Over the course of seven seasons, The 100 has seen a lot of different antagonists make trouble for the main characters. In the first season, one of those antagonists was Richard Harmon’s Murphy. One of the 100 delinquents sent to Earth, he was more of a troublemaker than he was interested in contributing to the survival of the group.
Murphy, however, has come a long way since that first season. He’s still a survivalist, or as Raven Reyes likes to call him, a “cockroach.” Years later, however, he’s more interested in saving the people he cares about, and innocent kids caught up in the fights of adults, than he is himself. Now a fan favorite, there’s still quite a bit fans might not know about him.
How Old Was Murphy When He Was Arrested?
When the original 100 are sent to Earth in the pilot episode, they are all children convicted of crimes who haven’t yet turned 18 years old. Clarke is arrested for trying to help her father get the word out about the Ark’s viability, Octavia is arrested for being born illegally, and Murphy is arrested for setting fire to the living quarters of the officer who arrested his father.
Just how old he is when that happens is never revealed in the show. Actor Richard Harmon, however, has his own idea of backstory for the character, revealed at the events of Unity Days 2018. Harmon believes that it’s a few years after his father’s death that Murphy makes the decision, likely getting arrested in his early teenage years, at 13.
What Do He And Raven Have In Common?
Though the two seem to exist at opposite ends of the morality spectrum, Murphy and Raven do have a similar background – especially when it comes to their mothers.
Raven’s mother is an addict. She drinks so heavily that she can’t really support her daughter. Murphy’s mother becomes the same way, losing herself to alcohol after her husband is floated for stealing medicine for their son. She blames Murphy for the death of her husband and eventually drinks herself to death.
What Is His Full Name?
Most of the characters in the series call him Murphy. There are only a handful of characters, including Emori, who call him John. Originally, he was designated as “John #1” to differentiate him from a character with the same name in the pilot. His first name, however, isn’t John.
According to showrunner Jason Rothenberg, his full name is Jonathan Murphy. No one calls him by his longer first name. Even those calling him John are using a nickname, though they might not all know it.
Was Murphy Always Planned As A Main Character?
In the pilot episode, Murphy isn’t even called Murphy yet, so fans probably are aware he wasn’t initially a main character. After Rotheberg’s initial viewing of the pilot, however, he decided he liked what Richard Harmon did with the supporting character and wanted to keep him on the show.
According to Harmon, Rothenberg emailed him to let him know that he liked what he did for the pilot and was making him the bad guy of the first season. By season three, Murphy and Harmon were so ingrained in the show that he was promoted to a series regular.
What Does Richard Harmon Love Most About His Character?
In his acting career, Harmon has played a lot of not-so-nice characters over the years. With Murphy falling under that antagonistic category early in The 100, The Vancouver Courier was curious what his favorite aspect of Murphy was when they spoke with him in 2016.
Harmon explained that Murphy was like “a wild dog… relentless.” He loved that whatever Murphy “puts his mind to, he will do,” and that hasn’t changed in the seasons since.
Does He Have As High Of A Kill Count As Clarke And Bellamy?
Since Murphy spends so much of the first season goading the other delinquents into conflicts with one another, some fans might expect that Murphy’s instigation of trouble would lead to a lot of blood on his hands. That’s surprisingly untrue.
Murphy has actually only killed seven people in the series. He has been indirectly responsible for the death of a few more when inciting trouble between the Eligius prisoners and the Grounders, but not many more. He has one of the lowest body counts compared to Bellamy, Clarke, Octavia, and the rest of the main characters.
What Does Murphy Have In Common With Clarke?
Murphy and Clarke are both all about survival. For Clarke, it’s the survival of humanity, but for Murphy, it’s the survival of himself and those he cares about. They don’t always see eye-to-eye, but they do have one big experience in common.
In the sixth season of the show, they both die. Bellamy dies during the Red Sun at the start of the season while Clarke dies a few episodes later when Gabriel tries to get Josephine out of her head. Both of them were brought back from death as well.
How Long Does It Take Him To Apologize To Raven?
At the end of the first season, Raven finds herself with a gunshot wound that could have killed her if actress Lindsey Morgan had turned down a spot as a series regular. Some fans tend to forget that’s how Raven ends up with her permanently injured leg. The bullet is courtesy of Murphy.
While Murphy is redeemed from his villain status, becoming more of an antihero as the show continues, it still takes him a long time to take responsibility for what he did to Raven. It’s not until the fourth season (three seasons later) as the world is about to succumb to toxic levels of radiation that he apologizes to her for the pain she feels everyday.
How Is He Related To Niylah?
Niylah is introduced in the third season when Clarke is on the run from the Grounders with a bounty on her head. She and Murphy don’t have a ton of scenes together, but there’s a good chance the actors discuss the show in their downtime. That’s because they’re siblings.
Richard Harmon is the younger brother of Jessica Harmon. Though the two are both based out of Vancouver, they don’t often get cast in the same projects.
Was Murphy Supposed To Die In The First Season?
Even though Murphy isn’t a series regular right away, it’s not clear what the character’s fate could have been early in the series. There don’t appear to have been any plans to kill the character, but Richard Harmon thought there were.
During The Comic Con At Home streams, Harmon revealed that he thought Murphy would be killed off early in the series when showrunner Jason Rothenberg asked to speak to him suddenly on set. Murphy was supposed to be injured in an upcoming scene, and Harmon thought that would be the end. Instead, Rothenberg told him he wanted to up him to series regular.
