Judge Claude Frollo

**Judge Claude Frollo** is the main antagonist of *The Hunchback of Notre Dame*. He is a ruthless Parisian justice minister who, after a series of sensitive circumstances, becomes the begrudged caretaker of the deformed Quasimodo.

In addition to his political power, Frollo is a religious zealot with an intolerance to sinners. He believes Romani people (or "gypsies", as he refers to them) to be the most heinous of all malefactors, and therefor dedicates twenty years of his life to eradicating them. Frollo's self-imposed mission drives him to perform inhumane acts of violence, all the while using his loyalty to God as justification.

With a majority of the film's heavy thematic elements being directly tied to Frollo's story arc — such as religion, lust, and genocide — he is widely considered to be amongst the darkest Disney villains of all time.

## Background

### Personality

Judge Claude Frollo is a rather complex person. A religious extremist and a dogmatist, Frollo is convinced that all his actions are justified because they are God's will, though he is a cruel and arrogant government official who uses his place in power to meet his own extreme ends, even employing common thugs to enforce his interpretation of God's will while posing as "soldiers."

This makes him feared and reviled throughout the city. Frollo is especially determined to eliminate the gypsies scattered throughout Paris as their indulgence in "witchcraft and sorcery" is infectious to those around them, according to him, which therefore makes him genocidal. He is also shown to have sadism, as other than his desire to persecute sinners, he also briefly smiles when the previous Captain of the Guard prior to his promoting Phoebus to the rank was heard being whipped for having failed him.

However, despite being highly religious, he turns out to be unwillingly blasphemous calling religious people such as the Archdeacon "fools" (likely because, amid his pride, he thinks himself superior and even more religious than the Archdeacon himself), and once attempting to commit murder within the city's beloved cathedral (because he thought the said murder was God's will and that it was thus completely justified to execute God's will inside His house). Interestingly, despite his dark methods, Frollo is a somewhat forgiving person. This was evident in including "Forgiveness" as the representing word for the letter "F" during Quasimodo's reading lesson and how he forgave Quasimodo for attempting to deceive him. Another example is how the gargoyles seemed to be aware of Frollo's merciful side, as they suggested Frollo was more likely to forgive Quasimodo for his defiance than to permit him to attend the Festival of Fools.

Interestingly, while most Disney villains know that what they do is wrong (and either does not care or take pride from this), Frollo actually believes that he is a good person, making him something of a three-dimensional character as well. He repeatedly refuses to find fault within himself and is quite self-righteous, declaring himself much purer than "the common vulgar, weak, licentious crowd" and to be above the biblical doctrine that all men are equally sinful. He believes that everything he does is in the name of God, even as he attacks the cathedral of Notre Dame for the sake of catching, arresting, and executing one gypsy woman. However, at the end of "Hellfire", he does beg God for mercy on Esmeralda for what he plans to do with her and mercy on him for his plans, and part of his sparing Quasimodo was as penance for his killing his mother, so he is capable of some form of guilt in his own twisted way. On a similar note, the "mea culpa" chorus of Hellfire implies that he does to some level recognize that he was at fault, and implies a more self-loathing aspect to his nature.

Apparently, Frollo used to be celibate. However, he comes to lust for the beautiful Esmeralda, but after a moment of indecision ends up blaming his own lust for her on witchcraft and the devil rather than accept that he himself is prone to sin as everyone else. His lust drives him murderously insane, which ultimately proves to be his downfall when he pushes Quasimodo too far by almost killing Esmeralda. When he believes his lust for Esmeralda to be turning him to sin, he is partially right because it's this that makes him murderous and unfair towards the other people, arresting two families and attempting to kill one just because they wouldn't give him Esmeralda.

