Emperor Belos

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> I'll do anything to save humanity from evil.
>
> Emperor Belos, Hollow Mind

**Emperor Belos** is the main antagonist of the Disney Channel animated series *The Owl House*. He is the ruler of the Boiling Isles, and founder of the Coven system. He is later revealed to be **Philip Wittebane**, a witch hunter from the Human Realm bent on destroying all of witchkind.

## Background

### Personality

Belos is described as omnipotent and a megalomaniac. He is shown to be a strict and commanding figure, impatient and not tolerating failure from his subordinates. His authority is shown to be a powerful one that garners fear and respect. However, deep down, he is an insane and delusional individual who still clings to 1600s idea of witches being evil, rejecting any proof of the contrary, and holds no actual regard to any live other than his, seeing others as tools to be disposed of once they are of no use to him, usually through murder.

Throughout in the present and the past, he is clever, lying, selfish, deceiving, cunning, and slick in many ways when it comes to lying and tricking people to gain their trust and get exactly what he's after.

Belos is a very narcissistic man who refuses to see any fault in his actions. Arguably the biggest proof of that is his brother, whom he not only killed for loving a witch instead of hating them like he "is supposed to", but kept cloning in the form of Grimwalkers, wanting to create what he sees as a "better" version of Caleb, as in, more submissive to him. This narcissism also prevents him from realizing his own nature, as he sees himself as good and witches as evil in spite of all true of the contrary. He even believed and expected humanity would "reward" him for his atrocities.

He is a sociopath, refusing to realize he is a wrong in his actions, like he still believes witchkind is "evil" despite living with them for centuries, killed the previous Golden Guards, who are all Grimwalkers when they defied him and attacked Luz when she points out he is in the wrong. He is also very immature in spite of his age, as his longs about witchkind stem from the childhood games he played with his brother and tends to essentially lash out in murderous tantrums whenever things do not go his way or whereas reality does not align with his view.

As another view of his immaturity, Belos possess a very black-and-white view of the world. In his eyes, humans are purely good, and witches are not. Due to this, he ironically grew into a very poor judge of character, as he believed Luz and Caleb's pure love for magic as the Isles "corrupting" them instead of something of their own, and even believed the kind and good-hearted Luz would let innocents die if that meant saving herself and her friends merely because she is also a human, leaving him exposed to Luz' trap.

Belos is also a hypocrite. In spite of deeming magic as evil, he used magic to keep himself alive for centuries, which he learned through studies and pacts with the Collector, making him a pitch-perfect example of what a witch was seen as in the 1700s. And even though he claims his actions are for the good of mankind, he sees no issue with killing humans the second they disagree with him, even a young child like Luz.

All in all, Belos is Luz' polar opposite: An evil and selfish man who never learned to let go of his fantasies.

## Physical appearance

Emperor Belos wears a mask with two long, upward-facing horns. His eyes are hollow through the mask, creating the appearance of having no eyeballs. He wears a large cape with white and brown, as well as gold trim. Under the mask, Belos is revealed to be an elderly man with fair skin, long, ash-blond hair, cornflower-blue eyes, wrinkly lips and a notch on his left ear similar to Hunter's. Most prominently though, he has a large, greenish scar running across his face and down his neck with holes that seem to be eroding it, an indication of how severely his unknown illness is affecting his body.

## Role in the series

### Backstory

Philip first arrived on the Isles somewhere around the 1600s and lived among the witches, until he was run out of all the towns. During his time on the Isles, he endeavored to learn how to master the magic of the isles in the hopes of finding a way to return to the human realm. This would eventually lead up to him creating the portal door, (which would end up in Eda's possession centuries later) combining human tech and magic based components. In five years time, he discovered the key ingredient for his portal. A rare substance known as Titan's Blood, which can cause breaches between realms. Philip journeyed back to Eclipse Lake, which was where Titan's Blood was found and how he came to the Isles. His search was successful and treacherous.

He kept a record of his life on the isles and his quest to find a way home in a diary, which was donated to the Bonesborough Public Library before he was run out of all the towns.

Fifty years later, at the time the series began, Philip returned under the name of Belos. He declared that he alone could speak to the island, and convinced the witches of the isles that their usage of magic was wrong. His teachings came into place, his strength grew, and became Emperor of the Boiling Isles. He taught that mixing magic was wrong, and only he had that right. He created the coven system to restrict the use and knowledge of magic, and those who resisted were declared wild witches who would face harsh punishments.

### Season Two

In his years of power, Belos retreated into his castle where he spent his time planning and preparing for what he calls the "Day of Unity", which is a day that will bring the end of wild magic and create a modern utopia. As revealed in "Hunting Palismen", he is Hunter's "uncle" that took him in after claiming their family was destroyed by wild magic. At an unknown point in time, Belos gained a curse similar to the Owl Beast Curse via the use of wild magic. Combined with the demise of his and Hunter's family at the hands of wild magic, Belos developed a strong hatred for wild magic and all things considerably related to it, even forbidding his nephew from further researching the art.

In "Follies at the Coven Day Parade", he appears to the public at the end of Coven Day Parade, reveals to them about the Day of Unity in a month, and it will end all wild magic. He also reveals his face for the first to the public. Luz and everyone wonders what Belos is really planning and why he had Terra Snapdragon give Luz a message about looking forward to meeting her again.

In "Hollow Mind", it is confirmed that Belos is Philip Wittebane who has lied and deceived witches. He reveals there were many Grimwalkers he created and Hunter is the latest one. He tells Luz who he really is and is human like her. He is also a witch hunter and reveals that because he intends to destroy "evil" which is witchkind on the Day of Unity. The "curse" he suffered from was actually the souls of the palismans he ate, trying to break free from his body and expose the truth.

## Trivia

* Belos' voice actor, Matthew Rhys, considers Belos to be "misunderstood" rather than actually evil.
* The Emperor's name is misspelled as "Bellows" in the closed captioning.
* The word "belos" means "beautiful" in several Iberian and Mediterranean languages, such as Portuguese, Galician, and Corsican.

## External links

* Emperor Belos on The Owl House Wiki

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pt-br:Imperador Belos

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