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The Girls:
Jennifer Simpson
Jennifer Simpson
Jennifer in The First Fear
Click here for her appearance in the second game
Voiced by: Rumiko Varnes (Clock Tower), Chinami Nishimura (Clock Tower 2 Drama CD)
The heroine of the first and second games, she has to find a way out of the Barrows' mansion without getting murdered by the Scissorman.- Action Survivor: Just an ordinary girl who gets adopted into the mansion.
- Break the Cutie: The first game's events take a serious toll on her.
- Child by Rape: In the Clock Tower: Adventure Novels, Ending B will have Jennifer become the mother of a reborn Dan and Bobby Barrows after Dan tricks her into reciting the reverse door spell.
- Connected All Along:
- If the player finds the skeleton in the room, it reveals to be Jennifer's father and he has connections to the Barrows as he helped deliver them.
- Jennifer is related to the Barrows, according to the novelization.
- Conveniently an Orphan: Or not so convenient, since it's Mary Barrows' fault.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Many of the deaths she can suffer, usually getting chopped up by Bobby.
- Crucified Hero Shot: Happens to Jennifer in the last part of Helen's route in the second game. If you do everything before and after right, you'll be fine. But if you don't...
- Doom Magnet: Anyone Can Die just by associating with her or if they happen to get in the way, considering she's Scissorman's main target.
- Driven to Suicide: In the first game, the second to worst ending said that Jennifer was found dead. It's implied that she may have killed herself.
- Expy: Obviously based on Jennifer Corvino from Phenomena, minus the ability to talk to insects.
- Face–Heel Turn: In one ending of Helen's adventure novel after finding out about her Barrows heritage and Helen accepts her own murderous impulses, Jennifer becomes a Scissorman.
- Final Girl: Averted if you get an ending where one or more of your friends live, but she's the only survivor of the orphan girls in the canonical ending.
- Almost every character can survive in the second game but in the best ending of Jennifer's path she will be the one left to face Scissorman by herself in the end.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Ending B in the second game: She opens the portal that seals Dan forever, but the bastard manages to take her with him.
- Happily Adopted: To Helen, but not to the Barrows family.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Jennifer is modeled and named after Jennifer Corvino,
Jennifer Connelly's character in Dario Argento's movie Phenomena, which the original game is loosely based on. - Oh, Crap!: Nonverbal, but iconic nonetheless in the first game's Ending H.
- Sole Survivor: Officially confirmed to be this after the first game.
- Straw Vegetarian: Hinted at in the second game when she refuses to eat red meat. Justified in that if anyone saw half the stuff she did, they would lose their appetite for meat.
- Stronger Than They Look: While Jennifer is mostly a non-combatant she does show some feats of strength in certain situations that are quite impressive for someone that is so young, such as holding Bobby's scissors with her bare hands if he catches up to her during a chase and managing to hold Mary's arm as she tries to stab her during one of the endings.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: The girly girl to Lotte's tomboy.
- Trauma-Induced Amnesia: By the start of the sequel, she's suffering from this. She remembers only a little bit of what happened during The First Fear, so Professor Barton constantly puts her under hypnosis to find the truth. If all the requirements are met to get the best ending, though, she remembers everything when she confronts the true Scissorman.
- True Blue Femininity: She wears a blue dress in The First Fear to further emphasize the difference between herself and her more tomboyish friend, Lotte, who wears red. However, Jennifer switches to a red coat in the second game.
- Vomit Discretion Shot: If Jennifer sees the horribly murdered corpse of Rose in the university research building, she vomits in the corner of whatever room she finds the body in, but nothing is shown.
- Yamato Nadeshiko: She's all dressed up for an adoption interview, so she really isn't in much shape to fight back, but she refuses to just lay down and die.
Lotte
Lotte
Lotte's guidebook artwork
Jennifer's best friend. A red-haired tomboy with a strong will.- Almost Dead Guy: If you're playing a route where Jennifer was not locked up in the cell, she'll find Lotte down in the caves, laid out as an apparent sacrifice. Lotte passes along some crucial information, then quietly dies.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: The redhead to Laura's blonde and Anne's brunette.
- Boyish Short Hair: Given she's a tomboy.
- Doomed by Canon: Unlike Anne or Laura, she can't survive the events of the game no matter what path you take.note
- Girly Run: Weirdly enough. The best way to see this is to get thrown in the cell.
