Merlot

Doctor **Merlot** (メルロー, *Merurō*), is both the fictional character and antagonist of the *Tales of RWBY* series created by Monty Oum and Monty Oum and Yoshiharu Gotanda. He is a scientist with an obsession for Monsters (like Grimm, Daemons, and Dragons) due to believing they are a superior species to humanity and desires to improve them even further with his research.

Merlot is the main antagonist of the video game *Tales of RWBY: Grimm Eclipse*, the video game tie-in for the series. He has yet to be mentioned or appear in the show itself. He makes a minor reappearance in *Tales of RWBY: Combat Ready*, starring in an objective titled "The Return of Dr. Merlot".

"*Monsters are a superior species, fascinating in their biology, their unbridled, raw aggression and lack of sentience make them the perfect vessel.*"

—Dr. Merlot, on Monsters.

## Appearance & Biography

*Voice Actor*: Dave Fennoy (English), Not Known (Japanese), Not Known (Albanian), Not Known (Arabic), Not Known (Basque), Not Known (Brazilian), Not Known (Cantonese), Not Known (Catalan), Not Known (Chinese), Not Known (Dutch), Not Known (Finnish), Not Known (French), Not Known (Galician), Not Known (German), Not Known (Greek), Not Known (Hebrew), Not Known (Hong Kong), Not Known (Hungarian), Not Known (Indonesian), Not Known (Isralian), Not Known (Italian), Not Known (Korean), Not Known (Mandarin), Not Known (Norwegian), Not Known (Polish), Not Known (Portuguese), Not Known (Romanian), Not Known (Russian), Not Known (Serbian), Not Known (Spanish), Not Known (Swedish), Not Known (Tagalog), Not Known (Thai), Not Known (Valencian), Not Known (Brazilian Portuguese), Not Known (European Spanish), Not Known (European Portuguese), Not Known (Latin American Spanish), Not Known (Latin Spanish)

### Appearance

Merlot is an old man with a robotic, glowing red eye. He also has a robotic right arm with red inner circuits.

He has disheveled gray hair, a matching mustache and beard and prominent eyebrows. He wears a gray jacket with a high collar and a red shirt underneath.

* Hair Color: Gray
* Skin Color: Not Known
* Eye Color: Not Known
* Age: Not Known
* Birthday: Not Known
* Height: Not Known
* Weight: Not Known

## Personality

Merlot is portrayed as a smug and overly confident man who believes Monsters (like even Dragons, the most powerful creatures) can be controlled to make the world better for humanity.

He is implied to have a mild god-complex as he firmly believes that nature and evolution has failed to perfect the monsters and that his science can fix it's failures, with his theme song even having him call himself the "god of the Savages".

## Relationships

### Enemies

* Lloyd Irving
* Team RWBY
	+ Ruby Rose
	+ Weiss Schnee
	+ Blake Belladonna
	+ Yang Xiao Long
* Team JNPR
	+ Jaune Arc
	+ Nora Valkyrie
	+ Lie Ren
* Qrow Branwen
* Oscar Pine
* Maria Calavera

## History

### Past

Doctor Merlot was the founder of Merlot Industries, a research and development corporation based out of the ill-fated settlement at Mountain Glenn. At some point, Merlot gained an unhealthy obsession towards the Ultimate Beasts, believing them to be a "superior species" due to their "unbridled raw aggression and lack of sentience". Said fascination led to him falling out of favor with Professor Ozpin.

Merlot was personally familiar with Ozpin, whom he called "Oz". However, they were on bad terms, with Ozpin believing that the world would have been better off had Merlot died in the disaster that he had caused. According to Ozpin, the other professors at Beacon Academy had a similarly low opinion of Merlot.

Undaunted, the corporation began performing experiments on Grimm, Daemons and other Monsters, research which Merlot believed was vital to the future of Remnant. However, when they began running out of specimens to experiment on, they started attracting even Dragons to the city in order to acquire more, with disastrous results. After the fall of Mountain Glenn, Doctor Merlot was presumed dead.

## Theme songs

* *Tales of RWBY: Grimm Eclipse*: "Lusus Naturae" - Jeff Williams.

## Etymology

* Merlot is a type of grape most notably used in making the red wine that shares its name.
* The character of Doctor Merlot may allude to the science fiction novel *The Island of Doctor Moreau* by H. G. Wells. Apart from the similarity in name, the story features an eccentric doctor living on a remote island and performing morally questionable experiments on animals. The seventh chapter of the Grimm Eclipse's campaign mode seems to support this with the level being titled "The Island of Dr. Merlot".
	+ The song "*Lusus Naturae*" is presumably written from Merlot's perspective, and goes deeper into his motivations and obsession with the Grimm. The song is written and performed by Jeff Williams and plays over the credits of *Tales of RWBY: Grimm Eclipse* and is in the *Tales of RWBY: Volume 4 Soundtrack*.

## External links

* Dr. Merlot *RWBY Wiki*
* Dr. Merlot *Villains Wiki*

## Notes & Trivia

* One of the Objective Cards in the board game *Tales of RWBY: Combat Ready* is The Return of Dr. Merlot, which when selected has the players fight a menagerie of enhanced Grimm.
* The terminals in his lab used to open doors and activate elevators have the text "Process status: 78% completed Mutant Grimm Experiments: -Creep -Beowolf -?? Beacon will fall"
* In Grimm Eclipse if the player(s) pick up at least 30 artifacts, Merlot's laugh can been heard after the ending credits.