Characters / Shadow Man

Liveside

Michael LeRoi

Michael LeRoi

Voiced by: Redd Pepper

• A God Am I: A rare heroic example, Michael refers to himself as a "god" in Deadside.
• Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: Michael is very overconfident in his abilities and he's not afraid to boast about his title as the Lord of Deadside.
• Badass Bookworm: Michael majored in English literature before his addiction to gambling made him flunk out of college.
• Bad Powers, Good People: He openly embraces the demonic power of the Dark Souls and tries to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Shadow Man is a mask that hides a troubled, traumatized man who blames himself for the death of his younger brother and parents, and would do anything to bring the former back to life.
• Experienced Protagonist: He's been acting as Shadow Man for quite sometime, at least enough to have formed a friendship with Jaunty.
• The Gambling Addict: What caused him to flunk out of college and kickstarted the series of traumatic events that'd eventually lead to the death of his family and him becoming Shadow Man.
• Gangsta Style: Michael wields his handguns like this, even in first person mode.
• Geas: As a zombie caught between the living and the dead world and kept alive by magic, Michael is compelled to obey the orders of whoever he is magically bound to. Originally this was the Evil Sorcerer who resurrected him in the place, but Mama Nettie has since freed him from that bound, albeit of the cost of binding him to her instead.
• Horrifying the Horror: More evident in the Remastered version, the Asylum and the Five are the only things that manage to outright disgust the voodoo equivalent to a demi-god.
• Justified Extra Lives: Being Shadow Man, Michael can never really die. Anyone who dies must go to Deadside, but since the Shadow Man is the Lord of Deadside, Michael will always appear as the Shadow Man whenever he goes there. In effect, that means that if Michael dies in Lifeside, he just goes to Deadside and becomes Shadow Man, who is able go back to Liveside at anytime he wants, and if he "dies" as Shadow Man in Deadside, he will just reappear somewhere else in Deadside.
• Mage Marksman: Michael is highly proficient in the use of common firearms and voodoo artifacts, making him a deadly fighter in both worlds.
• Professional Killer: Michael used to be a hitman called "Zero" for the Evil Sorcerer who saved his life, albeit unwillingly.
• Revenant Zombie: Michael is caught in a state between life and death, having been turned to a zombie slave by an evil bokor. At first Michael, only had limited awareness of his real identity, but Mama Nettie freed him from the bokor's control (although placing him under her own in the process) and restored his memory.
• Scary Black Man: He's considerably more muscular and intimidating in the second game, his appearance in Deadside even turns him into a Humanoid Abomination!
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Justified. In his Shadow Man form, Michael doesn't need to breathe, so he can stay underwater however long he wants to. Michael's mortal Lifeside form, however, needs to breathe and thus can drown.
• Warrior Poet: As a former student of English literature, Michael is always wonderfully eloquent and philosophical in his descriptions of Deadside and its macabre landscape.

Mama Nettie

Mama Nettie

Voiced by: Lani Minella

• Angry Guard Dog: Her home is guarded by a pack of aggressive Rottweilers that may or not be canine demons in disguise.
• Big Good: As Shadow Man's most important advisor throughout his journey and the creator of his Mask of Shadows, Mama Nettie is the closest thing the game has to one.
• Good Is Not Nice: She didn't so much free Michael as she did bring him under her control. Michael occasionally gives her grief for this, but her intentions for him are ultimately much more benevolent than his previous master's were.
• Good Is Not Soft: Has the bokor who enslaved Michael executed by her Hired Guns to bring him to her side.
• Mission Control: Shares this role with Jaunty. ​
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Only Michael calls Mama Nettie by her real name, which is apparently Agnetta.
• Really 700 Years Old: She's actually centuries-old and stays forever young by draining some of Shadow Man's powers for herself, explaining why she's Hotter and Sexier in the sequel.

