Frollo

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> I'll find her! I'll find her if I have to burn down all of Paris!
>
> Frollo on his obsession for Esmeralda

> **And He shall smite the wicked, and plunge them into the fiery pit!**
>
> Frollo's most famous quote, as well as his blasphemous last words before suffering his very ironic demise.

**Judge Claude Frollo**, also simply known as **Frollo**, is the main antagonist of Disney's 34th full-length animated feature film Template:W, which is based on the 1831 French novel of the same name by the late Victor Hugo.

He is the religious Minister of Justice in the city of Paris who uses his position to enrich himself and persecute those he considers inferior, especially the city's Romani, as they are called and they call themselves in the film. He is the also the abusive ex-foster father and arch-nemesis of Quasimodo.

He was voiced by the late Template:W, who also voiced Lord Dregg in *Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles*, Megabyte in *ReBoot*, Baron Mordo in *Spider-Man: The Animated Series*, The Elder God in *Legacy of Kain* and Machestro in *Xyber 9: New Dawn*.

## What Makes Him Pure Evil?

* He devoted his life to a genocidal crusade against the Romani people (otherwise known as the Gypsies), persecuting them on account of their ethnicity and race, due to supremacist and racist beliefs that they are outside the order he wishes to impose.
* He chased and then killed Quasimodo's mother in the prologue merely under the suspicion that she was running off with stolen goods.
	+ Even worse, he killed her right on the steps of the Notre Dame cathedral, which was extremely blasphemous to his religion.
	+ Prior to killing Quasimodo's mother, he had two other Romani (one of them happening to be Quasimodo's father) and their boat captain arrested and taken to the Palace of Justice, most likely to have them executed.
* He was immediately disgusted by Quasimodo's appearance upon seeing him and attempted to drown him in a nearby well, only to be stopped by the Archdeacon, who reminded him that the eyes of Notre Dame are watching him.
* He adopted Quasimodo in order to make up for the sin of killing his mother, not out of any actual remorse, guilt or regret, but due to fear of God's wrath. He also claimed that the child would one day be useful to his schemes as another reason to raise him.
	+ And even then he's far from a decent parent, keeping him in isolation for 20 years, within that duration emotionally and psychologically abusing him into poor self-esteem and the belief that he's a monster and forcing Quasimodo to address him as “master”, not saving him from the crowd torturing him as punishment for disobedience and prevents Esmeralda from freeing Quasimodo (while he wasn't wrong that people would bully Quasi for his appearance, this still doesn't excuse Frollo's actions), and attacking him the day after he helps Esmeralda escape the cathedral.
* He casually has a man (presumably his former captain of the guard) tortured (probably to death, and presumably for his failure to hunt the Romani) with a whip, displaying clear sadism.
* While hiring Captain Phoebus as his new captain of the guard, he openly announced that he spent the last 20 years rounding up and executing more Romani citizens. He also stated that the Romani citizens have a safe haven underneath the streets of Paris (known as the Court of Miracles), and that he intends to find the hideout and execute all of the Romani civilians living there.
	+ To that end, he spotted several ants crawling on a loose slab of the Palace of Justice, and used them as an example of how he handles the Romani population. Upon pulling out the loose slab (which reveals a large nest of ants), Frollo flips the slab upside down and shoves it back into place, crushing all of the ants to death and cementing the point of what he plans to do to the Romani population.
* He is misogynistic and he's also lustful at the same time towards Esmeralda. Upon seeing Esmeralda defend Quasimodo from the cruelty of the crowd, Frollo orders for her to be arrested, forcing Esmeralda to head over to the cathedral for sanctuary. Despite not being able to arrest Esmeralda, Frollo grabs Esmeralda's wrist and was extremely close behind her, saying that "gypsies don't do well inside stone walls" while sniffing her hair. He even sets several guards to secure the perimeter of the cathedral to ensure that Esmeralda would be arrested if she ever tries to leave the cathedral. During his song "Hellfire", he sings, "Or let her be mine and mine alone", referencing Esmeralda as he grabs the smoke representing her against his body.
* He burns a majority of Paris during his massive search for Esmeralda, possibly imprisoning and/or killing many innocents. While capturing many Romani citizens (including children) during the search for Esmeralda, he offers them payment in silver coins in exchange for Esmeralda's whereabouts, only for the captured Romani to silently refuse his offer, prompting Frollo to have them arrested for treason and locked up in custody.
* He even directly attempts to burn an innocent family alive, after lying to them and pretending to put them on house arrest, simply because he falsely concludes they are traitors on the flabby grounds that they've given shelter to Romani travelers in the past. While the family survives, he still ends up burning down their house.
* He is not shown to care for his horse, Snowball, beyond seeing it as a means of transportation.
* While he takes a liking to Captain Phoebus at first, he refers to him as an insolent coward for refusing to commit murder, and attempts to have Phoebus promptly executed for rescuing a family from his wrath, and orders his soldiers to let Phoebus drown in the Seine River after one of them pierced Phoebus's chest with an arrow. He later promotes the Brutish Guard to fill in as the new captain of the guard in Phoebus's absence while continuing his search for Esmeralda (who saved Phoebus and tended his wounds), burning more of Paris and sending people into panic.
* While confronting Quasimodo for letting Esmeralda escape, he goes on a tirade blaming Quasimodo for having all of Paris burned, despite the fact that Frollo himself was responsible for it. He even thrashed out Quasimodo's house sets and burned out a little doll that Quasimodo created with a resemblance of Esmeralda.
* Before leaving, Frollo tricks Quasimodo into leading him to the Court of Miracles by falsely claiming that he knows where the hideout is and that he will attack the hideout with a thousand men. Worried for Esmeralda's safety, Quasimodo reach to the actual Court of Miracles with Phoebus, where they warn the Romani of Frollo's intentions, only for Frollo and his soldiers to trap them all. Frollo also rubs the salt into this by sarcastically thanking Quasimodo for being of "great use" to him, which leaves Quasimodo extremely shattered after realizing that he was tricked.
* Upon succeeding in tracking down the Court of Miracles and rounding up Esmeralda and the entire Romani population, Frollo openly vows to have them all executed in the public square; he even plans to have Phoebus subjected to the same fate in order to "remedy his miracle of reviving from the dead". He then orders two of his guards to transport a demoralized Quasimodo back to the bell tower and have him chained to ensure that he will never interfere again.
* While preparing for Esmeralda's execution, Frollo callously refused the townspeople's pleas to release Esmeralda, and he even gets two of his soldiers to prevent the Archdeacon from stopping him from doing the execution.
* He attempts to have Esmeralda by forcing her into a double bind between submitting to him or burning alive, due to his own insatiable lust for her, and attempts to burn Esmeralda at the stake when she refuses his offer by spitting at him.
* He furiously attacks and defiles the Notre Dame cathedral by ordering his soldiers to take over the cathedral after Quasimodo frees himself and saves Esmeralda from being burned. This forced an angry Phoebus to free himself and rally the townspeople to free the rest of the Romani people from captivity and help defend the cathedral by fighting back against Frollo's soldiers.
* Though Quasimodo poured in molten copper to prevent Frollo's soldiers from breaking in, Frollo manages to break into the cathedral himself, and he defies the Archdeacon by violently flinging him down the stairs when the latter vows to have him reported to the French monarchy and arrested for his crimes. He also locks up the door leading to the bell tower to ensure that the Archdeacon will not interfere on what Frollo is going to do next.
* Upon confronting Quasimodo weeping over a seemingly dead Esmeralda, he pretends to assert his guilt by claiming that it was his "duty" to kill Esmeralda, all in an attempt to stab Quasimodo with a dagger as punishment for defying him. Fortunately, Quasimodo plays wise to this and furiously disarms Frollo while ranting out all the horrible actions that Frollo has done.
	+ In the same scene, he begs for Quasimodo to listen to him, only for Quasi to interrupt him and lament about how he had lied to him over the years.
* Upon Quasimodo escaping with a recuperating Esmeralda, Frollo attempts to kill them both with his sword; causing damage to the cathedral's balcony. He even spitefully confessed that he murdered Quasimodo's mother when she tried to protect him as a baby.
* Abandoning whatever concern he had for Quasimodo, Frollo uses his cape in an attempt to throw Quasimodo off the cathedral and into the molten copper, but Quasimodo managed to grab hold of the cathedral balcony while pulling on the cape, dragging Frollo and leaving him dangled. Even when Quasimodo refuses to let go of the cape while holding for dear life, Frollo manages to swing himself back onto a gargoyle, intending to strike down Esmeralda (who is trying to help Quasimodo back up into the balcony) with his sword while referring to himself as an incarnation of God, only for the gargoyle to break because of his weight (Frollo hallucinating the gargoyle coming to life and growling at him), sending Frollo to his well-deserved death in the molten copper below.
* He did not have any remorse for any of his actions, instead claiming to be a "just and righteous man" who served God under his name. If he ever recognized his actions as immoral, he'd quickly blame it on other people or just not care about it.
* For all of Frollo's claims as a just and righteous man imposing god's will to enforce order onto Paris, as the film reveals more and more of, Frollo is simply a complete self-serving hypocrite twisting gods words to excuse the selfish actions he takes to impose his control over Paris out of an increasing god complex, and will shut down any lingering feelings of goodness and concern for others to realize such ambitions.

