Damien Thorn

"Suffer the little children to come unto me. Your words, Nazarene. Not mine."

- Damien Thorn

"My followers have been slaughtering your children around the world, and you have not lifted a finger to save them."

- Damien mocking the statue of crucified Jesus Christ

"Nazarene, You have won nothing."

- Damien Thorn's last words upon being overpowered by the Messiah in the final act of The Omen trilogy.

Damien Thorn is the main antagonist of The Omen trilogy. He is the son of the Devil and the Biblical Antichrist who is destined to bring on the apocalypse, in the first movie Damien was a child and was just beginning to utilize his apocalyptic powers against the world but as he grew older his influence expanded until his climatic battle with the Second Coming of Christ during the events of Omen III.

He was portrayed by Harvey Spencer Stevens in the first film, Jonathan Scott-Taylor in the second film, Sam Neil - who also portrayed Charles Bromley in Daybreakers and Dr. William Weir in Event Horizon - in the third film, and Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick in the remake.

The Omen (original)
In the original film, Damien was born of Satan and a jackal in Rome at 6:00 AM on June 6, 1971 - which is linked to the number 666, the traditional sign of the Devil, and the number 666 also appears on Damien's body as a birthmark.

Damien was adopted by Robert Thorn, the American Ambassador to Britain after his child died in what he assumed was a stillbirth, a fact he hid from his wife and together they raised him as their own son - things started off fine until Damien reached 5 years old, at which point the Devil arrived during his birthday celebrations in the form of a dog and hypnotizes Damien's nanny into hanging herself in front of the crowd while declaring it was all for Damien.

Soon after Robert is approached by Father Brennan, who tries to warn him of Damien's true-power but fails and Robert remains unconvinced, Father Brennan would meet a grisly end for his stand against the Antichrist however when he was impaled by a church spire that was knocked down by lightning presumably summoned by Satan himself - around this time a demonic woman by the name of Mrs. Baylock manages to obtain the position of Damien's new nanny and secretly becomes the budding Antichrist's guardian.

Damien's behavior becomes more unnatural as time progresses and his mother Katherine ultimately loses her next unborn child when Damien knocks her off a balcony using a tricycle and Robert finally begins to question the origins of his "son", with some added help from a photographer named Keith Jennings.

Together Robert and Keith seek out the hospital where Damien was born in order to find his birth-mother and get answers - only to discover the hospital burned down in a horrible accident, killing several people and all of the records - however they learn of one of the survivors, the head priest at the hospital, and locate him - finding him gravely ill but alive and he tells them where to find Damien's mother, who turned out to have been buried at an ancient and abandoned Etruscan graveyard.

Robert and Keith head to this graveyard and find the woman's grave next to the grave of Robert's true son - when they remove the cover of Damien's mother's grave they find a jackal's corpse in place of a humans, confirming Damien was not of the natural world. Keith understandably becomes alarmed and wanted to leave but Robert wanted to uncover the grave of his son in the hope it would contain a similar corpse and give him some hope that his son could be alive - to his horror, this isn't the case and the grave holds the remains of a human child - the skull having a wound showing it was murdered at birth.

At this point the Devil is tired of the two men snooping as a pack of dogs suddenly sets upon them and drove them from the graveyard.

During these terrible events Katherine is thrown out of the hospital window by Mrs. Baylock to her death - devastating Robert when he finds out. later he and Keith journeyed to Israel to find a man named Bugenhagen, an archaeologist who knew how to stop the Antichrist.

Robert learned that he had to stab Damien with the seven daggers of Megiddo to end the Antichrist's power but Robert was repelled by the thought of killing a child and threw the daggers away, Keith ran after them only to meet his fate as he was decapitated by a pane of glass from a run-away truck - this death prompts Robert to return to London with the daggers, intending to kill Damien and put an end to the carnage.

Returning home, Robert finds Mrs. Baylock's guard dog awaiting him but he manages to lock it in the cellar and then goes upstairs to check whether Damien has the "666" birthmark of the Antichrist, when Damien is revealed to indeed have the birthmark Robert knows what he must do.

However Mrs. Baylock attacked him on Damien's behalf but was fought off, ultimately being killed when Robert stabbed her during their violent struggle - after this he dragged Damien to a church with the intent of killing the Antichrist on the altar.

Robert arrived at the church and laid Damien on the altar, reaching for the daggers and prepared to kill Damien but is shot dead by police who arrive on the scene and thus Damien's life was spared. The movie ends with Robert's and Katherine's double funeral, where Damien is seen holding the hand of the U.S. President, their backs facing the camera. Suddenly, Damien turned completely around, and looked straight at the audience and gave a sinister smile - knowing his reign on earth had just begun.

Damien: Omen II
In the second film Damien has returned and lives with his uncle Richard and his wife and Damien is enrolled in Davidson Miltary Academy.

He has been chosen to succeed his uncle in his business, but a Satanist in the buisness desires Damien to kill his cousin Mark and start his reign of terror. Damien accidentally shows off his powers in military school by reciting all of a historical battle's events as if he had actually been present. This shocks the teacher until the Satanist approaches him after class warning him to keep a low profile because now is not the time for the world to know who he is. Confused, Damien asks him who he really is, to which he is told to read Revelations, because it speaks of the near future and Damien's role in it. Shocked at finding out he is the Antichrist, Damien initally rejects his powers out of fear. However, after careful thought, Damien begins plotting to conquer.

