| “ | Our world is changing. The mass extinction we feared… has already begun… and we are the cause. We are the infection. But like all living organisms, the Earth unleashed a fever to fight this infection: its original and rightful rulers, the Titans. For thousands of years, these creatures have remained in hiding around the world. And unless all the Titans are found, our planet will perish, and so will we. They are the only guarantee that life will carry on. | „ |
| ~ Emma Russell explaining her goal to awaken the Titans and restore peace to Earth due to humanity causing destruction to the planet. |
| “ | Long live... the king. | „ |
| ~ Emma's last words before dying after being injured by King Ghidorah when attempting to distract him in order to save Godzilla and allow her family to escape. |
Dr. Emma Russell is a major antagonist in the 2019 monster film Godzilla: King of the Monsters and the main protagonist of its prequel comic book Godzilla: Aftershock.
She a Monarch scientist who formerly worked for Monarch until the death of her son Andrew in 2014 during Godzilla's fight with the M.U.T.O.s led to her descent into evil when she started working with Alan Jonah and his terrorist group while becoming convinced that humanity was like a plague as the Titans were the only way to restore nature to the Earth. Although not necessarily evil, Emma is willing to take drastic and unpredictable measures in her best efforts to save and protect her family at all costs. In doing so, she accidentally unleashed Godzilla's nemesis King Ghidorah and intended to use him to restore balance. However, her hubris got the better of her and she underestimated Ghidorah, not realizing that he is an alien and how incredibly dangerous he really was. Once Emma realized she couldn’t control Ghidorah as he planned to use the other Titans to kill off the human race, she realized her mistake and betrays Jonah to save her family. She would then sacrifice her life to Ghidorah in order to save Godzilla and to protect her family while intending to fix what she had broken.
She was portrayed by Vera Farmiga, who also played Norma Bates in Bates Motel, Joanna in The Commuter, Livia Soprano in The Many Saints of Newark, Lindsay Carson in Law & Order, and Eleanor Bishop in Hawkeye.
Biography[]
Background[]
Emma was born to Gene Williams and Josephine Williams. From a young age, she was considered a brilliant but rebellious Maverick as she was involved with environmental activism, and she took part in protests that resulted in the occasional arrest. She went on to get her Masters of Science in Biology and PHD in Paleobiology at the University of Rochester and Ohio State University respectively.
At some point in Emma's life, she married a man named Dr. Mark Russell, nine months later, she gave birth to their first and only son, Andrew, born in 2002 and five years later, she gave birth to their daughter, Madison. In 2014, Emma lost her twelve-year-old son, Andrew during Godzilla's battle between the M.U.T.O.s in San Francisco, while her daughter, Madison survived. Sometime after Andrew's funeral, Emma and Mark divorced, mainly because Emma was working seriously for the Monarch expedition and she was given custody of Madison.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters[]
At some point prior to the movie, Emma contacted Alan Jonah and his ecoterrorist group and offered to give them the ORCA her ex-husband Mark Russell had designed so that they could use it to awaken the other Titans. After Jonah and his men killed the other members of Emma's Monarch expedition during the birth of Mothra, they retrieved Emma and her daughter Madison along with the ORCA.
Russell then traveled with them to Antarctica where they intended to use the ORCA to awaken a Titan, called "Monster Zero". However, while there, they were attacked by Monarch forces and Emma found herself confronted by Mark at gunpoint. Mark pleads to Madison to come over to him so that she can escape, but before he could do so, Emma activated a detonator which sets off the explosives around the area Monster Zero was contained in, releasing Ghidorah from his icy prison. Emma and the rest of Jonah's forces then made their escape on helicopter as Ghidorah attacked the Monarch forces before Godzilla intervened and fought the Titan until Ghidorah escaped.
After Ghidorah's escape, Emma contacts Monarch for a negotiation, claiming that by awakening the Titans, she can restore the natural order and revert the wrongdoings of humanity. Afterwards, Jonah plans on awakening a destructive Pteranodon-like Titan named Rodan in Isla de Mara, Mexico. He orders Emma to use the ORCA to awaken Rodan from a nearby volcano in Mexico, but Madison, having overheard Emma's entire argument with Monarch and Mark, pleads with her mother to give Monarch more time to get the civilians to safety, only to be ignored by Emma, who once again listens to Jonah and activates the ORCA. Upon being awakened after responding to the ORCA's call, Rodan instantly starts destroying everything in his path, but is somehow defeated by Ghidorah, who now steals Godzilla's title as the new alpha after the latter's supposed death by a nuclear warhead known as the Oxygen Destroyer while fighting his rival underwater (although it turned out that Godzilla had survived, but badly injured from the blast, although later revived after Dr. Serizawa sacrifices himself by detonating another warhead to increase Godzilla's power).
