The characters of the 2015-2017 series Zoo.
open/close all folders
Task Force:
In General
- Five-Man Band (Type 1):
- The Leader / The Lancer: Shared and switched by Jackson and Chloe- if the situation is mostly in the field, then Jackson is the former and Chloe is the latter; if negotiating or dealing with people is largely involved, then Chloe takes charge.
- The Big Guy: Abe- Physically the largest member on the team. Nice Guy but can be intimidating when necessary.
- The Smart Guy: Mitch- the Insufferable Genius who snarks at everything but will do anything asked of him and more for the team
- The Heart: Jamie- Intrepid Reporter who knows how to relate to people.
- The Sixth Ranger: Dariela- A U.S. Army Ranger who joins the team at Chloe's request after her original unit is killed off. Knows how to fight, knows how to shot, is extremely loyal to her team.
- (Type 2-after Chloe's death:
- The Leader: Technically, it's newcomer Allison but as far as field operations go, it's Jackson, at least for now...
- The Lancer: Dariela
- The Big Guy: Still Abe
- The Smart Guy: Still Mitch
- The Heart: Still Jamie, although with all the changes, it remains to be seen if she remains this.
- The Sixth Ranger: Logan- He has a Dark and Troubled Past as a thief and despite Jamie vouching for him, no else trusts him when he's brought on board.
- Sixth Ranger Traitor: Logan is The Mole and has been reporting to Gen. Davies the entire time.
Jackson Oz
Jackson Oz
- Played By: James Wolk
An ex-zoologist who now lives in Botswana, making a living as a tour guide for photo safaris. He gets involved in the animal attacks when he rescue Chloe Tousignant from being taken out by lions. Leads the team's wilderness forays and interprets the afflicted animals' abnormal behavior.
- Adaptational Heroism: Much more mature and considerate than in the novel, where he was a dropout blogger who'd ruined his own reputation, kept a chimpanzee in his New York apartment, and got his ex-girlfriend killed because he never thought to warn her that the ape she was baby-sitting could turn violent.
- All of the Other Reindeer: Shunned because his father, Robert, had tried to bring forth a theory that animals will someday take down humans.
- Official Couple: With Chloe. It's a Foregone Conclusion to anyone who's read the novel.
- The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: Ever since he left the zoologist career behind to stay in Botswana. That ended after he's caught up in a lion attack.
- Sins of the Father: How the public treats him thanks to his father. That is, until the animals attacked.
- Zombie Infectee: Jackson was bitten by an afflicted German shepherd in the season one finale, and now appears to be contaminated with the same "Phase Two" infection that mutated Kovacs.
Abraham Kenyatta
Abraham Kenyatta
- Played By: Nonso Anozie
A close confident and companion of Jackson in Botswana, Abe is a photo-safari guide who was nearly killed in a mass lion attack. Following his rescue, he agrees to join with Jackson in order to solve the mystery. Field tracker, protector, and occasional conscience of the team.
- Casanova Wannabe: He sees himself as one.Abe: Besides, I think Japanese women are very sexy.Jackson: I'm sure they're gonna find you sexy, too, in a beaten-up kind of way.
- Child Soldiers: He and his younger brothers were captured by rebels, who conscripted Abe as one until he managed to escape.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Was an ex-child soldier for the United Republic Army before he escaped and changed his name.
- Fish out of Water: Abraham doesn't understand the uniqueness of cosplaying in Japan. Justified since it's been a while for him since he last traveled.Abe: Another hour searching through city streets with teens dressed like circus clowns. And did I mention, I haven't been off the African Continent in over a decade?
- He didn't expect Americans to be "obsessed" with using guns.
- Race Lift: Abe was a white Afrikaner with a different surname in the novel.
- Sadistic Choice: The rebels who conscripted Abe ordered him to choose one of his little brothers to shoot, else both would be executed. Abe refused to choose knowing that both his brothers would die, because he knew the survivor's fate as a conscript soldier would be crueler than the other's quick death.
- Spared by the Adaptation: His book version is one of the first people to die on-screen by the animal attacks.
- Ship Tease: With new season 2 main character Dariela Marzan with who he flirts with and they hook up in episode 3 and have a sexual relationship.
- Survivor Guilt: He feels horrible about having to leave Jamie behind in the Season 2 premiere. Mitch's blaming him doesn't help matters, resulting in Abe delivering a mini "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
- Token Minority: In the task force. Subverted in season 2 when Dariela joins the team.
Jamie Campbell
Jamie Campbell
- Played By: Kristen Connolly
A journalist who's made it her mission to uncover evidence that the multinational company, Reiden Global, might be involved in the recent animal attacks. Self-taught expert on Reiden's past misdeeds, with covert contacts among its ex-employees.
- Amateur Sleuth: Starts to go through it even before the series started. For starters, she was able to get incriminating information on Reiden Global thanks to acquaintances from the hacker underworld.
