The Ace Attorney series is all about investigating crime scenes and dishing out court room justice in order to bring the vile criminals of the world to justice. As such, you’d expect the series to really bring the big guns (so to speak) when it comes to the scum and villainy you’ll have to take down with the legal system. After all, Ace Attorney games are visual novels. Excellent storytelling is about all you can do in that framework.
Thankfully, Ace Attorney does not disappoint. It’s villains are some of the best in gaming. What follows is a brief breakdown of my favorite criminal mastermind from each of the games in the series that I have played. Phoenix and friends really have their work cut out taking down these foes!
(Dahlia Hawthorne, the best Ace Attorney villain, will not be in this article. She’ll be getting her own entire article in the future.)
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney ~ Police Chief Damon Gant
This man is like the picture perfect definition of a genial old man (if an incredibly tall, buff, and imposing old man). He even, upon first appearance, acts just as friendly as his smile would indicate. He pals around with the courtroom judge, cracks jokes and creates silly nicknames, and generally doesn’t take himself too seriously. Of course, this is all a calculated act. Gant wants to be disarming, because the sudden switch from silly to serious is all hte more shocking for it.
In just the blink of an eye, Gant morphs from complimentary to condescending. From teasing to threatening. It’s honestly pretty scary to see it in action, and Gant has the power to back up his intimidation. He’s the chief of police for the entire district, so he’s got the police and detective force under his thumb. He’s also, due to an incident from the past, blackmailed the chief prosecutor Lana Skye into following his every order. So, he’s got the most powerful and prominent half of the legal system in his pocket too.
All of this is to say that Gant is an extremely powerful man who exercises his authority over everyone around him. If he was just a mustache-twirling baddie, he’d already be cool, but he’s even more than that. Gant isn’t a nefarious criminal…he’s trying to STOP criminals, no matter the cost. His iron-fisted grip on the law is so that no criminal can ever escape justice again, and he doesn’t particularly care if his methods are questionable if it gets the job done. Blackmailing Lana, forging evidence, and manipulating others is, in his mind, all in the name of justice.
It’s rare to face off against a “lawful good gone wrong” type of villain in Ace Attorney, and Gant delivers on all accounts. His theme song is iconic, his mannerisms are hilarious, and his lengthy but exhilarating courtroom defeat is the stuff of legends.
Ace Attorney: Justice for All ~ Ini Miney
Ini Miney starts off the second case of this game as a seemingly ditzy airhead wholly unrelated to the murder of a famous doctor. Of course, Ace Attorney fans know that, when in doubt, point the finger of accusation at the least likely suspect. As your investigation continues, evidence and witness testimony slowly begins to pile up in opposition of the confoundingly dumb valley girl. The red head plays innocent until the very end, however, so the only place to settle things is in court.
It’s the final trial of the case wherein Ini really begins to shed her entertainingly stupid demeanor for something much more sinister…and tragic. As you pick apart her testimony, her façade of ditziness crumbles to reveal the frustrated, temperamental, haughty woman beneath. You come to find out that her twin sister, Mimi Miney, once worked for the doctor who was murdered, and Mimi lost her life in a car crash a year back. Ini was in the crash too, but survived after intensive surgery care.
But…you realize that Ini didn’t have a driver’s license. Mimi did. You also manage to piece together that the survivor of the car crash was on the driver’s side, not passenger side like the woman standing before you attempts to claim. The truth hits the player like a truck. The woman standing before you is not Ini. It’s Mimi. Ini died in the car crash.
Catching Mimi in the lie, you lay down the facts and she breaks, confessing to the murder of the doctor. She tells how horribly he treated his staff, and in particular, her. One night, after the doctor forced her to work for an eighteen hour shift, a delirious Mimi accidentally overdosed a room full of patients, killing them all. Fired from her job and sentenced to a court hearing, Mimi sank into a depression that culminated in passing out at the wheel while driving with her sister. They crashed, and yet cruel fate claimed innocent Ini’s life and left Mimi to suffer. Mimi killed the doctor out of despair-induced revenge.
