| “ | William, I want this world to become a better place, but if that world doesn't have you in it, I don't see the value in being there myself. | „ |
| ~ Louis reminding a suicidal William of his loyalty |
Louis James Moriarty is one of the two deuteragonists (alongside Sherlock Holmes) of the 2016 manga series 'Moriarty the Patriot and of its 2020 anime adaptation. He is William James Moriarty's younger biological brother, and the adoptive brother of Albert James Moriarty. Together the 3 form the identity of the Lord of Crime, James Moriarty. He is the person that maintains the Moriarty estate and its assets.
In Japanese, he was voiced by Chiaki Kobayashi as an adult and Nao Toyama as a child. Int he English dub, he was voiced by Howard Wang as an adult and Laura Stahl as a child.
Personality[]
Louis is noticeably much more aloof in comparison to both his brothers, who are much more outgoing and openly friendly to others, and will mostly sport a scowl of disapproval in all his appearances or general emptiness, which is used as a mask to hide the trauma of living as an orphan and getting worryingly severe lung disease to the point of feeling empty without his brother. The only time he would usually lose it and be smiling is whenever he interacts with his brothers.
Louis' most defining trait is an undying loyalty to William, feeling there is no world he can live in without William that for the sake of William's plans he is even willing to injure himself and corrupt his soul participating in William's criminal activities, willing to stop at nothing to see William's vision for an equal British society realized. However, upon the Final Problem, Louis was faced with the dilemma of either betraying William or allow his plans to continue and destroy himself to shoulder all the burden of their sins. He even has a certain protectiveness as well, put off by Sherlock's demeanor around William and feeling it suspiciously too friendly that he plots to get rid of him once his usefulness ends.
Upon William's presumed death, Louis initially has a feeling of emptiness and belonging as he saw no reason to exist in the world without his brother who always reassured him that he had worth, but ultimately decided to treasure his life and keep on going to atone for his and his brothers' sins.
Appearance[]
Louis is a man with light skin, slim build and is somewhat tall with a height of 6 feet, and blond hair of average length and styled in a long-side fringe to the right. On his right cheek, a burn mark is present as a result of a self-inflicted injury he made to himself, which is hidden by his hair. He also wears black glasses, as well as a dark blue tuxedo with a waistcoat of the same colour and a golden pocket watch. After the time-skip, Louis removes his glasses permanently and pushes back his fringe, exposing his scar and leaving his hair parted.
Biography[]
Past[]
Louis was the younger brother to the boy who would become William. Being orphans who fended for themselves on a street, Louis was always willing to assist William in his helpings of people, including of the orphanage where they lived. Upon noticing the food portions becoming smaller and water being added tot he milk, he and William inquired their caretaker on what happened to the orphanage, to which she donated large sums of money to Viscount Baxter in hopes of him paying her back. Helping William give Viscount Baxter 350 pounds, William had prebooked a civil court case expecting Viscount Baxter to be in reality a scammer and testify as William's witness. Upon William winning the case and donating most of the returned money tot he orphanage, they burn their names off the records as they move to settle in another orphanage.
Eventually catching a bad lung illness, Louis was seen accompanying his brother around the orphanage, especially in the secret meetings among he hosts among the children to encourage an uprising against the aristocracy. Upon William impressing the disillusioned son of Earl Moriarty, Albert, Louis gets adopted to the Moriarty family where he would undergo a surgery that cured his lung illness. Doing servants work for the Moriarty Manor and enduring abuse from Albert's brother, William, Louis gladly joins his brother's plot to covertly burn Moriarty Manor to the ground and kill everyone and frame it as an accident, even inflicting a burn onto himself to convey the tragedy being an accident than deliberate. Taken in by the Blackwells, there Louis was trained by the butler, Jack Reinfield, on the art of killing and combat, and like his brothers, graduate university as a King's Scholar and manage the Moriarty estate's assets.
Present[]
In the anime, Louis is introduced giving William tea while the latter reads the newspaper where William discusses with him the clues on who the recent Chavi-Slasher is and sets out to investigate him. When William deduces Earl Argleton to be the killer, Louis gets the drop on the corrupt constable sent by Argleton to kill William and use it to intimidate information out of him.
Louis is then present helping William settle into the Moriarty residence in Durham when William took a job as the Professor of Mathematics. Upon hearing from William the corruption of the other dominating noble in the town of Durham, Baron Leonard Tomas Dublin, Louis joins William and Albert to the dinner and tea party Baron Dublin set up so that William can have Dublin cause his own death ingesting grapefruit and causing a violent reaction with his medication.
Upon Louis calling in Sebastian Moran and Fred Pollock to deal with Dudley Bale, William uncovers a huge opium ring backed up by nobles. Hearing William's plot to bait members of the cartel to kidnap him, Louis follows the plan and feigns worry when William is kidnapped upon their arrival on London for Albert to arrive on time to save William and take down the opium ring. upon Albert manipulating Mycroft to create MI6, Louis voices his support for William's declaration to begin his master plan to be the Lord of Crime to reshape British society. Upon the success of the plan to kill Blitz Enders, Louis then listens as he hears William informing everybody on a potential threat and pawn, Sherlock Holmes.
In one of William's many commutes to Durham for his job as a university professor, Louis is accompanying him, to which on their way back, they stumble upon Sherlock. Sherlock then casually chats with William as if he is family, turning Louis off. When Sherlock brings up the Lor of Crime, Louis then instantly gets worried if William would end up outing himself off to Sherlock as the Lord of Crime. While William manages to keep the heat of him, Louis still contemplates killing Sherlock immediately after he is of no use to William. Louis then helps William solve the murder case that happens on the train and apprehend the murderer.
Informed by Fred Pollock on the infamous Baskerville hunts, Louis then calls William to relay the information, to which William immediately sets up an operation to close these hunts for good. Louis then voices his dissatisfaction of being left out on William's operations and wishes to participate more, to which upon some contemplation, William accepts as they both as well as Sebastian and Fred arrive on the human hunting grounds where the 4 kill all the evil nobles and save the children they kidnapped. Upon Albert being dispatched to retrieve a bunch of government documents stolen by Irene Adler, Louis is present when the brothers reveal their intentions to Mycroft to earn his silence on their matters, as well as witness Adler's transformation into James Bond.
Upon the rise of the Jack the Ripper murders, Louis, alongside James, Fred and Sebastian, are sent to retrieve Jack's knives from the bank where they deal with a robbery that immediately occurs and take them all down to save everyone inside the bank and have the guard promoted, to which Louis and Fred realize the entire thing was set up by William to test the team's initiative and ethics. When the team joins together upon Jack's arrival to deal with the Jack the Ripper murders in Whitechapel, as William sets up an elaborate diversion in Whitechapel to distract the cult masterminding the murders so that he and William can get the drop on them and kill them one by one before having the entire building blown up to eliminate any survivors.
Upon Milverton's death and the beginning of the "Final Problem", after William deliberately outing himself as the Lord of Crime, Louis then makes his preparations to ensure the success of the final plan. However having grown very apprehensive of William's decision to shoulder the blame of their crimes, Louis tries to plead and reason with William to allow them both to share the burden and not have himself be destroyed, to which William refuses. Upon William's presumed death and Albert's arrest, Louis was then appointed as the new M to head MI6. Louis then uses this as his means to atone, and eventually reunites with Albert and William 3 years later.
Trivia[]
- Louis ranked third place in the first and second popularity polls of the series
