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"Mature Content Warning!" |
| “ | Do you know what I got Alex? I got my friends, I got the team. I don't get to be all "boo-hoo I'm sad my friend died", I'm gonna put a bullet in my head so the whole world feels sorry for me. Jesus, you wave that gun around like I give a shit. I don't, man. If I sell out Bryce or lie either way my life falls apart. I got no one else on my side. I can't run home, that team's my home. Going to playoffs, winning state, being an athlete? That's not about fun, for me it's about survival. It's all I got. It's everything. | „ |
| ~ Monty to Alex on the motivation for his crimes. |
| “ | Ty-Ty, nothing happened to you that hasn't happened to a hundred guys. It's nothing. Get over it. | „ |
| ~ Monty refusing to apologize for raping Tyler. |
Montgomery "Monty" de la Cruz is the secondary antagonist of the 2017 Netflix series 13 Reasons Why, based on the 2007 novel of the same name by Jay Asher.
He was one of the Liberty High School baseball and football jocks who would mess around with the subjects of Hannah Baker's Baker's Dozen, most notably Tyler Down, having affected him emotionally and mentally. Initially seeming to merely be an insensitive and easily-annoyed bully, his sociopathic nature becomes apparent by the second season, where his crimes become more abhorrent and even deadly.
In the fourth season, he became one of Clay Jensen's hallucinations and part of his nightmares, primarily because of his minor involvement towards Baker's suicide by spreading rumors about Baker, who Courtney Crimsen initiated, and of Monty attempting to end him.
He was portrayed by Timothy Granaderos.
His Evil Ranking[]
What Makes Him Close to Being Pure Evil?[]
In General/Past[]
- His bad childhood does nothing to excuse his actions. While Monty does have an extremely abusive father, who goes as far as assaulting him with a hammer at one point and breaking his arm at another, kept a nightstick on him to defend himself, had to run away from home and live homeless in a hotel a few times, and acts homophobic to hide that he's gay because his father was also homophobic, his actions far exceed his abuse from his father as his abuse and mistreatment toward other people, especially his sociopathic behavior, has nothing to with this tragedy nor makes it sympathetic. Overall, he is no better than his dad and is an abuser just like him.
- One point, he essentially admitted to Jessica that he uses dad's abuse towards him as an excuse to hurt others, making it more invalid.
- Furthermore, Justin Foley went through similar abuse his entire life (even having been abused sexually at five years old) from his mothers' boyfriends but held onto his morals, further showing he has no excuse.
- His speech about "survival" shows that his friendship with the other jocks isn't redeeming; Monty uses the jocks and the baseball season as a way to benefit himself and escape from his abusive father. And even without that, he never displays any genuine care for any of them beyond simple friendships.
- Even though other jocks like Diego Torres state that he was a loyal friend and a hallucination of Monty talks about how he cared for the jocks, his relationships with them are never shown onscreen and given it is a hallucination of him saying this, it might not even be true. This also contradicts how he generally maintains his disrespectful tone even when interacting with other jocks and where it is shown most of them do not even like him at all.
- While in Season 1, he tells Bryce he misses Jeff Atkins, their relationship is largely unexplored and he may have said that to save face. He never seems to mention Jeff again either way.
- Although he did push Tyler away from Sheri and asked her if she is okay with that deal bothering him, it came off solely as an excuse to bully Tyler rather than genuine protectiveness.
- Revealed through a flashback, he witnessed Bryce raping Hannah Baker and chose to do nothing while also leaving Alex Standall oblivious to the fact. Hannah's rape and Monty doing nothing to stop it were the primary reasons why Hannah would go on to commit suicide.
- It is implied that he has raped numerous girls alongside Bryce in the Clubhouse since it's stated other athletes participated in the rapes as well, which could've included Monty, and the fact that he's confirmed to be aware of Bryce's other rapes and did nothing to stop them either, nor did he tell the cops only strengthens this idea.
- Given Monty's sexuality, however, it's likely he didn't actively participate in raping them but was at the very least complicit or an accomplice.
- He is a bully to just about everyone but especially to Tony, whom he frequently bullies for being gay and often calls a "f****t" and Tyler, whom he abuses numerous times such as shoving him on the floor and against lockers, leading to Alex and even Bryce coming to Tyler's defense.
- Even compared to the other jocks who have anger issues, Monty is particularly vicious, constantly going out of his way to inflict sheer pain if not misery onto others. He has also admitted directly to Tyler that he is more than willing to commit murder by means of sheer brutality with little to no provocation.
- While he has occasional comedic moments due to how stupid he is, all his actions, especially Tyler's rape, are taken absolutely seriously both by the narrative and others in-universe.
