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[[foldercontrol]]
!!SCORPIA
[[folder:SCORPIA As A Whole]]
->'''Julia Rothman''': "They could have added kidnapping, blackmail, terrorism, drug trafficking and vice, but that wouldn't make a word. Anyway, we've got to be called something, and I suppose SCORPIA has a nice ring to it."
* BigBad: Featuring in five of the eleven novels[[note]]''Scorpia'', ''Snakehead'', ''Scorpia Rising'', ''Russian Roulette'' and ''Never Say Die''[[/note]] (as well as later being revealed to be responsible for the events of ''Stormbreaker'') and responsible for most of the series' backstory, with their disbanding at the end of ''Scorpia Rising'' meant to be one of the big indications the series was now over, SCORPIA are effectively the BigBad of the entire series.
* BondVillainStupidity: Averted in Scorpia Rising, as Razim needs Alex alive and without any physical marks on him. He also refuses to tell Alex what he is planning.
* ColdBloodedTorture: An obvious instrument they use. Played straight in ''Scorpia Rising'' with [[TheSociopath Razim]], who wants to create a measurable unit of pain and slowly kills people with various horrific instruments, like knives, syringes and many more, to measure the pain that they feel. He tortures a French spy; the author manages to spare the readers the details, though. ...Unless you ''[[BileFascination want]]'' to read about that stuff...
** It's later mentioned that he does several more "experiments" with [[spoiler: Julius.]] Again, the details are thankfully spared.
* ConspicuouslyPublicAssassination: [[spoiler:SCORPIA's plot in ''Scorpia Rising'']].
* CosmopolitanCouncil: At the beginning of ''[=SCORPIA=]'', the leaders of the eponymous criminal organization are a woman from Wales (their sole female member), an Englishman with a Chinese mother, a Yugoslavian, a man of mixed African and Japanese ancestry, a Frenchman, an elderly German, a one-eyed Israeli man, an Australian man with many names, and a Chinese TortureTechnician. In later books they recruit new co-leaders from Ireland, Italy, and Iraq.
* DramaticIrony: In ''Scorpia Rising'', [[spoiler:the reader is aware pretty much from the start that Alex's mission is a trap to deliver him to Scorpia]].
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Sanity wise: SCORPIA condemned [[spoiler:Damian Cray]] as a [[AxCrazy madman]].
* FunWithAcronyms: SCORPIA: Sabotage, [=CORruPtion=], Intelligence, Assassination. Yes, the P ''is'' a bit of a stretch. The narration [[LampshadeHanging remarks]] at one point that whoever came up with the name had probably been watching a little too much ''Franchise/JamesBond''.
* GainingTheWillToKill: SCORPIA runs an assassination school, so naturally, this is part of the curriculum.
* GreaterScopeVillain: Zeljan Kurst, leader of Scorpia.
** SCORPIA themselves.
* MakeItLookLikeAnAccident: The plot of ''Snakehead'', where SCORPIA have to destroy a conference aiming to wipe out poverty but avoid the organisers looking like martyrs.
* ManBehindTheMan: SCORPIA's admitted to [[spoiler: being behind Herod Sayle's plan in Book 1 by selling him the virus strain he implanted in the Stormbreakers.]] It's very possible that [[spoiler: they're behind some of the other villain's actions if not all of them.]]
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: There's a SCORPIA member named Dr. Three.
* NebulousEvilOrganisation: Scorpia. They're the villains of three books.
* OnlyInItForTheMoney: They are essentially an elite terrorist-for-hire outfit that works for anyone who has large sums of money. In ''Scorpia'', Julia Rothman claims to Alex that they are even occasionally hired by the intelligence services for dirtier jobs... [[UnreliableExpositor though make of that what you will]].
* OutOfFocus: In ''Scorpia Rising'', six new members are added to SCORPIA's executive board, replacing the ones who have been killed; three of the new members are the [[BigBad Big Bads]] of the next two books. This means that there are four members of the original board who appear in at least three of the books without even being identified by name.
* RedRightHand: SCORPIA has a few.
* TheSyndicate: SCORPIA is basically the series's version of [[Literature/JamesBond SPECTRE]].
* UriahGambit: In ''Scorpia Rising'', [[spoiler:Zeljan Kurst has Levi Kroll killed and false evidence placed on his cadaver in order to lure [=MI6=] -- and Alex -- into a trap.]]
* VillainDecay: InUniverse example; SCORPIA's credibility is seriously affected when a fourteen-year-old boy destroys two of their operations and (indirectly) kills two of their executives within a few months. [[spoiler: The failure of their plan in ''Scorpia Rising'' results in the organization being dismantled.]]
[[/folder]]
!!Board Members
[[folder:Julia Rothman]]
!!Julia Rothman
* BeautyIsBad: Unlike most other villains, Mrs. Rothman has no disfigurements, and her descriptions paint her as being quite good-looking. It doesn't change the fact that she's a terrorist planning to mass-murder children.
* BitchInSheepsClothing: Really wants to get even with John Rider and [=MI6=] for outwitting her and she thinks she can do this through killing Alex.
* DeathByLookingUp: [[spoiler: Killed by the hot air balloon she was using as a platform for her attack]]. Ironically she would have survived if she knew that the SAS soldiers were actually trying to warn her, not detain her.
* FauxAffablyEvil: She appears every bit a polite and generous hostess to Alex, treating him to an expensive dinner at a luxury hotel. [[spoiler:This despite planning from the start to use him to get even with [=MI6=] and then dispose of him with Invisible Sword.]]
* GenreSavvy: She refuses to tell Alex how Invisible Sword works at any point, even after she believes he has killed Mrs Jones, leaving him to try and work it out by himself. Although he does manage to do so, Rothman is the only BigBad of any ''Alex Rider'' book whose plan isn't foiled because they explained every last detail to Alex.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Not uncommon for the antagonists in the series, Julia Rothman [[spoiler:is flattened by the satellites on the hot air balloon needed to initiate Invisible Sword]].
* LittleBlackDress: She wears one in ''Scorpia'', which Alex takes notice.
* ManipulativeBastard: Isn't a big player in SCORPIA for nothing.
* MrsRobinson: Some of her comments to Alex are very flirtatious, fitting since she was in love with his father.
* RavenHairIvorySkin: Well actually, her skin is more peach coloured but as far as the hair description.
* ShoutOut: [[spoiler: Her death is like Alec Trevelyan's, the main antagonist from the James Bond movie ''Film/{{Goldeneye}}'']].
* UnreliableExpositor: The actual truth about Alex's father, revealed at the end of ''Scorpia'', leaves a question mark over how much - if any - of what Rothman says to Alex is true.
* WouldHurtAChild: She says she'd rather not, but if the money pays well...
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Major Winston Yu]]
!!Major Winston Yu
* AsianBabymama: His mother had an affair with a British businessman, who promised to take her home with him, then left her behind in China.
* BondVillainStupidity: A really bad case, as [[OrganTheft his plan for Alex]] doesn't even require him to be alive (aside from sheer sadism). And he may be the only villain ever to ''out-and-out state'' the best option is to JustShootHim and then not do it.
* CareerEndingInjury: Forced to leave active service after contracting ''osteoporosis imperfecta''.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler:The earthquake caused by Royal Blue's early detonation hits his boat and breaks every bone in his body.]] He also apparently inflicts this on [[YouHaveFailedMe henchmen who fail him]], as Bill Tanner commits [[BetterToDieThanBeKilled suicide]] to avoid incurring Yu's wrath.
* DeathByIrony: [[spoiler:He's killed by the bomb that he would have destroyed Reef Island with.]]
* DisappearedDad: His father abandoned his mother after she became pregnant. Yu never found out who he was.
* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: After she died, he went off the rails. He also bribed a guard into letting him scatter her ashes around Buckingham Palace's garden because he knew she would have liked that.
* EvilCripple: While he's not technically disabled, he does have ''[[MadeOfPlasticine osteoporosis imperfecta]]'', also known as [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin brittle bone disease]]. [[spoiler:This ultimately does him in.]]
* EvilOldFolks: He's in his [=60s=] and is still an active executive for Scorpia, with all the crime and terrorism that entails.
* FastestGunInTheWest: Boasts that he is, as the Americans say, "quick on the draw". He proves it when drawing his gun on Alex without him seeing it.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Exceedingly polite, happily describing his plans to make money by killing scores of people and torturing Alex. He learned from his mother that one should never lose their temper.
* {{Foil}}: To Herod Sayle, in that both are foreigners who came from dirt-poor families but, because of extraordinary circumstances, ended up receiving a top-rate education in Britain. While Sayle's experiences led to him despising the Brits however, Yu became a huge fan of British culture.
* HalfBreedDiscrimination: Faced some bullying in school for being a half-British, half-Chinese illegitimate child. It ended when one of his biggest bullies had an [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident unfortunate car accident]], coincidentally after Yu's mother heard about his problems in school.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:Quite literally. The bomb he stole for his EvilPlan ultimately does him in when it's detonated prematurely.]]
* ImmigrantPatriotism: Served with distinction in Northern Ireland but when he was consigned to a desk job at [=MI6=], this went out the window. Still loves Britain however.
* InTheBlood: His mother was a ProfessionalKiller in the snakeheads. He would eventually join them and [[KlingonPromotion take the leadership himself]].
* MamaBear: Had a very dark one in his mother--she did whatever it took, even contract killings, to give her son a better life in Britain. Yu estimates at least 16 men (and his schoolyard bully) died for his education.
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: Named after UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill, and even went to Harrow School, which Churchill also attended.
* SmugSnake: He's too confident for his own good.
* WickedCultured: He has a very aristocratic behaviour.
* WorthyOpponent: Perhaps more than any other BigBad in the series, Yu seems to admire Alex's intelligence and resourcefulness, and happily admits to Alex that he has underestimated his capability when Alex reveals he knows about the bomb.
* YellowPeril: The only main villain of East Asian descent.
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: How he felt after being relegated to a PostInjuryDeskJob, leading to him steal state secrets and sell out to the snakeheads.
** Defied in regards to the plan to disrupt the conference. He makes it so the bomb can only activate with a scan of his fingerprints, ensuring that nobody is able to replace him.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Zeljan Kurst]]
!!Zeljan Kurst
* CrazyPrepared:
** Earlier, during his meeting with Ariston at the London Museum, he has several SCORPIA agents disguised as civilians or tourists there just in case things turn sour. Sure enough, the police attempt to capture him but most of them end up done in by the various agents.
** He's fully aware that one of his fellow board members might be considering avoiding the usual punishment for retirement by gunning them down when SCORPIA begins to hit rock bottom, so he has snipers placed on the roof of the Scorpia riverboat to take them out. [[spoiler:This is how Kroll dies.]]
* GreaterScopeVillain: He's the leader of SCORPIA, and the one who orders the {{Big Bad}}s of ''Snakehead'' and ''Scorpia Rising'' to carry out their plots, though he never comes face to face with Alex.
* ManBehindTheMan: In ''Snakehead'' and ''Scorpia Rising'', for Winston and Razim respectively. He comes up with plans, the other Scorpia executives carry them out.
* TheUnfought: Despite being a prominent member of SCORPIA, and responsible for setting the events of ''Scorpia Rising'' in motion, Kurst never even meets Alex or any other [=MI6=] member, with the final chapter stating that he was arrested offscreen in the aftermath of Razim's failure.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Levi Kroll]]
!!Levi Kroll
* AxCrazy: He prefers direct violence as a first resort.
* EyeScream: The result of his PillowPistol.
* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace: Managed to do this to himself before we first see him. He lived through it, though.
* PillowPistol: Until it went off.
* PragmaticVillainy: [[spoiler:He fiercely opposes Razim's plan to bait Alex as part of Scorpia's ploy against [=MI6=], not out of any moral standards, but because he doesn't want to risk another credibility-erasing embarrassment. He doesn't live long enough to see how right he was.]]
* TooDumbToLive: [[spoiler:Pulls a gun on [[CrazyPrepared Zeljan]] of all people and gets assassinated for his trouble.]]
* TheUnfought: [[spoiler:Never comes face-to-face with Alex or any other major character outside Scorpia's executive board, despite appearing in three books and having a minor story arc that impacts on the events of the latter two books.]]
* WrongGenreSavvy: He knows retiring from Scorpia just leads to early death. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, he misinterprets a comment from Razim as a suggestion that they should kill him, and ends up giving them reason to. Probably what Razim had intended, of course.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Max Grendel]]
!!Max Grendel
* AsskickingLeadsToLeadership: He was a commander in the German Secret Police and personally killed a foreign spy during a performance of Beethoven's Fifth.
* BadassDecay: InUniverse example -- since his secret police days, he has become a grandfather and has developed an eye condition which means he is nearly always weeping.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Despite being fairly sentimental in his old age, don't forget he's a board member of SCORPIA, and [[NoodleIncident once strangled a foreign spy during a performance of Beethoven's Fifth]].
* BitCharacter: Had a fair amount of dialogue in one chapter, before dying at the end of it.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Despite being part of SCORPIA and complicit in many of their atrocities, Julia Rothman's plan to kill thousands of British schoolchildren is a step too far for him.
* ResignationsNotAccepted: In the opening chapter of ''Scorpia'' he refuses to participate in Scorpia's latest project: a biological weapon that specifically targets children. He is given a "retirement present" of suitcase filled with deadly scorpions.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Harming children, and seeing his fellow board members being completely on board with the idea, is too much even for him. Given he's a grandfather, this is understandable.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Dr. Three]]
!!Doctor Three
* AffablyEvil: Despite being a complete sadist, he is very polite when talking to Julia Rothman.
