Howard Clifford

"You think you can stop the future?! I AM THE FUTURE!!!"

- Howard to Pikachu. "A futile effort. A Pikachu cannot beat a Mewtwo in a Pokémon battle!"

- Howard insulting Pikachu before his defeat.

Howard Clifford is the main antagonist of the 2019 video game film Pokémon: Detective Pikachu. He is the disabled founder of Clifford Enterprises and the visionary behind the creation of Ryme City, who, in reality, is a criminal mastermind who plots to use the psychic Pokémon Mewtwo and the drug R to merge all of humanity with Pokémon. He is also the father of Roger Clifford, and the trainer/partner of Ditto).

He was portrayed by Bill Nighy, who also voices Mewtwo when he is possessed by him.

Personality
On the outside, Howard portrays himself as a deeply caring humanitarian who wishes the best for all those around him. His degenerative disease had seemingly given him a new lease on life that caused him to deeply value the connection between humans and Pokémon, driving him to build the utopia of Ryme City for the sake of unifying both groups. He has a great passion for Pokémon and constantly surrounds himself in monuments and artifacts related to them (as best seen in his office, which contains a number of Evolutionary Stones and statues of Legendary Pokémon); though, at the same time, this same passion has lead to him overlooking many other parts of his life, including his own son, whom he feels he has neglected throughout his life. In addition to this, Roger often accuses him of being incredibly narcissistic about his accomplishments and thinking incredibly highly of himself, further adding to the strain in their relationship. Yet, despite what he has accomplished, Howard feels restricted by his aging and disabled body, having to invent hologram technology so that he can experience the world in some way. His compassion is also shown to extend to people as well, as he shows remorse to Tim and Pikachu in their meeting for Harry Goodman's kidnapping.

However, as revealed towards the end of the film, nearly everything that Howard had shown about himself previously was a farce. In truth, he was power-hungry, ruthless, legitimately arrogant and egotistical, and utterly delusional in his goals. Though he still believes in the unity of humans and Pokémon, he has a warped perspective as to what is necessary for them both to peacefully coexist, given his plan to forcefully bond both groups together so they are both capable of "evolving" into better versions of themselves. At the same time as this, however, he has no problem with harming or experimenting on Pokémon for the sake of his end goals—endangering dozens of them through the R testing done in Sebastian's illegal Pokémon battles, funding PCL's growth enhancement and mind control experiments (resulting in montain-sized Torterras and a group of Greninjas being converted into loyal henchmen), and actively tormenting and hunting Mewtwo—which implies that he may have never cared about Pokémon. He also seemingly never cared about his own son as well, given that he was willing to go as far as to frame him for his scheme and even kidnap him to keep him out of the way (though it is implied that Roger knew of his illegal experiments yet did not know of his end goal). Furthermore, Roger's claims of him having a narcissistic attitude seem to be made somewhat valid by the end of the film, as he regards himself as the future of both people and Pokémon alike.

The only person/Pokémon which Howard is ever shown to trust is his Pokémon partner Ditto, whom he created in one of his experiments and either trained or engineered to be capable of taking human form, to the point where it can seamlessly pose as his assistant Mrs. Norman, his son Roger, or a number of other individuals (while also being intelligent enough to operate technology, to the point it can actually communicate with him through text). He possesses an extreme disregard for the lives of anyone who stands in his way as well, justifying his attempt on Harry's life in his mind by claiming he was getting too curious about his operations, and trying to kill his enemies throughout the final battle as well; ordering his Ditto to take care of Tim, while he physically attempted to dispose of Pikachu in Mewtwo's body. It can also be presumed that he had a great desire for power as well, given that he not only transports his consciousness into Mewtwo (who is referred to as the most powerful Pokémon in the world at many different points) and takes full advantage of his incredible abilities, but seemingly seeks a place as the ruler of his new world as well. In the end, Howard proved himself to be nothing more than an empty, sociopathic husk of the persona he created for himself, devoid of virtually all the compassion and love he was believed to have.

History
TBA

Trivia

 * Coincidentally, Howard's actor Bill Nighy ended up becoming a Pokémon fan himself in the process of making the film, despite knowing next to nothing of the franchise beforehand.
 * Although he is an original character to the film, Howard seems to be loosely inspired by the character Mr. Ethan Graham from the original Detective Pikachu game, given their similar appearances and depictions (Graham being the founder of the Graham News Network and boss of Roger Clifford, and Howard being the founder of Clifford Enterprises and it's media outlet, the Clifford News Network, and the father of the movie's Roger Clifford).
 * Towards the end of the Detective Pikachu game, the character Meiko makes a passing comment that she never would have suspected Roger of being the mastermind yet wouldn't have been surprised if Graham was; which is fairly ironic given that, while Graham was an innocent suspect in the game and Roger was the true antagonist, in the film Roger was the innocent one while Howard was the culprit.
 * Howard's characterization is also much more in line with Roger's from the game, as he too used the R drug to unethically experiment on Pokémon and indirectly caused the disappearance of Harry Goodman, while also pretending to be an ally of Tim and Pikachu.
 * Howard is the first villain in the Pokémon franchise to have an actual physical disability; that being his inability to use his legs.