Thomas Deacon

Thomas Deacon

• Ascended Demon: His true form is suspiciously similar to that of a Fallen Angel, it's left ambiguous whether he was always like that or if Liveside restored his angelical wings.
• Dead Partner: His was Gabe, another police detective who had the same encounter with Sammael but wasn't lucky enough to escape alive.
• Friend on the Force: He's a retired NYPD homicide detective who essentially functions as Mama Nettie's personal private investigator.
• Handicapped Badass: Sammael not only killed his partner but also broke his legs in several places, leaving amputation as the only option. In the sequel, he's ambushed by a hit squad and kills every thug sent after him without getting so much as a scratch.
• Heel–Face Turn: He was formerly Deakith, a Grigori Malakim who once served as one of the many foot soldiers of Asmodeus.
• Unseen No More: After contributing to Legion's defeat by supplying Mama Nettie with information about the Five, we are finally properly introduced to him in the beginning of the second game.

Maxim St. James

Maxim St. James

• Hero of Another Story: We unfortunately never get to explore his adventures as the previous Shadow Man.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Sadly, Maxim sees the Mask of Shadows as a burden and even feels sorry for Michael having to go through the same pain.
• Nice Guy: He passes the torch to Michael with a note to help him traverse through Deadside, starting it by greeting Michael as a "friend and brother."
• Posthumous Character: He's been long dead by the time Michael obtains the Mask of Shadows and reads the note he left behind.
• Precursor Heroes: Served as the Shadow Man of the 19th century and constructed the Path of Shadows that Michael finds throughout his journey, he's assumed to have completed his duty shortly after the return of Legion.

Luke LeRoi

Luke LeRoi

• Dead All Along: Deadside Luke is actually Legion masquerading as the boy to toy with Michael.
• Foreshadowing: His emaciated body is always Coughing Up Blood... Much like a certain collector of Dark Souls.
• Improbable Infant Survival: Averted, Luke and his entire family (save for Michael) were killed in a drive-by shooting that was meant for his brother.
• Warp Whistle: His teddy bear teleports Michael to different sections of Deadside and can even bring him back to Liveside.

Deadside

Shadow Man

Shadow Man

• Ancient Artifact: These are the weapons granted to the Shadow Man, a number have been catalogued and hidden away by Maxim St. James in an effort to stop the growing influence of Legion.
• Dark Is Not Evil: As his name implies, Shadow Man draws his strength from darkness and nightfall.
• Legacy Character: The Mask of Shadows is passed down from generation to generation, Michael is merely the first modern Shadow Man.
• Purpose-Driven Immortality: The Shadow Man cannot die as long as he has the Mask of Shadows, and by extension a duty to fulfill. His powers do weaken over time, forcing Mama Nettie to search for worthy successors.
• Red Baron: The Immortal Voodoo Warrior, The Walker-Between-The-Worlds, Zombi Astral, Taker of Souls, Lord of Deadside... He's a badass, alright.
• Touched by Vorlons: The original Shadow Men were warriors of ancient African tribes who received their powers via blessings from gods.
• Voodoo Zombie: His appearance is based on one, the sequel gives him a near-Scary Skeleton rotting body.