- Heroic Sacrifice: One of two ways for her to die. She frees Jennifer when she's locked in the shack, but Mary shoots Lotte in the chest as she tries to escape.
- Hero of Another Story: Unlike Anne and Laura, she discovered Mary's true intentions and/or found a way to defeat Bobby Barrows during the course of the story, implying that she also investigated the mansion before being killed by Mary.
- Human Sacrifice: Her fate if Jennifer wasn't thrown in the cell.
- Misunderstood Loner with a Heart of Gold: Aside from Jennifer, Lotte has no other friends due to difficulties in socializing as a child. However, she is the only one of the three girls who will save Jennifer, or alternately finds a way to kill the Scissorman, which is also used to save Jennifer's life. At the cost of her own.
- No Social Skills: As a child. Which is why Jennifer is her only friend, as explained by Hifumi Kono.
- Only Friend: According to Hifumi Kono, Lotte and Jennifer are each other's only friend in the orphanage.
- Only One Name: Lotte has no last name, having been taken to the orphanage as a baby with no known familial ties.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: The tomboy to Jennifer's girly girl.
- Vasquez Always Dies: Although Anne or Laura can survive in one of the endings, the tomboy Lotte always ends up dying.
Laura Harrington
Laura Harrington
Laura's guidebook artwork
One of Jennifer's friends, she accompanies Jennifer, Lotte, and Anne to the Barrows mansion.- Adaptational Jerkass: The Playstation and Windows 95 ports have her be the one teasing Lotte's nervousness when they arrive at the mansion instead of Anne.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: The blonde to Anne's brunette and Lotte's redhead.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Being stuffed into a steel suit of armor.
- Deadly Bath: One of her deaths has her being stabbed and hung up in a shower. This is her official death in both the manga and the Clock Tower novelizations.
- Doomed by Canon: Although she can survive in Ending S of the first game, the second game affirms that Jennifer is the only one of the four girls that survives the incident, which means she canonically dies.
- Knight's Armor Hideout: Subverted and deconstructed.One of her deaths has her dying in a set of armor because the hard steel compressed her lungs just enough that she couldn't breathe.
- Nice Girl: As seen from the game and additional information, Laura is a polite if meek girl.
- Peek-a-Boo Corpse: Unlike Anne, whose various deaths are always shown onscreen, Laura's corpse is usually found by Jennifer unexpectedly.
- True Blue Femininity: She dresses in blue, and is described by Hifumi Kono as "elegant".
Anne
Anne
Anne's guidebook artwork
Another of Jennifer's friends, who accompanies Jennifer, Lotte, and Laura to the Barrows mansion.- Alpha Bitch: Has shades of this when talking to the other girls in the beginning, and additional information in the novel describes her as a "somewhat" selfish person. Though she seems to be happy to see Jennifer in the A ending, and doesn't behave badly toward her in the S ending. So she may be a Jerk with a Heart of Gold.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: The brunette to Laura's blonde and Lotte's redhead.
- Destination Defenestration: One of her deaths has her being thrown out a window after being stabbed by the Scissorman. This is her official death in both the manga and in the Clock Tower novelization.
- Doomed by Canon: Although she can survive in Ending S of the first game, the second game affirms that Jennifer is the only one of the four girls that survives the incident, which means she canonically dies.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Two of her deaths have her being impaled by Bobby's giant scissors, either falling from a giant stained glass window or being pushed by Scissorman out of a window after being stabbed.
- Hollywood Drowning: She can meet her end this way, being pulled into the pool by Bobby. Probably the more disturbing option of all her potential deaths since she spots Jennifer and cries out for help before Bobby pulls her under one last time.
- Only One Name: Like Lotte, she has no last name. According to the novelization, she was abandoned as a child and doesn't have one.
- Tempting Fate: The prologue manga has her claiming how lucky they are to be living in the mansion. Sure...
Antagonists:
Mary Barrows
Mary Barrows
Mary's guidebook artwork
The owner of the house and main antagonist of the game. She's the mother of Bobby and Dan, and adopted the four girls as well.- Ax-Crazy: She doesn't seem to have much of a motivation beyond "watch people suffer".
- Big Bad: Of First Fear. She adopted the girls specifically to have them all killed by her demonic children, laying all the horror of the game at her feet.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Pretends to be a sweet, nurturing woman when taking the girls in, but it's an act.
- Black Magic: Revealed via Word of God.
- Deal with the Devil: If the ceremony room is any indication, she seems to have made one to have her children.
