Moon Knight: Who Is Arthur Harrow? Who Is Ethan Hawke’s Villain Is, Inspired By True Religious Explained
Ethan Hawke himself has confirmed that his interpretation is inspired by Koresh.
The first official trailer of the Marvel Studios series titled Moon Knight is making the rounds of the web and the comments from fans seem to be largely positive pending the debut of the show on Disney+, set for March 30, 2022. In addition to the main character played by Oscar Isaac in the trailer also appears the villain of the series, who has the face of Ethan Hawke. The identity of the villain is not revealed in the promotional video but if you activate the subtitles of the official trailer – published by the Marvel Entertainment channel – they suggest the name of the speaking character.
In the case of Ethan Hawke, the villain has the name of Arthur Harrow and – according to what the actor stated in a 2012 interview – this is inspired by the real religious fanatic named David Koresh. But let’s go in order trying to understand who is in the TV series Arthur Harrow, who is this character in the comics and how the “guru” David Koresh may have influenced Ethan Hawke.
Arthur Harrow in the TV Series
The clues provided by the Moon Knight trailer are not many but they are probably sufficient to outline the profile of a leader of a religious sect. This character appears at minute 1 and 15 seconds of the trailer, dressed in a single-colored shirt and with long hair just like a “holy man” would dress, in the imagination of many:
If you look closely, you can see two identical silver bracelets on Arthur Harrow’s wrists. Even if it is difficult to identify them with certainty, one gets the impression that they may be important relics: the one placed on the left arm is better seen and seems to have particular engravings. Staying in the field of hypotheses, the bracelets could allow Arthur to transform into a creature or to tap into a supernatural power.
Around him – in a probably German location in central Europe – several followers gather, who kneel to honor him. Steven / Marc is the only one in the square not to kneel. This scene raises the hypothesis that Harrow should be playing a guru of some type of sect. Be careful because around him there are also those who look like armed bodyguards.
A few scenes later, when not framed, Harrow himself suggests to Steven / Marc to “embrace chaos”, a sign that Harrow may have a supernatural power with which he discovered Marc Spector’s secret identity linked to the Egyptian god Khonshu.
Arthur Harrow In The Comics
In the Marvel Comics Arthur Harrow is a secondary character, who first appeared in the 1985 American journal Moon Knight Vol. 2 number 2. Harrow is a scientist whose pain relief experiments are based on some Nazi research conducted on humans in Auschwitz. Obviously, being a secondary character in the comics, Marvel Studios probably used the name Arthur Harrow substantially changing his sights. The link with Germany, however, could be confirmed precisely by the image of the trailer in which the followers of the character of Ethan Hawke kneel in front of their leader.
The Influence of David Koresh
In an interview with the US program Late Night directed by Seth Meyers, actor Ethan Hawke stated that he based his character on the figure of David Koresh (at 2:15). In the United States, after attending the religious sect of the Davidians, David Koresh proclaimed himself as the new messiah and his influence was such that, in 1983, he divided the sect he frequented in two. In 1989 Koresh, after the death of his antagonistic leader George Roden, became the sole leader of the Davidian sect, who settled in the Mount Carmel Center in Texas. Within this center lived the followers of Koresh, who practiced group sex, abused drugs and trained with all kinds of weapons. All of this was revealed by the FBI following the historic Waco massacre in 1993, where Koresh himself was killed.
As Hawke argued in the interview, David Koresh has been used as the inspiration for so many TV and movie characters (a bit like Charles Manson), but why should Moon Knight’s villain take inspiration from this criminal? The answer may be in the “messiah complex” that could plague Hawke’s character. Furthermore, the latter may have an armed army following him, as Koresh had, and he may be so good with words that he can influence hundreds of people.