Legion

Legion

Voiced by: Guy Miller

• Adaptational Badass: In the Bible, Legion was a "normal" demon effortlessly dispatched by Jesus Christ, being Driven to Suicide by his mere presence. Here, he is a Satanic Archetype so powerful that Shadow Man, himself an uber badass Physical God, needs all the Dark Souls to stand a chance against him.
• Anticlimax Boss: Played straight with his laughably easy first form, averted with his suitably challenging One-Winged Angel one.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: He seems to deliberately take advantage of this trope to show off his authority over Deadside.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: Legion is incredibly powerful, and appears as a man in a fancy suit, albeit with garish colours and worn in a quite neglected way.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Michael finally kills him by forcing Legion to consume all of his beloved Dark Souls at once, which prove too powerful for him to handle.
• Biblical Bad Guy: The one and only from the Book. Just he had the time to down several barrels of steroids in the millennia following his encounter with Big J.
• Big Bad: Of the first game.
• Blood from the Mouth: Looks normal but his constantly bleeding mouth is a clear give-away that he is anything but.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Legion is evil, revels in it and boasts endlessly about ending the world.
• Catchphrase: In addition to the Share Phrase he gave the Five, the very sentence that made his legend, he ends most of his dialogue with "Amen to that."
• The Chessmaster: Shadow Man does not realize how much of one he is until the end. The Prophecy, Nettie's visions launching the quest, Luke's showing up in Deadside, it was all his doing.
• Creepy Centipedes: His true form is pretty much the creepiest, most eldritch centipede seen in a game. Helped by the fact that he is an Uber powerful demon looking like one.
• Demon Lords and Archdevils: Cut content from the sequel reveals that he and Asmodeus are the highest-ranking Gregori Malakims, Demon Lords implied to be fallen angels. Oddly enough, in Abrahamic Religions Grigoris are Messenger Angels and Malakims are Angels agents of God's will, both fearsome when wronged but extremely benevolent. Here, they are Demon Lords, plain and simple and evil as they come.
• Dimension Lord: He rules in Deadside and covets Liveside.
• Dream Weaver: Legion shaped all the "prophetic" dreams that prompted Nettie to send Shadow Man on his quest.
• Energy Ball: Attacks with streams of purple ones in his One-Winged Angel form.
• Evil Counterpart: Legion is aware that he's not very different from Michael Leroi and makes no point in denying it.
• Evil Genius: He does boast about his "incredible" intellect way too much, but there is no denying that he can back it up. Just look at his Evil Plan.
• Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor: His idea of a "joke" is a story about a murderer taking his victim to some deep, dark woods and ending up too scared to go back through them on his own.
• Evil Overlord: The sod rules all of Deadside, and is implied to have made it the atrocious Hell it is instead of a supposedly neutral afterlife.
• Faux Affably Evil: Legion affects a cordial, gentleman-like, business tone, to taunt, trash-talk and insult Shadow Man like no tomorrow.
• Final Boss: As expected.
• Fisher King: His dictatorship turned Deadside into a hellish purgatory for every departed souls.
• God of Evil: By his own admission, Legion was once the only god in existence. Though it is hard to tell whether he says that there was no god and he only played the part, or whether he was the only god.
• Gone Horribly Right: Everything in Legion's prophecy goes according to plan, including Michael bringing the Dark Souls to him, but unfortunately this results in Michael not only having become stronger than Legion, but gives him all of the Dark Souls in his possession, which kills Legion.
• Hell on Earth: He wants to open Deadside over Liveside, and terraform the latter into the former's likeness. Extinguishing all life and seizing every soul while he is at it.
• I Am Legion: It's in his name!
• Man of Wealth and Taste: Legion is well-read and erudite, with pretty good (if very gloomy) tastes.
• Manipulative Bastard: He's clever enough to have come up with a "grand and incredibly brilliant plan" to manipulate the ancients into believing his lies, and that plan is the Prophecy.
• Many Spirits Inside of One: He repeatedly claims to be "many" after all. The creepy figures around his mouth and the no less creepy skulls on his belly when in One-Winged Angel form are implied to be the "many" he speaks about.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: A fellow sporting one of the most famous demonic names in Fiction cannot possibly bring good news.
• Narcissist: Pretty prompt to sing his own praises at every chance he gets.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Legion wants to extinguish all life.
• One-Winged Angel: When defeated, he reveals his true form: A gigantic and repulsive flying centipede demon, covered in horns and skull-like scales, with a lamprey-like mouth surrounded with twisted, writhing faces or figures, and two tentacles framing a red, demonic face with red eyes.
  • In the comic-book adaptation, he looks like a humanoid demon, similar to an even bigger and more muscular Trueform, with brown skin and a sleeker design, sometimes with horns and a tail.
• Playing with Syringes: Under Legion's iron-fisted rule, Deadsiders are abducted en masse and taken to the deepest pits of the Asylum, where they are tortured, butchered and harvested before their raw material is infused with Dark Souls to create Super Soldiers for Legion's army.
• Red Baron: The Prophecy refers to Legion as "The One Who is Many" and "He Who Bears the Mouth of Blood". Lovely...
• Satanic Archetype: Lets see... Incredibly powerful, rules over a hellish dimension, tempts his prospective followers with powers to turn them into slaves, threatens the entire world. Yes, he checks all the boxes. He is even a Man of Wealth and Taste for crying out loud!
• Sword Beam: Once in a blue moon, he attacks with these under his humanoid form. Provided he is not taken down before that is.
• Sword Cane: He has one, which he never deigns making look like a normal cane, and uses it as a weapon.
• Take Over the World: He already succeeded in taking over Deadside, now all he wants is to use the Dark Souls to invade Liveside and stand at the top of both worlds.
• Voice of the Legion: Many creepy voices are heard blending with one when he speaks, creating a oh so lovely echo.
• Voluntary Shape Shifting: Legion can assume any aspect he wants. Like the one under which he first appears to Shadow Man.
• Wicked Cultured: He's well-spoken, dresses in elegant clothing and has a Sword Cane to boot!