- Break the Cutie: As if her experiences in the Canadian wilderness and Caraquet weren't traumatizing enough, she returns to find that Chloe has died. When she learns that Dariela was responsible, she absolutely loses it.
- Determinator: She's adamant about making Reiden Global pay for their crimes. Also in Season 2, she's dead-set on making it to Caraquet and reuniting with the the team, frigid conditions, shady companion, a possibly infected foot and an amputated big toe be damned.
- Drowning My Sorrows: In ""The Silence of the Cicadas" when the senator she trusted refuses to help her any longer due to Reiden Global being too powerful. Combined with losing her job and apartment, she briefly decided to give up.
- Intrepid Reporter: Her invasive home visits to witnesses and attempts to discredit megacorporation Reiden Global borders on fanatical. She is fired from the newspaper in the first episode for refusing to give up her conspiracy blog, which only strengthens her resolve to bring Reiden down with her. It turns out that her fanaticism has roots, as Reiden’s use of pesticides in her home town allegedly led to the death of twenty-six people, including her own mother.
- Parting-Words Regret: In "The Silence of the Cicadas", she told Mitch that she was ashamed of her mother's baldness (due to Reiden Global's contamination of their town).
- Survivor Guilt: Blames herself for Leo's death.
Dr. Mitch Morgan
Mitch Morgan
- Played By: Billy Burke
- Better with Non-Human Company: Mitch has an establishing character moment early on where he outright admits to liking animals (but also beer, pizza, and heavy traffic) better than people. After this, references to his affinity for animals are generally more subtle: he visibly recoils when he sees a moose stuffed and mounted in Senator Vaughn’s office, but recovers himself enough for polite commentary. Only once the senator is revealed to be a corporate jerkass and kicks them out of his office does Mitch deliver a parting shot revealing his contempt for the trophy.
- Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: As Abe describes him, he's the sort who can't stop "poking the beast until it bites".
- Heroic Sacrifice: Traps himself in the control room with the hybrids on Pangea in order to ensure that the rest of the team escapes with the cure for daughter Clem's illness
- Insufferable Genius: In addition to having No Social Skills, he snarks at everything and makes a second career out of pushing everyone's buttons. The team needs his veterinary expertise, so they put up with it... barely.
- MacGyvering: Jury-rigs a device to test the effects of bacteria on cerebrospinal fluid using a coffee pot, a car battery and some coconut milk. He also throws together a bat-repelling sonic oscillator from $20 worth of miscellaneous electronic junk (and crazily enough, he only requested the equipment to buy time in order to prevent being killed by gangers, but still managed to build an effective device out of it). In Season 2, "Collision Course" has him rigging up an electric chair to help kill an ant that Dariela accidentally swallowed
- Papa Wolf: His attempt to sell out the team to Reiden Global was only done because Reiden had access to experimental medicine that could cure Clementine's illness. The moment he decides not to do it, he steals the medicine and runs.
- Red Herring: It appeared that Mitch was willing to give up the Mother Cell to Reiden, but later doesn't do it.
- The Snark Knight: He makes a passing attempt at being polite when first introduced, but efforts to rein in his sarcasm rapidly dissolve as the conversation continues. As Abe describes him, he's the sort who can't stop "poking the beast until it bites".
Dariela Marzan
Dariela Marzan
- Played By: Alyssa Diaz
- Action Girl: She's an Army Ranger who "shoots things for a living".
- Dark Is Not Evil: Dariela wears black clothes, but she's not a bad guy.
- Elites Are More Glamorous: See Ranger for more details.
- Expy: A Bad Ass Spaniard with military experience who's the only survivor of her squad and had to kill a mutated team member? Where have we seen that before?
- Happily Married: To Kenyatta in Season 3, though the happiness is negated by the fact that the entire human population has been sterilized and their son is one of humanity's last generation.
- I Ate WHAT?!: She accidentally swallows one of the electric ants in "Collision Course" and has to have it shocked to death while it's still inside her.
- I Choose to Stay: Done twice. First when she chooses to stick around in the team at Chloe's request and later when she stays in England to help the refugees there.
- I Did What I Had to Do: Her response when she's called out for causing Chloe's death. Justified since if she hadn't sealed off the hallway, everyone in the building would have been poisoned.
- Official Couple: With Abe after their sexual relationship results in her getting pregnant and in the Time Skip they are married and watching their son graduate.
- Ranger: The only female Ranger in the squad sent to Argentina.
- Sole Survivor: Her Ranger squad was wiped out in Argentina.
- Ship Tease: Flirts with Abe in "Caraquet" and briefly hooks up with him in "Collision Course" and when she decides to stay with the team they continue with a sexual relationship.
- Spicy Latina: Her name implies a Hispanic heritage and she's tough as nails to boot.
