Carnivale/Characters

Carnies

Ben Hawkins (Nick Stahl)

• Always Save the Girl: Especially in the series finale:

Jonesy: What if [Sofie's] dead?
Ben: Then God help 'em. God help every single person in that valley.

• Blessed with Suck
• Can't Hold His Liquor
• Crucified Hero Shot
• Disappeared Dad: Not that it isn't justified - Scudder wanted to keep his son safe from his dark nature.
• Dreaming of Things to Come
• Farm Boy: Well, until the First Bank of Oklahoma comes to repossess it...
• Fish Out of Water
• Hates Being Touched: You would too if you had a serious case of Psychic Dreams for Everyone or could accidentally kill people if you weren't careful.
• Healing Hands
• Hero with Bad Publicity: He's already shady due to whatever he did to land himself in prison and then go on the run, but with the events of the finale, one imagines Ben's public image is going to nosedive.
• Likes Older Women: Ruthie being the main example, though he later regrets it.
• Loners Are Freaks
• Messianic Archetype
• Mysterious Parent
• Mysterious Past
• Naive Newcomer: To the point where he's everyone in the Carnivàle's personal Butt Monkey.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat Justin
• Took a Level in Badass

Samson (Michael J. Anderson)

• Badass Grandpa
• Deadpan Snarker
• Liz Lemon Job
• No Badass to His Valet: Neither Management nor Ben really impress Samson with their powers.
• Only Sane Man: You'd think Samson would have learned; Avatars are not the most mentally-stable of people.
• Pay Evil Unto Evil: Samson's solution to the Babylon problem - specifically Stangler escaping Carny Justice and no one being held accountable for Dora Mae's death? Shoot Stangler between the eyes anyway.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse
• What the Hell, Hero?: Frequently, to Ben, especially when Ben kills Management, the necessity of which Samson cannot understand.

Clayton "Jonesy" Jones (Tim DeKay)

• Badass Normal
• Cold-Blooded Torture: The victim of it, in "Lincoln Highway".
• Grease Monkey
• Handicapped Badass: At least, until he gets better. Then he's just a Badass.
• Happily Married: In Season Two, to Libby.
• The Lancer: To Ben, especially in the latter half of Season Two.
• Mr. Fanservice: Count the number of times Tim DeKay is shirtless.
• Nice Guy

Sofie Agnesh Bojakshiya (Clea Duvall)

• Attempted Rape
• Black Eyes of Evil
• Broken Bird
• Circus Brat
• Face Heel Turn
• Fortune Teller
• Heroic BSOD: Multiple times, although to be fair, it really does suck to find out that your mother tried to kill you because you were the product of a rape, the daughter of the Antichrist, and very probably heir to some serious demonic powers.
• Lipstick Lesbian: Or, Lipstick Bisexual. She makes out with Libby, but nothing is ever really made of it.
• Miss Conception
• She Cleans Up Nicely

Apollonia (Diane Sallinger)

• And I Must Scream: Trapped in your own body, unable to communicate except through psychic contact with your daughter? AUGH.
• Fainting Seer
• Heroic BSOD: A big enough one to make her catatonic.
• Rape as Backstory

Libby Dreifuss (Carla Gallo)

• Cassandra Truth: When she tells her mother about Ben
• Happily Married: To Jonesy in Season Two.
• Hooker with a Heart of Gold
• Lipstick Lesbian: Along with Sofie, it's more like a case of Lipstick Bisexual.
• Nipple-and-Dimed
• Smitten Teenage Girl: Her marriage to Jonesy has elements of this in the beginning, but she definitely grows up in "Lincoln Highway".

Dora Mae Dreifuss (Amanda Aday)

• And I Must Scream: Not only is she murdered, but her ultimate fate is to serve as the eternal plaything for a bunch of rapist immortal miners.
• BBW: Amanda Aday is gorgeous, and the show never once argues against that.
• Nipple-and-Dimed
• Stuffed Into the Fridge
• You Can Leave Your Hat On: Horribly, horribly averted in "Babylon".

Rita Sue Dreifuss (Cynthia Ettinger)

• BBW: Hell yes, and easily one of the sexiest women on the show.
• Evil Matriarch: Well, less "evil", more "manipulative".
• Hot Mom
• Lady Macbeth: She manages to talk Stumpy into (or out of) just about anything.
• Manipulative Bitch
• Nipple-and-Dimed
• Pet the Dog: Almost Hypocritical Heartwarming, but when Dora Mae is killed, Libby turns up missing as well. Cue Rita Sue frantically searching for her daughter. Libby shows up later, smoking and back-talking Rita Sue - who slaps her, then hugs her tightly.
• Stage Mom: Teaches her daughters all her stripping and prostitution tricks, and when they don't listen, proves that she's still got it.
• You Can Leave Your Hat On

Felix "Stumpy" Dreifuss (Toby Huss)

• Bumbling Dad: He really does love his daughters, but he's not the brightest bulb in the box.
• Henpecked Husband: Rita Sue wears the pants in that family and everyone knows it.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: All his dubiously-legal hijinks - pimping his wife and daughters, blatantly cheating the public, shilling fake healers, gambling - are so obviously due to his devotion toward his family.
• Pervert Dad: Yeaaaah, with the pimping and the exploitation...
• Racist Dad

Ruthie (Adrienne Barbeau)

• Back from the Dead
• Christmas Cake
• Deadpan Snarker: Probably her Crowning Moment of Awesome, among many, is her editorial comment to Justin forcing Iris to ride the Colossus in the finale:

Prick.