Ghidorah then makes Rodan his right-hand man and calls out to the other Titans, ordering them to cause numerous massacres under his command. Horrified at witnessing the destruction and countless deaths the Titans are now causing, Madison, disgusted by her mother's actions, coldly disowns Emma for endangering billions of innocent lives. While arguing with Emma about releasing the Titans and restoring balance, Madison poses a heartbreaking question by asking her mother if Andrew would approve of what they've done before locking herself away. Later, Emma eventually starts doubting that Jonah's goals are as effective as he says they are, and suggests the possibility of using the ORCA to broadcast a signal from the Fenway Park stadium in Boston, but Jonah disagrees. Emma, however, discovered that Madison, having overheard her and Jonah's conversation, had stolen the ORCA and was heading to Boston to fulfill her mother's plan of disrupting Ghidorah's communication with the other Titans and get them to stop attacking. After Jonah decides to let Emma go once he finds out, she then went to Boston herself to rescue her daughter, encountering Mark and the remaining members of Monarch before finally reuniting with Madison while Godzilla and Mothra battle Ghidorah and Rodan.
While there, Emma, feeling remorseful for her actions, allows Mark and Madison to escape with Monarch in a desperate attempt to protect her family before sacrificing herself by using the ORCA to distract Ghidorah and lure him away as the group flees, only for Ghidorah to fatally wound her with his gravity beams while chasing Emma through Boston, destroying the ORCA and leading to Emma succumbing to her injuries. However, it was revealed that Emma's sacrifice had given enough time for Godzilla to recover and achieve a fiery form due to having Mothra's energy transferred into him when she sacrificed herself to Ghidorah, whereupon he activates thermonuclear pulses that incinerate and obliterate his nemesis instantly, thus disintegrating Emma's body and avenging her along with those who have been killed by Ghidorah.
Despite Emma's death and heroic sacrifice, the Titans acknowledge Godzilla as their rightful alpha, as Godzilla decides to have them clean up the wrongdoings of humanity before sending most of the Titans back into hibernation.
Legacy[]
a crumpled and damaged article surrounding Emma Russell's legacy.
Despite Emma's death, Godzilla finishes what she had started, but instead of having the planet reset back to its natural order, as she had originally intended, he instead forced his fellow Titans to undo the wrongdoings of the human race by repairing all the damage caused to Earth. Despite Emma's redemption, the public still have mixed feelings about her. Even 5 years after her death, they still do not know whether to regard Emma as a hero or a villain for her actions.
Personality[]
Emma was described as brilliant and independent, but somewhat unorthodox, she was passionate about the well-being of the planet stemming from her pre-Monarch days as an environmental activist. Emma was also dedicated to her daughter Madison, and feeling a duty to both her and the planet, Emma seeks to prepare her daughter for the post-Godzilla world. Emma also holds resentment towards Mark for running out on the family after Andrew's death; that bitterness probably manifested in parental alienation, in which Emma tried to turn Madison against her father by telling Maddie that he was drunk who left them because he couldn't be strong for Madison's sake and he didn't care about them anymore. When all the titans emerged and attacked humankind Madison demonized her seeing how it wasn't going according to her plan. Emma tried to justify how the military were gonna take over Monarch and wipe out the titans. Madison disowns her and reminds her of Andrew not wanting this to happen.
Emma's grief over Andrew's death gave her the desire to right old wrongs by secretly joining Alan Jonah's eco-terrorist group so she can help them awaken the titans to reverse humanity's destruction on the world and ensure he didn't die for nothing. Despite this, after being let go by Alan as she was just used as a pawn by him, she changes her mind and ways by saving Godzilla from Ghidorah and luring him away in order to save her daughter and ex-husband before eventually getting killed.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Emma is the first villain in MonsterVerse to be redeemed followed by Rodan.
- Emma Russell is the first female human villain in the MonsterVerse film series, with Preston Packard, Alan Jonah, Asher Jonah, Walter Simmons and Ren Serizawa as the male human villains in the film series, but unlike them, Emma redeems herself in the end.
- She is currently one of the many characters in the MonsterVerse portrayed by an actor with a role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, being played by Vera Farmiga (Eleanor Bishop). The others are Aaron Taylor-Johnson (Quicksilver), Elizabeth Olsen (Scarlet Witch), Tom Hiddleston (Loki), Brie Larson (Captain Marvel), Samuel L. Jackson (Nick Fury), John C. Reilly (Rhomann Dey), Brian Tyree Henry (Phastos), Rebecca Hall (Maya Hansen), Corey Hawkins (Navy Op), Kurt Russell (Ego the Living Planet), Wyatt Russell (U.S. Agent), Jonathan Howard (Ian Boothby) and Bradley Whitford (John Flynn).
See also[]
- Emma Russell on the Heroes Wiki.
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 Villains
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Titans Apex Cybernetics Terrorists RM Construction Hyenas Others | ||