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: He presumably has the title "Dr." for a reason, and from what we know about him his field of expertise may well be torture.
* {{Sadist}}: It's said he enjoyed the [[ColdBloodedTorture research]] he did for his book.
* TortureTechnician: Wrote a book on torture called ''Modern Interrogation Techniques''.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: He appears in every board meeting of SCORPIA that we see, and usually says something, but after ''Scorpia Rising'' his ultimate fate is unknown. Mrs. Jones did remark that all of the board members had either been arrested or were on the run, so we can assume he is one of these.
* WouldHurtAChild: Had no objections when Julia Rothman asked if he minded that Invisible Sword would kill thousands of children.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Brendan Chase]]
!!Brendan Chase
* IHaveManyNames: Has a number of them which he uses as aliases.
* LandDownUnder: He's from Australia and was once the paymaster for its secret intelligence service, before fleeing the country with $400,000 of his agency's money while drunk.
* WouldHurtAChild: Moreso than most other SCORPIA members. In ''Scorpia Rising'', he tells Razim that if he needs a volunteer to kill Alex for his plan, he'd "be glad to fire the bullet" himself.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Razim]]
!!Abdul-Aziz al-Rahim (Razim)
* AlliterativeName: His real name is Abdul-Aziz Al-Rahim. That's a lot of "A" names.
* AxCrazy: The things he did while he was a child says a lot about how fucked up he was, and considering that the only development in this as he got older was managing to somewhat conceal this so that you won't be able to tell at first glance anymore, still is.
* TheChessmaster: He plays Alan Blunt like a chump.
* DisproportionateRetribution: As a child, he stabbed his nanny in the leg when she told him off for teasing his sister.
* EvilGenius: As a child, he thrived in his studies and learned multiple languages. As an adult, he was the head of Iraqi Intelligence Services under Saddam Hussein and planned terrorist attacks for al-Qaeda before winding up with SCORPIA. He's the mastermind for their latest plan in ''Scorpia Rising''.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Always goes with a polite and stoic demeanour, but it's entirely fake and just serves to make him even worse.
* ForScience: Takes no pleasure in his experiments. Supposedly.
* FourEyesZeroSoul: Happens to wear glasses, and is downright obsessed with inflicting pain.
* KarmicDeath: As one of the most outright sadistic villains in the series, it's only appropriate that he gets one of the more painful, drawn-out deaths.
* KickTheDog: [[spoiler:He had no practical reason to murder Jack, he did it just to get an emotional pain response out of Alex.]]
* KidsAreCruel: He was this as a child, strangling his dog and ratting out his parents to the Iraqi police alongside his sister. Then he wanted to join the police himself and start killing. The officer trying to give the "you did the right thing" talk was [[EvenEvilHasStandards disgusted by him]] and considered shooting him on the spot.
* KnightOfCerebus: The series was never light to begin with, but Razim takes it into its darkest moments pretty much single-handedly.
* MustHaveNicotine: Smokes frequently, and craves for another cigarette during meetings. This habit would indirectly backfire on him later on.
* NoSenseOfHumor: He often kills people for telling jokes about him. One such example was when he killed one of his own henchman for comparing him to Literature/HarryPotter.
* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: We're told his real name at one point, but he doesn't use it once.
* {{Sadist}}: He claims that horrifically torturing innocent people to create a unit of measurement for pain is purely for science, though Alex suspects that it's how Razim gets his kicks. He certainly seems very engrossed in his "experiments."
* SelfMadeOrphan: Indirectly; he ratted his parents out to the Saddam Hussein government, leading to their execution.
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Twice in his backstory. He fled Iraq during the 2003 US-British invasion, joining with Al-Qaeda, then leaving them after being ordered to carry out a suicide bombing.
* SpannerInTheWorks: [[spoiler: He expects Jack to steal a knife when she and Alex are dining with him, as it's part of his plan to cause Alex emotional pain. Alex stealing a cigarette packet at the same meal is ''not'' part of his plan.]]
* TheSociopath: He is characterized by a complete lack of emotions or empathy.
* TheUnsmile: At the end when he's [[spoiler: fallen into the pile of salt and is [[VillainsWantMercy pleading with Alex]] to throw him a rope]]. It's described as looking more like a hideous grimace than anything.
* VillainousBreakdown: He completely flips out when he finds out that Alex is still alive. In his final moments, he goes out cursing Alex - [[NotSoStoic likely the first and last time he would ever feel emotion]].
* WhiteHairBlackHeart: His silver hair is a defining feature, and he is quite possibly one of the most sadistic villains in the series.
[[/folder]]
!!SCORPIA members
[[folder:Nile]]
* DeathByIrony: He has a fear of heights, and ends up being knocked off a hot air balloon from a height of 100 metres after Alex realises what he's afraid of and uses it against him. To add insult to injury, he gets knocked off by a [[KillItWithFire fireball]] that Alex sets off by severing the balloon's propane burner. How did he do that? By cutting through it ''with a sword Nile had thrown at him''.
* FailedASpotCheck: He searches Alex head to toe after the assignment to kill Mrs. Jones. He didn't think to look inside Alex's mouth, which was hiding a tracker.
* {{Foreshadowing}}: Nile is mentioned as having a weakness that keeps him from being Scorpia's #1 assassin. While talking to Alex at a bell tower, Nile tries to avoid going all the way up, and after Alex jumps onto the Invisible Sword balloon satellite, Nile shows [[ThisIsGonnaSuck sudden reluctance]] when Rothman orders him to go after Alex.
* ItGetsEasier: He says learning to enjoy the kill is part of the job.
* MasterSwordsman: They're his weapon of choice, though he's not above using other things available.
* ProfessionalKiller: One of Scorpia's top assassins who's had successful assignments all over the world.
* RedRightHand: He has [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitiligo vitiligo]], giving him patches of pale skin across his face.
* ScaryBlackMan: As a Scorpia enforcer, he's scary by default, and skin condition aside, he is biologically black.
* ThrowingYourSwordAlwaysWorks: When he kills a researcher, though later {{averted|Trope}} when he tries to kill Alex because he was crippled by his fear of heights. Though these are swords that are meant to be thrown, not normal swords.
* WhyDidItHaveToBeSnakes: His biggest flaw is his crippling acrophobia.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Anan Sukit]]
* TheDragon: [[spoiler: Would be this if he lived longer.]]
* GladiatorGames: Runs one of these, and forces Alex into it.
* InTheBack: [[spoiler: Courtesy of Fox.]]
* RedRightHand: Has no ears.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Dr. Bill Tanner]]
* CoDragons: With Ash, to Yu.
* DrivenToSuicide: Possibly; it's known that he kills himself, but why he does is never explained (it's suggested that he was following orders from Yu after Alex escaped, which given the fate of de Wynter earlier seems likely).
* FauxAffablyEvil: Remains polite even after threatening Alex with a slow and painful death.
* MadScientist: Dissects people to give their organs away.
* SmugSnake: He has to brag about how Alex "can't escape" and gives away how he can escape.
[[/folder]]
[[folder: Yassen Gregorovich]]
* AccidentalMisnaming: [[spoiler: His name is really Yasha. Sharkovsky misheard it as , since Yasha had just been beaten up by Sharkovsky's two bodyguards and his face was still swollen. After escaping, Scorpia ran with it. This was likely intended as a {{Retcon}}, as Horowitz named the character after someone he knew and was unaware that was not a Russian name.[[note]]There was a well-known Russian journalist named Yasen Zasursky, but it's not a standard Russian name by any means. Zasursky was born in 1929, when new "revolutionary names" were in fashion, and his mother decided to name him Yasen because of his father's bright eyes (the name "Yasen" is sort of a masculine noun formed from the adjective "yasniy", meaning "bright" in Russian).[[/note]]]]
%%* AffablyEvil
%%* AllAPartOfTheJob
* BatheHerAndBringHerToMe: A rare male example, Sharkovsky orders his men to make sure the captured young has washed himself throughly before being in his presence as was living on the streets at the time.
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Cray orders to kill Alex and Sabina. refuses, saying he "does not kill children". [[spoiler: Flustered, Damian snatches his gun, and instead of shooting Alex and Sabina, turns the gun on .]]
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassination by Gregorovich, but from the perspectives of Alex and , respectively.]]
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went from 's gun into Sayle's chest.]]
* CrazyPrepared: Had a backup plan in case Alex escapes from Cray's compound in ''Eagle Strike'', deploying an entire squad of mercs to intercept him in Amsterdam. And after that failed, he had a ''backup'' backup plan in the form of [[IHaveYourWife I Have Your Ex-Girlfriend]].
* CulturedBadass: The fourth book mentions that he listens to classical music and is learning nine languages.
* ADayInTheLimelight: Is the focus of ''Russian Roulette'', which delves into his childhood and how he came to be an assassin.
* DoomedHometown: His home village was contaminated with an artificial strain of anthrax, and later destroyed by the Russian government as part of their quarantine/cover-up.
* TheDragon: For Damien Cray in ''Eagle Strike''.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: is a professional assassin, but even he [[WouldntHurtAChild refuses to kill children]] and anyone not strictly on his list of targets. That being said, he doesn't have a big problem with maiming them. Considering his role in Stormbreaker (a plot to kill tens of thousands of British schoolchildren), he was likely lying about not killing children and was simply using it as an excuse to not kill Alex.
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible for 's own death]]).
* FateWorseThanDeath: He spent three years working as a slave for Vladimir Sharkovsky.
* {{Foil}}: To Ash, Alex’s godfather. They were the two people closest to John, and both [[spoiler: worked for SCORPIA. Yassen killed Ian. Ash murdered Alex’s mom and dad.]]
** [[spoiler: Ash acts remorseful about murdering Alex’s parents, but his remorse is ultimately pointless, as it doesn’t stop him from trying to kill Alex if it benefits Ash’s career.]] Yassen appears to be remorseless about killing Ian. However, he disobeys orders to protect Alex, and ultimately [[spoiler:gave his life to save Alex.]]
** Ash didn’t object to Alex working in the business, and will get Alex more involved if it benefits him. Yassen repeatedly tries to convince Alex to stay out of the spy business for Alex’s safety.
** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the [=MI6=], and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
* ForegoneConclusion: Of course he, Julia Rothman and [[spoiler:John Rider]] will survive ''Russian Roulette''.
* HeelFaceTurn: [[spoiler:[[ProfessionalKiller ]], arguably, in the end of the fourth book when he tried to stop Damian Cray from killing Alex and [[RedemptionEqualsDeath got shot in the process]]. He dies in Alex's arms after Damian Cray dies]].
* IdealIllnessImmunity: has never been ill once in his life. He attributes this to his parents giving him an antidote to a powerful strain of anthrax when he was a kid.
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex, since [[YouKilledMyFather killed his uncle]].
* KilledOffForReal: [[spoiler:Dies at Damian Cray's hands.]]
* MadeASlave: For three years following a burgulary gone wrong, after he was caught by the rich man he tried to rob.
* AMillionIsAStatistic: His rationalization of taking jobs for people planning to kill millions.
-->The numbers were irrelevant to . People died all the time. He knew that every time he drew a breath, at that exact moment, somewhere in the world a hundred or a thousand people would be taking their last. Death was everywhere; it could not be measured.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this for , who in ''Eagle Strike'' first arranges him to "die" in a bullfight so that Alex can escape and then tries PleaseSpareHimMyLiege on [[spoiler: Damian Cray]].
* NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: gives one of these in ''Russian Roulette'' when he talks about how people who couldn't afford vodka would use shoe polish as a drug.
** This is close to TruthInTelevision. In the 1990s, many alcoholics in Russia had to resort to drinking all kinds of dubious ethanol-containing substances when they couldn't afford actual vodka.
** And earlier, in the late 1980s during Gorbachev's prohibition, people had to resort to dubious substances because they couldn't ''purchase'' vodka even when they had the money.
* NotSoDifferentRemark: Part of his empathy for Alex probably comes from [[spoiler: knowing what it's like to be a helpless kid himself.]]
* OrphansOrdeal: His parents died in the plague that destroyed his village. He was a street kid after that, begging and stealing to survive.
* ProfessionalKiller: He's an assassin.
* PunchClockVillain: In it for the money, and nothing else.
* RedemptionEqualsDeath: [[spoiler:He may have not liked John Rider trying to turn him away from being a assassin but when push comes to shove, he won't lay a finger on Alex and is willing to die instead.]]
* {{Retirony}}: [[spoiler:He chooses to spare Damian and go through with the Eagle Strike project because after that, he can retire and return to Russia. Of course, he didn't expect Damian to shoot him later on.]]
* RulesLawyer: Doesn't kill kids, but is fine setting Alex up to ''get'' killed, and unrepentantly works for an outfit that kill kids all the time. Guess that little bit still counts...
* RussianRoulette: Sharkovsky makes him, as a fourteen-year-old, play it after he is captured. [[spoiler: At the end of the book, he returns to Sharkovsky's mansion and plays it again - but this time with five bullets instead of one. [[ForegoneConclusion He survives]], and kills Sharkovsky and his son.]]
* TheSleepless: His narration mentions that he never sleeps more than four hours at a time.
* SmallRoleBigImpact: In the main series, he only actually appears in two of the books, twice briefly in ''Stormbreaker'', and acting as TheDragon to Damian Cray in ''Eagle Strike'' before being [[spoiler: killed off.]] Despite that, his actions continue to influence Alex's life for the rest of the series, in addition for being the one indirectly responsible for Alex being railroaded into the spy game from the very beginning (by killing his uncle). Thanks to that, he received his own spin-off novel focusing on his origins.
