Bryce Walker

"She wanted me. Me. She was practically begging me to f-ck her. If that's rape, then every girl at this school wants to be raped."

- Bryce taunting Clay after beating him up, revealing his true depraved nature and disregard for others' lives. "You want to know what really happened with me and Hannah, Mom? She got in the hot tub with me, no suit, just panties and a bra over some very nice t-ts. And she looked at me like she was hungry. And yeah, I wanted her. I just... I just had to have her. So I took her, I turned her around, and I f-cked her from behind. Hard. Until she cried. Is that what you want to hear?"

- Bryce confessing to his mother that he raped Hannah.

"I'm trying to change, but this f-cking world won't let me."

- Bryce Walker

Bryce Barry Walker is the main antagonist of the 2007 novel Thirteen Reasons Why and the 2017 Netflix TV adaptation 13 Reasons Why, serving as the main antagonist of season one, one of the main antagonists (along with Montgomery de la Cruz) in season two, and one of the main protagonists in season three.

Bryce is a part of Hannah Baker's Baker's Dozen and the subject of Hannah Baker's twelfth tape from her list of reasons why she killed herself. Bryce Walker raped Hannah at a party, completely breaking her soul. This event is what lead Hannah to go through with her decision to kill herself. His actions against Hannah are the worst of them all as he is responsible for most, otherwise all of the events that have transpired throughout Hannah Baker's life.

He is portrayed by in the TV series.

Biography (Novel)
In the novel, Bryce is depicted as one of the bullies at Liberty High School. Unlike the TV series, Bryce's early life and past isn't fully developed. In the ninth tape, Hannah Baker reveals that she was witness to somebody raping Jessica Davis at a house party in her bedroom, and blamed Justin Foley for allowing it to happen. This person is later revealed to be Bryce.

He is depicted as the subject of Hannah Baker's twelfth tape, where Bryce raped Hannah in a hot tub at Courtney Crimsen's house. Hannah did not resist Bryce, but nonetheless, Bryce sexually assaulted her. Following Hannah's suicide, Clay Jensen - the novel's narrator - fights the urge to confront Bryce for Hannah's rape. Following the conclusion of the novel, it is unknown what happens to Bryce afterwards.

Biography (TV Series)
Bryce Walker was born to Barry and Nora Walker. Despite coming from a wealthy family his parents were extremely negligent of their son. They wanted Bryce to have more freedom, so he could make his own choices and trust him to make good decisions in life. However, this back-fired greatly as Bryce not only felt his parents were never there for him but also because he feels like a stranger in his own home.

In the 3rd Grade, an 8-9 Year Old Bryce broke up a fight between a young boy named Justin Foley and another kid. Bryce called the other boy a "dick" and went on to help Justin up. Later, at lunch, Bryce went and sat with Justin, who had been sitting by himself at an empty table. Having seen that Justin didn't have a lunch bag, Bryce offered Justin his sandwich. Justin accepted but only after Bryce stole some Twinkies from another kid so that they could trade. The two became best friends ever since and Justin has always relied on Bryce for anything he may have needed. When they reached High School Justin slept over at Bryce's house the night before their freshman year and vowed to be the kings of Liberty High. Bryce and Justin attended Liberty High where they befriend Zach Dempsey, Montgomery de la Cruz, and Marcus Cole.

Bryce and Justin became the most popular athletes at Liberty High and were treated as pillars of Liberty High. With his status at school and his already affluent family being well known and respected Bryce became an egotist and indulged in hedonistic activities such as parties, drinking, drugs, and sex to satisfy himself. Bryce and the rest of his friends began bullying everyone at Liberty High for their own amusement. They mainly targeted the female student body, who they would sexually harass, otherwise worse. Feeling that everyone owes him and should respect him in someway, Bryce began raping the girls of Liberty High to satisfy his sexual desires. Because of Bryce's boisterous antics, his baseball coach Rick Wlodimierz informed Bryce of the existence of "The Clubhouse"; a shed behind Liberty High's baseball field that is used for parties and drugging/taking advantage of female students.