## Trivia

* According to his voice actor, Tony Jay, Frollo was not meant to be seen as Pure Evil by audiences, as he said in an interview that both he and the filmmakers wanted to make Frollo into a fully-fleshed, three-dimensional and even tragic character whose actions were understandable but not excusable, and it even shows somewhat with the "Hellfire" song as he takes self-righteous pride in his "virtues" while also initially expressing shame in his sexual frustrations rather than just being cruel for the sake of cruelty like most other Disney villains.
	+ However, in the final product, Frollo turned out to be a racist and perverted zealot, blaming absolutely everybody for his own problems while committing one atrocity after another, not to mention that his shame becomes nullified when he tries to burn Esmeralda alive with a huge sadistic smile on his face, so he still qualifies. He was, however, still deemed complex by several as he did have some redeeming qualities at the beginning of the film, didn't see himself as a villain unlike most Disney villains and had hints of hating some of his own aspects, but he slowly drops any positive qualities over the course of the film and turns down all redemption chances offered to him, with Esmeralda's attempted execution serving as the final nain in the coffin.
* The original Victor Hugo novel cannot have him qualify as Pure Evil, since Frollo willingly adopted Quasimodo out of genuine mercy after his parents abandoned him as a baby. Unlike the film, his care is sincere towards his foster son until Esmeralda comes in, leading Frollo's lust and obsession over her to begin his slow descent into insanity and villainy.
* The producers of the movie have directly stated that Disney's version of Frollo is based off another Pure Evil, that being Amon Goeth's depiction in *Schindler's List*.

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