** His impact was so big that he was included in the first season of the TV series (based on a book in which he was not even present). In the second season [[spoiler:he ends up being SparedByAdaptation instead of being KilledOffForReal like he is in the book ''Eagle Strike'', thereby all but confirming that he will be included in future seasons if the show is renewed.]]
* StealthMentor: Enjoys seeing Alex succeed at things. Also encourages him to get out of the spy game where no other adult in it does. His protectiveness probably comes from [[spoiler: having been colleagues with Alex's dad.]]
* StreetUrchin: While he was a kid, he lived as one in Moscow.
* Unknown Rival: Ash devotes a decent amount of time discussing building up his battle with Yassen, where Yassen [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomped]] him when he was only nineteen. He’s rather fixated on Yassen, and seems to see Yassen as his greatest enemy, particularly for his injury and his failed mission in Malta. Yassen, in his narration, doesn’t seem to spare much thought to Ash.
* {{Unperson}}: Because of [[DoomedHometown certain events]] in his childhood, there are no records of his existence anywhere in the world. It's this trait which makes him good at his job, since it's much harder to track him down.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Played with. He has no qualms about working for an employer intending to kill ''millions'' of children, but objects to directly killing Alex and Sabina. [[spoiler: Though this may be because worked with Alex's dad]].
* YouAreNotReady: Scorpia sent him out to assassinate a New York lawyer. He had doubts; [[MortonsFork a Scorpia sniper killed her anyway]]. Scorpia knew that this was the case, so he wasn't killed like Grant was.
* YouKilledMyFather: Was responsible for the death of Ian Rider, Alex's uncle.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Erik Gunter]]
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler:Stung to death by a scorpion Alex had hidden in a cigarette packet.]]
* CareerEndingInjury: Served in the army before he was wounded in Afghanistan and invalided home. He still has two bullets in his body that the surgeons could not remove.
* EvilPaysBetter: Joined Scorpia after being medically discharged and unable to find a job elsewhere.
* FailedASpotCheck: Alex's plan to escape would have failed [[spoiler: if only he had noticed the cigarette packet hadn't been there before Alex got into the van.]]
* FallenHero: Once a loyal soldier, it is suspected that this happened after leaving his hospital treatment. The suspicions are true.
* OvershadowedByAwesome: Gunter is a fairly big part of ''Scorpia Rising'' as Dragons go, but he is noticeably overshadowed in comparison to his monstrously evil boss and his primary Dragon.
* SmugSnake: [[spoiler:He tells Alex more or less the whole plan.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Julius Grief]]
* AxCrazy: He's rather unhinged as a result of his CloneAngst (and being raised by Dr. Grief didn't help, either). This is someone who ''enjoys'' making other people, especially Alex, suffer.
* BackForTheFinale: [[spoiler:He hadn't appeared since ''Point Blanc''.]]
* CloneAngst: DoubleSubverted. [[spoiler:He knows his genetic material is the same as his father's, but he doesn't mind, and when neither Julius nor his "father" knew who Alex ''really'' was, he was OK with becoming a clone of Alex Friend. But then [[GoMadFromTheRevelation once he figured out Alex's true identity...]]]]
* DemotedToDragon: [[spoiler:If one takes the view that the clones ''are'' Grief, which is mentioned several times in ''Point Blanc''.]]
* LastOfHisKind: Last of the [[spoiler:Grief clones]].
* LookBothWays: Downplayed. [[spoiler:Getting hit by a car doesn't outright kill him, but it does leave him wounded for Alex to finish off.]]
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: He was named after UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar. His "brothers" also have the names of powerful leaders in history such as {{UsefulNotes/Napoleon|Bonaparte}}, {{UsefulNotes/Genghis|Khan}}, [[UsefulNotes/MaoZedong Mao Tse]] and {{UsefulNotes/Adolf|Hitler}}.
* NotQuiteDead: [[spoiler:Remember the fire in ''Point Blanc''? Yeah, he survived that.]]
* PostClimaxConfrontation: He first appears and confronts Alex at the very end of ''Point Blanc''. [[spoiler:While the narration deliberately makes it ambiguous as to which Alex walks away, the fact that there are more books in the series resolves the issue.]]
%%* WalkingSpoiler
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Giovanni Grimaldi and Eduardo Grimaldi]]
* AscendedExtra: Briefly mentioned in one of the earlier books as SCORPIA thugs, they become the main antagonists of ''Never Say Die''.
* BadBoss: They have a tendency to underpay their workers and kill them when they ask for more.
* BerserkButton: Trying to separate them. They killed a nanny in their youth when she tried to do this as a way of punishing them.
* BigBadDuumvirate: They are both the main antagonists of ''Never Say Die''.
* TheDividual: It's mentioned that they almost never spent any time apart during their lifetimes. They were basically the same person, they always wore the same clothes, they always ate the same food, they even finished each other's sentences.
* IdenticalTwinIdTag: Giovanni is left handed, while Eduardo is right handed.
[[/folder]]
[[foldercontrol]]
!!SCORPIA
[[folder:SCORPIA As A Whole]]
->'''Julia Rothman''': "They could have added kidnapping, blackmail, terrorism, drug trafficking and vice, but that wouldn't make a word. Anyway, we've got to be called something, and I suppose SCORPIA has a nice ring to it."
* BigBad: Featuring in five of the eleven novels[[note]]''Scorpia'', ''Snakehead'', ''Scorpia Rising'', ''Russian Roulette'' and ''Never Say Die''[[/note]] (as well as later being revealed to be responsible for the events of ''Stormbreaker'') and responsible for most of the series' backstory, with their disbanding at the end of ''Scorpia Rising'' meant to be one of the big indications the series was now over, SCORPIA are effectively the BigBad of the entire series.
* BondVillainStupidity: Averted in Scorpia Rising, as Razim needs Alex alive and without any physical marks on him. He also refuses to tell Alex what he is planning.
* ColdBloodedTorture: An obvious instrument they use. Played straight in ''Scorpia Rising'' with [[TheSociopath Razim]], who wants to create a measurable unit of pain and slowly kills people with various horrific instruments, like knives, syringes and many more, to measure the pain that they feel. He tortures a French spy; the author manages to spare the readers the details, though. ...Unless you ''[[BileFascination want]]'' to read about that stuff...
** It's later mentioned that he does several more "experiments" with [[spoiler: Julius.]] Again, the details are thankfully spared.
* ConspicuouslyPublicAssassination: [[spoiler:SCORPIA's plot in ''Scorpia Rising'']].
* CosmopolitanCouncil: At the beginning of ''[=SCORPIA=]'', the leaders of the eponymous criminal organization are a woman from Wales (their sole female member), an Englishman with a Chinese mother, a Yugoslavian, a man of mixed African and Japanese ancestry, a Frenchman, an elderly German, a one-eyed Israeli man, an Australian man with many names, and a Chinese TortureTechnician. In later books they recruit new co-leaders from Ireland, Italy, and Iraq.
* DramaticIrony: In ''Scorpia Rising'', [[spoiler:the reader is aware pretty much from the start that Alex's mission is a trap to deliver him to Scorpia]].
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Sanity wise: SCORPIA condemned [[spoiler:Damian Cray]] as a [[AxCrazy madman]].
* FunWithAcronyms: SCORPIA: Sabotage, [=CORruPtion=], Intelligence, Assassination. Yes, the P ''is'' a bit of a stretch. The narration [[LampshadeHanging remarks]] at one point that whoever came up with the name had probably been watching a little too much ''Franchise/JamesBond''.
* GainingTheWillToKill: SCORPIA runs an assassination school, so naturally, this is part of the curriculum.
* GreaterScopeVillain: Zeljan Kurst, leader of Scorpia.
** SCORPIA themselves.
* MakeItLookLikeAnAccident: The plot of ''Snakehead'', where SCORPIA have to destroy a conference aiming to wipe out poverty but avoid the organisers looking like martyrs.
* ManBehindTheMan: SCORPIA's admitted to [[spoiler: being behind Herod Sayle's plan in Book 1 by selling him the virus strain he implanted in the Stormbreakers.]] It's very possible that [[spoiler: they're behind some of the other villain's actions if not all of them.]]
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: There's a SCORPIA member named Dr. Three.
* NebulousEvilOrganisation: Scorpia. They're the villains of three books.
* OnlyInItForTheMoney: They are essentially an elite terrorist-for-hire outfit that works for anyone who has large sums of money. In ''Scorpia'', Julia Rothman claims to Alex that they are even occasionally hired by the intelligence services for dirtier jobs... [[UnreliableExpositor though make of that what you will]].
* OutOfFocus: In ''Scorpia Rising'', six new members are added to SCORPIA's executive board, replacing the ones who have been killed; three of the new members are the [[BigBad Big Bads]] of the next two books. This means that there are four members of the original board who appear in at least three of the books without even being identified by name.
* RedRightHand: SCORPIA has a few.
* TheSyndicate: SCORPIA is basically the series's version of [[Literature/JamesBond SPECTRE]].
* UriahGambit: In ''Scorpia Rising'', [[spoiler:Zeljan Kurst has Levi Kroll killed and false evidence placed on his cadaver in order to lure [=MI6=] -- and Alex -- into a trap.]]
* VillainDecay: InUniverse example; SCORPIA's credibility is seriously affected when a fourteen-year-old boy destroys two of their operations and (indirectly) kills two of their executives within a few months. [[spoiler: The failure of their plan in ''Scorpia Rising'' results in the organization being dismantled.]]
[[/folder]]
!!Board Members
[[folder:Julia Rothman]]
!!Julia Rothman
* BeautyIsBad: Unlike most other villains, Mrs. Rothman has no disfigurements, and her descriptions paint her as being quite good-looking. It doesn't change the fact that she's a terrorist planning to mass-murder children.
* BitchInSheepsClothing: Really wants to get even with John Rider and [=MI6=] for outwitting her and she thinks she can do this through killing Alex.
* DeathByLookingUp: [[spoiler: Killed by the hot air balloon she was using as a platform for her attack]]. Ironically she would have survived if she knew that the SAS soldiers were actually trying to warn her, not detain her.
* FauxAffablyEvil: She appears every bit a polite and generous hostess to Alex, treating him to an expensive dinner at a luxury hotel. [[spoiler:This despite planning from the start to use him to get even with [=MI6=] and then dispose of him with Invisible Sword.]]
* GenreSavvy: She refuses to tell Alex how Invisible Sword works at any point, even after she believes he has killed Mrs Jones, leaving him to try and work it out by himself. Although he does manage to do so, Rothman is the only BigBad of any ''Alex Rider'' book whose plan isn't foiled because they explained every last detail to Alex.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Not uncommon for the antagonists in the series, Julia Rothman [[spoiler:is flattened by the satellites on the hot air balloon needed to initiate Invisible Sword]].
* LittleBlackDress: She wears one in ''Scorpia'', which Alex takes notice.
* ManipulativeBastard: Isn't a big player in SCORPIA for nothing.
* MrsRobinson: Some of her comments to Alex are very flirtatious, fitting since she was in love with his father.
* RavenHairIvorySkin: Well actually, her skin is more peach coloured but as far as the hair description.
* ShoutOut: [[spoiler: Her death is like Alec Trevelyan's, the main antagonist from the James Bond movie ''Film/{{Goldeneye}}'']].
* UnreliableExpositor: The actual truth about Alex's father, revealed at the end of ''Scorpia'', leaves a question mark over how much - if any - of what Rothman says to Alex is true.
* WouldHurtAChild: She says she'd rather not, but if the money pays well...
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Major Winston Yu]]
!!Major Winston Yu
* AsianBabymama: His mother had an affair with a British businessman, who promised to take her home with him, then left her behind in China.
* BondVillainStupidity: A really bad case, as [[OrganTheft his plan for Alex]] doesn't even require him to be alive (aside from sheer sadism). And he may be the only villain ever to ''out-and-out state'' the best option is to JustShootHim and then not do it.
* CareerEndingInjury: Forced to leave active service after contracting ''osteoporosis imperfecta''.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler:The earthquake caused by Royal Blue's early detonation hits his boat and breaks every bone in his body.]] He also apparently inflicts this on [[YouHaveFailedMe henchmen who fail him]], as Bill Tanner commits [[BetterToDieThanBeKilled suicide]] to avoid incurring Yu's wrath.
* DeathByIrony: [[spoiler:He's killed by the bomb that he would have destroyed Reef Island with.]]
* DisappearedDad: His father abandoned his mother after she became pregnant. Yu never found out who he was.
* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: After she died, he went off the rails. He also bribed a guard into letting him scatter her ashes around Buckingham Palace's garden because he knew she would have liked that.
* EvilCripple: While he's not technically disabled, he does have ''[[MadeOfPlasticine osteoporosis imperfecta]]'', also known as [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin brittle bone disease]]. [[spoiler:This ultimately does him in.]]
* EvilOldFolks: He's in his [=60s=] and is still an active executive for Scorpia, with all the crime and terrorism that entails.
* FastestGunInTheWest: Boasts that he is, as the Americans say, "quick on the draw". He proves it when drawing his gun on Alex without him seeing it.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Exceedingly polite, happily describing his plans to make money by killing scores of people and torturing Alex. He learned from his mother that one should never lose their temper.
* {{Foil}}: To Herod Sayle, in that both are foreigners who came from dirt-poor families but, because of extraordinary circumstances, ended up receiving a top-rate education in Britain. While Sayle's experiences led to him despising the Brits however, Yu became a huge fan of British culture.
* HalfBreedDiscrimination: Faced some bullying in school for being a half-British, half-Chinese illegitimate child. It ended when one of his biggest bullies had an [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident unfortunate car accident]], coincidentally after Yu's mother heard about his problems in school.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:Quite literally. The bomb he stole for his EvilPlan ultimately does him in when it's detonated prematurely.]]
