| “ | You're just a goody-goody | „ |
| ~ Julius taunts Alex even though his shoulder is dislocated. |
| “ | I can't tell you how much I've been looking forward to this! | „ |
| ~ Julius to Alex, taking him to torture. |
Julius Grief is an arch-enemy in the Alex Rider series and the evil clone of Alex himself.
History
Origins
Julius Grief is the legacy of Dr. Hugo Grief. Hugo Grief was experimenting with cloning and through rape, he made sure his plans would come to success. He made sixteen artificial clones of himself, and changed their appearances to resemble the sons of billionaires, because of his plans to rule Earth. Julius Grief was the sixteenth and final clone of Hugo Grief, and the others were all named after world dictators; in Julius' case, he was named after Julius Caesar. There were others, with names such as named Adolf, Napoleon and Mao Ztetung.
The boys had a very militaristic upbringing. Hugo Grief caned them whenever they displeased him, and so Julius had a very sadistic view of the world. Hugo Grief also spread his xenophobic and genocidal views on the youths, and so Julius had a maddening superiority complex.
The youths had a ten-mile run session every day as gym training and so Julius kept up this habit through his life.
In Point Blanc
In the school, Julius was waiting to take Alex Rider's place when he heard of the boy enrolling there. He spied on him after his surgery was done and Alex felt he was being watched by Julius even in his bedroom. Alex didn't know who was spying on him though.
Alex found Julius' room above his four floors in his search of the school. So he knew that he was being watched.
Julius only appeared at the end of the novel, when Hugo Grief had been killed by Alex, Julius escaped arrest by MI6 and tracked Alex to his school in London. He posed as the headmaster, claimed he wanted to see Alex, and got him to the school. But Julius found he couldn't shoot Alex even though he hated him so much because he was too similar.
The two boys fought through the school and Alex set off sprinklers and soon chemicals in the science lab exploded, set off by Julius, and the school exploded. But the boys fought on the roof, so great was their hatred for each other. Finally, Alex won and knocked Julius down into the burning school, with the fire surrounding him.
In Prison
Alex believed Julius was dead, but he had in fact survived, gone to hospital, recovered, and then been taken to Gibraltar prison for security. Some MI6 agents believed Julius could, in fact, start a normal life if given time to recover away from Grief's poisoning (by this point, two of Julius' brothers, more clones of Dr. Grief, had died behind bars). At first, this seemed to work, but Julius was contacted by the evil organization Scorpia. Scorpia supplied him with a sawn-off pistol, with which he threatened to kill his psychiatrist unless the guards let him out.
He escaped and ran down the hill upon which the prison stood, starting a jeep, and running it down to a barn. The guards saw Julius drive himself off a high cliff into the sea in the jeep and believed he was dead, thus announcing that to the world. However, Julius had switched a mannequin of himself (made by Scorpia) to fool the men. The mannequin was in the jeep and Julius lived again.
He was taken to Africa where he met Abdul al-Aziz Razim, who became his master and trainer.
Revenge and death
Julius spied on Alex when MI6 sent him to Egypt, spying on him through the school. The traitorous security guard Eric Gunter was in fact a Scorpia agent, and Julius' thug. Julius had the upper hand. He and Razim had a plan to kill the American Secretary of State because she thought Britain was weak, but make it look like Alex had killed her on MI6's orders and thus blackmail them to return the Elgin marbles. Julius almost broke Alex's mind because Alex tried to work out who Julius was when he spied on him. Alex saw a picture of himself alone at school which was odd because he was never alone at school. But this was not a picture of Alex; it was Julius.
Julius soon kidnapped Alex's guardian Jack, took her to Scorpia's prison, and blackmailed Alex into coming to her rescue.
He met Alex in the Turkish graveyard in Cairo, and tortured him, then took him with Ghunter to Scorpia. Julius and Razim tortured Alex by making him watch Jack being blown up and murdered. Alex went mad and Julius laughed in delight.
Julius told Gunter that "We played a little trick on Alex, but I don't think he liked it."
Julius Grief set himself up as the sniper to kill the secretary. But Alex managed to knock Ghunter out with scorpion poison, run after Julius, and get to his balcony on time, saving the secretary from assassination. He then managed to anger Julius, who shot at him, but the shot killed an MI6 man. Then the crowd went mad and ran outside into the largest thunderstorm Egypt had had for 150 years. In the chaos, Julius stole a policeman's gun, knocked him out, and ran for it, shooting anyone he wanted. Alex followed him down to the motorway, where Julius ran across in a hurry and was struck by a taxi. Julius lay there with blood pooling out of him and bragged to Alex how he couldn't shoot him even though he'd killed Jack. Julius boasted that Alex was just a "goody-goody" and being bad was better. He asked Alex how much did Alex hate him. Alex just said "you're nothing to me" and walked off. But Julius tried to shoot Alex, and, rapidly, Alex shot first. Julius died instantly; his body was trampled in the ensuing melee.
Personality
Julius Grief was a complete sociopath, psychopath and sadist. His psychopathic nature came from a year in prison. Julius was raised with a strict military backbone, that included four mile runs. He was very strict about his physique, too much for someone who is fourteen. Julius was a cold-blooded sociopath, but he was able to hide his nature with Alex's friends, such as having fooled Jack into thinking he was Alex. Julius could be charming when he wanted. He was even able to master his rage, such as when he wanted to kill the prison guard, but refused, because it would have been too obvious. It is unknown if Julius ages. He is fourteen in the beginning of the series but since he was never properly born, it is unknown if the ageing process stops at fourteen; however, Dr Grief states that in the end, all the clones will be him. He should be fifteen at the end of the series, like Alex. It is unknown though if it is so.
Julius shared his father's xenophobic prejudices, thinking all blacks, Jews, Muslims, gays, Catholics (anybody not sharing Ayran beliefs) were ignorant and foolish, and that white people should rule the world. When first contacted by SCORPIA, he wondered if it was his father's old South African friends, as Dr Grief was spontaneously something high up in the field of biology at Johannesburg University and something high up in BOSS (Bureau Of State Security), the infamous South African intelligence service, which was azed in 1980 following horrible scandals.
Trivia
- Julius was named after Julius Caesar, as were all his siblings named after world dictators.
- Julius had a Facebook profile and his user name was "Julius G".
- He is similar to Evil Ash:
- He is an evil clone of the protagonist.
- He is the "bad" half of the main character.
- Both characters were minor antagonists in the first episodes until the last installment.
- Him and Evil Ash become the leaders of the Dark Side after being created.
- Julius Grief is shown to be the evil side of Alex Rider that MI6 created.