Damien

Damien
A possible profile of Damien by vlasdygoth
Details
Full Name	Damien Gorham (Formerly Robert Douglas Gorham)
Alias	Damien Subject #E-307 Shady Park Guy Number 5 Neonthorn
Date of Birth	February 2, 1988
Family	Unnamed father Unnamed mother
First Mentioned	Episode 3
Portrayed By
Voice Actor	Charlie Ian
First Heard	Episode 10

Robert Douglas Gorham (aka Damien) is a major character in The Bright Sessions and the main character of A Neon Darkness. He is a Class E atypical with an ability referred to as "mind manipulation". In The Bright Sessions, he is somewhat unofficially a patient of Dr. Bright's, having forced her to give him therapy and information after discovering she had experience with atypicals. The novel A Neon Darkness follows him at 19 years old, having just moved to LA, as he befriends a group of people known as the Unusuals. His story after and during the 4th season of The Bright Sessions is also continued in Some Faraway Place, which details the unlikely friendship between him and Rose Atkinson.

Biography

Damien developed his power sometime before he was thirteen years old. When he was thirteen, he had less control over his power, and ended up driving his parents away in an argument because he wanted to be left alone. They never returned.

Abilities

Imposing his want on other people, the power of persuasion. His ability is very rare. He is considered a high-risk patient by Dr. Bright, earning him a Class E-3.

His abilities operate on an unconscious level. People around him are compelled to behave as he wants them too. This includes responding to his verbal requests, but speech is not required.

He appears to be unable to influence telepaths like Chloe due to the complementary nature of their abilities.

When his ability was reversed by a backlash with Mark’s mimic ability, he temporarily became aware of what others around him wanted from him and was compelled to act in accordance, regardless of their abilities or lack thereof.

While trying to kidnap Adam, Damien was beaten severely by Caleb. After spending several weeks in a coma, Damien woke to discover his ability no longer worked. Damien can still feel thinking minds in the vicinity, but he can no longer influence them. Chloe also still cannot read his mind.

Appearance

In A Neon Darkness, Damien is stated to be a white man with dark hair and an "emo haircut". He is also described as being short and chubby.

No physical description of him is given in The Bright Sessions, however Lauren Shippen mentions in a blog post that he is the fifth tallest of the show's main cast.

In The College Tapes, while he is viewing Mark's memories of Damien, Beck remarks that Damien had lost weight since he'd seen him in A Neon Darkness.

Relationships

Dr. Joan Bright

Joan is Damien's therapist, by his insistence. She is the only character who can (partially) resist Damien's influence of her own free will, rather than due to an atypical ability or a scientific intervention. In season 2, the two characters appear to have a close (if somewhat antagonistic) relationship. Damien stalks Joan and compels her to tell him secrets about herself and her other patients, resisting her attempts to provide proper therapy. Damien repeatedly teases Joan about being her closest companion, all while ignoring the fact that the reverse also seems to be true. He grows jealous of Agent Green and becomes angry when Joan is forced to tell the AM about Damien. However, he agrees to help Joan rescue Mark on the condition she finds someone like Damien. The two even spend a significant amount of time strengthening Damien's control.

Their relationship suffers irreparable damage in season 3 when Damien kidnaps Mark. When Damien loses his ability, Joan reluctantly tries to help at Mark's insistence, but Damien later berates her for relishing his temporary powerless state. They generally avoid each other after Damien is released from the AM, and when they do meet, they share a cold, strained familiarity at best.

Chloe Turner

Chloe is initially terrified of Damien. She panics and says his mind is "cold and hard and sharp" and that there is something "really wrong" with him. She tries to persuade Dr. Bright that he is too dangerous to treat. Damien seems to prove Chloe right when he shifts his stalking from Joan to Chloe, fixating on her ability to resist him fully. However, Damien's attentions soon shift to Mark, and Chloe becomes less fearful.

Damien later hits Chloe on the head with a heavy lamp, causing her severe chronic pain and problems with her abilities. Chloe takes an extended leave to deal with her injury, and she runs into Damien in a diner on the drive back to the city. The two share a cautious meal and catch up. Damien apologizes for hurting her and then accepts without argument when she says she's not ready to forgive him. Chloe also reveals that she still can't read his mind, saying that his ability must still be there somewhere.