* ImmigrantPatriotism: Served with distinction in Northern Ireland but when he was consigned to a desk job at [=MI6=], this went out the window. Still loves Britain however.
* InTheBlood: His mother was a ProfessionalKiller in the snakeheads. He would eventually join them and [[KlingonPromotion take the leadership himself]].
* MamaBear: Had a very dark one in his mother--she did whatever it took, even contract killings, to give her son a better life in Britain. Yu estimates at least 16 men (and his schoolyard bully) died for his education.
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: Named after UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill, and even went to Harrow School, which Churchill also attended.
* SmugSnake: He's too confident for his own good.
* WickedCultured: He has a very aristocratic behaviour.
* WorthyOpponent: Perhaps more than any other BigBad in the series, Yu seems to admire Alex's intelligence and resourcefulness, and happily admits to Alex that he has underestimated his capability when Alex reveals he knows about the bomb.
* YellowPeril: The only main villain of East Asian descent.
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: How he felt after being relegated to a PostInjuryDeskJob, leading to him steal state secrets and sell out to the snakeheads.
** Defied in regards to the plan to disrupt the conference. He makes it so the bomb can only activate with a scan of his fingerprints, ensuring that nobody is able to replace him.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Zeljan Kurst]]
!!Zeljan Kurst
* CrazyPrepared:
** Earlier, during his meeting with Ariston at the London Museum, he has several SCORPIA agents disguised as civilians or tourists there just in case things turn sour. Sure enough, the police attempt to capture him but most of them end up done in by the various agents.
** He's fully aware that one of his fellow board members might be considering avoiding the usual punishment for retirement by gunning them down when SCORPIA begins to hit rock bottom, so he has snipers placed on the roof of the Scorpia riverboat to take them out. [[spoiler:This is how Kroll dies.]]
* GreaterScopeVillain: He's the leader of SCORPIA, and the one who orders the {{Big Bad}}s of ''Snakehead'' and ''Scorpia Rising'' to carry out their plots, though he never comes face to face with Alex.
* ManBehindTheMan: In ''Snakehead'' and ''Scorpia Rising'', for Winston and Razim respectively. He comes up with plans, the other Scorpia executives carry them out.
* TheUnfought: Despite being a prominent member of SCORPIA, and responsible for setting the events of ''Scorpia Rising'' in motion, Kurst never even meets Alex or any other [=MI6=] member, with the final chapter stating that he was arrested offscreen in the aftermath of Razim's failure.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Levi Kroll]]
!!Levi Kroll
* AxCrazy: He prefers direct violence as a first resort.
* EyeScream: The result of his PillowPistol.
* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace: Managed to do this to himself before we first see him. He lived through it, though.
* PillowPistol: Until it went off.
* PragmaticVillainy: [[spoiler:He fiercely opposes Razim's plan to bait Alex as part of Scorpia's ploy against [=MI6=], not out of any moral standards, but because he doesn't want to risk another credibility-erasing embarrassment. He doesn't live long enough to see how right he was.]]
* TooDumbToLive: [[spoiler:Pulls a gun on [[CrazyPrepared Zeljan]] of all people and gets assassinated for his trouble.]]
* TheUnfought: [[spoiler:Never comes face-to-face with Alex or any other major character outside Scorpia's executive board, despite appearing in three books and having a minor story arc that impacts on the events of the latter two books.]]
* WrongGenreSavvy: He knows retiring from Scorpia just leads to early death. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, he misinterprets a comment from Razim as a suggestion that they should kill him, and ends up giving them reason to. Probably what Razim had intended, of course.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Max Grendel]]
!!Max Grendel
* AsskickingLeadsToLeadership: He was a commander in the German Secret Police and personally killed a foreign spy during a performance of Beethoven's Fifth.
* BadassDecay: InUniverse example -- since his secret police days, he has become a grandfather and has developed an eye condition which means he is nearly always weeping.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Despite being fairly sentimental in his old age, don't forget he's a board member of SCORPIA, and [[NoodleIncident once strangled a foreign spy during a performance of Beethoven's Fifth]].
* BitCharacter: Had a fair amount of dialogue in one chapter, before dying at the end of it.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Despite being part of SCORPIA and complicit in many of their atrocities, Julia Rothman's plan to kill thousands of British schoolchildren is a step too far for him.
* ResignationsNotAccepted: In the opening chapter of ''Scorpia'' he refuses to participate in Scorpia's latest project: a biological weapon that specifically targets children. He is given a "retirement present" of suitcase filled with deadly scorpions.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Harming children, and seeing his fellow board members being completely on board with the idea, is too much even for him. Given he's a grandfather, this is understandable.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Dr. Three]]
!!Doctor Three
* AffablyEvil: Despite being a complete sadist, he is very polite when talking to Julia Rothman.
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: He presumably has the title "Dr." for a reason, and from what we know about him his field of expertise may well be torture.
* {{Sadist}}: It's said he enjoyed the [[ColdBloodedTorture research]] he did for his book.
* TortureTechnician: Wrote a book on torture called ''Modern Interrogation Techniques''.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: He appears in every board meeting of SCORPIA that we see, and usually says something, but after ''Scorpia Rising'' his ultimate fate is unknown. Mrs. Jones did remark that all of the board members had either been arrested or were on the run, so we can assume he is one of these.
* WouldHurtAChild: Had no objections when Julia Rothman asked if he minded that Invisible Sword would kill thousands of children.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Brendan Chase]]
!!Brendan Chase
* IHaveManyNames: Has a number of them which he uses as aliases.
* LandDownUnder: He's from Australia and was once the paymaster for its secret intelligence service, before fleeing the country with $400,000 of his agency's money while drunk.
* WouldHurtAChild: Moreso than most other SCORPIA members. In ''Scorpia Rising'', he tells Razim that if he needs a volunteer to kill Alex for his plan, he'd "be glad to fire the bullet" himself.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Razim]]
!!Abdul-Aziz al-Rahim (Razim)
* AlliterativeName: His real name is Abdul-Aziz Al-Rahim. That's a lot of "A" names.
* AxCrazy: The things he did while he was a child says a lot about how fucked up he was, and considering that the only development in this as he got older was managing to somewhat conceal this so that you won't be able to tell at first glance anymore, still is.
* TheChessmaster: He plays Alan Blunt like a chump.
* DisproportionateRetribution: As a child, he stabbed his nanny in the leg when she told him off for teasing his sister.
* EvilGenius: As a child, he thrived in his studies and learned multiple languages. As an adult, he was the head of Iraqi Intelligence Services under Saddam Hussein and planned terrorist attacks for al-Qaeda before winding up with SCORPIA. He's the mastermind for their latest plan in ''Scorpia Rising''.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Always goes with a polite and stoic demeanour, but it's entirely fake and just serves to make him even worse.
* ForScience: Takes no pleasure in his experiments. Supposedly.
* FourEyesZeroSoul: Happens to wear glasses, and is downright obsessed with inflicting pain.
* KarmicDeath: As one of the most outright sadistic villains in the series, it's only appropriate that he gets one of the more painful, drawn-out deaths.
* KickTheDog: [[spoiler:He had no practical reason to murder Jack, he did it just to get an emotional pain response out of Alex.]]
* KidsAreCruel: He was this as a child, strangling his dog and ratting out his parents to the Iraqi police alongside his sister. Then he wanted to join the police himself and start killing. The officer trying to give the "you did the right thing" talk was [[EvenEvilHasStandards disgusted by him]] and considered shooting him on the spot.
* KnightOfCerebus: The series was never light to begin with, but Razim takes it into its darkest moments pretty much single-handedly.
* MustHaveNicotine: Smokes frequently, and craves for another cigarette during meetings. This habit would indirectly backfire on him later on.
* NoSenseOfHumor: He often kills people for telling jokes about him. One such example was when he killed one of his own henchman for comparing him to Literature/HarryPotter.
* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: We're told his real name at one point, but he doesn't use it once.
* {{Sadist}}: He claims that horrifically torturing innocent people to create a unit of measurement for pain is purely for science, though Alex suspects that it's how Razim gets his kicks. He certainly seems very engrossed in his "experiments."
* SelfMadeOrphan: Indirectly; he ratted his parents out to the Saddam Hussein government, leading to their execution.
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Twice in his backstory. He fled Iraq during the 2003 US-British invasion, joining with Al-Qaeda, then leaving them after being ordered to carry out a suicide bombing.
* SpannerInTheWorks: [[spoiler: He expects Jack to steal a knife when she and Alex are dining with him, as it's part of his plan to cause Alex emotional pain. Alex stealing a cigarette packet at the same meal is ''not'' part of his plan.]]
* TheSociopath: He is characterized by a complete lack of emotions or empathy.
* TheUnsmile: At the end when he's [[spoiler: fallen into the pile of salt and is [[VillainsWantMercy pleading with Alex]] to throw him a rope]]. It's described as looking more like a hideous grimace than anything.
* VillainousBreakdown: He completely flips out when he finds out that Alex is still alive. In his final moments, he goes out cursing Alex - [[NotSoStoic likely the first and last time he would ever feel emotion]].
* WhiteHairBlackHeart: His silver hair is a defining feature, and he is quite possibly one of the most sadistic villains in the series.
[[/folder]]
!!SCORPIA members
[[folder:Nile]]
* DeathByIrony: He has a fear of heights, and ends up being knocked off a hot air balloon from a height of 100 metres after Alex realises what he's afraid of and uses it against him. To add insult to injury, he gets knocked off by a [[KillItWithFire fireball]] that Alex sets off by severing the balloon's propane burner. How did he do that? By cutting through it ''with a sword Nile had thrown at him''.
* FailedASpotCheck: He searches Alex head to toe after the assignment to kill Mrs. Jones. He didn't think to look inside Alex's mouth, which was hiding a tracker.
* {{Foreshadowing}}: Nile is mentioned as having a weakness that keeps him from being Scorpia's #1 assassin. While talking to Alex at a bell tower, Nile tries to avoid going all the way up, and after Alex jumps onto the Invisible Sword balloon satellite, Nile shows [[ThisIsGonnaSuck sudden reluctance]] when Rothman orders him to go after Alex.
* ItGetsEasier: He says learning to enjoy the kill is part of the job.
* MasterSwordsman: They're his weapon of choice, though he's not above using other things available.
* ProfessionalKiller: One of Scorpia's top assassins who's had successful assignments all over the world.
* RedRightHand: He has [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitiligo vitiligo]], giving him patches of pale skin across his face.
* ScaryBlackMan: As a Scorpia enforcer, he's scary by default, and skin condition aside, he is biologically black.
* ThrowingYourSwordAlwaysWorks: When he kills a researcher, though later {{averted|Trope}} when he tries to kill Alex because he was crippled by his fear of heights. Though these are swords that are meant to be thrown, not normal swords.
* WhyDidItHaveToBeSnakes: His biggest flaw is his crippling acrophobia.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Anan Sukit]]
* TheDragon: [[spoiler: Would be this if he lived longer.]]
* GladiatorGames: Runs one of these, and forces Alex into it.
* InTheBack: [[spoiler: Courtesy of Fox.]]
* RedRightHand: Has no ears.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Dr. Bill Tanner]]
* CoDragons: With Ash, to Yu.
* DrivenToSuicide: Possibly; it's known that he kills himself, but why he does is never explained (it's suggested that he was following orders from Yu after Alex escaped, which given the fate of de Wynter earlier seems likely).
* FauxAffablyEvil: Remains polite even after threatening Alex with a slow and painful death.
* MadScientist: Dissects people to give their organs away.
* SmugSnake: He has to brag about how Alex "can't escape" and gives away how he can escape.
[[/folder]]
[[folder: Yassen Gregorovich]]
* AccidentalMisnaming: [[spoiler: His name is really Yasha. Sharkovsky misheard it as , since Yasha had just been beaten up by Sharkovsky's two bodyguards and his face was still swollen. After escaping, Scorpia ran with it. This was likely intended as a {{Retcon}}, as Horowitz named the character after someone he knew and was unaware that was not a Russian name.[[note]]There was a well-known Russian journalist named Yasen Zasursky, but it's not a standard Russian name by any means. Zasursky was born in 1929, when new "revolutionary names" were in fashion, and his mother decided to name him Yasen because of his father's bright eyes (the name "Yasen" is sort of a masculine noun formed from the adjective "yasniy", meaning "bright" in Russian).[[/note]]]]
%%* AffablyEvil
%%* AllAPartOfTheJob
* BatheHerAndBringHerToMe: A rare male example, Sharkovsky orders his men to make sure the captured young has washed himself throughly before being in his presence as was living on the streets at the time.
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Cray orders to kill Alex and Sabina. refuses, saying he "does not kill children". [[spoiler: Flustered, Damian snatches his gun, and instead of shooting Alex and Sabina, turns the gun on .]]
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassination by Gregorovich, but from the perspectives of Alex and , respectively.]]
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went from 's gun into Sayle's chest.]]
* CrazyPrepared: Had a backup plan in case Alex escapes from Cray's compound in ''Eagle Strike'', deploying an entire squad of mercs to intercept him in Amsterdam. And after that failed, he had a ''backup'' backup plan in the form of [[IHaveYourWife I Have Your Ex-Girlfriend]].
* CulturedBadass: The fourth book mentions that he listens to classical music and is learning nine languages.
* ADayInTheLimelight: Is the focus of ''Russian Roulette'', which delves into his childhood and how he came to be an assassin.
* DoomedHometown: His home village was contaminated with an artificial strain of anthrax, and later destroyed by the Russian government as part of their quarantine/cover-up.
