The Assassin's Creed media franchise, which primarily consists of a series of open-worldaction-adventurestealth video games published by Ubisoft, features an extensive cast of characters in its historical fiction and science fiction-based narratives. The series also encompasses a wide variety of media outside of video games, including novels, comic books, board games, animated films, a live-action film, and an upcoming Netflix television series. The series features original characters intertwined with real-world historical events and figures, and is centered on a fictional millennia-old struggle for peace between the Assassin Brotherhood, inspired by the real-life Order of Assassins, who fight for peace and free will and embody the concept of chaos; and the Templar Order, inspired by the real-life Knights Templar, who desire peace through control over all of humanity, and embody the concept of order. A convention established by the first game involves the player experiencing the lives of these characters as part of a simulation played by a protagonist from the modern day, using technology known as the Animus developed by Abstergo Industries, a corporate front of the Templar Order in the modern era.
The first five games feature modern-day protagonist Desmond Miles, a direct descendant of their respective lead characters who are members of familial lines that had sworn an allegiance to the Assassins. By exploring his ancestors' memories, Desmond searches for powerful artifacts called "Pieces of Eden", which are connected to the Isu, a precursor race that created humanity to serve them and went extinct following a catastrophic event tens-of-thousands of years ago. However, they left behind clues to guide humanity to their technology, which could be used to prevent the same disaster from happening in the future. Following the events of Assassin's Creed III, Abstergo develops a more advanced version of the Animus technology called the Helix, which can explore the genetic memories of any historical individual using their DNA without relying on the user being a direct descendant of them. From Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag to Assassin's Creed Syndicate, the player assumes control of unnamed research analysts working for the entertainment branch of Abstergo or the Assassin Brotherhood; the analysts are intended to be the embodiment of the player in the Assassin's Creed universe.[1] From Assassin's Creed Origins to Assassin's Creed Valhalla, the modern-day protagonist is Layla Hassan, an ambitious former Abstergo employee who developed a portable version of Animus technology and is eventually recruited to the Brotherhood.
This article describes major historical and fictional characters that appear in the video games and the 2016 live-action film adaptation. Most games tend to feature standalone or self-contained stories told within a fictionalized version of real-world historical civilizations, with at least one lead character from that setting and time period. However, some games are more interconnected than others, as is the case with the "Ezio Trilogy", consisting of Assassin's Creed II, Brotherhood, and Revelations. These games feature interconnected characters and plot points, so to avoid listing a character multiple times, this article organizes character by their first or most significant appearance and describes their entire history there.
Fictional character
Desmond Miles (13 March 1987 – 21 December 2012) is a fictional character from Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed video game series. He is the protagonist of five Assassin's Creed installments, with his journey uniting the frame story of the first five installments. Desmond has also appeared in smaller capacity in subsequent games in the series, as well as various spin-off media. He is voiced by actor Nolan North,[3][4] and modeled after Canadian fashion model Francisco Randez.[5] According to several video game journalists and authors, Desmond's character is meant to represent a form of transcendence symbolically from the necessity of the human body.
In the franchise, Desmond is a descendant of a long line of important characters, including Adam,[6][7] Aquilus,[8][9][10]Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad,[11]Ezio Auditore da Firenze,[12][13][14]Edward Kenway,[15][16]Haytham Kenway,[17][18][19] and Ratonhnhaké:ton / Connor, most of whom were members of the Assassin Brotherhood, a fictional organization inspired by the real-life Order of Assassins that is dedicated to safeguarding peace and freedom.[20][21][22] Born into the Brotherhood, Desmond is trained as an Assassin from a young age, but his desire to lead a normal life eventually prompts him to run away from home and cut ties with the Assassins. However, he is eventually kidnapped by the Templar Order, the Assassins' mortal enemies, who force him into a machine called the Animus that allows Desmond to experience the genetic memories of his ancestors.[23][24] In doing so, the Templars hope to locate powerful artifacts called Pieces of Eden and enslave all of humanity. Desmond manages to escape and, after accepting his Assassin heritage, rejoins the Brotherhood to help them stop the Templars. In the process, he learns that he is destined to save humanity from an impending solar flare, and continues to explore his ancestors' memories to find the technology of a precursor race called the Isu, who were wiped out by a similar disaster.[25][26]
Critical reception of the character has been mixed. Many reviewers and video game journalists criticized Desmond as a dull and uninteresting protagonist, whose story arc does not match the quality of the historical plots featured in each of the games, though more positive commentary focused on North's performance and Desmond's character development. The decision to have Desmond killed off in Assassin's Creed III also proved controversial, as both critics and players noticed a significant decrease in the importance of the series' modern-day storyline after his death. Nevertheless, Desmond is considered to be a significant part of the franchise's identity.