• Ethical Slut
• Grandma, What Massive Hotness You Have!: Is played by Adrienne Barbeau. 'Nuff said.
• Hot Mom
• Miss Yo Yo Knickers
• Snake Charmer

Lodz (Patrick Bauchau)

• Blind Seer
• Bondage Is Bad: Lodz and Lila have fun with his cane.
• Deal with the Devil: Shame his psychic powers had to come at the price of his eyes. That's what you get for dealing with Dark Avatars.
• Dirty Mind Reading
• Treacherous Advisor: To Ben, although he advises Samson as well.

Lila (Debra Christofferson)

• BBW: With a beard. And still the best-dressed woman in the cast.
• Bondage Is Bad: Lodz's cane, meet Lila.
• Christmas Cake
• The Dragon: To Lodz, even after his death.
• Pet the Dog: Lila assisting Ruthie in wrapping Dora Mae's body in silk and telling stories about how much the Carnivale really loved her is absolutely tear-jerking.
• The Vamp: "When you're done with Grandma, you come see Lila." Yowza.

Gabriel (Brian Turk)

• Berserk Button: Do not touch his Mama.
• The Big Guy
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass
• Gentle Giant: As long as you don't hurt Ruthie, he's fine.
• Momma's Boy: Justified, as he's mentally handicapped, and Ruthie is the only one who can calm him down.

Affiliated with the New Canaan Ministry

Brother Justin Crowe (Clancy Brown)

• Affably Evil
• Anti-Villain
• The Antichrist: No, really. Literally.
• Bad Powers, Bad People
• Black Eyes of Evil
• Brother-Sister Incest: Canonical, too.
• Dark Messiah
• Foe-Tossing Charge: Anyone in Justin's way when he finally comes face-to-face with Ben? Gets eviscerated by his scythe.
• Go Among Mad People
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope
• Mangst: Justin is the emo-est Dark Messiah ever, until he just embraces the evil.
• Moral Event Horizon: His treatment of the maids, as well as Norman, which makes his killing of Scudder positively unimaginative in retrospect.
• Nightmare Fuel: Justin is pretty much an alphabetized list, from the Body Horror coin-vomiting to his stint in the crazy house to his playing around with the maids.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat Ben
• Sinister Minister: Ur-Example.

Iris Crowe (Amy Madigan)

• Axe Crazy: Though her preferred weapon is a boat oar, and the axe is technically meant for someone else to use.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing
• Brother-Sister Incest: Pretty explicit on both sides, though Justin's is sexual in nature and Iris's is emotional.
• Christmas Cake
• The Dragon: To Justin, at least until Stroud comes along.
• Heel Face Revolving Door: Much debate centers around Iris's true nature after the events of Season Two. Is she still loyal to Justin? Was her alliance with Norman just for appearances? Why did she let Ben go? Is she truly sorry for setting the Ministry fire? And just whose side is she on, anyway?
• Knight Templar Big Sister: Five Words - "I did it for you".
• Promotion to Parent: Iris is arguably one of the only competent mother-figures Justin has ever known. Which makes their relationship that much squickier.
• Stepford Smiler
• Stronger Sibling: Well, smarter and more ruthless, at any rate.
• Took a Level in Badass: She takes several over the course of the series, even ones that are levels in retrospect (her "punishment" from Justin and plotting with Norman).
• Yandere: Calm and pleasant on the surface, "crazier than a shithouse rat" underneath.

Norman Balthus (Ralph Waite)

• Good Shepherd
• Parental Substitute: For Justin and Iris, which makes Justin's sadistic treatment and killing of him very Oedipal in nature.
• Sacrificial Lion: One of the great shockers of the finale is Justin killing him.

Tommy Dolan (Robert Knepper)

• Deal with the Devil
• Intrepid Reporter
• Unwitting Pawn: To be fair, no one in-universe sees Iris coming as the arsonist, and no one could predict how far Justin would go to protect her and how manipulative he can be.

Varlyn Stroud (John Carroll Lynch)

• Affably Evil
• Complete Monster: While Justin is more of an Anti-Villain, Stroud has no redeeming qualities of any kind.
• The Dragon: To Justin, replacing Iris.
• Psycho for Hire

Eleanor McGill (K Callan)

• Cloudcuckoolander: She certainly chooses to ignore a lot of the strange goings-on around Justin's ministry.
• Kindly Housekeeper
• Magnetic Plot Device: Her coin-stealing in the pilot provides the impetus for the first manifestation of Justin's powers.
• Sacrificial Lion: Shouldn't have insisted upon telling Justin you saw his Black Eyes of Evil, Eleanor - Iris didn't appreciate it.

Other Characters

Henry Scudder (John Savage)

• Black Eyes of Evil
• Daddy Had a Good Reason For Abandoning You: Sort of. And he ended up leaving his son alone with an insane, abusive mother because of it.
• Dark Is Not Evil

Management AKA Lucius Belyakov (voiced by Linda Hunt)

• The Faceless
• Good Is Not Nice
• The Man Behind the Curtain: Literally - there's a curtain separating his bed from the rest of the trailer.