* TheDragon: For Damien Cray in ''Eagle Strike''.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: is a professional assassin, but even he [[WouldntHurtAChild refuses to kill children]] and anyone not strictly on his list of targets. That being said, he doesn't have a big problem with maiming them. Considering his role in Stormbreaker (a plot to kill tens of thousands of British schoolchildren), he was likely lying about not killing children and was simply using it as an excuse to not kill Alex.
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible for 's own death]]).
* FateWorseThanDeath: He spent three years working as a slave for Vladimir Sharkovsky.
* {{Foil}}: To Ash, Alex’s godfather. They were the two people closest to John, and both [[spoiler: worked for SCORPIA. Yassen killed Ian. Ash murdered Alex’s mom and dad.]]
** [[spoiler: Ash acts remorseful about murdering Alex’s parents, but his remorse is ultimately pointless, as it doesn’t stop him from trying to kill Alex if it benefits Ash’s career.]] Yassen appears to be remorseless about killing Ian. However, he disobeys orders to protect Alex, and ultimately [[spoiler:gave his life to save Alex.]]
** Ash didn’t object to Alex working in the business, and will get Alex more involved if it benefits him. Yassen repeatedly tries to convince Alex to stay out of the spy business for Alex’s safety.
** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the [=MI6=], and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
* ForegoneConclusion: Of course he, Julia Rothman and [[spoiler:John Rider]] will survive ''Russian Roulette''.
* HeelFaceTurn: [[spoiler:[[ProfessionalKiller ]], arguably, in the end of the fourth book when he tried to stop Damian Cray from killing Alex and [[RedemptionEqualsDeath got shot in the process]]. He dies in Alex's arms after Damian Cray dies]].
* IdealIllnessImmunity: has never been ill once in his life. He attributes this to his parents giving him an antidote to a powerful strain of anthrax when he was a kid.
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex, since [[YouKilledMyFather killed his uncle]].
* KilledOffForReal: [[spoiler:Dies at Damian Cray's hands.]]
* MadeASlave: For three years following a burgulary gone wrong, after he was caught by the rich man he tried to rob.
* AMillionIsAStatistic: His rationalization of taking jobs for people planning to kill millions.
-->The numbers were irrelevant to . People died all the time. He knew that every time he drew a breath, at that exact moment, somewhere in the world a hundred or a thousand people would be taking their last. Death was everywhere; it could not be measured.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this for , who in ''Eagle Strike'' first arranges him to "die" in a bullfight so that Alex can escape and then tries PleaseSpareHimMyLiege on [[spoiler: Damian Cray]].
* NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: gives one of these in ''Russian Roulette'' when he talks about how people who couldn't afford vodka would use shoe polish as a drug.
** This is close to TruthInTelevision. In the 1990s, many alcoholics in Russia had to resort to drinking all kinds of dubious ethanol-containing substances when they couldn't afford actual vodka.
** And earlier, in the late 1980s during Gorbachev's prohibition, people had to resort to dubious substances because they couldn't ''purchase'' vodka even when they had the money.
* NotSoDifferentRemark: Part of his empathy for Alex probably comes from [[spoiler: knowing what it's like to be a helpless kid himself.]]
* OrphansOrdeal: His parents died in the plague that destroyed his village. He was a street kid after that, begging and stealing to survive.
* ProfessionalKiller: He's an assassin.
* PunchClockVillain: In it for the money, and nothing else.
* RedemptionEqualsDeath: [[spoiler:He may have not liked John Rider trying to turn him away from being a assassin but when push comes to shove, he won't lay a finger on Alex and is willing to die instead.]]
* {{Retirony}}: [[spoiler:He chooses to spare Damian and go through with the Eagle Strike project because after that, he can retire and return to Russia. Of course, he didn't expect Damian to shoot him later on.]]
* RulesLawyer: Doesn't kill kids, but is fine setting Alex up to ''get'' killed, and unrepentantly works for an outfit that kill kids all the time. Guess that little bit still counts...
* RussianRoulette: Sharkovsky makes him, as a fourteen-year-old, play it after he is captured. [[spoiler: At the end of the book, he returns to Sharkovsky's mansion and plays it again - but this time with five bullets instead of one. [[ForegoneConclusion He survives]], and kills Sharkovsky and his son.]]
* TheSleepless: His narration mentions that he never sleeps more than four hours at a time.
* SmallRoleBigImpact: In the main series, he only actually appears in two of the books, twice briefly in ''Stormbreaker'', and acting as TheDragon to Damian Cray in ''Eagle Strike'' before being [[spoiler: killed off.]] Despite that, his actions continue to influence Alex's life for the rest of the series, in addition for being the one indirectly responsible for Alex being railroaded into the spy game from the very beginning (by killing his uncle). Thanks to that, he received his own spin-off novel focusing on his origins.
** His impact was so big that he was included in the first season of the TV series (based on a book in which he was not even present). In the second season [[spoiler:he ends up being SparedByAdaptation instead of being KilledOffForReal like he is in the book ''Eagle Strike'', thereby all but confirming that he will be included in future seasons if the show is renewed.]]
* StealthMentor: Enjoys seeing Alex succeed at things. Also encourages him to get out of the spy game where no other adult in it does. His protectiveness probably comes from [[spoiler: having been colleagues with Alex's dad.]]
* StreetUrchin: While he was a kid, he lived as one in Moscow.
* Unknown Rival: Ash devotes a decent amount of time discussing building up his battle with Yassen, where Yassen [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomped]] him when he was only nineteen. He’s rather fixated on Yassen, and seems to see Yassen as his greatest enemy, particularly for his injury and his failed mission in Malta. Yassen, in his narration, doesn’t seem to spare much thought to Ash.
* {{Unperson}}: Because of [[DoomedHometown certain events]] in his childhood, there are no records of his existence anywhere in the world. It's this trait which makes him good at his job, since it's much harder to track him down.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Played with. He has no qualms about working for an employer intending to kill ''millions'' of children, but objects to directly killing Alex and Sabina. [[spoiler: Though this may be because worked with Alex's dad]].
* YouAreNotReady: Scorpia sent him out to assassinate a New York lawyer. He had doubts; [[MortonsFork a Scorpia sniper killed her anyway]]. Scorpia knew that this was the case, so he wasn't killed like Grant was.
* YouKilledMyFather: Was responsible for the death of Ian Rider, Alex's uncle.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Erik Gunter]]
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler:Stung to death by a scorpion Alex had hidden in a cigarette packet.]]
* CareerEndingInjury: Served in the army before he was wounded in Afghanistan and invalided home. He still has two bullets in his body that the surgeons could not remove.
* EvilPaysBetter: Joined Scorpia after being medically discharged and unable to find a job elsewhere.
* FailedASpotCheck: Alex's plan to escape would have failed [[spoiler: if only he had noticed the cigarette packet hadn't been there before Alex got into the van.]]
* FallenHero: Once a loyal soldier, it is suspected that this happened after leaving his hospital treatment. The suspicions are true.
* OvershadowedByAwesome: Gunter is a fairly big part of ''Scorpia Rising'' as Dragons go, but he is noticeably overshadowed in comparison to his monstrously evil boss and his primary Dragon.
* SmugSnake: [[spoiler:He tells Alex more or less the whole plan.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Julius Grief]]
* AxCrazy: He's rather unhinged as a result of his CloneAngst (and being raised by Dr. Grief didn't help, either). This is someone who ''enjoys'' making other people, especially Alex, suffer.
* BackForTheFinale: [[spoiler:He hadn't appeared since ''Point Blanc''.]]
* CloneAngst: DoubleSubverted. [[spoiler:He knows his genetic material is the same as his father's, but he doesn't mind, and when neither Julius nor his "father" knew who Alex ''really'' was, he was OK with becoming a clone of Alex Friend. But then [[GoMadFromTheRevelation once he figured out Alex's true identity...]]]]
* DemotedToDragon: [[spoiler:If one takes the view that the clones ''are'' Grief, which is mentioned several times in ''Point Blanc''.]]
* LastOfHisKind: Last of the [[spoiler:Grief clones]].
* LookBothWays: Downplayed. [[spoiler:Getting hit by a car doesn't outright kill him, but it does leave him wounded for Alex to finish off.]]
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: He was named after UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar. His "brothers" also have the names of powerful leaders in history such as {{UsefulNotes/Napoleon|Bonaparte}}, {{UsefulNotes/Genghis|Khan}}, [[UsefulNotes/MaoZedong Mao Tse]] and {{UsefulNotes/Adolf|Hitler}}.
* NotQuiteDead: [[spoiler:Remember the fire in ''Point Blanc''? Yeah, he survived that.]]
* PostClimaxConfrontation: He first appears and confronts Alex at the very end of ''Point Blanc''. [[spoiler:While the narration deliberately makes it ambiguous as to which Alex walks away, the fact that there are more books in the series resolves the issue.]]
%%* WalkingSpoiler
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Giovanni Grimaldi and Eduardo Grimaldi]]
* AscendedExtra: Briefly mentioned in one of the earlier books as SCORPIA thugs, they become the main antagonists of ''Never Say Die''.
* BadBoss: They have a tendency to underpay their workers and kill them when they ask for more.
* BerserkButton: Trying to separate them. They killed a nanny in their youth when she tried to do this as a way of punishing them.
* BigBadDuumvirate: They are both the main antagonists of ''Never Say Die''.
* TheDividual: It's mentioned that they almost never spent any time apart during their lifetimes. They were basically the same person, they always wore the same clothes, they always ate the same food, they even finished each other's sentences.
* IdenticalTwinIdTag: Giovanni is left handed, while Eduardo is right handed.
[[/folder]]
to:
[[foldercontrol]]
!!SCORPIA
[[folder:SCORPIA As A Whole]]
->'''Julia Rothman''': "They could have added kidnapping, blackmail, terrorism, drug trafficking and vice, but that wouldn't make a word. Anyway, we've got to be called something, and I suppose SCORPIA has a nice ring to it."
* BigBad: Featuring in five of the eleven novels[[note]]''Scorpia'', ''Snakehead'', ''Scorpia Rising'', ''Russian Roulette'' and ''Never Say Die''[[/note]] (as well as later being revealed to be responsible for the events of ''Stormbreaker'') and responsible for most of the series' backstory, with their disbanding at the end of ''Scorpia Rising'' meant to be one of the big indications the series was now over, SCORPIA are effectively the BigBad of the entire series.
* BondVillainStupidity: Averted in Scorpia Rising, as Razim needs Alex alive and without any physical marks on him. He also refuses to tell Alex what he is planning.
* ColdBloodedTorture: An obvious instrument they use. Played straight in ''Scorpia Rising'' with [[TheSociopath Razim]], who wants to create a measurable unit of pain and slowly kills people with various horrific instruments, like knives, syringes and many more, to measure the pain that they feel. He tortures a French spy; the author manages to spare the readers the details, though. ...Unless you ''[[BileFascination want]]'' to read about that stuff...
** It's later mentioned that he does several more "experiments" with [[spoiler: Julius.]] Again, the details are thankfully spared.
* ConspicuouslyPublicAssassination: [[spoiler:SCORPIA's plot in ''Scorpia Rising'']].
* CosmopolitanCouncil: At the beginning of ''[=SCORPIA=]'', the leaders of the eponymous criminal organization are a woman from Wales (their sole female member), an Englishman with a Chinese mother, a Yugoslavian, a man of mixed African and Japanese ancestry, a Frenchman, an elderly German, a one-eyed Israeli man, an Australian man with many names, and a Chinese TortureTechnician. In later books they recruit new co-leaders from Ireland, Italy, and Iraq.
* DramaticIrony: In ''Scorpia Rising'', [[spoiler:the reader is aware pretty much from the start that Alex's mission is a trap to deliver him to Scorpia]].
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Sanity wise: SCORPIA condemned [[spoiler:Damian Cray]] as a [[AxCrazy madman]].
* FunWithAcronyms: SCORPIA: Sabotage, [=CORruPtion=], Intelligence, Assassination. Yes, the P ''is'' a bit of a stretch. The narration [[LampshadeHanging remarks]] at one point that whoever came up with the name had probably been watching a little too much ''Franchise/JamesBond''.
* GainingTheWillToKill: SCORPIA runs an assassination school, so naturally, this is part of the curriculum.
* GreaterScopeVillain: Zeljan Kurst, leader of Scorpia.
** SCORPIA themselves.
* MakeItLookLikeAnAccident: The plot of ''Snakehead'', where SCORPIA have to destroy a conference aiming to wipe out poverty but avoid the organisers looking like martyrs.
* ManBehindTheMan: SCORPIA's admitted to [[spoiler: being behind Herod Sayle's plan in Book 1 by selling him the virus strain he implanted in the Stormbreakers.]] It's very possible that [[spoiler: they're behind some of the other villain's actions if not all of them.]]
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: There's a SCORPIA member named Dr. Three.
* NebulousEvilOrganisation: Scorpia. They're the villains of three books.
* OnlyInItForTheMoney: They are essentially an elite terrorist-for-hire outfit that works for anyone who has large sums of money. In ''Scorpia'', Julia Rothman claims to Alex that they are even occasionally hired by the intelligence services for dirtier jobs... [[UnreliableExpositor though make of that what you will]].
* OutOfFocus: In ''Scorpia Rising'', six new members are added to SCORPIA's executive board, replacing the ones who have been killed; three of the new members are the [[BigBad Big Bads]] of the next two books. This means that there are four members of the original board who appear in at least three of the books without even being identified by name.
* RedRightHand: SCORPIA has a few.
* TheSyndicate: SCORPIA is basically the series's version of [[Literature/JamesBond SPECTRE]].