He is also very cruel to Quasimodo. He refuses to allow the hunchback to experience freedom and forces the young man to call him "master", and allows him to be humiliated in public without even bothering to help him, as punishment for disobeying him. Additionally, during Frollo's outbursts, Quasimodo tries to move away from him, implying that Frollo has physically abused Quasimodo in the past. Despite all that, Frollo has traces of humanity in his relationship with Quasimodo as he spent his free time eating lunch and dinner with his adoptive son, as well as his willingness to educate him, employ him as Notre Dame's bell ringer, provide for him and even gave him the means to spend time on his hobbies. He also seems to be somewhat down-to-earth, believing that stone cannot talk and attempt to get Quasimodo to believe this as well.

Furthermore, Frollo appears to be a rather stoic man, always appearing cool and collected, and only shows fear when Quasimodo overpowers him after he prepares to kill him and when he is about to fall to his death; he also shows visible fear when the many eyes of Notre Dame glare at him for murdering an innocent woman upon the cathedral steps. He rarely exhibits humor, and whenever he does, it's dry and black.

Despite his single-mindedness, Frollo's true weakness was that he couldn't feel or understand love for another person even when he tried. It was this cruelty and abusiveness that drove Quasimodo to have very little loyalty towards his master and protected the only person who ever showed the hunchback kindness from him. Nevertheless, Frollo did genuinely try to be a good father to Quasimodo while raising him, but ultimately he proved to be too full of hate and pride to be a caring parent.

Frollo also appears to have little to no sense of personalization, despite Quasimodo being the only person he refers to by name as he refers to his soldiers as "You men!" as they prepare to attack the cathedral and usually refers to Esmeralda as "the gypsy girl".

Frollo also appears to have a soft spot for animals, as he displayed a great bond with his horse and ordered his men to not harm him when Phoebus rode him in order to escape Frollo's wrath.

### Physical appearance

Frollo is an aging man defined by his wrinkled, care-worn face and thinning white hair. As the Minister of Justice and a high-ranking public official, Frollo is most frequently dressed in a black and purple robe, a purple jumpsuit, a purple and black striped hat with a red tassel attached to the bottom, and black shoulder pads with red stripes. He also wears rings on his fingers, two on the right and one on the left, with the jewels colored blue, red, and green.

### Abilities

Despite his frail appearance, Frollo possesses a considerable amount of strength, shown by the muscle in his arms and how he is able to hold his own against Quasimodo, who despite being smaller than Frollo in terms of stature is larger in terms of built and has displayed signs of superhuman strength.

## Differences from the source material

* Frollo in Victor Hugo's original *The Hunchback of Notre Dame* novel was far more compassionate, caring, and tragic, as well as a considerably more sympathetic character than the Disney film, and was 36 years old (whereas he was around 56 years old in the Disney version).
* In the book, Frollo was the archdeacon of Notre Dame rather than Paris' Minister of Justice.
* In the book, Frollo willingly adopted Quasimodo out of sympathy when his mother abandoned him as an infant (though is alluded to in the film). In the Disney version, Frollo is compelled to adopt him in order to make up for his sin.
* Frollo named Quasimodo after the Notre Dame holiday Quasimodo Sunday instead of his disfigurement.
* In the novel, Frollo taught Quasimodo to communicate via sign language after he lost his hearing. As Quasimodo was not deaf in the Disney version, he taught him to read instead.
* Frollo in the novel only becomes the villain when Esmeralda enters the picture. His lust drives him insane much like in the Disney version. In the Disney version, however, Frollo is shown to be a man with a god complex and poor morals long before he meets Esmeralda.
* In the book, Frollo tries to force himself on Esmeralda when he realizes he cannot have her. Though Quasimodo prevents him from doing so, the Paris authorities seize Esmeralda and have her hanged. When Quasimodo hears Frollo laughing at her demise, he throws him off the bell tower in rage. In the Disney version, Frollo makes no attempt at forcing himself on her, though he does give her a choice to either become his mistress or be burned alive, and he eventually falls down the cathedral and into molten lead when a stone gargoyle he stands on mysteriously breaks.
* In the book, Frollo had a younger brother named Jehan Frollo. Jehan did not appear in the Disney version.
	+ Ironically, however, Claude Frollo's characterization in the Disney version was closer to that of Jehan Frollo from the 1939 film adaptation of the book than to his namesake. Claude's villainous role in the original novel was given to his brother Jehan in the 1939 film, and so Jehan became the Chief Justice of Paris, which may have quite possibly inspired Claude to be the villainous judge/Minister of Justice in the 1996 Disney version.
* In the book, Frollo never explicitly forbade Quasimodo from leaving Notre Dame, though he did discourage him from doing so as he knew how the Parisians would react to his deformity.
* Although Frollo was biased against gypsies in the book (as most people were during the time the story takes place), he was not as extreme as he was in the Disney version.