Mimi’s story is heartbreakingly tragic, and still sticks with me to this day.
Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations ~ Luke Atmey
Switching gears to a completely tonally brighter villain, we have the goofy gentleman detective, Luke Atmey. This dashing detective cannot go a single sentence without talking about how great he is, or how great his rivalry with the infamous thief Mask*DeMasque is. Anyone who even halfway reads between the lines can get that this guy is pretty shady, even though he insists that he will perfectly guard a valuable museum’s sacred treasure.
Then, shockingly, the museum is robbed by Mask*DeMasque and the treasure is stolen. Blame falls on your client, who dresses like Mask*DeMasque and loudly proclaims that they are, indeed, the modern Robin Hood. However, the actual evidence tells a different story, leading you on to Luke Atmey instead. Confronting the dapper detective in court, you tear apart his feeble lies and baseless claims, before finally proving that he is his own greatest enemy. He is Mask*DeMasque, the thief, and he is arrested.
Case closed…except for the news that a body has been found on the opposite side of town, and the murder occurred approximately at the same time as the thievery. Now, the only apparent guilty party is your client. Uh oh.
Suffice it to say, the end of the long road of investigation and court reasoning produces the truth: your client is Mask*DeMasque, and Luke Atmey is the murderer. How? Luke is leagues smarter than he appears, and fabricated a replica costume of the thief, and doctored video footage of the stolen museum treasure, in order to be found guilty of the theft. Therefore, he couldn’t be found guilty of the murder if he was already convicted of a robbery.
He expertly played the court to trade a hefty prison sentence for a veritable slap on the wrist, and almost got away with it. Genius!
Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney ~ Kristoph Gavin
Kristoph Gavin is the epitome of petty. A man obsessed with the idea of perfection and total control of the courtroom, he sought exclusively high profile cases in which to work his defense attorney magic. He lined one case up, and to ensure his swift victory, forged evidence in his favor (while simultaneously blackmailing and poisoning the ones who assisted in the forgery creation). One can imagine, then, that he nearly blew his lid when the prospective client backed out and asked for Kristoph’s rival attorney instead: Phoenix Wright.
Angered, bitter, and desperate to hide his forgery scheme, Kristoph slipped the fake evidence into Phoenix’s case file, which led to Phoenix accidentally setting himself up to take the fall. Disbarred, Phoenix was left to wallow while Kristoph rose unopposed as the de facto defense attorney of the district. In the subsequent years, he kept obsessive tabs on everyone roped into his forgery scheme, silencing some and manipulating others.
Eventually, his antics catch up to him in the present day, as his new protégé, Apollo Justice, and a disheveled Phoenix reveal all his secrets in court. Kristoph is sent off to jail, but it takes the entire rest of the game to uncover the full depths of Kristoph’s depravity. In the final act of the game, Apollo and Phoenix unveil every bit of testimony that condemns Kristoph, and a newly formed jury system finds the man guilty on all accounts, even though no true decisive evidence exists.
Kristoph, unable to handle the imperfection of everyday people dictating law in a courtroom, breaks down into hysterical, maniacal laughter. His perfection is tarnished once and for all, in what has to be the most “anime” villain defeat in this series.
Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies ~ Marlon Rimes
Marlon Rimes takes a page from Mimi’s book, and showcases the much more tragic side to death and revenge, when compared to some of the cartoonishly vile baddies in this series.
A relatively normal guy, Marlon dated one Azura Summers, a famous orca trainer at the Shipshape Aquarium. He loved her dearly, and was horrified when, while watching one of her live shows, Azura suddenly fell into the pool of water. She was dragged around by her orca training partner for minutes before being rescued, whereupon she was immediately declared dead by the paramedics. Distraught, Marlon swore revenge on the orca, who was not put down for the incident.