- Overall, he easily comes off as the most vile and sadistic character in the show where the Heinous Standards include various forms of abuse (including sexual) on a frequent basis. While characters such as Clay, Tyler (which is mostly his fault anyway) and Seth Massey have higher attempted kill counts in addition to Bryce having raped more girls, he still easily stands out for his plethora of other heinous crimes, most notably his assault on Tyler.
- It certainly helps he has lower resources than villains such as Bryce (an extremely wealthy individual and with influence over the entire school due to his personality), Seth (who is a drug dealer with possible power and influence), Rick (a renowned coach at school who gets paid more than other teachers) and even Tyler (who had access to powerful weapons.) Meanwhile, Monty is a teen from a poor family and only connections to a few other jocks or whenever Bryce feels like helping him.
Season 1[]
- He and Bryce moon Tyler after his nude photos get sent around the school by Clay, just to make fun of him.
- He nearly hits Alex and a few other students while driving to school, callously laughs it off and then beats Alex until he's barely conscious after he goads him into a fight.
- At the school dance, he sexually assaults Courtney Crimsen by grabbing her thigh and claims he knows she was the one kissing Hannah in a circulating photograph. After Courtney lies to conceal her sexual orientation, Monty harasses Hannah and contributed to the rumors of her being not only a "slut", but a "psycho lesbian" as well.
Season 2[]
- As the Bakers v Liberty High trial went on, Monty threatened those who received subpoenas for the Bakers' case against Liberty High, in an attempt to silence them.
- After leaving a note threatening her to keep her mouth shut, Monty hung a sex doll with "slut" written on it on Jessica Davis' porch; Jessica was raped by Bryce, a fact Monty was well aware of.
- He destroyed the photography room and writes "you ain't seen shit" across multiple photographs to intimidate Tyler.
- He threatens to murder Justin Foley via note.
- He broke into the Jensen's house, stole a gun and then delivered it to Alex Standall, who had recently attempted his own life, a bullet and a paper target silhouette reading "better luck next time", later sending him the gun as well with a note saying, "How can you live with yourself?", attempting to provoke him into suicide out of guilt of failing to stop Hannah's rape and suicide.
- He attempts to kill Clay Jensen by running him off the road in Bryce's Range Rover.
- He kills a rat and puts it in Zach Dempsey's sports bag to taunt him about his sexual relationship with Hannah before she died.
- He severely vandalized Tony Padilla's car, which Tony held dear to him.
- With three other jocks, he violently assaulted Clay in the locker room, all wearing helmets in the dark to conceal their identities.
- He threw a brick through Mr. Porter's car window (where Porters infant son generally sits) with a note saying "know your place".
- He set a sign in Marcus Cole’s yard on fire.
- He stalked Zach’s sister, took pictures of her and put them in Zach’s locker, causing him to think it was Tyler and attack him.
- In a particularly cruel act, he vandalized Baker's Drug Store inside and out, including spray-painting "she's dead" across the front, mocking the Bakers whose daughter had just killed herself. As insult to injury, Monty barely even knew Hannah and had nothing to gain from this. He did this solely to dance in the face of her parents and loved ones.
- Once alone with Alex and his crimes exposed, he cruelly taunted Alex about his suicide attempt - claiming he's bluffing with his threats since he "can't even shoot [himself]" - and stole the gun, promptly abandoning Alex in the middle of nowhere.
- When the cops confronted him on his actions, he lied his way out of trouble and denied everything, saying, “[he’s] never touched a gun in his life.”
- Despite Bryce ordering Monty to leave him alone (albeit for pragmatic reasons), as revenge for him vandalizing the baseball field and cancelling baseball season, Monty confronted Tyler in the bathroom and viciously battered him, repeatedly smashing his head into the mirror, sink, and dunking his face into the toilet despite Tyler apologizing and trying to diffuse the situation. He then had his buddies Taylor and Kenneth hold Tyler down on the toilet while he grabbed a mop and proceeded to sodomize Tyler with the mop handle until he was bleeding, deeply psychologically and physically damaging Tyler to the point where he almost shot up the school.
Season 3[]
- When talking to Charlie, he mocks Alex's suicide attempt, insisting he failed to successfully kill himself via shooting his head.
- Remains unapologetic to Tyler for raping him, rationalizing that the same thing has happened to a hundred other guys and that he should "get over it". He even threatens to rape Tyler again, is seen mocking him in the hallway by making kissing noises at him and later lied him that Bryce ordered him to do it (which leads to Tyler nearly killing Bryce in anger), a blatant lie since Bryce's exact instructions to Monty were to leave Tyler alone.