Season Three
In the aftermath of Spring Fling, Bryce transfers schools from Liberty to Hillcrest. Due to his notorious reputation at Liberty, and combined with the testimonies against Bryce in court, Bryce becomes the subject of bullying against his Hillcrest peers. It is here that Bryce begins to reconsider his actions, and goes on a personal quest of redemption. He attempts to makes things right with Jessica Davis, and his ex-girlfriend Chloe Rice, but fails. Back at home, Nora hires Amara Achola as a maid, also enlisting her to look after Nora's elderly father Harrison Chatham as a nurse. As a result, Achola's daughter Ani begins living at the Walker Residence. Bryce and Ani form a mutual relationship. Unbeknownst to Bryce, his lawyers at his testimony - paid by Barry - had blackmailed Tony Padilla, and called Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to deport Tony's family.

Sometime later, the furious and emotionally wrecked Tyler Down confronts Bryce, believing that he was responsible for issuing Montgomery de la Cruz to sexually assault him at the Liberty washrooms before Spring Fling. Bryce denies these allegations, and insists that Monty had committed the assault on his own accord. Bryce urges Tyler to kill him with the pistol he had coveted for his own suicide if he believed that he was lying. Tyler couldn't bring himself to kill Bryce. Later, at a Hillcrest party, Bryce is forced to pay off Winston Williams after Monty, who he had oral sex with earlier, brutally attacks him in front of everyone else.

Bryce is consulted by the insecure Alex Standall for steroids, which he uses to cope with being rejected by Jessica Davis. They develop a mutual relationship, and Bryce later compensates Alex with drugs and prostitutes. Turmoil at the Walker Residence flourishes when it is revealed that Barry had been having an affair with Bryce's mother, and had been coveting a daughter from both of them. Barry kicks out Bryce and Nora from his home. Seeking retaliation, Bryce enlists Alex into trashing the inside of his father's house. While the two initially break-and-enter into the wrong residence, Bryce overhears Barry mentioning his real house's location in conversation, and wreaks havoc inside alone. He later admits this to his father, and the two engage in an argument, where Bryce refuses to pay for any of the damages.

Later, Justin Foley reaches out to Bryce to help him pay back his abusive father Seth Massey, and provides him with Oxycodone to help him cope with his heroin addiction. Due to Tony's family being deported, he sells his prized 1970 Ford Mustang to Bryce in an attempt to pay for his own lawyers. Tony becomes furious at Bryce when he learns that his lawyers were responsible for his family's deportation. Tony forces Bryce to listen to Hannah Baker's tapes, giving Bryce a larger sense of clarity for his actions in his quest for redemption. He is urged to confront Hannah's mother Olivia and apologize for his actions, although Olivia coldly dismisses his apology.

Bryce begins a sexual relationship with Ani, and bonds with his mother Nora some more at her yoga clinic. Bryce begins writing a letter to Jessica, writing a thorough apology to her, but he is unable to finish it before Hillcrest and Liberty's homecoming football game. Instead, Bryce records a cassette tape, entailing his apology to Jessica and the many others he had raped, and his pleas for redemption.

At the game, Bryce confronts Monty about Tyler's sexual assault, and threatens to ruin his life should any more harm be inflicted upon Tyler. Bryce arranges to meet Jessica at the docks to exchange the cassette. Bryce meets Chloe at the game, who reveals to him their unborn child, who she had an abortion with. When she reveals that Zach Dempsey had helped her through with the abortion, Bryce misinterprets this as them starting a relationship. On the field, after Jessica incites a riot in the middle of the game to call out for sexual assault, Bryce attacks Zach, and breaks his knee, ruining his chances for an athletic scholarship and football career. Following the riot's end, and therefore, the game, Bryce contacts Tyler to affirm him that Monty would no longer be a problem.