* UriahGambit: In ''Scorpia Rising'', [[spoiler:Zeljan Kurst has Levi Kroll killed and false evidence placed on his cadaver in order to lure [=MI6=] -- and Alex -- into a trap.]]
* VillainDecay: InUniverse example; SCORPIA's credibility is seriously affected when a fourteen-year-old boy destroys two of their operations and (indirectly) kills two of their executives within a few months. [[spoiler: The failure of their plan in ''Scorpia Rising'' results in the organization being dismantled.]]
[[/folder]]
!!Board Members
[[folder:Julia Rothman]]
!!Julia Rothman
* BeautyIsBad: Unlike most other villains, Mrs. Rothman has no disfigurements, and her descriptions paint her as being quite good-looking. It doesn't change the fact that she's a terrorist planning to mass-murder children.
* BitchInSheepsClothing: Really wants to get even with John Rider and [=MI6=] for outwitting her and she thinks she can do this through killing Alex.
* DeathByLookingUp: [[spoiler: Killed by the hot air balloon she was using as a platform for her attack]]. Ironically she would have survived if she knew that the SAS soldiers were actually trying to warn her, not detain her.
* FauxAffablyEvil: She appears every bit a polite and generous hostess to Alex, treating him to an expensive dinner at a luxury hotel. [[spoiler:This despite planning from the start to use him to get even with [=MI6=] and then dispose of him with Invisible Sword.]]
* GenreSavvy: She refuses to tell Alex how Invisible Sword works at any point, even after she believes he has killed Mrs Jones, leaving him to try and work it out by himself. Although he does manage to do so, Rothman is the only BigBad of any ''Alex Rider'' book whose plan isn't foiled because they explained every last detail to Alex.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Not uncommon for the antagonists in the series, Julia Rothman [[spoiler:is flattened by the satellites on the hot air balloon needed to initiate Invisible Sword]].
* LittleBlackDress: She wears one in ''Scorpia'', which Alex takes notice.
* ManipulativeBastard: Isn't a big player in SCORPIA for nothing.
* MrsRobinson: Some of her comments to Alex are very flirtatious, fitting since she was in love with his father.
* RavenHairIvorySkin: Well actually, her skin is more peach coloured but as far as the hair description.
* ShoutOut: [[spoiler: Her death is like Alec Trevelyan's, the main antagonist from the James Bond movie ''Film/{{Goldeneye}}'']].
* UnreliableExpositor: The actual truth about Alex's father, revealed at the end of ''Scorpia'', leaves a question mark over how much - if any - of what Rothman says to Alex is true.
* WouldHurtAChild: She says she'd rather not, but if the money pays well...
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Major Winston Yu]]
!!Major Winston Yu
* AsianBabymama: His mother had an affair with a British businessman, who promised to take her home with him, then left her behind in China.
* BondVillainStupidity: A really bad case, as [[OrganTheft his plan for Alex]] doesn't even require him to be alive (aside from sheer sadism). And he may be the only villain ever to ''out-and-out state'' the best option is to JustShootHim and then not do it.
* CareerEndingInjury: Forced to leave active service after contracting ''osteoporosis imperfecta''.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler:The earthquake caused by Royal Blue's early detonation hits his boat and breaks every bone in his body.]] He also apparently inflicts this on [[YouHaveFailedMe henchmen who fail him]], as Bill Tanner commits [[BetterToDieThanBeKilled suicide]] to avoid incurring Yu's wrath.
* DeathByIrony: [[spoiler:He's killed by the bomb that he would have destroyed Reef Island with.]]
* DisappearedDad: His father abandoned his mother after she became pregnant. Yu never found out who he was.
* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: After she died, he went off the rails. He also bribed a guard into letting him scatter her ashes around Buckingham Palace's garden because he knew she would have liked that.
* EvilCripple: While he's not technically disabled, he does have ''[[MadeOfPlasticine osteoporosis imperfecta]]'', also known as [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin brittle bone disease]]. [[spoiler:This ultimately does him in.]]
* EvilOldFolks: He's in his [=60s=] and is still an active executive for Scorpia, with all the crime and terrorism that entails.
* FastestGunInTheWest: Boasts that he is, as the Americans say, "quick on the draw". He proves it when drawing his gun on Alex without him seeing it.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Exceedingly polite, happily describing his plans to make money by killing scores of people and torturing Alex. He learned from his mother that one should never lose their temper.
* {{Foil}}: To Herod Sayle, in that both are foreigners who came from dirt-poor families but, because of extraordinary circumstances, ended up receiving a top-rate education in Britain. While Sayle's experiences led to him despising the Brits however, Yu became a huge fan of British culture.
* HalfBreedDiscrimination: Faced some bullying in school for being a half-British, half-Chinese illegitimate child. It ended when one of his biggest bullies had an [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident unfortunate car accident]], coincidentally after Yu's mother heard about his problems in school.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:Quite literally. The bomb he stole for his EvilPlan ultimately does him in when it's detonated prematurely.]]
* ImmigrantPatriotism: Served with distinction in Northern Ireland but when he was consigned to a desk job at [=MI6=], this went out the window. Still loves Britain however.
* InTheBlood: His mother was a ProfessionalKiller in the snakeheads. He would eventually join them and [[KlingonPromotion take the leadership himself]].
* MamaBear: Had a very dark one in his mother--she did whatever it took, even contract killings, to give her son a better life in Britain. Yu estimates at least 16 men (and his schoolyard bully) died for his education.
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: Named after UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill, and even went to Harrow School, which Churchill also attended.
* SmugSnake: He's too confident for his own good.
* WickedCultured: He has a very aristocratic behaviour.
* WorthyOpponent: Perhaps more than any other BigBad in the series, Yu seems to admire Alex's intelligence and resourcefulness, and happily admits to Alex that he has underestimated his capability when Alex reveals he knows about the bomb.
* YellowPeril: The only main villain of East Asian descent.
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: How he felt after being relegated to a PostInjuryDeskJob, leading to him steal state secrets and sell out to the snakeheads.
** Defied in regards to the plan to disrupt the conference. He makes it so the bomb can only activate with a scan of his fingerprints, ensuring that nobody is able to replace him.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Zeljan Kurst]]
!!Zeljan Kurst
* CrazyPrepared:
** Earlier, during his meeting with Ariston at the London Museum, he has several SCORPIA agents disguised as civilians or tourists there just in case things turn sour. Sure enough, the police attempt to capture him but most of them end up done in by the various agents.
** He's fully aware that one of his fellow board members might be considering avoiding the usual punishment for retirement by gunning them down when SCORPIA begins to hit rock bottom, so he has snipers placed on the roof of the Scorpia riverboat to take them out. [[spoiler:This is how Kroll dies.]]
* GreaterScopeVillain: He's the leader of SCORPIA, and the one who orders the {{Big Bad}}s of ''Snakehead'' and ''Scorpia Rising'' to carry out their plots, though he never comes face to face with Alex.
* ManBehindTheMan: In ''Snakehead'' and ''Scorpia Rising'', for Winston and Razim respectively. He comes up with plans, the other Scorpia executives carry them out.
* TheUnfought: Despite being a prominent member of SCORPIA, and responsible for setting the events of ''Scorpia Rising'' in motion, Kurst never even meets Alex or any other [=MI6=] member, with the final chapter stating that he was arrested offscreen in the aftermath of Razim's failure.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Levi Kroll]]
!!Levi Kroll
* AxCrazy: He prefers direct violence as a first resort.
* EyeScream: The result of his PillowPistol.
* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace: Managed to do this to himself before we first see him. He lived through it, though.
* PillowPistol: Until it went off.
* PragmaticVillainy: [[spoiler:He fiercely opposes Razim's plan to bait Alex as part of Scorpia's ploy against [=MI6=], not out of any moral standards, but because he doesn't want to risk another credibility-erasing embarrassment. He doesn't live long enough to see how right he was.]]
* TooDumbToLive: [[spoiler:Pulls a gun on [[CrazyPrepared Zeljan]] of all people and gets assassinated for his trouble.]]
* TheUnfought: [[spoiler:Never comes face-to-face with Alex or any other major character outside Scorpia's executive board, despite appearing in three books and having a minor story arc that impacts on the events of the latter two books.]]
* WrongGenreSavvy: He knows retiring from Scorpia just leads to early death. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, he misinterprets a comment from Razim as a suggestion that they should kill him, and ends up giving them reason to. Probably what Razim had intended, of course.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Max Grendel]]
!!Max Grendel
* AsskickingLeadsToLeadership: He was a commander in the German Secret Police and personally killed a foreign spy during a performance of Beethoven's Fifth.
* BadassDecay: InUniverse example -- since his secret police days, he has become a grandfather and has developed an eye condition which means he is nearly always weeping.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Despite being fairly sentimental in his old age, don't forget he's a board member of SCORPIA, and [[NoodleIncident once strangled a foreign spy during a performance of Beethoven's Fifth]].
* BitCharacter: Had a fair amount of dialogue in one chapter, before dying at the end of it.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Despite being part of SCORPIA and complicit in many of their atrocities, Julia Rothman's plan to kill thousands of British schoolchildren is a step too far for him.
* ResignationsNotAccepted: In the opening chapter of ''Scorpia'' he refuses to participate in Scorpia's latest project: a biological weapon that specifically targets children. He is given a "retirement present" of suitcase filled with deadly scorpions.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Harming children, and seeing his fellow board members being completely on board with the idea, is too much even for him. Given he's a grandfather, this is understandable.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Dr. Three]]
!!Doctor Three
* AffablyEvil: Despite being a complete sadist, he is very polite when talking to Julia Rothman.
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: He presumably has the title "Dr." for a reason, and from what we know about him his field of expertise may well be torture.
* {{Sadist}}: It's said he enjoyed the [[ColdBloodedTorture research]] he did for his book.
* TortureTechnician: Wrote a book on torture called ''Modern Interrogation Techniques''.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: He appears in every board meeting of SCORPIA that we see, and usually says something, but after ''Scorpia Rising'' his ultimate fate is unknown. Mrs. Jones did remark that all of the board members had either been arrested or were on the run, so we can assume he is one of these.
* WouldHurtAChild: Had no objections when Julia Rothman asked if he minded that Invisible Sword would kill thousands of children.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Brendan Chase]]
!!Brendan Chase
* IHaveManyNames: Has a number of them which he uses as aliases.
* LandDownUnder: He's from Australia and was once the paymaster for its secret intelligence service, before fleeing the country with $400,000 of his agency's money while drunk.
* WouldHurtAChild: Moreso than most other SCORPIA members. In ''Scorpia Rising'', he tells Razim that if he needs a volunteer to kill Alex for his plan, he'd "be glad to fire the bullet" himself.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Razim]]
!!Abdul-Aziz al-Rahim (Razim)
* AlliterativeName: His real name is Abdul-Aziz Al-Rahim. That's a lot of "A" names.
* AxCrazy: The things he did while he was a child says a lot about how fucked up he was, and considering that the only development in this as he got older was managing to somewhat conceal this so that you won't be able to tell at first glance anymore, still is.
* TheChessmaster: He plays Alan Blunt like a chump.
* DisproportionateRetribution: As a child, he stabbed his nanny in the leg when she told him off for teasing his sister.
* EvilGenius: As a child, he thrived in his studies and learned multiple languages. As an adult, he was the head of Iraqi Intelligence Services under Saddam Hussein and planned terrorist attacks for al-Qaeda before winding up with SCORPIA. He's the mastermind for their latest plan in ''Scorpia Rising''.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Always goes with a polite and stoic demeanour, but it's entirely fake and just serves to make him even worse.
* ForScience: Takes no pleasure in his experiments. Supposedly.
* FourEyesZeroSoul: Happens to wear glasses, and is downright obsessed with inflicting pain.
* KarmicDeath: As one of the most outright sadistic villains in the series, it's only appropriate that he gets one of the more painful, drawn-out deaths.
* KickTheDog: [[spoiler:He had no practical reason to murder Jack, he did it just to get an emotional pain response out of Alex.]]
* KidsAreCruel: He was this as a child, strangling his dog and ratting out his parents to the Iraqi police alongside his sister. Then he wanted to join the police himself and start killing. The officer trying to give the "you did the right thing" talk was [[EvenEvilHasStandards disgusted by him]] and considered shooting him on the spot.
* KnightOfCerebus: The series was never light to begin with, but Razim takes it into its darkest moments pretty much single-handedly.
* MustHaveNicotine: Smokes frequently, and craves for another cigarette during meetings. This habit would indirectly backfire on him later on.
* NoSenseOfHumor: He often kills people for telling jokes about him. One such example was when he killed one of his own henchman for comparing him to Literature/HarryPotter.
* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: We're told his real name at one point, but he doesn't use it once.
* {{Sadist}}: He claims that horrifically torturing innocent people to create a unit of measurement for pain is purely for science, though Alex suspects that it's how Razim gets his kicks. He certainly seems very engrossed in his "experiments."
* SelfMadeOrphan: Indirectly; he ratted his parents out to the Saddam Hussein government, leading to their execution.
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Twice in his backstory. He fled Iraq during the 2003 US-British invasion, joining with Al-Qaeda, then leaving them after being ordered to carry out a suicide bombing.
* SpannerInTheWorks: [[spoiler: He expects Jack to steal a knife when she and Alex are dining with him, as it's part of his plan to cause Alex emotional pain. Alex stealing a cigarette packet at the same meal is ''not'' part of his plan.]]
* TheSociopath: He is characterized by a complete lack of emotions or empathy.
* TheUnsmile: At the end when he's [[spoiler: fallen into the pile of salt and is [[VillainsWantMercy pleading with Alex]] to throw him a rope]]. It's described as looking more like a hideous grimace than anything.