- Survivor Guilt: Due to being the only member of her Ranger unit to survive Kovacs's onslaught. She gets another one later when she makes it to safety ahead of a cloud of Deadly Gas but is forced to close the doors before Chloe can catch up to her and breaks down in hysterics as Chloe seemingly suffocates to death.
Logan Jones
Logan Jones
- Played By: Josh Salatin
- Back from the Dead: Managed to survive being tranquilized and sent falling out of a plane due to the tranq wearing off just in time for him to activate his parachute.
- Ship Tease: With Jamie
- Sixth Ranger Traitor: Is revealed to have been acting as General Davies's mole in Season 2. He's no longer this by Season 3, but Jamie has an understandably hard time trusting him.
Chloe Tousignant
Chloe Tousignant
- Played By: Nora Arnezeder
A DGSE intelligence analyst, first met on vacation in Botswana. The only survivor of a coordinated lion attack, she manages to escape the savannah thanks to assistance from Jackson Oz. Acts as team leader and liaison with officialdom, as well as its translator/spokeswoman in far-flung locales. Killed Off for Real after inhaling a lethal amount of Deadly Gas.
- Action Girl: Chloe's packed a gun against hoods in Brazil, and a flamethrower against killer rats in New England.
- Adaptational Badass: Very different from the novel version, who was an ecologist and Jackson's semi-neglected Love Interest.
- Dark and Troubled Past: She ended her engagement to her fiancé because he had an affair with her sister.
- Death by Adaptation: In the novel, she survives and starts a family with Jackson. Here, she's killed by Deadly Gas barely 5 episodes into Season 2.
- Dropped a Bridge on Her / Killed Off for Real: Dies 4.5 episodes into the second season after inhaling Deadly Gas.
- Official Couple / Second Guy Wins: She's recently made her feelings for Jackson known and the feeling is mutual. Foregone Conclusion if you've read the novel. Doesn't last past Episode 2x05, unfortunately.
- Omniglot: She speaks five languages, which include English and French as her two main languages. She uses Portuguese in "Blame It on Leo".
- Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: Her native French accent becomes more pronounced when she's excited or pissed off.
- Trapped in Containment: How she dies, of poison gas accidentally unleashed at Reiden Global.
- You Can Keep Her!: Chloe tries using this trope when Gaspard has her sister tortured to coerce Chloe into talking. Chloe points out that her sister had tempted her fiance away from her, suggesting she may enjoy watching her suffer, but Gaspard doesn't believe she hates her sibling enough for that.
Other Members And Associates Of The Task Force
Clementine Lewis
Allison Shaw
Allison Shaw
- Played By: Joanne Kelly
Former Step-mother of Mitch Morgan who was secretly running the task force.
Interpol:
Gaspard Alves
Played by: Henri Lubatti
An Interpol agent who is responsible for assembling the task force on behalf of Delavane.
- Dark Is Not Evil: Wears a black trenchcoat at times, but he's with Interpol. Subverted up the wazoo when he has Brannigan shot to capture Chloe, then interrogates her about the team's destination.
- I Have Your Wife: Has Chloe's sister tortured on live video to motivate her to talk.
- Number Two: For Delavane in the task force and for Reiden Global.
- Omniglot: He can speak French and English.
Delavane
Played by: Carl Lumbly
An Interpol agent who is tasked to investigate the worldwide animal attacks.
- Big Good: Was responsible for assembling the task force. At least until he subverts it by turning up at Reiden.
- Dirty Cop/The Mole: For Reiden Global inside the task force.
- Heel–Face Turn: In Eats, Shoots and Leaves. He saves Chloe and her sister from being tortured by Reiden Global's hired thugs.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Warns that Shaffer's death in America will undo the good work the task force has done eventually unless they can show evidence that he's really working for Reiden.
Scientists & Doctors:
Robert Oz
Played by: Ken Olin
A renowned zoologist who was ostracized by his peers for suggesting a theory that animals will one day take down humanity. He moved to Japan after Jackson's mother divorced him and took their son to Botswana, and got married to a Japanese woman while he isolated himself to do his research. Strongly implied to have been Driven to Suicide, although the reasons have yet to be stated.
- All of the Other Reindeer: Prior to the events of the show/novel, he was ostracized for his theory.
- Doing Research: Following his isolation from society, his stay in Japan was to use his research on horses to help reinforce his theory.
- Eye Scream: He found that one way of pacifying the affected animals was to remove their eyeballs. Two eyeless horses used in his research are still alive, and apparently no longer hostile, when Jackson and Abe visit his abandoned research outpost.
- Ignored Expert: Was the first to diagnose such things as the "defiant pupil" and how animals would eventually do something to fight back against ecological devastation. Everybody thought that he was insane, even his own son.