The Five

The Five

General Tropes

• Artificial Hybrid: Fusion with the Dark Souls made them half-demons, which is seen when they lose enough of their health and their True Forms are revealed.
• Hellseeker: A requirement to join Legion's ranks is throwing your old life away and diving straight into Deadside.
  Jack the Ripper: The darkness is visible here. This hell is all I deserve and all that I ever desired.
• Psycho for Hire: Working as Legion's top lieutenants gives them free rein to kill people left and right, be it for Legion's cause or not. The major prerequisite for becoming a member is being a serial killer.
• The Quisling: They sacrificed their own humanity for positions of power in Deadside and are completely on-board with Legion's plan to take over Liveside despite being half-humans themselves.
• Serial Killer: All of them were infamous serial killers even before Legion presented them with Dark Souls.
• Share Phrase: "For we are many!"
• Transhuman Treachery: They already were monsters long before joining Legion, the Dark Souls just expanded their horizon a bit further and made it literal.

Victor Batrachian

Voiced by: Guy Miller

• The Dragon: Victor somehow got Jack's "promotion" and was chosen by Legion to lead the Five in his absence.
• Herr Doktor: Victor speaks with a strong German accent that invokes this trope.
• Large and in Charge: He's 6'2, an inch taller than Milton.
• Lawman Baton: He stole a nightstick from one of the dead prison guards and kept it as his weapon.
• Leitmotif: His is Ominous Latin Chanting, fitting for the man who's basically Legion's High Priest.
• Lightning Bruiser: He's the only member of the Five to use this trope as his fighting style, making him the deadliest of them.
• Mad Doctor: The unlicensed variant, Victor was expelled from London Medical School without completing his course but still posed as a General Practitioner to murder wealthy widows.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed: Batrachian is heavily inspired by the real world serial killer Harold Shipman, who likewise was a medical doctor who murdered elderly patients under his care, especially women, and forged wills which granted himself as the main beneficiary of his victim's estates.
• Prison Riot: Victor masterminded a three-day siege at Gardelle County Penitentiary by releasing over 300 prisoners from their cells. Most, if not all guards and inmates are turned into headless zombies to serve as Cannon Fodder for Legion's army.
• Red Baron: He's the "Lizard King" of the Prophecy.
• Smug Snake: His Fatal Flaw is an implied Inferiority Superiority Complex that makes him think he's more important than those around him, Michael sees right through him and wastes no time in delivering an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
  Michael: You think you're so smart, look at you, so smug in your self-belief, the hero at the heart of your own pathetic power fantasy... But really you're a little baby girl, aren't you? Deep inside, shivering inside, pissing your frilly little panties.
  Victor: Oh, come now.
  Michael: A squealing, puking hairless puppy inside.
  Victor: Now you're mixing metaphors.
  Michael: So move out of my way, puppy dog... I won't ask you again.
  Victor: I will not move out of your way, I will not! Do you know who I am!? Do you!?
  Michael: You're my little puppy dog!
  Victor: Don't call me that! I am Doctor Death! I am the Lizard King! Can't you see what I've accomplished here!? I have brought his kingdom to Earth! I am the leader of the Five! You should fear me... Fear me!
  Michael: I pity you...
• The Sociopath: He's well-aware of his mental condition and exploited it to win a Ph.D. in forensic psychiatry with a thesis about the psychopathology of anti-social personality disorder.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Victor has all the strength and speed to go mano-a-mano with Michael but doesn't know how to fight an equal opponent who's immune to his powers, resorting to simply kicking and beating Michael with a nightstick until he falls.
• Your Head A-Splode: His modus operandi and what he did to the entirety of Gardelle County Penitentiary, Victor explodes the heads of his victims through "some great and unnatural internal pressure."