During a school trip to Thorn Industries, Damien and the other students are infected by loose gases. However, when the doctor examines Damien's skeleton for damage, he finds to his shock Damien's internal system is that of a jackal. Horrified, he attempts to alert the authorities but the Devil kills the doctor by malfunctioning an elevator he was riding.

From here, Damien only grows in power. Knowing he is protected by the Devil, he kills his own cousin Mark after a horrified Mark threatened to reveal Damien's secret. Richard is devastated, but retrieves the Daggers of Megiddo. He attempts to kill Damien at a museum, but his wife betrays him, revealing she was also a Satanist, and kills Richard. She then yells for Damien, who nonchalantly sets the museum on fire, burning her to death, as Damien calmly walks out into the night and is rescued by police.

Omen III (The Final Conflict)
In the third and final film, Damien had grown into a powerful politician, and revered cult leader who commanded a crowd of fanatically devoted, Satanic 'Apostles' known as the Disciples of the Watch, who sought to take over the world - going as far as committing a modern-day Massacre Of The Innocents when he became aware of the coming of the Messiah. He also uses his Hellhound to manipulate Barbara Dean into killing her husband, Harvey, and her son with a hot iron.

Later in the film he rapes journalist, Kate Reynolds, whom he had become romantically involved with and manipulates her son Peter into being his disciple, but later uses him as a human shield against Father De Carlo when he tries to stab him, resulting in his death. However he was unable to stop destiny and ultimately died in the climax of this movie: having been stabbed by three mystical daggers by Kate and laying by the image of what is presumably Jesus - defiant to the end Damien looked upon the face of the Messiah and uttered "you have won... nothing" before collapsing, the death of Damien was symbolic of a fresh beginning and as the film ends it is heavily implied that the Second Coming has occurred: sealing Damien's fate forever.

Legacy
Although Damien Thorn died in the Omen III he was succeeded by a daughter of his who became the antagonist of the less popular Omen IV and joining her younger twin brother who is the other child of Damien himself.

The Omen (remake)
In 2006 Damien Thorn was introduced to a new generation of viewers in a remake of the original film - this remake sought to bring The Omen to a new audience and was also likely designed to play on a one-time marketing device due to the date 06.06.06 - which makes up the numbers "666", Damien's birthmark and the traditional symbol of the Beast.

Personality and Traits
Due to his unholy heritage and his destiny as the Antichrist, Damien possessed several harmful and unholy abilities and weaknesses. He could cause machinery to break down and/or stop working, and could cause people to see horrific visions and develop aneurysms. He also knew vast information about virtually every known historical event.

It was also shown that Damien was apparently immune to all major and minor mortal ailments (from colds and chicken pox to chemical poisoning), and that the Seven Daggers of Megiddo are the only weapons that could harm him; and even then Damien had to be killed with all seven of the daggers on a church altar to destroy his body and incapacitate his soul. He could cause people to hallucinate others as someone else, and could also control some animals such as dogs and horses.

Because of his Satanic status and lineage, Damien deeply feared churches as a child, and felt discomfort and pain when the second Star of Bethlehem formed during the Second Coming of Christ.

Trivia

 * Damien is one of the only 2 characters to appear in more than one of the original Omen films, the other being Carl Bugenhagen.
 * All the actors who portrayed Damien had their hair dyed jet black for the role.
 * The name Damien has become somewhat symbiotic with the Devil, because of the reputation of the film, however, the name Damien actually means "The subduer." However, this is still appropriate for the Devil's son, because of how he attempts to subdue mankind and rally an army against God.
 * In the original ending for The Omen, Robert managed to stab and kill Damien with the Daggers of Megiddo before the former was shot.
 * Originally in Damien - Omen II, Damien was going to be 15 instead of 12. He would also have had a girlfriend, so that when he discovered that he was the Antichrist, he would be torn between love and destiny. This idea was ultimately scrapped.
 * Some aspects of Damien's life appear to mirror those of Jesus Christ's, possibly because of how Damien, as the Devil's son, is an unholy mockery and polar opposite of Christ. When Damien was born in Rome, a new star formed over Europe (similar to how the Star of Bethlehem formed over Bethlehem when Jesus was born there); and Damien was just under 33 at the time of his death, which is the approximate age Jesus was when he was crucified.
 * In The Omen and Damien - Omen II, Damien's 666 birthmark was on the top of his scalp. But in The Final Conflict, it was above his right ear.
 * In Damien - Omen II, when Richard left for New York, Damien had a pimple beneath his bottom lip; and when Damien screamed after killing Mark, fillings were visible in his teeth. However, it was made apparent in the first Omen film that Damien is immune to mortal ailments. Although, these were more likely inserted by Damien himself to blend in with human society, rather than as any teething problems. Also if they were made of silver, this would showcase his wealth to the world.
 * In The Final Conflict, it was indirectly indicated at one point in the film by Damien that he was born in 1949. But at another point in the film, Kate Reynolds indirectly indicated that Damien was born in 1945.
 * Lucius Wagner, the titular protagonist villain of the Lucius videogame was similar with Damien, given that the said game was heavily inspired by The Omen franchise.