## Trivia

* Frollo is considered as one of the (if not *the*) darkest of all of Disney´s villains, even more than his original counterpart. In fact, Disney was ***intent*** on having Frollo to be as evil and as vile as possible (as well as being blinded to the consequences of his actions), in an attempt to avert the trope "Evil is Cool," common to many Disney villains. However it did not work as despite their best efforts Frollo became a popular villain anyway, and in some fans' cases even inferred he was closer to being the good guy.
* When Frollo falls to his death, it clearly meant to symbolize that his soul is now trapped in eternal damnation in the satanic and demonic fires of Hell for all eternity as punishment for all of his actions and ending his tyranny once and for all. Ironically, his final words in life were "And He shall smite the wicked and plunge them into the fiery pit.", referring to Quasimodo and Esmerelda, but he himself was the "wicked" who was "smitten and plunged into the fiery pit".
* Frollo was voiced by Tony Jay, who also voiced Monsieur D'Arque in *Beauty and the Beast*. Tony Jay's performance as Monsieur D'Arque is what led the directors of both films to cast him as Frollo. He also voiced Shere Khan in various *Jungle Book* spin-offs from 1990-2003.
	+ Frollo was Tony Jay's most iconic voice role and he has stated that it was his favorite one of his entire career.
* Frollo's behavior strongly suggests that he is a pyromaniac.
* Based on his mannerisms, it is implied that Frollo is ambidextrous.
* In the novel, Frollo was kind and willingly took Quasimodo in when no one else would and turned into a villain when Esmeralda came into the story.
* He seemingly felt guilty for two of his sins: killing Quasimodo's mother and his lust for Esmeralda, though considering his self-righteous personality, he tries without totally believing himself to blame them on external forces such as the Devil, Esmeralda, or even God himself (whom he blames for having made Man weaker than the Devil). As already said, he doesn't fully convince himself with those lies and he still fears for his soul because of those sins, asking the Lord for mercy numerous times (though he later rejects his guilt).
* Frollo represents the deadly sins of lusts, as he lusted after Esmeralda, pride, as he considered himself above all humans and completely flawless (although Hellfire shows him begging God for mercy on both their souls, so he is at least somewhat aware of what he plans is a sin), and wrath, as he desires to punish and murder several innocent people.
* Intentionally or not, he has ironically committed himself to damn souls rather than save them. His eyes turning yellow when he was about to kill Quasimodo and Esmeralda helps symbolize his total abandonment of serving God.
* Judge Claude Frollo become Thomas and Twilight Sparkle's enemy in *Thomas and Twilight Sparkle Meets The Hunchback of Notre Dame.*

* Frollo appears in Thomas and Twilight Sparkle's Adventure Series to get revenge on Thomas, Twilight and their friends for defeating and defying him. He also now likes to serve evil, believing that it'II bring him eternal salvation under darkness and no longer cares about serving religion since he's been brought back to life, no longer fearing for his soul and abandoned serving God for the sake of doing whatever he wants with his evil plans to get rid of the gypsies.
* Frollo is considered one of Thomas and Twilight Sparkle's darkest and most evil villains.