Unfortunately, in his attempts to kill the orca, Marlon only furthered his own despair, and the despair of those around him. He took a job as an animal feeder at the aquarium, and during a routine pool cleaning he took his chance to kill the orca. The amicable and friendly aquarium owner, Jack Shipley, discovered the scheme and rushed to stop Marlon, only to end up slipping into the drained pool. Though Marlon caught Jack’s wrist, he couldn’t pull him to safety, and Jack fell to his death.
Worse still, Marlon’s good friend Sasha Buckler, an innocent orca trainer who was Azura’s protégé, is blamed for the crime. Marlon is forced to appear in court and do everything he can to take the blame off of Sasha and put it onto the orca, while keeping his own involvement secret. THEN, he finds out that Azura actually died of a heart attack before even falling into the pool, and the orca had nothing to do with her passing (instead it had thought it was playing with her, like they usually practice). Marlon’s revenge plan was against an innocent orca all along, and one man died and one woman was accused of guilt in the process.
Defeated, Marlon admits it all. It’s a surprisingly touching confession, and culminates in Marlon being a memorably conflicted person. You really feel bad for him, and it’s great to know that he’s only sentenced to six months of light punishment and rehab, before he’s able to rejoin the aquarium staff. A happy ending for a case criminal in Ace Attorney! What a world!
Ace Attorney: Spirit of Justice ~ Roger Retinz
This Robert Downey Jr-looking tv producer plays the role of lovable scumbag to perfection. He’s that perfect villain that you just love to hate. You want to punch his smarmy mug every time he shows up, but you also can’t help but laugh at his biting sarcasm and flinch at his genuinely threatening cunning. It helps that he’s also one of the smartest antagonists in the entire series, and nearly gets away with the perfect crime.
See, Retinz is actually The Great Mr. Reus, a once famous magician who faded into obscurity after a falling out from his past. The world-famous Troupe Gramarye took him in as an additional member to their magic group, but after he bungled a reckless trick and defied the troupe master’s order to stay home, he was kicked out of the group. Despite the incident being nearly entirely his fault, Retinz proceeded to let a deep, violent grudge against Troupe Gramrye fester inside of him. He swore revenge, no matter how long it took.
Decades later, and he’d made a name for himself as a bigshot tv producer, the Mr. Reus persona gone from the public knowledge. Meanwhile, the only surviving Troupe Gramarye member was Trucy Wright, the bubbly magic girl with a penchant for astounding amazement and her unfaltering smile. Slowly but surely, Retinz wormed his way into signing a contract with her to sponsor a full stage performance featuring her. The single caveat: if the performance is ruined by the fault of the star (read: Trucy), then the star will be forced to repay damages up to several millions dollars.
Predictably, the show goes wrong, and a fellow magician assisting Trucy is murdered. The evidence points solely to Trucy, so she’s off to court with you by her side. However, because of the contract clause, all of Trucy’s belongings (including the attorney agency the whole series is about) hangs in the balance! The stakes are high, and not a single shred of evidence points to another killer…least of all, Retinz.
See, this is because Retinz’ murder was beautifully simple. He merely stuck a sword in the ceiling of the auditorium, so that the other magician would impale himself on it during a flying trick. Meanwhile, Retinz was across town overseeing a television broadcast, and thus established an infallible alibi!
In the end, it was unforeseeable circumstances that do him in. A flaw in the execution of the plan necessitated Retinz making an appearance at the crime scene after the body was discovered, and he had to tamper with the evidence to finalize Trucy’s suspicion. A single forgotten hand print does him in, alongside witness testimony. Even still, Retinz goes down swinging, proclaiming that Troupe Gramarye must burn, and that Trucy is a talentless sham.
Truly scum…but entertainingly so!