While awaiting Jessica at the docks, Bryce is confronted by a furious Zach, and the two engage in a fight. During their scuffle, Zach dislocates Bryce's arm, and beats him senseless, breaking his leg and throwing his phone into the river. After Zach leaves, Jessica arrives with Alex. While Bryce gives Jessica the cassette, the two decide not to help up Bryce, as doing so would implicate Zach to be arrested for assault, but if they didn't help Bryce, he'd die overnight and freeze to death, combined with his injuries. Alex feels remorse for Bryce, and helps him up, but when Bryce threatens retaliation against Zach, Alex snaps and throws Bryce into the river. Due to having his arm and leg dislocated, Bryce is unable to swim, and drowns helplessly as Alex and Jessica watch over him, ending his shortlived quest for redemption. With Bryce dead, Alex and Jessica keep his death a secret, although the two break up afterwards.

Personality
On the surface Bryce comes off as a cocky, yet well meaning friend, who enjoys parties and having fun with friends. He even went out of his way to help his fellow teammate and friend Justin Foley when he was faced with difficult situations in his dysfunctional family. At times he can be seen as the most mature and kindhearted of his group of friends. However as the series progresses we see his character come to light in a darker tone. When with his friends he is just as obnoxious and an irresponsible bully as the rest of his cliche, for instance, getting drunk and having sex with whomever he wants even by force if need be, going as far as to rape Hannah Baker and an unconscious Jessica Davis (the latter of whom was his best friend's girlfriend.), all while showing no signs of remorse, even sadistically stating that Hannah was "practically begging him to fuck her", and denying that his actions do qualify as rape, even though it obviously was indeed rape. Bryce appears in the tapes several times, all of which show less than desirable behavior, all more proof of his dark side within.

Even his friends note how dangerous and monstrous he can be at times as out of everyone's actions Bryce's are the most heinous and vile; especially whenever provoked or angered he will become physically violent and brutal. Some examples include shoving Justin out of the room his girlfriend was sleeping in when he tried to stop him from raping her, brutally beating Clay after Clay punched him for mocking Hannah, even kicking Clay in the stomach a couple times while he was down. Tyler Down, another student wonders why everyone is protecting him as he believes Bryce to be the real reason Hannah Baker committed suicide.

Bryce first appears to be good or at least sympathetic to the main protagonists (and thus to the audience) until his true nature is revealed. In some cases, to add suspense, Bryce makes the audience know that he is obviously lying, but the protagonist doesn't.

Bryce is extremely charismatic, manipulative, charming, deceptive, and cunning. Despite not being academically gifted, or appearing too obnoxious to be considered an actual threat sometimes, Bryce is actually very intelligent. Bryce is openly cruel but can still have good manners and style. He fakes friendships, and sometimes love, to get what he wants. He is also well-known for being capable of rounding up plenty of followers due to his charisma.

However, in Season 3, we begin to see a much more sympathetic and humanizing portrayal of Bryce, while he doesn't change completely, he does seem to realize that he's been given a second chance at life with the punishment he was given and he truly begins to see the damage that he's done to people around him and how much that he's become reviled in his community, and with that, he attempts to try and make some amends with some of the people he's hurt, such as apologizing to Jessica for what he did to her, helping Justin with his debt to Seth and his addiction, trying to give Tony his car back after his father ratted his family out to ICE. He also becomes more sensitive to his emotions and the emotions of everyone around him, opening up to Mr. Porter about his home life and his complicated relationships with his parents, as well as forming a genuine relationship with Ani. He was also appalled by Monty's rape of Tyler (rather hypocritically though, to be fair) and tried his best to help him in his situation and was even moved when he finally heard Hannah's tapes, even shown to be emotional when it got to his tape. He even asked Tony if he could try to get him in contact with Hannah's mother so he could try to make amends. Though, despite that, he still did some horrible things, such as vandalizing his father's house and a house of a family that he mistook to be his father's house, selling drugs to Alex, as well as still disrespecting and having a generally difficult relationship with his mother. Despite all of that, Bryce does seem to want to make a change before his unfortunate demise.

