Giovanni de' Medici

Giovanni de' Medici is a central character from the TV series Medici: Masters of Florence. Though he is the father of the protagonist and not considered as an antagonist for the series plot, his actions to take benefits for his family are totally villanous.

He is the founder of the Medici Bank and the maker of his family's richness. He is willing to do anything to increase the Medici's power on Florence and his most frequent quote is: "It is sometimes necessary to do some bad in order to achieve a much greater good."

He is a member of the Signoria of Florence and aims to be the only leader in the town.

He is married with Piccarda de' Medici and has got two sons: Lorenzo and Cosimo.

He gets killed by the administrator of the Medici Bank, Ugo Bencini.

He is portrayed by Dustin Hoffman, who also portrayed Captain James Hook.

History
Giovanni is one of the most potent men in Florence, but he feels he has grown old and he has to choose one of his two sons to be the next leader of the family.

He travels to Rome with Lorenzo and Cosimo, where he orders them to corrupt the Conclave members to elect Cardinal Baldassarre Cossa, who is affiliated to the Medici Bank as new Pope. After this goal is reached, Giovanni chooses Cosimo as his successor.

Cosimo's main ambition is to be an artist and not a banker, and while sitting in Rome he falls in love with a common woman named Bianca. Giovanni intimidates her to leave Cosimo and, a few weeks later, he obliges his son to marry Contessina de' Bardi, whose family's bank is going on bankruptcy and Govanni aims to take control on it.

Later, he pushes Cosimo to become a friend of Rinaldo degli Albizzi, in order to get information to remove his father, Maso degli Albizzi, from the Signoria. Giovanni reaches this goal, leaving his son very disappointed of being exploited for such a vile action.

When Giovanni's eldest son, Lorenzo, also falls in love with a common woman, Rosa, he orders to his administrator Ugo Bencini to take her away from Lorenzo. Ugo sends the woman to a convent where, a few months later, she gives birth to Lorenzo's son. Knowing this, Giovanni sends an assassin to kill the woman and the baby.

Horrified by tis action, Ugo poisons with hemlock the grape attached on Giovanni's favourite grapevine. After having eaten it, Giovanni dies.