- Died Standing Up: If she dies from being electrocuted, she's stuck to the circuit board in a way that resembles this.
- Disney Villain Death: She can also die in the climax by falling from the Clock Tower.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: She genuinely cares for her monstrous children. Her Stepford Smiler facade shatters when you kill Dan, and she drops everything to kill you if Bobby dies as well.
- Evil Orphanage Lady: Ms. Mary arranges for the protagonist Jennifer and her friends to be adopted by Simon Barrows with seemingly no ill intent. Then the whole thing is revealed to be a group sacrifice for her satanic sons, Dan and Bobby.
- High-Voltage Death: In one ending, she's knocked into the tower's circuit board and electrocuted.
- Mama Bear: Goes apeshit on Jennifer for causing the deaths of Bobby and Dan.
- Jerkass: To everyone except for her sons.
- Sadist: Word of God says that Mary locked up her husband, instead of just simply killing him, so she could enjoy seeing him lose his sanity.
- Stepford Smiler: Type C. She can be smiling serenely one moment, and stabbing Jennifer in the chest in the next.
- Take Your Time: If Jennifer gets drugged by Mary, Lotte will rescue you out of the cell, but Mary will come over with a gun to kill you. But Mary won't start killing Jennifer until either she hides in the crate or you pick up the club to knock her out.
- Unreliable Illustrator: Due to the color palette limitation, her sprites doesn't match her artwork.
- Her artwork in both mannual and novels depict her more younger with a dark blue top with a long green skirt and blue leggings. The game sprite depicts her wearing a light blue top with a dark blue skirt and no leggings.
- According to the manuals and novels, Mary is in her mid thiries by the time the events of the first game happen. But both ingame and portrait sprites make her look much older.
- Would Hurt a Child:
- Mary doesn't hesitate to try strangling Jennifer or throw her last living friend into the gears of a clock tower.
- She's not above shooting or stabbing them either.
- Mary doesn't hesitate to try strangling Jennifer or throw her last living friend into the gears of a clock tower.
The Scissorman
Bobby Barrows/The Scissorman
- Ax-Crazy: His only motivation is to maim and kill, and he does both with sadistic glee.
- Body Horror: He has a hunchback and a skull face. Definitely not the cutest kid.
- Captain Ersatz: Scissorman is very similar to the character Cropsy from the slasher movie The Burning, even using a similar weapon, more so in Clock Tower 2 than the first game.
- Creepy Child: There's little more creepy than a deformed child trying to murder you with a gigantic pair of shears.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Falls into the gears of the clock tower after becoming disoriented by time starting up again. Not like he didn't deserve it.
- Disney Villain Death: The clock tower striking the hour ends up disorienting Bobby enough that he falls from the ledge and into the gears of the clock.
- Doomed by Canon: Considering the second game, it's clear that Bobby is confirmed dead in the canon storyline.
- The Dragon: For Mary Barrows. He's subservient to his mother, but also the most frequently encountered antagonist of First Fear.
- Dragon Their Feet: If you kill Mary Barrows first, Bobby will show up to make one last effort to kill you.
- Enfant Terrible: While most kids his age would be playing hopscotch, Bobby instead is playing homicide.
- The Heavy: He's probably the least important member of the Barrows family in the mythos, but also the single biggest thing the player has to worry about, by far. Once he scores his first kill, the chase is on, and from that point forward, getting the hell away from Bobby is what drives Jennifer deeper into the house.
- Humanoid Abomination: Bobby looks mostly humanoid, but he is quite clearly a demon.
- I'm a Humanitarian: The first thing he did when he was born? Eat Jennifer's father's hand.
- Implacable Man: He can't be stopped when he appears — all you can do is hide from him.
- Offscreen Teleportation: Scissorman does this constantly. If he didn't, he'd never get closer to you.
- Shear Menace: His weapon is an enormous pair of scissors that he's constantly cutting with.
- Small Role, Big Impact: Despite only appearing in the first game, Bobby's role would be handed over to his brother.
- The Speechless: He does have a vile cackle, though.
Dan Barrows
Dan Barrows/Edward
Click here for his appearance in the second game
Mary's other child.
- Avenging the Villain: Dan's motivation for killing Jennifer is to avenge his mother and brother.
- The Bad Guy Wins: In the sequel, Dan can win. The game does have a lot of endings.
- Beauty Is Bad: How he was able to manipulate Kay.