- Posthumous Character: Killed himself some time before the series, leaving behind cryptic video-logs and hidden research materials Jackson must track down. At least, that's what everyone thought until "Sex, Lies and Jellyfish", which revealed he's alive and a prisoner of General Davies.
Evan Lee Hartley
Played by: Marcus Hester
A ex-scientist who once worked alongside Robert Oz, he was arrested and incarcerated by the police for killing a group of hunters prior to the events of the series.- Exotic Eye Designs: He has the Defiant Pupil.
- Eye Scream: Has an eye doctor take samples of his retina... by sticking a long needle into his eye, without anesthesia. When he has the doctor try to inject him into the eye with a possible cure, he is unable to handle the pain and jerks, resulting in damage. He dies minutes later.
- Wham Episode: The ending of "Pack Mentality" has Jamie secure a photo of him with Robert.
Leo Butler
Played by: Jay Paulson
An ex-Reiden Global chemist who went to hiding after he found out information that their products are potentially contaminated, he was able to hide by moving around and getting blackmail money to different accounts.- Character Death: Gets killed in a car crash when Evan drove the pickup on the side.
- Crazy-Prepared: Leo prepared himself by using fake names and different bank accounts to get the blackmail money and then give them to various charity foundations dedicated to helping those who were wronged by Reiden.
- Properly Paranoid: He insists that Reiden has people everywhere so that critics and traitors can be killed.
Janos Kovacs
Played by: Ryan Handley
Formerly a Hungarian physician working with the Red Cross, Kovacs was bitten by an afflicted elephant and became a "Phase Two" mutant that killed dozens of villagers in Ydermo, Argentina, and wiped out Dariela's Ranger squad.- Curb-Stomp Battle: Mutant-Kovacs killed every one of Dariela's heavily-armed and trained squadmates in minutes, with most of these Rangers never even seeing what it was that was attacking them.
- Life-or-Limb Decision: Kovacs was trapped in a crashed car with his arm pinned at the time he began transforming, and tore or chewed off his own limb to escape once his humanity was gone.
- Was Once a Man: Before the Phase Two mutation deformed and deranged him, Kovacs was a human doctor.
U.S. Government:
Special Agent Ben Shaffer
Played by: Geoff Stults
A FBI agent tasked with investigating the animal attacks throughout America, he crosses path with the Interpol task force when they first met each other in Mississippi.- Arbitrary Skepticism: He can't simply tell his superior that someone from Reiden Global created a bacteria responsible for the worldwide animal attacks. Because he works for Reiden Global..
- Dirty Cop/The Mole: For Reiden inside the FBI.
- Theres No Kill Like Over Kill: Chloe shoots him multiple times with his own sidearm after he turns rogue.
Special Agent Ronnie "Dogstick" Brannigan
Played by: Xander Berkeley
A FBI agent who was acquainted with Shaffer. He starts going after the task force after he gets information that Shaffer last met with Tousignant several times.
- Cassandra Truth: After being told Shaffer was a dirty agent, he tries to kill the team to avenge his death.
- Hero Antagonist: For the task force because, they're responsible for killing Shaffer, despite being told that he was dirty.
- Inspector Javert: He absolutely gives no shits about the bigger conspiracy that is going on, labeling it as a lie that the group (and especially Chloe) made up to try to divert the blame from them killing Shaeffer (in Brannigan's defense, he was an FBI Agent). He tries to kill Chloe once he finally meets her (after actually saying that he was proud of never firing his gun once in the many years he's worked for the Bureau) and his last words were an oath to hunt Chloe to the ends of the Earth if he had to in order to arrest her.
- Kick the Dog: When he meets an injured member of an Animal Wrongs Group, Brannigan tortures him to get he to reveal where the former Task Force members are headed, and this is in a hospital and the doctors do nothing to stop him. He also made a point of mentioning that he had never fired his gun once in the many years he had worked for the Bureau... right before quick-drawing it and trying to shoot Chloe and the rest of the group dead without any other warning.
Amelia Sage & Eleanor Lewis
Played by: Jayne Atkinson (Amelia), April Grace (Eleanor)
A pair of government officials who believe the Task Force is on the right track and back their operation following the expedition to Zambia.- Dropped a Bridge on Him: Amelia is reported dead from a bird-strike-induced plane crash.
- High-Voltage Death / Orifice Invasion: Eleanor is fatally electrocuted after the electric ants get into her room-service meal.
General Davies
Played by: Peter Outerbridge
A U.S. Army officer placed in charge of containing the hostile animals.
- He Knows Too Much: Davies kills Eleanor's aide to conceal the fact that the Noah Objective will also kill millions of humans.
Reiden Global
Clayton Burke
Played by: Steven Culp
A Reiden Global executive who Mitch meets up secretly.
- An Offer You Can't Refuse: Agrees to help Mitch if he gives up the Mother Cell.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: In league with the company to cover up the contaminated products.