Jack the Ripper

Voiced by: Simon Phipps

• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Legion has a clear preference for Victor despite Jack having been fanatically loyal to him for 111 years, not that he minds of course.
• Evil Genius: His task within Legion's inner circle is to create the tools needed for the demonic invasion.
• Fragile Speedster: Unlike the other members of the Five, Jack can't endure much of Michael's attacks when facing him, instead crawling on the ceiling and waiting for the opportunity to jump on him.
• He-Man Woman Hater: His psychological profile states that he more than likely has misogynistic tendencies.
• Hidden Depths: It's implied he once felt remorse for his crimes, he would have killed himself if not for Legion's timely intervention.
• Immortality Immorality: He once sought to achieve immortality by performing the Ritual of the Knife on the women who fell to his dagger in a bid to consume their souls, Legion corrects him by revealing that Jack's theory was indeed right, immortality does lie within the soul... He was just looking for the wrong ones.
• Jack the Ripoff: Inverted, the police believe that a "Jack 2" is behind a string of killings in the East End of London when the culprit is the actual Jack the Ripper himself. Justified by him existing for over a century, long enough for the London police to naturally assume the original is long since deceased.
• Leitmotif: Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata—reversed or otherwise—plays whenever he's around.
• Mad Artist: His job as an architect by trade is the exact reason why Legion recruited him first. He used those skills to design and build the nightmarish madhouse known as Asylum in Deadside.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: His real name, John G. Pierce, appears to be a secret that Jack keeps to himself.
• Only Sane Man: "Sane" is a stretch but Jack is the only member of the Five to actually have a civilized conversation with Michael.
• Psycho Knife Nut: As per usual, Jack the Ripper's weapon is a very sharp blade. He even hoists it up like Norman Bates as he runs in to savagely stab at you.
• Straw Nihilist: In his own words, dying is the fate of all mortal men.

Avery Marx

Voiced by: Simon Phipps

• Ax-Crazy: The craziest of the bunch, Deacon notes that his mental state is almost verging on total psychosis. It's honestly a miracle that Legion can even communicate with him, let alone entice Avery to follow along with any kind of plan; his poem even refers to Avery as an "idiot monster".
• Freudian Excuse: He was repeatedly molested by his mother, Cassie Marx, since childhood and in turn developed an incestuous fixation with her; Cassie would eventually become one of his first victims.
• Genuine Human Hide: He makes furniture out of human skin, and it's still his favorite hobby after joining Legion.
• Gonk: Whilst the limited graphics of the game don't really do anybody any favors, Avery is ugly even by the game's standards, with tiny squinting eyes, abnormally pale skin, a hunched back, a Primal Stance, and what are implied to be extremely bad teeth — a "triangle" formation of two upper teeth and one lower tooth can be seen in his mouth during his introductory cutscene.
• Leitmotif: He's associated with intense and loud "Psycho" Strings that will make you uneasy.
• Loners Are Freaks: Having No Social Skills resulted in him living as a recluse for most of his life.
• Nail 'Em: His weapon are a pair of nail guns that are (unsurprisingly) pretty ineffective against the Shadow Man.
• Night-Vision Goggles: Another part of his arsenal, Avery is especially fond of cutting the power in people's homes before striking. He keeps his own lair dark to capitalize on it.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed: Marx's reclusive lifestyle, fixation on his mother and use of human skin in furniture connect him to the real serial killer Ed Gein.
• Psychopathic Manchild: The sexual abuse at the hands of his mother left him emotionally-stunted and with the mindset of a depraved Momma's Boy... one that killed his mother and still acts like she's alive.
• Shout-Out: Introduces himself to Michael by shouting "Heeeere's Johnny", and this is even the title given to his introductory cutscene in the "review movies" function of the Updated Re Release.

