"The Observants look at time like they are watching a parade: one thing after another, passing by in sequence right in front of them. I see the parade from above - all the twists and turns it might, or might not, take."
— Clockwork, The Ultimate Enemy
Danny Phantom protects Amity Park from a variety of ghouls and ghosts, but he can't catch 'em all, 'cause he has to deal with these superbly sly specters:
Sections by order of first appearance.
All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!
Recurring Characters
- Nicolai Technus, the ghost master of science and electrical technology, is a hilarious Large Ham who is far more dangerous than he appears. Over the series, Technus keeps Danny on his toes, constantly upgrading and adapting himself to face off with and fight Danny on an even playing field. Technus infiltrates the game Doomed and uses his powers and skills to try and win it in order to conquer the World Wide Web, coming dangerously close to victory. Eventually purging himself of his goofier quirks which were affecting his plans, Technus upgrades into the more sleek and suave "Technus 2.0". Technus 2.0 manipulates Danny and Valerie Gray into getting together in order to distract him so he can hack into and take control of her father's computer satellite, allowing him control over all the world's technology. He later exploits Danny's Secret Identity to force him to not transform in public so he can kill him with Valerie's suit and later, in a move of quick thinking, transforms Valerie into a new ghost hunter form to stall Danny as Technus 2.0 begins his digital ascension into a world wide threat.
- Desiree is a sultry ghost genie who, in life, was a harem girl whose heart was broken by the Sultan she loved, leading to her becoming twisted over time due to bitterness. Desiree grants the wishes of others and twists them to create chaos, leading to best friends Danny and Tucker coming to blows. In her return, Desiree discovers that Sam was the person who convinced Danny to go into the Ghost Portal and hence get his powers and formulates a plan to get rid of him. She manipulates monsters into being sent against Danny's crush and then has them subtly hint that Sam is behind them, causing them to come to blows and having Sam wish that they had never met which takes away Danny's powers. Desiree seeks to get him out of the way so she can use the wishes of the Shooting Star festival to give her ultimate power.
- Walker is the snarky warden of Ghost Zone's prison and a Southern-accented ghost who seeks to bring "order" to the Ghost Zone. After Danny escapes from him, Walker has his army invade the human world to flush him out. Walker sends the ghostly prisoner Wulf to sniff out all of the people Danny is close to in order to possess them and use them to manipulate public favour away from Danny by making him hated and feared by all. Framing him for the attacks, Walker, when defeated, uses the body of the Mayor to proclaim that Danny is attacking him to permanently ruin his reputation, stating "the town he lives in will now be his prison". Later kidnapping Danny's classmates, Walker plans to capture him when he arrives. A brilliant plotter with a love for sadistic jokes, Walker would end up being one of Danny's toughest opponents.
- Fright Knight is a boisterous brute of a ghost with an equally impressive physical presence as well as cunning mind. In his first appearance, Fright Knight escapes his long-time prison and faces down Danny, proving to be one of the hero's only unbeatable foes in sheer combat. Cleverly slicing apart the book that lists his only weaknesses in a fight, Fright Knight returns in service to his master Pariah Dark, laying siege to Amity Park to force Danny to hand over Pariah's ring of power lest the city be destroyed at the Knight's order. Ultimately tiring of Pariah's mistreatment, Fright Knight betrays his master and ensures his doom at Danny and Vlad's hands for his own purposes, later being shown in the Bad Future to have allied with Dark Danny and become his herald, avoiding the humiliating defeats that most other villainous ghosts were subjected to.
- Clockwork is the mysterious, manipulative master of all time, who oversees everything that has or ever will happen across the universe while tampering with it at his leisure. To test young Danny Phantom for his capacity for evil, Clockwork throws a variety of villains in his path in an attempt to prove he won't become the villainous Dark Danny. Eventually engineering the confrontation between Danny and his evil future self, Clockwork ensures Danny has proven his inner goodness before stepping in and saving his family as well as future, giving the young boy a second chance to avoid the circumstances of Dark Danny. Clockwork later allows Danny to tamper with time and endanger himself and his future once more to teach him a lesson, before still giving him a helping hand in saving his friends. Refusing to sit idly by and simply witness time passing like the Observants, Clockwork is happy to manipulate and "cheat" temporal rules to ensure the best outcome.
Specific Episodes
- "The Fright Before Christmas": The Ghost Writer is a wisecracking ghost who decides to teach Danny a lesson about how ruining Christmas for others is wrong after Danny destroys his prized poem and mocks him for it. In order to do this, The Ghost Writer traps Danny in a world where everything rhymes. Using his powers to summon and control monsters such as ghost reindeer and living Christmas tree monsters, the Ghost Writer cleverly sets about framing Danny for the destruction to the town and holiday he caused to make him into an outcast in order to to show him how ruining the holiday for others feels. When Danny returns to the Ghost Zone to defeat him, he summons all of Danny's Rogues Gallery to aid him and when they side with Danny against him due to a Christmas truce, has them mind controlled into fighting each other. Even though he's defeated, the Ghost Writer is still able to teach Danny his lesson and ends the episode being proud of him.
- "Forever Phantom": Amorpho is a shapeshifting ghost who seeks to make up for his lack of identity by disguising himself as others and playing pranks for attention. Causing all sorts of mischief through Amity Park with his tricks, Amorpho nonetheless expresses a desire to avoid pointlessly harming innocents, trying to stick with deceptions that don't seriously endanger his targets. When Danny Phantom's heroics steal his spotlight, Amorpho turns into the young half-ghost and tampers with his life, later adapting to his powers being dampened by disguising himself as Mr. Lancer to avoid suspicion. Ultimately realizing he needs to work with Danny to restore their fading ghost powers, Amorpho teams up with Phantom and outwits the Fenton parents before parting ways peacefully with Danny, nonetheless taunting him that they may very well meet again as enemies in the near future.
- "Frightmare": Nocturn is the suave, mysterious and cool "Ghost of Sleep" who sets his sights on Amity Park. Having traveled to other towns, Nocturn, along with his Sleepwalkers, have put everyone to sleep in each town so that he can increase his power by harnessing all the dreams and he is now in the process of doing the same to Danny’s town as well. First putting Danny to sleep and then in the Ghost Zone during a confrontation in order to keep him out of the way, Nocturn uses the helmets he puts on everyone once they’re asleep and dreaming in a machine where he has the dreams channeled to himself in a chamber. When Danny and Sam invade his own dream, even unconscious, Nocturn proves himself just as masterful and impressive in that he not just is able to see and control others' dreams, but can still bend his own dreams to his whims and still be totally aware while fast asleep.