Ace Attorney Investigations: Shih-na/Calisto Yew
It can’t be said that Ace Attorney doesn’t strive for diversity when it comes to their villains. Up to this point in the series, we’ve had to take down corrupt politicians, twisted authority figures, sadistic celebrities, demented serial killers, and manipulative backstabbers. What we HAVEN’T come across yet is an international smuggling ring, and their secretive, inscrutable, and infinitely mysterious and callous enforcer. Talk about a jump in stakes, huh?
Shih-na is a woman wholly devoted to her cause, which happens to be fulfilling the orders and protecting the secrecy of the smuggling ring no matter the cost. To that end, she adopts the persona of Calisto Yew, a fictional sister to one Cece Yew, a recently deceased office clerk who was killed by the smuggling ring for almost uncovering their secrets. Calisto feigns emphatic loss over Cece’s death, and buddies up to the prosecutor and investigator responsible for putting the smuggling ring hitman behind bars.
She maintains her Calisto disguise for years, forming a partnership with the prosecutor, Byrne Faraday, and the detective, Tyrell Badd. However, its all in service of covering up the smuggling rings actions and disposing of any potential evidence and witnesses. When Faraday comes close to figuring out the truth, Calisto murders him without hesitation. She dresses up the crime scene to frame someone else, but is eventually defeated in court by Miles Edgeworth, the main character of this series.
Calisto doesn’t go down easy. Prepared for the worst outcome, she pulls a gun on Edgeworth and Badd, and flees from the courtroom, escaping. This is groundbreaking for an Ace Attorney game to have the villain get away at the end of the case. Poor little Kay Faraday is left fatherless thanks to Calisto…BUT, there’s still the final case of the game.
Years later, and the protagonists meet Calisto again, this time in the guise of Interpol agent Shih-na. A grown-up Kay is framed for the death of a man named Manny Coachen, and also for setting a foreign embassy on fire. As the heroes investigate to prove Kay’s innocence, all of the buried truths come to light. Shih-na is actually Calisto, Calisto is actually an enforcer of the smuggling ring, and she is the one behind nearly all the events of the game.
Confronted with her father’s killer, Kay snaps and rushes to hit her. Seizing her chance, Shih-na grabs Kay and uses her as a hostage to buy time for her second escape in this game. Thankfully, Detective Badd makes his heroic entrance and shoots Shih-na in the leg, subduing her and rescuing Kay. She’s dragged away to prison denying nothing, and relishing in the chaos of the night. Kay is left to grapple with her own unresolved emotional state.
Shih-na/Calisto is one of the most personal main villains in the series, and one of the most unpredictable and tenacious. Point of fact, the player never even discovers her real name or backstory, as both “Shih-na” and “Calisto” are merely covers. She’s an agent of mayhem and mystery, and she’s awesome!
Ace Attorney Investigations: Prosecutor’s Path ~ Simon Keyes
Ace Attorney is no stranger to introducing seemingly nice characters and then revealing that they are really anything but. Simon Keyes is a great example of this trope in action. He spends the majority of the game hanging around with his pet monkey (he works at the local circus), and putting up a meek but friendly façade. In truth, he’s a cunning and brilliant chessmaster, playing everyone around him like fiddles in his quest for revenge against the world.
Simon found himself in an orphanage from an early age, thanks to his cruel and neglectful father. Then, by chance, the front yard of the orphanage became the site of an international incident as a foreign president was murdered by a group of conspirators. A witness to the murder, Simon was caught by the conspirators and mercilessly abused and interrogated for years, until he finally managed to escape. For a few more years, he wandered aimless and alone.
He eventually found employment at the circus, and using the circus as a covered, made contact with prison inmates during monthly animal shows. The one thing he wanted above all was revenge against everyone he felt wronged him. The conspirator group who abused him as a child. His former best friend when he was very young. And, as one might expect, his father.