* VillainousBreakdown: He completely flips out when he finds out that Alex is still alive. In his final moments, he goes out cursing Alex - [[NotSoStoic likely the first and last time he would ever feel emotion]].
* WhiteHairBlackHeart: His silver hair is a defining feature, and he is quite possibly one of the most sadistic villains in the series.
[[/folder]]
!!SCORPIA members
[[folder:Nile]]
* DeathByIrony: He has a fear of heights, and ends up being knocked off a hot air balloon from a height of 100 metres after Alex realises what he's afraid of and uses it against him. To add insult to injury, he gets knocked off by a [[KillItWithFire fireball]] that Alex sets off by severing the balloon's propane burner. How did he do that? By cutting through it ''with a sword Nile had thrown at him''.
* FailedASpotCheck: He searches Alex head to toe after the assignment to kill Mrs. Jones. He didn't think to look inside Alex's mouth, which was hiding a tracker.
* {{Foreshadowing}}: Nile is mentioned as having a weakness that keeps him from being Scorpia's #1 assassin. While talking to Alex at a bell tower, Nile tries to avoid going all the way up, and after Alex jumps onto the Invisible Sword balloon satellite, Nile shows [[ThisIsGonnaSuck sudden reluctance]] when Rothman orders him to go after Alex.
* ItGetsEasier: He says learning to enjoy the kill is part of the job.
* MasterSwordsman: They're his weapon of choice, though he's not above using other things available.
* ProfessionalKiller: One of Scorpia's top assassins who's had successful assignments all over the world.
* RedRightHand: He has [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitiligo vitiligo]], giving him patches of pale skin across his face.
* ScaryBlackMan: As a Scorpia enforcer, he's scary by default, and skin condition aside, he is biologically black.
* ThrowingYourSwordAlwaysWorks: When he kills a researcher, though later {{averted|Trope}} when he tries to kill Alex because he was crippled by his fear of heights. Though these are swords that are meant to be thrown, not normal swords.
* WhyDidItHaveToBeSnakes: His biggest flaw is his crippling acrophobia.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Anan Sukit]]
* TheDragon: [[spoiler: Would be this if he lived longer.]]
* GladiatorGames: Runs one of these, and forces Alex into it.
* InTheBack: [[spoiler: Courtesy of Fox.]]
* RedRightHand: Has no ears.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Dr. Bill Tanner]]
* CoDragons: With Ash, to Yu.
* DrivenToSuicide: Possibly; it's known that he kills himself, but why he does is never explained (it's suggested that he was following orders from Yu after Alex escaped, which given the fate of de Wynter earlier seems likely).
* FauxAffablyEvil: Remains polite even after threatening Alex with a slow and painful death.
* MadScientist: Dissects people to give their organs away.
* SmugSnake: He has to brag about how Alex "can't escape" and gives away how he can escape.
[[/folder]]
[[folder: Yassen Gregorovich]]
* AccidentalMisnaming: [[spoiler: His name is really Yasha. Sharkovsky misheard it as , since Yasha had just been beaten up by Sharkovsky's two bodyguards and his face was still swollen. After escaping, Scorpia ran with it. This was likely intended as a {{Retcon}}, as Horowitz named the character after someone he knew and was unaware that was not a Russian name.[[note]]There was a well-known Russian journalist named Yasen Zasursky, but it's not a standard Russian name by any means. Zasursky was born in 1929, when new "revolutionary names" were in fashion, and his mother decided to name him Yasen because of his father's bright eyes (the name "Yasen" is sort of a masculine noun formed from the adjective "yasniy", meaning "bright" in Russian).[[/note]]]]
%%* AffablyEvil
%%* AllAPartOfTheJob
* BatheHerAndBringHerToMe: A rare male example, Sharkovsky orders his men to make sure the captured young has washed himself throughly before being in his presence as was living on the streets at the time.
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Cray orders to kill Alex and Sabina. refuses, saying he "does not kill children". [[spoiler: Flustered, Damian snatches his gun, and instead of shooting Alex and Sabina, turns the gun on .]]
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassination by Gregorovich, but from the perspectives of Alex and , respectively.]]
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went from 's gun into Sayle's chest.]]
* CrazyPrepared: Had a backup plan in case Alex escapes from Cray's compound in ''Eagle Strike'', deploying an entire squad of mercs to intercept him in Amsterdam. And after that failed, he had a ''backup'' backup plan in the form of [[IHaveYourWife I Have Your Ex-Girlfriend]].
* CulturedBadass: The fourth book mentions that he listens to classical music and is learning nine languages.
* ADayInTheLimelight: Is the focus of ''Russian Roulette'', which delves into his childhood and how he came to be an assassin.
* DoomedHometown: His home village was contaminated with an artificial strain of anthrax, and later destroyed by the Russian government as part of their quarantine/cover-up.
* TheDragon: For Damien Cray in ''Eagle Strike''.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: is a professional assassin, but even he [[WouldntHurtAChild refuses to kill children]] and anyone not strictly on his list of targets. That being said, he doesn't have a big problem with maiming them. Considering his role in Stormbreaker (a plot to kill tens of thousands of British schoolchildren), he was likely lying about not killing children and was simply using it as an excuse to not kill Alex.
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible for 's own death]]).
* FateWorseThanDeath: He spent three years working as a slave for Vladimir Sharkovsky.
* {{Foil}}: To Ash, Alex’s godfather. They were the two people closest to John, and both [[spoiler: worked for SCORPIA. Yassen killed Ian. Ash murdered Alex’s mom and dad.]]
** [[spoiler: Ash acts remorseful about murdering Alex’s parents, but his remorse is ultimately pointless, as it doesn’t stop him from trying to kill Alex if it benefits Ash’s career.]] Yassen appears to be remorseless about killing Ian. However, he disobeys orders to protect Alex, and ultimately [[spoiler:gave his life to save Alex.]]
** Ash didn’t object to Alex working in the business, and will get Alex more involved if it benefits him. Yassen repeatedly tries to convince Alex to stay out of the spy business for Alex’s safety.
** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the [=MI6=], and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
* ForegoneConclusion: Of course he, Julia Rothman and [[spoiler:John Rider]] will survive ''Russian Roulette''.
* HeelFaceTurn: [[spoiler:[[ProfessionalKiller ]], arguably, in the end of the fourth book when he tried to stop Damian Cray from killing Alex and [[RedemptionEqualsDeath got shot in the process]]. He dies in Alex's arms after Damian Cray dies]].
* IdealIllnessImmunity: has never been ill once in his life. He attributes this to his parents giving him an antidote to a powerful strain of anthrax when he was a kid.
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex, since [[YouKilledMyFather killed his uncle]].
* KilledOffForReal: [[spoiler:Dies at Damian Cray's hands.]]
* MadeASlave: For three years following a burgulary gone wrong, after he was caught by the rich man he tried to rob.
* AMillionIsAStatistic: His rationalization of taking jobs for people planning to kill millions.
-->The numbers were irrelevant to . People died all the time. He knew that every time he drew a breath, at that exact moment, somewhere in the world a hundred or a thousand people would be taking their last. Death was everywhere; it could not be measured.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this for , who in ''Eagle Strike'' first arranges him to "die" in a bullfight so that Alex can escape and then tries PleaseSpareHimMyLiege on [[spoiler: Damian Cray]].
* NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: gives one of these in ''Russian Roulette'' when he talks about how people who couldn't afford vodka would use shoe polish as a drug.
** This is close to TruthInTelevision. In the 1990s, many alcoholics in Russia had to resort to drinking all kinds of dubious ethanol-containing substances when they couldn't afford actual vodka.
** And earlier, in the late 1980s during Gorbachev's prohibition, people had to resort to dubious substances because they couldn't ''purchase'' vodka even when they had the money.
* NotSoDifferentRemark: Part of his empathy for Alex probably comes from [[spoiler: knowing what it's like to be a helpless kid himself.]]
* OrphansOrdeal: His parents died in the plague that destroyed his village. He was a street kid after that, begging and stealing to survive.
* ProfessionalKiller: He's an assassin.
* PunchClockVillain: In it for the money, and nothing else.
* RedemptionEqualsDeath: [[spoiler:He may have not liked John Rider trying to turn him away from being a assassin but when push comes to shove, he won't lay a finger on Alex and is willing to die instead.]]
* {{Retirony}}: [[spoiler:He chooses to spare Damian and go through with the Eagle Strike project because after that, he can retire and return to Russia. Of course, he didn't expect Damian to shoot him later on.]]
* RulesLawyer: Doesn't kill kids, but is fine setting Alex up to ''get'' killed, and unrepentantly works for an outfit that kill kids all the time. Guess that little bit still counts...
* RussianRoulette: Sharkovsky makes him, as a fourteen-year-old, play it after he is captured. [[spoiler: At the end of the book, he returns to Sharkovsky's mansion and plays it again - but this time with five bullets instead of one. [[ForegoneConclusion He survives]], and kills Sharkovsky and his son.]]
* TheSleepless: His narration mentions that he never sleeps more than four hours at a time.
* SmallRoleBigImpact: In the main series, he only actually appears in two of the books, twice briefly in ''Stormbreaker'', and acting as TheDragon to Damian Cray in ''Eagle Strike'' before being [[spoiler: killed off.]] Despite that, his actions continue to influence Alex's life for the rest of the series, in addition for being the one indirectly responsible for Alex being railroaded into the spy game from the very beginning (by killing his uncle). Thanks to that, he received his own spin-off novel focusing on his origins.
** His impact was so big that he was included in the first season of the TV series (based on a book in which he was not even present). In the second season [[spoiler:he ends up being SparedByAdaptation instead of being KilledOffForReal like he is in the book ''Eagle Strike'', thereby all but confirming that he will be included in future seasons if the show is renewed.]]
* StealthMentor: Enjoys seeing Alex succeed at things. Also encourages him to get out of the spy game where no other adult in it does. His protectiveness probably comes from [[spoiler: having been colleagues with Alex's dad.]]
* StreetUrchin: While he was a kid, he lived as one in Moscow.
* Unknown Rival: Ash devotes a decent amount of time discussing building up his battle with Yassen, where Yassen [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomped]] him when he was only nineteen. He’s rather fixated on Yassen, and seems to see Yassen as his greatest enemy, particularly for his injury and his failed mission in Malta. Yassen, in his narration, doesn’t seem to spare much thought to Ash.
* {{Unperson}}: Because of [[DoomedHometown certain events]] in his childhood, there are no records of his existence anywhere in the world. It's this trait which makes him good at his job, since it's much harder to track him down.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Played with. He has no qualms about working for an employer intending to kill ''millions'' of children, but objects to directly killing Alex and Sabina. [[spoiler: Though this may be because worked with Alex's dad]].
* YouAreNotReady: Scorpia sent him out to assassinate a New York lawyer. He had doubts; [[MortonsFork a Scorpia sniper killed her anyway]]. Scorpia knew that this was the case, so he wasn't killed like Grant was.
* YouKilledMyFather: Was responsible for the death of Ian Rider, Alex's uncle.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Erik Gunter]]
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: [[spoiler:Stung to death by a scorpion Alex had hidden in a cigarette packet.]]
* CareerEndingInjury: Served in the army before he was wounded in Afghanistan and invalided home. He still has two bullets in his body that the surgeons could not remove.
* EvilPaysBetter: Joined Scorpia after being medically discharged and unable to find a job elsewhere.
* FailedASpotCheck: Alex's plan to escape would have failed [[spoiler: if only he had noticed the cigarette packet hadn't been there before Alex got into the van.]]
* FallenHero: Once a loyal soldier, it is suspected that this happened after leaving his hospital treatment. The suspicions are true.
* OvershadowedByAwesome: Gunter is a fairly big part of ''Scorpia Rising'' as Dragons go, but he is noticeably overshadowed in comparison to his monstrously evil boss and his primary Dragon.
* SmugSnake: [[spoiler:He tells Alex more or less the whole plan.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Julius Grief]]
* AxCrazy: He's rather unhinged as a result of his CloneAngst (and being raised by Dr. Grief didn't help, either). This is someone who ''enjoys'' making other people, especially Alex, suffer.
* BackForTheFinale: [[spoiler:He hadn't appeared since ''Point Blanc''.]]
* CloneAngst: DoubleSubverted. [[spoiler:He knows his genetic material is the same as his father's, but he doesn't mind, and when neither Julius nor his "father" knew who Alex ''really'' was, he was OK with becoming a clone of Alex Friend. But then [[GoMadFromTheRevelation once he figured out Alex's true identity...]]]]
* DemotedToDragon: [[spoiler:If one takes the view that the clones ''are'' Grief, which is mentioned several times in ''Point Blanc''.]]
* LastOfHisKind: Last of the [[spoiler:Grief clones]].
* LookBothWays: Downplayed. [[spoiler:Getting hit by a car doesn't outright kill him, but it does leave him wounded for Alex to finish off.]]
* NamedAfterSomebodyFamous: He was named after UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar. His "brothers" also have the names of powerful leaders in history such as {{UsefulNotes/Napoleon|Bonaparte}}, {{UsefulNotes/Genghis|Khan}}, [[UsefulNotes/MaoZedong Mao Tse]] and {{UsefulNotes/Adolf|Hitler}}.
* NotQuiteDead: [[spoiler:Remember the fire in ''Point Blanc''? Yeah, he survived that.]]
* PostClimaxConfrontation: He first appears and confronts Alex at the very end of ''Point Blanc''. [[spoiler:While the narration deliberately makes it ambiguous as to which Alex walks away, the fact that there are more books in the series resolves the issue.]]