- His bullying of Tyler eventually pushed him to nearly commit suicide, with Tyler only stopping because he saw Bryce's dead body and decided he wanted to live.
- When Tyler stood up at a assembly to represent sexual assault victims, Monty’s only response was to coldly laugh and shake his head, refusing to feel a shred of sympathy for what he did to Tyler.
- Even in prison, when his father confronted him for the crime (mostly because it was a boy he raped), he doesn't feel a single shred of remorse, insisting he was "just messing with him."
- Hooks up with Winston Williams at a party, and after he suggests that they hang out again, Monty (out of fear Bryce and Alex will discover he's gay simply because Winston was talking to him) beats him ruthlessly until Bryce and another partygoer pull him away.
- Even Bryce, a serial rapist himself, was disgusted upon learning of Monty raping Tyler with a mop. After Bryce threatened to reveal Monty's crimes to the police if he didn't stay away from Tyler, Monty spent the homecoming game trying to injure Bryce, fighting him during the big brawl (though Bryce had the upperhand) and threatened to "take him out" after the game, however, this threat was empty.
- Despite several characters (mainly Winston) claiming "he didn’t deserve to die", Monty’s actions push him far, far past the point of being a scapegoat, especially given the inmates killed him specifically as retribution for his rape of Tyler.
Season 4[]
- Even after his death, Monty still continues to haunt the protagonists, as he posthumously caused Winston along with Diego Torres to become antagonists just so they could he clear his name, with Diego committing many acts of violence.
- The guilt of framing Monty for Bryce's death would also cause Clay's mental health to deteriorate, leading to his descend into villainy and him developing his alternate persona called "Percy."
- Although his sister, Estela, claimed to genuinely love him and mourns for his death, it is never made clear if Monty cared for her as he never mentioned her and their relationship is never shown or described in details.
- It is made it clear that his relationship with Winston wasn't genuine, outright stating that Winston loved the "idea of [Monty]" rather than Monty himself and the relationship never would've worked because the real Monty was a horrible person.
What Prevents Him from Being Pure Evil?[]
- He has quite a few scenes throughout the third and fourth seasons that portray him sympathetically:
- He is insecure as he is revealed to be a repressed homosexual due to his father's abuse. This is proven when he opens up his feelings to Winston, and him beating the latter up to hide his homosexuality was just so he could fit in with his friends, showing that he had some kind of self-loathing buried within his cruel nature.
- His final scene is played sympathetically as before he dies in prison, he stands up to his dad by telling him that at least the inmates that beat him won't be him for once, and when finally admits to him that he's gay before the latter spits on his face in response to his admission, he is then seen on the verge of tears, during which sad music plays in the background.
- Other characters (especially Winston and Diego) also mourned his death; even Clay and his friends, despite everything Monty did to them.
- He genuinely cares about Bryce. Despite how toxic their friendship may have appeared in Season 2, it was later shown he indeed cared about him, as is shown multiple times, such as him mourning at his funeral (even trying to attack the girls that protest the funeral), showing sadness while talking to Coach Keebra about Bryce and being genuinely insulted at Clay's suggestion that he killed Bryce, saying Bryce was his best friend in a hurt tone of voice. It's even shown that Monty's grades dropped and he seemed to be giving up on school after the news of Bryce's death.
Trivia[]
- Monty's moral status was interchangeable throughout the first three seasons:
- Had the show not been renewed and ended at Season 1, Monty would have been a Villainous Benchmark. Even though his redeeming qualities were zilch, he was a bog standard bully for the most part and it had not been revealed by then he had let Bryce rape Hannah.
- Both he and Bryce were considered Pure Evil during the time of Season 2, given that both of them committed terrible atrocities and neither were seen in a sympathetic light. Though it was known that Monty was abused, it was played with no sympathy and his friendship with Bryce came off as fake on his part given he would use him for his status as captain of the team.
- In Seasons 3 and 4, like Bryce, he ended up getting portrayed with some sympathy and gained a few redeeming qualities, though unlike Bryce, he didn't make any more to redeem himself and had much fewer, coming off as Unintentionally Unsympathetic.
External Links[]
- Monty de la Cruz on the Villains Wiki
- Monty de la Cruz on the Ultimate Evil Wiki
- Monty de la Cruz on the 13 Reasons Why Wiki
- Monty de la Cruz on the Scrappy Wiki
- Monty de la Cruz on the Pathetic Pinhead Wiki
- Monty de la Cruz on the Shonen Villains Wiki
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 Near Pure Evils
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Monty de la Cruz | Taylor and Kenneth | Rick Wlodimierz | |||||||||||
