Marcus/V

Marcus was a supporting character featured in the 2009-2011 ABC television series V. He was played by actor Christopher Shyer and was introduced in the series pilot episode. He appeared in a total of 21 out 22 episodes between seasons 1 and 2.

Biography
Marcus was an extraterrestrial and a member of the race known only as the Visitors. He was a high-ranking member of the Visitor High Command, and served loyally under former High Commander Diana up until the years of Diana's apparent death. Following her disappearance, Diana's daughter Anna assumed the mantle of High Commander and Marcus followed her with equal zeal.

Marcus accompanied Anna and the Visitor fleet to Earth in 2009 where they publicly revealed themselves to the planet's general population. Visitor sleeper agents had been operating on Earth in secret for years, but this was the first time that Earthlings learned that they were no longer alone in the universe. ( Pilot)

Marcus was a stoic and pragmatic subordinate and differed himself from others in that he never wavered in his objectives. Marcus also did not suffer from the affliction of human emotion - a condition that affected many Visitors who had endured prolonged exposures to human DNA skin coverings.

A resistance cell known as the Fifth Column made repeated attacks against the Visitors. In one ambitious mission, one of their more notable members Erica Evans succeeded in getting aboard the Visitor Mother Ship and destroying Anna's incubation room filled with her unborn young. During this instance, a Visitor member of the Fifth Column, Joshua, was killed in action, but Marcus was able to use Visitor Blue Energy technology to revive him. Unfortunately for the Resistance, Joshua retained no memory of his time with the Fifth Column. ( Red Sky)

Marcus had a V spy named Sarita Malik infiltrate the New York office of the FBI. Sarita stole important evidence linking a series of explosions to the Fifth Column and delivered it to Marcus. Unbeknownst to both of them, the meeting was witnessed by reporter Chad Decker who then realized that the Visitors were truly evil and joined the Fifth Column shortly thereafter. ( Serpent's Tooth)

The Fifth Column orchestrated an assassination attempt against Anna who was making a public appearance to announce her plans to build the Concordia skyscraper (which was in fact a landing platform for the mother ship though the people of Earth were largely unaware of this). Fifth Column member Kyle Hobbes fired the shot meant for Anna, but struck Marcus instead, gravely injuring him. Marcus healed from the assault and Anna was very grateful for his heroic sacrifice. ( Concordia)

It was eventually revealed that Anna's mother, Diana, was in fact alive and had been kept prisoner by Anna in the bowels of the New York mother ship. Marcus' first loyalty was always to the High Command and knew that his place was with Diana. Anna however, wasted little time with her mother's surprising return to glory and murdered her before a full assemblage of Visitors. Afterward, she wrapped her tail around Marcus' neck accusing him of being disloyal for siding with Diana against her. Marcus was willing to let Anna execute him, but Anna forgave Marcus for his transgressions, warning him that she will not be so merciful a second time.

Anna's next plan was to use the young hybrid daughter of Ryan Nichols to project the power of her hypnotic Bliss across the entire planet Earth. Marcus tried to convince Anna to abandon such a feat out of fear of what physical toll might be exacted upon Anna's person, but Anna went ahead with the plan, which proved successful. ( Mother's Day)

Notes & Trivia

 * The character of Marcus was created by writers Kenneth Johnson, Scott Peters and director Yves Simoneau.


 * The season 2 episode, "Birth Pangs", is the only episode of the series that Marcus did not appear in.


 * Actor Christopher Shyer has appeared in other works of science fiction as well. He played Elliott Peoples in the "Paper Trail" episode of Viper. In the TV show First Wave he played a character named Lon in "All About Eddie". He played a man named Harold Zimmer in the "Seeds of Destruction" episode of the 1995 relaunch of The Outer Limits. On the show Jake 2.0, Shyer played Abdul Tiranzi in the episode "Training Day". In 2003, Shyer appeared in the critically reviled Jon Amiel film The Core where he received second billing as the character of Dave Perry. He played a character named Brad in the "The Lies That Bind" episode of Kyle XY in 2006.