The Archangel, the Knight...the Man

Contrary to the majority of people, except for Québécois, I did not discover Roy Dupuis through Michael. I have a different view. As far as I am concerned, Roy had a solid dramatic background behind him and although I like Michael because he is Roy's creation, I also appreciate him because like all other RD's characters, Michael has something of him, is a part of him.

No doubt, Michael is Roy's most secretive character that he ever played. I have been watching him for the last four years and to date he has not revealed himself. Michael is sparing when it comes to deal with his emotions. In the first episodes, Roy had more latitude. His ironical smiles, and his fiery looks were like a balmy oil in his performing machine. He was able to show off some emotions.

And suddenly, he became hardened if locked up in a suit of armor. Very little emotions will filter through him. He will devote his talent to render his hermetic character to perfection and will protect himself against all emotional attacks that may come from his environment. Only Nikita will be able to crack up his shell. If we has any doubt of his sincerity, he then will come true in their relationships.

I have been spending four years watching Michael's emotions and it has been most revealing. Michael's face has become even more cloistered now than when the series started.

An unspeakable look of sadness covers his beautiful face. A deep down sadness, on his face showing an impassive look, like a logo of melancholy painted on a helmet. His eyes are not lit anymore. Rarely will you notice some emotion: his thirst for Nikita, his sorrow, his hatred, his madness, his jealousy and sometimes his despair. I have never seen Michael being happy, really happy. Maybe once, when carried away in a carefree moment of joy. The scene where he will plant a tree with his son, or when taking the camera away from his wife, smiling, peacefully...there was a moment of happiness. On the fourth episode of the third season, you will see him cry when reminiscing of that scene. This absence of happy moments will explain his stoical attitude when confronted with life. Being so seldom happy, he will suffer so much when he lost his happiness that he avoids to be happy or unhappy again. As he knows how to control himself, he will hide behind a screen of indifference, making sure that he is not hurt again.

He is the opposite of Ovila, who was vulnerable. His heart was wide open, defenseless, totally immersed in life. Michael is built on the same scaffolding but he is sealed in, being watched by a spirit who will refrain his emotional outbursts. True that these two characters were living in a totally different world. Ovila had to deal with real life. Michael lives more in an imaginary world. Referring to life but not being life itself. Michael must kill to survive. No questions asked. Killing is not a normal gesture, even if you have to do it. But Michael has his own moral code, even when his conscience does resurface as in the episode Not Was.

Of this absent minded Michael, rebel, vulnerable, a totally inefficient cover, on whom no one can depend...well of this Michael, I have a precious souvenir. It is a main event of the series, as will as Half Life, which allowed us to meet him, to find out how fragile he was and to recognize his human side. And it also gave us the opportunity to see the duality of the character with a proper lighting, which will show him as the true hero of this adventure called NIKITA.

At the end of this episode, when Nikita sitting on the bed near him, will notice that he is himself again, the secret and efficient Michael, she feels better. Because now she knows that a different soul lives inside him, and she will love him as much as we do. For his precious support, his precise and competent use of his intelligence, of his physical agilities and for all the mysteries inside him. All this is responsible for his charming and strong attractive power.

What's most fascinating is Michael's duality. Behind stoical and proud Michael stands another person who, as we may feel, is very different. We can only imagine the hidden side but we are dying to know more so we can admire him more. So little of himself does he show us, to make us realize of his strength and brightness. If Michael is so successful in hiding himself so well, then he ought to be someone who must be discovered.

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