According to his voice actor Nolan North, the original plan for Desmond was that he would feature in six games, acquiring the skills of his Assassin ancestors to become "The Ultimate Assassin",[28] and at some point would be able to time-travel between different time periods. North became greatly interested in the concept but was scrapped. Adding upon this, North commented that he saw Desmond as a boring protagonist who ultimately had no direction to go forward, describing the character as "a fork in the road". Desmond has been defined as a MacGuffin, namely that "he exists to move the story forward, but he provides little substance."
Following the release of Assassin's Creed III and the conclusion of Desmond's storyline, lead designer Steve Master said: "What we're trying to do is bring some finality to Desmond's story. To actually wrap up what you've opened and experienced with him." Jean Guesdon, the creative director of the series, later said that Desmond is an important character in the Assassin's Creed series, and that despite his death, he would continue to play an important role in the franchise.[29]
In 2016, Michael Fassbender starred in and co-produced a film adaptation of the series, titled Assassin's Creed.[30] Initially thought to be cast as Desmond, Ubisoft later stated that Fassbender would play a new character, named Callum "Cal" Lynch.[31][32]
In the original Assassin's Creed, Desmond is introduced as a former Assassin leading a simple life as a bartender in New York City. In order to hide his identity, he lives under assumed names and uses only cash to protect himself. Despite this, he is eventually tracked down and captured by Abstergo Industries, a company used as a front by the modern-day Templar Order. Once inside Abstergo's facility in Rome, Desmond is forced to enter the Animus, a machine that allows him to relive the memories of his ancestors stored in his DNA. The Animus translates these memories into a three-dimensional environment, where Desmond retains some degree of control, but must remain synchronized with his ancestors' exact actions at any given moment or else he risks being kicked out of the Animus. Under the watch of Abstergo's lead scientist, Dr. Warren Vidic, and his assistant Lucy Stillman, Desmond is instructed to relive the memories of Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad (1165–1257; Syria), to help Abstergo find specific information they are looking for, which Vidic refuses to disclose.[33][34]
After recovering the information sought by Abstergo—a map showing the locations of various Pieces of Eden, ancient artifacts of great power created by a Precursor race—Vidic's superiors order Desmond to be killed. Lucy's quick thinking saves him, as she persuades Vidic to keep him alive until they know he is of no further use. Upon returning to his room, Desmond, suffering from the "Bleeding Effect" due to prolonged exposure to the Animus, discovers he has gained one of Altaïr's abilities: Eagle Vision.[35][36][37] This allows him to discern friend from foe and to read cryptic messages written on walls and floors by Subject 16, the previous Animus test subject that Lucy and Vidic occasionally mention.[25]
Assassin's Creed II continues from where the first game left off, as Desmond escapes from the Abstergo facility with the help of Lucy, revealed to be an undercover Assassin. After being taken to the Assassins' hideout, Desmond meets the rest of Lucy's team—historian Shaun Hastings and technician Rebecca Crane—and enters the Animus 2.0, built by Rebecca, to be quickly trained as an Assassin via the Bleeding Effect. Desmond begins reliving the memories of Ezio Auditore da Firenze (1459–1524; Italy), his ancestor from the Renaissance, in order to graft his skills and abilities onto himself.[38] After successfully navigating Ezio's early memories, Desmond is extracted from the Animus to avoid the mental degradation that Subject 16 suffered as a consequence of the Bleeding Effect. Soon after, Desmond involuntarily relives a memory of Altaïr while outside of the Animus, as a result of the Bleeding Effect.[25]
After spending more time in Animus 2.0, Desmond begins to adjust to his newly developed skills and becomes a master freerunner and expert fighter, just like his ancestors. The last segment of Ezio's memories brings an astonished Ezio and Desmond to a futuristic chamber underneath the Sistine Chapel, where they are met by a hologram of Minerva, a member of the Precursor race known as the Isu that created humanity and the Pieces of Eden. Minerva addresses Desmond by name, knowing that he is reliving Ezio's memories, and talks about a cataclysm which wiped out most of her race thousands of years ago, and which is set to occur again by the end of that year, if Desmond does not prevent it. Desmond is then pulled from the Animus as Abstergo discovers the Assassins' hideout, forcing the team to escape to a new hideout.[25]
In Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Desmond, Lucy, Shaun, and Rebecca arrive at Monteriggioni, where they set up a safe house in the Villa Auditore's sanctuary. Desmond re-enters the Animus 2.0 to continue reliving Ezio's memories and discover what he did with the Apple of Eden he had obtained, hoping to use the artifact to defeat the Templars and stop the cataclysm Minerva warned him about. After learning Ezio hid the Apple under the Colosseum, Desmond and the other Assassins head there to retrieve it. Desmond takes the Apple, but through it another Isu named Juno takes control of his body and forces him to stab Lucy, saying that she would have betrayed him if he allowed her to accompany him any further. Desmond then falls into a coma and is placed back into the Animus by two unknown Assassins in a bid to preserve his consciousness.[25]
In Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Desmond awakens within the Black Room, a safe mode area for the Animus. In the Black Room's Animus Island, he meets the digital construct of Subject 16, Clay Kaczmarek, who tells Desmond that he must find a "Synch Nexus", a memory that links him with Altaïr and Ezio, so that the Animus can reintegrate his shattered subconscious and awaken him from his coma. While in this state, Desmond can hear conversations between Shaun, Rebecca, and his father, William Miles, who are concerned about his state, and access five memory sequences that detail his own life prior to his abduction by Abstergo. In these sequences, Desmond reminisces of his time on "the Farm", where he grew up in secrecy among other Assassins, and his father's harsh training, which prompted him to run away on his 16th birthday, due to not wanting to live the life his parents had chosen for him. Eventually, he moved to New York, where he got a job at a high-end bar, but always regretted not being able to properly say goodbye to his parents. Following his abduction, he blamed himself for not taking his parents' warnings and training more seriously. In the present, Desmond realizes that his easiest days are now behind him and finally accepts his role as an Assassin.[25]
When the Animus begins to delete Animus Island to get rid of excess data. Clay sacrifices himself to prevent Desmond from being deleted, but not before transferring his own genetic memories onto him. Eventually, Desmond is able to reach the Synch Nexus, which allows him to communicate with the Isu Jupiter, who directs him to find the Grand Temple so that he may use the technology inside to save humanity from the solar flare set to hit the Earth in several weeks. Following this, Desmond awakens from his coma to find Shaun, Rebecca, and William next to him, and simply states that he knows what they have to do.[39]
The Lost Archivedownloadable content for Revelations expands upon Desmond's time in the Black Room, as he involuntarily experiences Clay's memories prior to the latter's death. Through these memories, he learns that Lucy was in fact a double agent for the Templars, and that his escape from Abstergo was staged as part of "Project Siren." In reality, Vidic had ordered Lucy to extract Desmond to a place where he would feel safe so that he would willingly enter the Animus and facilitate the search for Ezio's Apple of Eden, which Abstergo planned to send to space via satellite in an effort to enslave humanity. However, this plan came to a halt when Juno forced Desmond to kill Lucy.[25]
In Assassin's Creed III, Desmond arrives at the Grand Temple, located in a cave system in New York, and accesses it using Ezio's Apple of Eden. With the help of his father and friends, Desmond relives the memories of his ancestors Haytham Kenway (1725–1781; Kingdom of Great Britain) and Ratonhnhaké:ton / Connor (1756–unknown; Colonial America) using the new Animus 3.0, hoping to find the Key to the Temple's Central Vault, where the solution to stopping the solar flare is located. During his breaks in-between Animus sessions, Desmond explores the Temple and speaks with Juno, who tells him more of her race's history and their failed attempts to survive the Great Catastrophe. The Assassins also search for Isu batteries to power the Grand Temple and allow them to access the Central Vault, with Desmond being sent to retrieve them due to his superior skills. Desmond successfully retrieves two batteries from Manhattan and São Paulo, where he has run-ins with the Templar Daniel Cross, dispatched by Abstergo to capture him. As the date of the solar flare approaches, William volunteers to retrieve the final battery so Desmond can locate the Key, but is captured by Abstergo and taken to their Rome facility in an attempt to get Desmond to surrender his Apple of Eden. Instead, Desmond storms the facility to rescue his father, killing Cross and Warren Vidic and reconciling with William in the process.[25]
After retrieving the Key, Desmond and his allies enter the Central Vault, discovering a pedestal. The holograms of Minerva and Juno then appear, with the former warning Desmond not to touch the pedestal, as it would kill him and release Juno, who was imprisoned in the Temple to prevent her from conquering humanity. In response, Juno shows Desmond a vision of what will happen if the solar flare hits the Earth: although Desmond will become a messiah-like figure to other survivors and will be revered as a god after his death, future generations will manipulate his legacy for their personal gain. After several moments of consideration, Desmond decides to release Juno, believing humanity has a better chance at fighting her than rebuilding society after the solar flare. As the others leave the Temple, Desmond touches the pedestal, which frees Juno and activates a protective shield around the Earth that stops the solar flare, at the cost of his own life.