Mark Bryant

Damien considers Mark to be the only person capable of understanding his ability. After him and Dr. Bright make the agreement that if Damien helps her and Sam bust Mark out of the A.M. in exchange for Dr. Bright finding someone who also has his ability, Damien discovers that Mark has the ability to mimic other atypicals' abilities and kidnaps him. He lies to Mark saying that Dr. Bryant, his therapist who he calls Dr. B, and Dr. Bright, the doctor Sam mentioned during Mark's comatose time travel adventure in 1810, are different people, and that Dr. B his sister is dangerous; this, coupled with Damien's ability to keep Mark trapped, contributes to their summer-long roadtrip across the United States. Damien nurses Mark back to health with the aim of getting his ability working again so he can finally have somebody to be with that isn't fully influenced by his mind manipulation. Despite this, Mark still repeatedly asks to talk to his sister and return to Boston to reunite with her which Damien refuses, saying that because he doesn't want to, his ability won't let them.

Damien repeatedly makes Mark relive traumatic events from his stay at the A.M., wanting to know more about the institution and the extent of Mark's ability. He reveals some information to him about his personal life and past, despite not truly needing to, such as the fact that his parents abandoned him at a young age out of fear of his ability. Damien slowly comes to develop confusing feelings for Mark, and seemingly vise versa, to the point where he says that even if Mark's ability doesn't come back, he is still willing to stay with him and continue their road trip indefinitely. Mark is interested to know more about Damien and is unable to separate this desire as his own or as Damien's, a point of contention in their relationship. One day, when Damien leaves his phone behind while fetching dinner, Mark attempts to call his sister and reveals to Damien that he has known that Dr. B and Dr. Bright are the same person, and that Damien has been lying to him. This leads to an explosive argument wherein Mark not only gets back his own ability, but steals Damien's as well. After this Damien becomes easily susceptible to the wants of others and reveals to Mark that he wants him to want to stay with him and wants to tell him the truth about himself and why he took Mark, much to his dismay. On the road home to Boston, Damien attempts to take back control such as by destroying his phone to limit contact with Dr. Bright. He once again spills more information to Mark, such as that he isn't interested in human relationships because his ability makes it so none of them are genuine, and that he resents Mark for taking it from him despite the loneliness it causes him.

When they make it back to Boston, Damien goes home and begins plotting ways to not have his ability usurped again, or be influenced by the abilities of others. He attempts to kidnap Adam, Wadsworth's nephew, in order to get information about how she is able to resist atypical powers, but he beaten severely by Caleb. He is taken to the A.M. by Sam and Joan, much to Mark's dismay, and temporarily believes (somewhat due to Wadsworth's influence) that Mark abandoned him there. He later comes to realize that Mark would never do such a thing. When it is discovered that Damien's ability has been seemingly permanently blocked off as a result of his brain injury from Caleb, he is sent home.

Damien is in a slump without his ability, having no money and no identifiers. He gets drunk often, once calling Mark on his birthday and admitting later that it was because he wanted to hear his voice. Mark visits him at his house and tells him to leave Boston, which causes a tearful argument wherein Damien tells him that he has nothing in his life anymore without his ability, except Mark, and believes that because Mark even bothered to come to him it means he still cares. Mark says that he and his friends are afraid of Damien and what he might do, and Damien says he would never hurt him. Finally he accepts that Mark wants nothing to do with him and leaves town like he asks to start a new life without his ability.

Later, Sam gives him a call to ask for his perspective on Mark's ability and how it works, revealing that Mark isn't doing well. This concerns him deeply and he considers going back to check on him, but Sam discourages this saying it would only hurt him more. She and Damien talk about Mark and she says that the two of them being "in love with the same man" doesn't make them friends. This renders Damien speechless, but he doesn't quite deny her accusation; in Some Faraway Place, it is revealed that Damien has been writing unsent letters to Mark since his admittance to the A.M., and in his final letter he comes to terms with the fact that he is in love with Mark and that the only way to love him is from a distance.

Samantha Barnes

Sam and Damien initially had a rocky relationship due to Damien kidnapping Mark and Sam punching Damien the first time she met him. This tension escalated when Damien bragged to Joan that he could make Sam commit suicide if he wanted to, although he later insists this was an empty threat. After Damien's release from the AM, Sam falsifies papers for Damien to leave town and escape Ellie Wadsworth's supervision. Among other things, she legally changes his name to Damien—a fact which seems to have earned her Damien's grudging respect. Sam, likewise, turns to Damien for advice on Mark, reminding him that they're "both in love with the same man."

Trivia

• Lauren Shippen was forced to rewrite Damien's character after watching Marvel's Jessica Jones.
• Damien considers religion pointless.
• Damien's Myers-Briggs personality type is ISTP.
• Damien is very good at playing the violin.
• Damien is lactose intolerant.
• Damien loves dogs.[1]