Micah and his father. They committed a double homicide, then hung the bodies from the rafters with their throats slit.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: He is on the same side as Arthur and the rest of the gang for most of the game. Regardless, he has reciprocal animosity with almost every member of the gang, especially Arthur, except Dutch before he actually turns on them.
• Token Evil Teammate: In a gang full of outlaws and con-artists, Micah stands out from the rest as the most unhinged and trigger-happy of the lot. And that's before he's revealed as the traitor.
• Too Dumb to Live: Justified: One of Micah's most noticeable traits is his seemingly compulsive need to be a jerk to everyone regardless of who they are, if they did anything to actually deserve it, or not, or if they can clearly kick his ass, and will if he provokes them. Additionally, he is so trigger-happy, and bloodthirsty that he'll turn normal, low-profile heists, and missions into major headline-grabbing bloodbaths despite being repeatedly told not to so the gang can keep laying low. You'd think these flaws would eventually bite him the ass, and get him killed during the course of the main story, or at the very least, get him kicked out of the gang, but they don't simply because he constantly sucks up to Dutch, and next to Arthur, and John, is the best gunslinger in the entire Van der Linde crew.
• Too Good to Be True: More like too bad to be true. On a first play through of the game, despite Micah’s obvious evil nature some players might believe he’s too obvious to be ratting the gang out. As such these players would believe Micah to be a Red Herring of sorts because of this. He isn’t. This can cause some expectations to be subverted. This is because the most obviously evil member of the gang who would be a bit too predictable of a candidate to be the rat, actually IS the rat.
• Took a Level in Kindness: He is noticeably friendlier to everyone during chapter 5, if only because he needs their help to get off of Guarma. It doesn't last.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Obviously he's a consistently awful person to everybody, but in the first couple of chapters, he at least makes a token effort of being nice to Arthur, though this stops when he realizes Arthur isn't gonna warm up to him.
• Toxic Friend Influence: Micah acts as one to Dutch, manipulating his eroding sanity to get him to commit worse and worse acts. In the end, the "friend" part is subverted as he sells out the entire gang to the Pinkertons, Dutch included.
  • This extends to the rest of the gang loyal to Dutch. In camp, Micah can be seen whispering rumours to Javier, turning him against Arthur.
• Trigger-Happy: Visibly so. It’s as if he’s finding a reason to shoot anyone he looks at. The first thing he does when Arthur lends him a gun in his prison escape is to shoot his cellmate, who he immediately kills for being an O'Driscoll although to be fair, his cellmate did deserve it.
• Undercover When Alone: When fighting with Arthur, he will repeatedly yell about Arthur being a traitor despite Dutch (seemingly) not being in sight. Throughout the entire game, he never admits to being the rat.
• Viler New Villain: Even though he only appears in a prequel, he is this to Edgar Ross during the first game. Ross at least has a cause he's fighting for, and the people he acts against were dangerous criminals. It's his underhanded methods and eventual treachery that made him a despicable man. Micah has all of Ross's worst qualities with none of his positive ones, as he just wants to hurt people, and shows equal gusto in gunning down enemy combatants and harmless civilians.
• Villain Ball: After getting shot by Dutch, Micah spends a few moments complimenting the shot instead of returning fire instantly. Given that Micah is fast enough to No-Sell Dead Eye, he may have been able to at least wound someone had he not wasted those few seconds.
• Villainous Breakdown: Just after Arthur's death, Dutch finally sees Micah for the rat that he really is and silently refuses Micah's offer to escape together, leaving him on the mountain. This leaves the normally unflappable Micah in rage as he futilely calls back to Dutch, even if only for a brief moment. The quote he tells differs based on whether you went to help John or get the money.
• Villainous Lineage: His bio states that he comes from "a long line of bad men", with his own dad being wanted for murder in five counties. Seems like he got his general nastiness from his old man.
• Villain Respect: He’s still a jerk about it, but he is impressed by strong and determined people who can pose a threat towards him and don’t play by the rules.
  • The most relevant one is his most prominent rival, Arthur for his competence and skills. He's pretty surprised to how Arthur is still able to beat him while he’s at the last stages of tuberculosis and is minutes away from dying.