- Beneath the Mask: Counts as a literal example as well. Edward is a nice, gentle boy, who turns out to be a vicious killer in the end.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: In the second game, he pretends to be a nice and gentle boy
- Big Bad: Of the second game.
- Body Horror: Holy Christ, his giant baby form.
- Body of Bodies: According to outer sources, Dan's giant baby form is actually a shell made from his murdered victims.
- Chekhov's Gunman: You can catch a glimpse of his face through the static of a TV near the beginning of The First Fear.
- The Corrupter: Towards Barton, Kay, and animals.
- Cute and Psycho: Kay's perspective, before The Reveal.
- The Dog Was the Mastermind: Edward, the boy who survived with Jennifer, is revealed to be Dan, the giant grotesque baby she accidentally burned back in The First Fear. Jennifernote is very shocked by The Reveal.
- Enfant Terrible: That giant fetus thing is made from all the people he killed.
- Evil Orphan: In the sequel, with his mother and father dead by then.
- Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: In the sequel, he was able to fool everybody. Including Jennifer, Helen (a trainee psychiatrist), and Barton (an actual psychiatrist). Word of God says that he was able to control Kay through his 'beautiful face'.
- Humanoid Abomination: The same applies to Dan once it's revealed that he's Edward.
- Kill It with Fire: Subverted: the fire burnt out his outer shell, but he survived.
- Madwoman in the Attic: Dan in the basement in the first game.
- Manipulative Bastard: Exploited Kay's feelings for him, manipulated Harris into becoming the decoy, and even fooled Barton.
- No-Sell: Downplayed. Dan can shrug off bullets, but hitting him with an umbrella or covering him with a bed sheet can incapacitate him.
- Not Quite Dead: He survived the first game and in the second, he can survive in a couple of endings.
- Space Master: It is suggested on the game's wiki that Bobby's Offscreen Teleportation is due to Dan's meddling with the space inside the mansion.
- Special Person, Normal Name: Who would expect a would-be Transhuman Abomination to simply be called Dan? Although, Edward sounds more fitting.
- Stalker with a Crush: In the novelization. He even says he loves Jennifer, trying to convince her of her heritage, and in the novel's Ending B, he successfully impregnates her.
- Stronger Sibling: He's notably much harder to kill than Bobby.
- Trauma-Induced Amnesia: Exploited, he's faking it.
- Villainous Crush: In the novel, as noted above in the Stalker with a Crush entry.
- Villains Out Shopping: He also goes to the library.
- Walking Spoiler: It's hard to talk about Dan without revealing everything.
Significant Persons:
SPOILER
Simon Barrows
Simon's guidebook artwork
Click here for his In-game profile
Mary's husband, and presumably the father of Bobby and Dan.
- Ax-Crazy: When Simon was locked inside the cage for a long time, he has gone crazy and if the ham was not given he will attack Jennifer and eat her.
- Driven to Madness: He was locked in a cage both so that he couldn't do anything about his sons, and so he would go mad. By the time Jennifer finds him, he's lost his grip on reality.
- The Faceless: All the
◊ official◊ artwork◊ depicts him as such, no doubt to prevent spoiling what happened to him. - I'm a Humanitarian: He will kill and eat Jennifer if she can't feed him. Ham will do... even if it is covered in insecticide.
- He Knows Too Much: Jennifer feeding him is sadly non-canon. By the time the police arrive, he is already dead — probably from starvation.
- Only Sane Man: Before going insane, he was genuinely disturbed by the evil nature of his two sons, and Mary locked him up so he couldn't stop them.
- Walking Spoiler:Simon gets mentioned later in the game and his reveal brings more info on the Barrows.
SPOILER
Dr. Walter Simpson
Jennifer holding Walter's skeleton
Jennifer's biological father, long since missing.- An Arm and a Leg: Bobby and Dan devoured his right hand seconds after being born.
- Disappeared Dad: To Jennifer.
- Dying Clue: He wrote a message about the twins' true nature before he suffocated. If Jennifer finds his corpse and the note, she won't fall for Mary's facade.
- He Knows Too Much: He delivered Bobby and Dan, and Mary locked him in an airtight room to keep him from revealing her secret.
- My Greatest Failure: ...was not killing the evil twins. He curses himself for not trying even on his dying breath.
- Posthumous Character: Naturally, with Jennifer being an orphan. The twist is that he was killed by the woman who adopted her in the first game.