Over the course of the game, Miles Edgeworth and Kay Faraday solve case after case, dismantling corruption in the city and sending criminals off to jail. It’s only near the finale of the game that you realize the criminals you caught WERE the conspirators, the former best friend, and the father. Simon strung Edgeworth, the player, and his enemies along like helpless puppets in his grand chess match, all while he sat back and watched with satisfaction. Interestingly enough, Simon’s revenge is pretty clean, and technically does more good for the world than bad.
Even then, Simon was forced to show his hand by personally killing one of the conspirators, which in turn created a paper trail that finally led Edgeworth and friends to Simon. His machinations revealed, Simon fought to the very end to maintain his innocence, but was no match for Edgeworth. Checkmate.
Professor Layton vs Phoenix Wright ~ High Inquisitor Darklaw
Last but certainly not least is High Inquisitor Darklaw, the chief enforcer of justice in the medieval town of Labyrinthia. The town is a quaint, joyous place by day, but a dark inferno of terror by night. Trapped in the old ways, the citizens are convinced that witches still exist, and so an elite group of inquisitors was established to find and burn these witches at the pyre. Darklaw is the leader of that group, and chillingly effective at her job.
But…then the seams of Labyrinthia began to tear, and the truth of the town comes to light.
The entire town is actually a modern day research facility that tests the hypnotic effects of a chemical compound in the water beneath the town’s ground. All of the citizens have merely been hypnotized into believing they live in the medieval era, and the witch trials are also a sham. Despite the fiery theatrics, the victims actually survive the flames and are instead indoctrinated into a secret group led by Darklaw herself. That group helps to keep up the charade of witches and magic so the research trial can continue.
It STILL isn’t as simple as that, however. Unlike every other citizen of the town, Darklaw knows of the water’s chemical effects and thus does not drink it, retaining her memories.
She recalls the single event that everyone else has forgotten: years ago, when the research trial first began, a massive fire broke out in town. A young Darklaw, then known by her real name of Eve Belduke, was playing with her best friend, Espella. While playing, Espella playfully rang a giant bell that disables the senses of any who hear it. Unbeknownst to its power, she and Eve passed out safely atop the bell tower…while the citizens of the town below slept through their own burning.
The only survivors were Espella, Eve, and the two girl’s fathers. Espella’s father quickly covered up the incident and brought in new willing participants for the hypnosis trial, while Eve’s father was wracked with guilt. That guilt eventually culminated in Eve’s father committing suicide, an act which drove Eve to frustrated despair. Blaming Espella and her father for her father’s death, and the covered-up death of the townspeople, she set out on her mission.
By the time the game has ended, Darklaw has, in essence, won. The secret of Labyrinthia is revealed to all, and the hidden deaths during the great fire brought to light. Darklaw is seconds away from bringing justice down on Espella for her unintentional childhood act, when a last chance testimony, piece of evidence, and logical conclusion unveils the final twist. It was Eve herself who rang the bell all those years ago, and she’d mentally blocked the memory from her mind and shifted the blame to Espella instead. On top of that, her father and Espella’s father knew, and had set up the entire lie to keep Eve sane and safe.
Overcome with grief over her entire revenge being for nothing, and the revelation of the love others had been showing to her all along, Eve repents from her dark vengeance and manages to save Espella from jumping to her death (as the poor girl had been about to commit suicide out of perceived guilt). She and Espella repair their friendship, and the incident of the great fire is addressed as the horrible but coincidental freak act of nature that it is.
Darklaw/Eve is an amazingly sympathetic antagonist, and the first main villain in the entire Ace Attorney series to never (maliciously) take a single life. Her redemption feels truly earned.
Ace Attorney villains never cease to amaze, and what I’ve talked about here is only a brief smattering of the vile and tragic goodness you can find within these oft-overlooked games. If you ever get a chance to give Ace Attorney a try, definitely take that opportunity!
But hey, that’s just my opinion!
(Stay tuned for an announcement in Saturday’s article, detailing the future of this blog)
The Contrarian Corner 