%%* WalkingSpoiler
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Giovanni Grimaldi and Eduardo Grimaldi]]
* AscendedExtra: Briefly mentioned in one of the earlier books as SCORPIA thugs, they become the main antagonists of ''Never Say Die''.
* BadBoss: They have a tendency to underpay their workers and kill them when they ask for more.
* BerserkButton: Trying to separate them. They killed a nanny in their youth when she tried to do this as a way of punishing them.
* BigBadDuumvirate: They are both the main antagonists of ''Never Say Die''.
* TheDividual: It's mentioned that they almost never spent any time apart during their lifetimes. They were basically the same person, they always wore the same clothes, they always ate the same food, they even finished each other's sentences.
* IdenticalTwinIdTag: Giovanni is left handed, while Eduardo is right handed.
[[/folder]]
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!SCORPIA
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** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the MI6, and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
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** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the MI6, [=MI6=], and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
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* {{Foil}}: To Ash, Alex’s godfather. They were the two people closest to John, and both [[spoiler: worked for SCORPIA. Yassen killed Ian. Ash murdered Alex’s mom and dad.]]
** [[spoiler: Ash acts remorseful about murdering Alex’s parents, but his remorse is ultimately pointless, as it doesn’t stop him from trying to kill Alex if it benefits Ash’s career.]] Yassen appears to be remorseless about killing Ian. However, he disobeys orders to protect Alex, and ultimately [[spoiler:gave his life to save Alex.]]
** Ash didn’t object to Alex working in the business, and will get Alex more involved if it benefits him. Yassen repeatedly tries to convince Alex to stay out of the spy business for Alex’s safety.
** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the MI6, and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
** [[spoiler: Ash acts remorseful about murdering Alex’s parents, but his remorse is ultimately pointless, as it doesn’t stop him from trying to kill Alex if it benefits Ash’s career.]] Yassen appears to be remorseless about killing Ian. However, he disobeys orders to protect Alex, and ultimately [[spoiler:gave his life to save Alex.]]
** Ash didn’t object to Alex working in the business, and will get Alex more involved if it benefits him. Yassen repeatedly tries to convince Alex to stay out of the spy business for Alex’s safety.
** Ash worked for the good side. Ash was trusted with the info that John was a double agent, and John also chose him as his best man. Despite John’s faith in him, Ash [[spoiler: betrayed him, murdered him, and, 14 years later, nearly got Alex killed.]] Yassen was John’s assassin trainee and worked for the villains. John never trusted him with the truth. Despite discovering John’s lies, Yassen never revealed John to the MI6, and later, [[spoiler: died saving his son.]]
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[[folder: Gregorovich]]
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[[folder: Yassen Gregorovich]]
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[[folder:Yassen Gregorovich]]
* AccidentalMisnaming: [[spoiler: His name is really Yasha. Sharkovsky misheard it as Yassen, since Yasha had just been beaten up by Sharkovsky's two bodyguards and his face was still swollen. After escaping, Scorpia ran with it. This was likely intended as a {{Retcon}}, as Horowitz named the character after someone he knew and was unaware that Yassen was not a Russian name.[[note]]There was a well-known Russian journalist named Yasen Zasursky, but it's not a standard Russian name by any means. Zasursky was born in 1929, when new "revolutionary names" were in fashion, and his mother decided to name him Yasen because of his father's bright eyes (the name "Yasen" is sort of a masculine noun formed from the adjective "yasniy", meaning "bright" in Russian).[[/note]]]]
* AccidentalMisnaming: [[spoiler: His name is really Yasha. Sharkovsky misheard it as Yassen, since Yasha had just been beaten up by Sharkovsky's two bodyguards and his face was still swollen. After escaping, Scorpia ran with it. This was likely intended as a {{Retcon}}, as Horowitz named the character after someone he knew and was unaware that Yassen was not a Russian name.[[note]]There was a well-known Russian journalist named Yasen Zasursky, but it's not a standard Russian name by any means. Zasursky was born in 1929, when new "revolutionary names" were in fashion, and his mother decided to name him Yasen because of his father's bright eyes (the name "Yasen" is sort of a masculine noun formed from the adjective "yasniy", meaning "bright" in Russian).[[/note]]]]
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* AccidentalMisnaming: [[spoiler: His name is really Yasha. Sharkovsky misheard it as
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* BatheHerAndBringHerToMe: A rare male example, Sharkovsky orders his men to make sure the captured young Yassen has washed himself throughly before being in his presence as Yassen was living on the streets at the time.
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Cray orders Yassen to kill Alex and Sabina. Yassen refuses, saying he "does not kill children". [[spoiler: Flustered, Damian snatches his gun, and instead of shooting Alex and Sabina, turns the gun on Yassen.]]
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassination by Yassen Gregorovich, but from the perspectives of Alex and Yassen, respectively.]]
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went from Yassen's gun into Sayle's chest.]]
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Cray orders Yassen to kill Alex and Sabina. Yassen refuses, saying he "does not kill children". [[spoiler: Flustered, Damian snatches his gun, and instead of shooting Alex and Sabina, turns the gun on Yassen.]]
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassination by Yassen Gregorovich, but from the perspectives of Alex and Yassen, respectively.]]
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went from Yassen's gun into Sayle's chest.]]
to:
* BatheHerAndBringHerToMe: A rare male example, Sharkovsky orders his men to make sure the captured young Yassen young has washed himself throughly before being in his presence as Yassen as was living on the streets at the time.
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Crayorders Yassen orders to kill Alex and Sabina. Yassen Sabina. refuses, saying he "does not kill children". [[spoiler: Flustered, Damian snatches his gun, and instead of shooting Alex and Sabina, turns the gun on Yassen.on .]]
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassinationby Yassen by Gregorovich, but from the perspectives of Alex and Yassen, , respectively.]]
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went fromYassen's 's gun into Sayle's chest.]]
* BlofeldPloy: In ''Eagle Strike'', Damian Cray
* BookEnds: Both ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Russian Roulette'' end with [[spoiler: Herod Sayle's assassination
* BulletHolesAndRevelations: The end of ''Stormbreaker'': Sayle has a gun pointed at Alex and two shots are fired.[[spoiler: But they went from
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* EvenEvilHasStandards: Yassen is a professional assassin, but even he [[WouldntHurtAChild refuses to kill children]] and anyone not strictly on his list of targets. That being said, he doesn't have a big problem with maiming them. Considering his role in Stormbreaker (a plot to kill tens of thousands of British schoolchildren), he was likely lying about not killing children and was simply using it as an excuse to not kill Alex.
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible for Yassen's own death]]).
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible for Yassen's own death]]).
to:
* EvenEvilHasStandards: Yassen EvenEvilHasStandards: is a professional assassin, but even he [[WouldntHurtAChild refuses to kill children]] and anyone not strictly on his list of targets. That being said, he doesn't have a big problem with maiming them. Considering his role in Stormbreaker (a plot to kill tens of thousands of British schoolchildren), he was likely lying about not killing children and was simply using it as an excuse to not kill Alex.
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible forYassen's 's own death]]).
** He appears pleased when Alex tells him that Cray has died, and says that he knew working for him was a mistake (and not just because Cray [[spoiler:was directly responsible for
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* HeelFaceTurn: [[spoiler:[[ProfessionalKiller Yassen]], arguably, in the end of the fourth book when he tried to stop Damian Cray from killing Alex and [[RedemptionEqualsDeath got shot in the process]]. He dies in Alex's arms after Damian Cray dies]].
* IdealIllnessImmunity: Yassen has never been ill once in his life. He attributes this to his parents giving him an antidote to a powerful strain of anthrax when he was a kid.
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex, since Yassen [[YouKilledMyFather killed his uncle]].
* IdealIllnessImmunity: Yassen has never been ill once in his life. He attributes this to his parents giving him an antidote to a powerful strain of anthrax when he was a kid.
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex, since Yassen [[YouKilledMyFather killed his uncle]].
to:
* HeelFaceTurn: [[spoiler:[[ProfessionalKiller Yassen]], ]], arguably, in the end of the fourth book when he tried to stop Damian Cray from killing Alex and [[RedemptionEqualsDeath got shot in the process]]. He dies in Alex's arms after Damian Cray dies]].
*IdealIllnessImmunity: Yassen IdealIllnessImmunity: has never been ill once in his life. He attributes this to his parents giving him an antidote to a powerful strain of anthrax when he was a kid.
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex,since Yassen since [[YouKilledMyFather killed his uncle]].
*
* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: For Alex,
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-->The numbers were irrelevant to Yassen. People died all the time. He knew that every time he drew a breath, at that exact moment, somewhere in the world a hundred or a thousand people would be taking their last. Death was everywhere; it could not be measured.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this for Yassen, who in ''Eagle Strike'' first arranges him to "die" in a bullfight so that Alex can escape and then tries PleaseSpareHimMyLiege on [[spoiler: Damian Cray]].
* NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: Yassen gives one of these in ''Russian Roulette'' when he talks about how people who couldn't afford vodka would use shoe polish as a drug.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this for Yassen, who in ''Eagle Strike'' first arranges him to "die" in a bullfight so that Alex can escape and then tries PleaseSpareHimMyLiege on [[spoiler: Damian Cray]].
* NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: Yassen gives one of these in ''Russian Roulette'' when he talks about how people who couldn't afford vodka would use shoe polish as a drug.
to:
-->The numbers were irrelevant to Yassen.to . People died all the time. He knew that every time he drew a breath, at that exact moment, somewhere in the world a hundred or a thousand people would be taking their last. Death was everywhere; it could not be measured.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this forYassen, , who in ''Eagle Strike'' first arranges him to "die" in a bullfight so that Alex can escape and then tries PleaseSpareHimMyLiege on [[spoiler: Damian Cray]].
*NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: Yassen NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer: gives one of these in ''Russian Roulette'' when he talks about how people who couldn't afford vodka would use shoe polish as a drug.
* MoralityPet: Alex seems to be this for
*
* Unknown Rival: Ash devotes a decent amount of time discussing building up his battle with Yassen, where Yassen [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomped]] him when he was only nineteen. He’s rather fixated on Yassen, and seems to see Yassen as his greatest enemy, particularly for his injury and his failed mission in Malta. Yassen, in his narration, doesn’t seem to spare much thought to Ash.
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* WouldntHurtAChild: Played with. He has no qualms about working for an employer intending to kill ''millions'' of children, but objects to directly killing Alex and Sabina. [[spoiler: Though this may be because Yassen worked with Alex's dad]].
to:
* WouldntHurtAChild: Played with. He has no qualms about working for an employer intending to kill ''millions'' of children, but objects to directly killing Alex and Sabina. [[spoiler: Though this may be because Yassen because worked with Alex's dad]].
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Changed line(s) 60 (click to see context) from:
* DeathByIrony[=/=]HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:He's killed by the bomb that he would have destroyed Reef Island with.]]
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* DeathByIrony[=/=]HoistByHisOwnPetard: DeathByIrony: [[spoiler:He's killed by the bomb that he would have destroyed Reef Island with.]]
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:Quite literally. The bomb he stole for his EvilPlan ultimately does him in when it's detonated prematurely.]]
Changed line(s) 99 (click to see context) from:
* PragmaticVillainy: [[spoiler:He fiercely opposes Razim's plan to bait Alex as part of Scorpia's ploy against [=MI6=], not out of any moral standards, but because he doesn't want to risk another credibility-erasing embarrassment]].
to:
* PragmaticVillainy: [[spoiler:He fiercely opposes Razim's plan to bait Alex as part of Scorpia's ploy against [=MI6=], not out of any moral standards, but because he doesn't want to risk another credibility-erasing embarrassment]].embarrassment. He doesn't live long enough to see how right he was.]]
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%%* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate
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* {{Sadist}}: He claims that horrifically torturing innocent people to create a unit of measurement for pain is purely for science, though Alex suspects that it's how Razim gets his kicks. He certainly seems very engrossed in his "experiments."
Changed line(s) 159 (click to see context) from:
* VillainousBreakdown: He completely flips out when he finds out that Alex is still alive. In his final moments, he goes out cursing Alex.
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* VillainousBreakdown: He completely flips out when he finds out that Alex is still alive. In his final moments, he goes out cursing Alex.Alex - [[NotSoStoic likely the first and last time he would ever feel emotion]].
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Changed line(s) 270 (click to see context) from:
[[folder:Giovanni Grimauldi and Eduardo Grimaldi]]
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[[folder:Giovanni Grimauldi Grimaldi and Eduardo Grimaldi]]
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Changed line(s) 257 (click to see context) from:
* AxCrazy: He's rather unhinged as a result of his CloningBlues (and being raised by Dr. Grief didn't help, either). This is someone who ''enjoys'' making other people, especially Alex, suffer.
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* AxCrazy: He's rather unhinged as a result of his CloningBlues CloneAngst (and being raised by Dr. Grief didn't help, either). This is someone who ''enjoys'' making other people, especially Alex, suffer.
Changed line(s) 259 (click to see context) from:
* CloningBlues: DoubleSubverted. [[spoiler:He knows his genetic material is the same as his father's, but he doesn't mind, and when neither Julius nor his "father" knew who Alex ''really'' was, he was OK with becoming a clone of Alex Friend. But then [[GoMadFromTheRevelation once he figured out Alex's true identity...]]]]
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* CloningBlues: CloneAngst: DoubleSubverted. [[spoiler:He knows his genetic material is the same as his father's, but he doesn't mind, and when neither Julius nor his "father" knew who Alex ''really'' was, he was OK with becoming a clone of Alex Friend. But then [[GoMadFromTheRevelation once he figured out Alex's true identity...]]]]