Marco Cruz

Voiced by: Corey Johnson

• Affably Evil: When he's introduced, Marco eagerly welcomes Michael like an old friend, just before opening fire on him.
• Gratuitous Disco Sequence: Essentially how you fight him and what the end of the world means to Marco, everything is just a big party for him to enjoy.
• The Gunslinger: His primary weapon is a .50 Desert Eagle that happens to be the same model as Michael's. In the Updated Re Release, you fight him in the Mojave Desert and he's shown wielding a revolver.
• Laughably Evil: He's obviously meant to be Played for Laughs rather than a genuine threat, even Marco doesn't take himself seriously.
• Leitmotif: Disco, did you expect something else?
• Relative Button: He taunts Mike about how his mother and kid brother are lost forever in Deadside and he can't help them anymore, which pisses Mike off wicked good.

Milton Pike

Voiced by: Corey Johnson

• Bad Boss: Between rape and serial murder, Milton was also found to have perpetrated the massacre of eighteen of his own militiamen.
• Blood Knight: He's deranged enough to miss the brutality of the Vietnam War, and going to war against all of mankind is just a dream come true to him.
• The Brute: Milton doesn't have much going for him outside of raw force, it's possible Legion didn't have many plans when giving him a Dark Soul and only recruited Milton as extra Dumb Muscle for his army.
• Leitmotif: His is a patriotic song mixed with the sounds of helicopters, gunshots and screaming.
• Mighty Glacier: Milton is a tough son of a bitch and noticeably slower than the other members of the Five, comes with being a Fat Bastard bearing a heavy machine gun.
• More Dakka: His weapon is a heavy machine gun that destroys everything in his path.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Besides his victims being mainly women, which all but outright states that he is a raging misogynist, Milton makes no attempt to hide his racism during his pre-fight confrontation with Mike. He insists on disdainfully referring to Mike as "boy", condescendingly warning him not to "get uppity", and telling him that he will see to it that Judgement Day happens to him and "his kind".
• Red Baron: Called the "Video Nasty Killer", due to him mailing video tapes to several police departments showing off his crimes.
• Renegade Splinter Faction: Led one called Knights of the American Heartland, his group was soon incorporated into the national militia and Milton himself was later expelled.
• Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: Joined a survivalist militia, the American Knights of the Cross, a year after killing his own mother. He parted on very bad terms with the group after killing eighteen of his fellow members with an RPG.
• Snuff Film: Milton was known for videotaping himself hunting down and torturing women to death and then sending the horrific footage to police departments around the country.
• Sociopathic Soldier: Was a Green Beret who raped a female officer during the Vietnam War, he was subsequently dishonorably discharged from service.
• Waxing Lyrical: Right before uttering the Share Phrase of the Five, he tells Mike that "This is the end, beautiful friend" while looking at his gun.

Jaunty

Jaunty

Voiced by: Barry Meade

• Deadpan Snarker: Jaunty is always ready for a sarcastic line or two, all in the same tone of voice of course.
• Demon of Human Origin: He was once an unlucky man who got sacrificed in a ritual by a group of amateur occultists, Mama Nettie reached to him and convinced Jaunty to become her own Deadside helper.
• Gate Guardian: Protecting the entrance to Deadside—the Marrow Gates—is one of his only roles, the other being...
• Mission Control: Shares this role with Mama Nettie.
• Plucky Comic Relief: More obvious in the sequel, where we get to see his Liveside form (a Leprechaun-like dwarf) instead of just his Animalistic Abomination serpent form (which even here looks a bit more comical).
• Suddenly Shouting: He has an odd habit of occasionally emphasizing words by screeching it out in a high-pitched shout.

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