Bryce is a very complicated character, while he's done monstrous things without a shred of remorse, he did seem to try and make a change by the end of his life and, in his own way and despite everyone's skepticism, he did try to find some sort of redemption for his actions.

Quotes
"Here to talk to you about Tyler, and how you raped him in the bathroom. (Montgomery: He told you that? I didn't rape him, that's f*cking insane.) You didn't violate him with a broom handle? (Montgomery: My god, dude, that was a joke.) You shoved a broom into his *sshole and made him bleed; explain the joke. (Montgomery: Okay, it was like hazing or whatever.) That's not hazing, that's rape. (Montgomery: Are you gonna teach me about what rape is? Like what you did to a dozen girls at this school?) I'm not gonna teach you anything. I'm just gonna tell you this: you're gonna stay the f*ck away from Tyler. You're not gonna touch him, you're not gonna look at him... anything. You have a class with him, transfer. Pass him in the halls, take a different hall. I'm gonna check in with him every week to see how he's doing. If I hear one f*cking thing about you, if I even hear that you looked in his direction, then the cops find out about Tony's car, about the gun you gave Alex, about the time you tried to kill Clay, they get everything. (Montgomery: The f*ck man, we're brothers. Why are you doing this?) Have a good game, "brother"."

- Bryce threatening to reveal Montgomery's crimes in Season 2 if he does not leave Tyler alone.

"For f-cks' sakes, you guys, please! Please, I don't want to die out here. Alex. Alex, please! Come on, we were... we were friends." "We were never friends." "Fucking Zach! I'm gonna f-ck up his other knee and wreck his f-cking life!" "You're not going to do anything to Zach." "You! She set me up!" "She did not set you up!" "She fucking set me up! (cries in pain)" "You've hurt everyone I ever loved." "Alex, what the f-ck? Alex, Alex! Sh-t! Alex, f-ck! Help! Help me, I can't-- Help me! Help, I can't--"

- Bryce Walker and Alex Standall's final exchange, before Bryce's death

"Hey, Jess. It's me. Yeah, I know. A tape. Yes, I did it on purpose. Not to be a dick, but... Because the day I listened to those tapes, my life changed. And I bet the same is true for you. And for Justin, and Zach, and everyone, and I wanted to give you this. I'd thought you'd hear me better if I wasn't standing in front of you. You said I had no idea what I'd done to you. You were right. I can't stop thinking about you, replaying that night in my mind. I raped you. I heard you say no, and I did it anyway. Because I wanted to, and I didn't care how you felt. Justin tried to stop me. I wish I could tell you that there was a tiny voice in my head telling me that what I was doing was wrong. There wasn't. I never had one of those before. That's not an excuse, it just is. I raped Hannah Baker. I raped 7 or 8 other girls. Some of them were my girlfriends at the time. I won't name them, but if they choose to tell you, believe them. I'm broken. I know that. I'm a person in a thousand pieces. But I'm seeing a counselor. It's a long, hard process, but... little by little, you start picking up the pieces. And you realize that what you're making is a mirror. And the more pieces you put together, the more you see yourself. I'd like to say that I'm not the same person who raped you, anymore, Jess. But what I've come to realize is that I'll always be him. But I'm trying to be better. To be someone worth something in this world. I have this dream that I could be someone who protects people somehow. Protects them from people like me, like who I was, I don't know. I am so fucking sorry for what I did to you, and I know words add up to nothing compared to what I took from you. Someone once told me that it'll take me a lifetime to learn what sorry is. They're right. But I'm starting. If you've listened this far, thank you. It's more than I deserve. I wouldn't blame you if you smashed this tape to fucking pieces. I would. I wish you the best, Jess, truly. Goodbye."

- Bryce's tape, revealing his crimes.