David Xanatos

David Xanatos
Gargoyles character
First appearance	Gargoyles 1x02 "Awakening Part 2"
Created by	Greg Weisman
Voiced by	Jonathan Frakes
In-universe information
Occupation	CEO of Xanatos Enterprises
Family	Fox (wife) Alexander (son) Petros Xanatos (father) Halcyon Renard (father-in-law) Anastasia Renard/Titania (mother-in-law) Oberon (stepfather-in-law)
Nationality	American
Abilities	Genius-level, inventive, and cunning intellect Master strategist and tactician Advanced scientific, technological, and engineering comprehension Access to vast wealth and technological resources Strong leadership skills and visionary foresight Enterprising nature and resourceful initiative Shrewd business and investment acumen Advanced proficiency in martial arts and weaponry Has mechanical suit that gives him superhuman strength

David Xanatos is a fictional character and one of the primary villains of the Disney animated television series Gargoyles. In the series, he is the founder, owner and CEO of Xanatos Enterprises and a member of the Illuminati. He was voiced by and inspired by Jonathan Frakes, specifically his character of William Riker in Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Character development

During the show's development, Xanatos was originally known as Xavier and he was the descendant of the wizard that originally cursed the gargoyles to sleep for a thousand years. According to Greg Weisman, he was, "rich, powerful and petulant. Very Captain Hook." [1]

On naming the character, Weisman revealed "Xanatos' orignal name was Xavier, which we dropped because of Professor X from the X-Men. But I still wanted a name that had that same kind of sound to it. It's a subjective thing, but I liked it. I thought of Thanatos, which is the name of the Greek God of death, which seemed cool. X and TH sounds are often exchanged. So I tried Xanatos. Everyone liked the sound of it. Later, I checked the phone book, and the name was there, (different first name though). It all seemed to fit. The name David was chosen because Goliath's name was Goliath. The hero/villain role reversal of David & Goliath was too perfect to resist."

Fictional biography

David Xanatos started life as the son of Petros Xanatos, a Greek immigrant who worked as a fisherman in Bar Harbor, Maine. Young Xanatos received an anonymous letter containing a set of valuable 10th-century coins. He sold the coins for $20,000 and invested the money in a series of successful business and investment ventures, thus pulling himself out of poverty in the process. Xanatos would later embark on a business career, where he laid the groundwork in the first steps towards building his own conglomerate company, Xanatos Enterprises. Despite his father's belief that Xanatos did not deserve the gift that had launched his business career, Xanatos continued to claim that he would one day prove his worth in his father eye's by being a self-made man in his own right.

During this time, Xanatos took on Owen Burnett under his wing, a former employee of business rival Halcyon Renard, as his assistant. Eventually, Burnett revealed that he is actually Puck, a Child of Oberon, and offered Xanatos a tempting choice: a single wish to gain immortality or a lifetime of service as the mortal Owen Burnett. Against Puck's expectations, Xanatos, confident that he could achieve immortality through other methods, chose Owen's service, and the decision deeply impressed Puck to keep his end of the bargain, with the inference that, should Xanatos achieve his goal, he will be guaranteed Puck/Owen's services for eternity.

Xanatos learned of Castle Wyvern from Demona, the only gargoyle from the Wyvern Clan who had neither been destroyed nor put into stone sleep. He purchased the ruins, transported them to Manhattan, and had it rebuilt atop his New York skyscraper, the Eyrie Building. With the castle "above the clouds," Xanatos successfully released the Manhattan Clan from their frozen sleep.

Xanatos initially posed as the Gargoyles' friend, convincing them to "acquire" technology from his rival Cyberbiotics for him and ultimately attempting to destroy the gargoyles with replacements he has built, the Steel Clan, when the gargoyles proved too hard to control. The Steel Clan was defeated, however, and Xanatos was convicted for receiving stolen property. Xanatos continued to plot against the Gargoyles from prison, testing them and attempting to remove them from the castle. Upon his release, he became one of their greatest enemies, having a particularly fierce rivalry with their leader, Goliath.

Xanatos also committed himself to create his own clan of gargoyles that would be loyal to him. To that end, he tried several attempts throughout the series to do that such as resurrecting Goliath's brother Coldstone and other dead gargoyles from the Wyvern Clan; enlisting the services of a "freelance geneticist" named Dr. Anton Sevarius to craft unwitting human subjects towards genetically creating gargoyle-like mutates from humans, one of whom was Elisa Maza's younger brother, Derek; creating a clone of Goliath named Thailog, and perfecting the Steel Clan. During this time, he also discovered the existence of the Illuminati and attained membership, though the lowest-ranked.

Xanatos' goals shifted to acquiring immortality for himself through the use of sorcery and magic, even involving himself with children of Oberon, including Oberon himself—the formidable Lord of the mystical island of Avalon.

Xanatos would meet an equal in Fox and marry her. It was on this occasion that, by inviting Goliath to the wedding and luring him into seeking reconciliation with Demona, Xanatos was able to reconstruct the Phoenix Gate. The wedding party was brought back in time to the 10th century, where Xanatos arranged for the ancient coins to be delivered to himself a thousand years in the future, via Illuminati, as well as a message describing what to do with them. In this way, Xanatos fulfilled his own history through a predestination paradox, at the same time proving himself to his father as a "self-made man" in his own volition.

When Demona finally betrayed Xanatos to advance her own goals of destroying the human race, he was forced to call a truce with Goliath to stop her. Goliath was later instrumental in saving Xanatos's newborn son Alexander, something which Xanatos owed him a great debt, and pledged to pay back to him. He soon created new robotic bodies for Coldstone's other personalities to inhabit, which he named Coldfire and Coldsteel. Since these gargoyles were also created by magic, though, it was impossible for mind transfer to occur. While he and Fox were out to dinner, Puck and Alexander performed the transfer for him. When the existence of the gargoyles was revealed to the public, Xanatos puts an end to the feud between them and voluntarily allows the gargoyles to come back to live in their ancestral castle.

Further reading

• Samantha Nelson. "How Gargoyles Redefined Cartoon Villainy". IGN. Retrieved September 24, 2021.