  • He's fond enough of Davey and Mac Callander to inquire about Davey's condition at the beginning of the game, remarking on his passing with a genuine-sounding "That's too bad," while also commenting on both Callander brothers' ability as fighters.
  • He has somewhat of a friendship with Sean, being genuinely amused by his putdowns, and (uncharacteristically) doesn't even bother with a comeback.
  • Despite his mutual enmity with John rivalling that of his with Arthur's, he does feel impressed at John's ability to verbally rebut Micah at Micah's every turn.
  • He's impressed at how brutal and ruthless Fussar was in Guarma.
  • Lastly, he seems to be impressed at how Dutch suddenly shoots him in the chest when he realizes that Micah’s trying to kill John, saying that he shot him good.
• Walking Spoiler: On account of his status as The Mole within the gang and the Final Boss of the game.
• Weak, but Skilled: It’s subtly implied that Micah, for all his weight and bravado, isn’t that strong without firearms. Javier and Charles are seen easily knocking him down in camp, Bill would’ve probably done the same in Colter if it wasn’t for the other gang members restraining him, and it’s heavily implied that he struggled with an average O'Driscoll thug before he was jailed in Strawberry. Even a terminally ill Arthur managed to hold his own against him in a fist fight (help John get to safety) or knife fight (return for the money). Lampshaded when Micah says Arthur can fight but can't think.
  Arthur: You can do neither.
  • However, he's still able to pick people up and even land some pretty effective hits, so it's possible that he is strong and tough but he either lacks proficiency or he just does not try so he doesn't waste his time being very combative with others.
  • It's also worth noting that Micah takes an impressive amount of hits in the fistfight or knifefight without dying or being knocked out, and even manages to shake off Arthur stabbing him in the eye rather quickly in the High Honor Money ending. He's either very durable, has a high pain tolerance or both.
• We Can Rule Together:
  • In Chapter 6, he cryptically tells Arthur that if he sticks with a survivor like him, he'll live, an early admission that he's not truly loyal to the gang and only looking out for himself. Since Arthur, regardless of honor, actually cares about his people and despises Micah, he never follows up on Micah's offer and they become mortal enemies soon after.
  • He tries to persuade John Marston to join him in the epilogue after getting in a standoff while using Sadie as a human shield. Given that he's just tried to kill John and threatened to kill Abigail and Jack afterwards, it's pretty clear this is only a ploy so John will lower his gun and Micah can kill him.
• White Hair, Black Heart: By the end of the epilogue, you can see that Micah's hair has grayed out due to him aging in the frozen mountains but he is still the malevolent rat he was before.
• Worthy Opponent: He's unsurprisingly a dick about it, but it's clear that he considers Arthur this especially when he's being as ruthless as him.
• Would Hit a Girl:
  • Needlessly murders his old friend Norman's wife, Maddy, while getting his favorite guns back.
  • Shoots Miss Grimshaw dead while she's distracted.
  • Two examples in the final mission of the epilogue: threatening to go after Abigail, and using an injured Sadie as a human shield.
• Would Hurt a Child: When John Marston hunts him down, he says he'll go after Jack once he's done killing John. He's also wanted for murdering a family, including a little girl whom Cleet tried to save.
• Yes-Man: An intentional example. He always supports Dutch's decisions, regardless of how suicidal or poorly planned they turned out to be. This is because Micah is secretly working with the Pinkertons, and is trying to undermine the gang's every move.
  • In the early chapters, he's somewhat like this towards Arthur as well, seemingly out of respect towards his abilities, and because of his high position in the gang.
• You Are a Credit to Your Race: While drinking with Javier, he tells him that he's okay for a greaser to which Javier responds that he's okay for an asshole. Both then promptly bust out laughing afterwards.
• You Fight Like a Cow: In one of the camp interactions, when Javier punches him for telling him to "fuck off back to Mexico", Micah responds by telling him, "You hit like you dress... all feminine," meaning that he "fights like a girl".
• Younger Than They Look: He's in his late 40s in the epilogue, but looks to be about 60.