| “ | I'm Johnny Garland and I'm sixteen. I'm a private detective living in New York City. | „ |
| ~ Johnny Garland |
Johnny Garland is the player character from the video-game Shadow Hearts: From the New World, while he comes off as decoy-protagonist at first over time he is proven quite significant in the fight against and past of the game's main villain - Lady.
He was voiced by Kunihiro Kawamoto in Japanese and Jamie McGonnigal in English.
Background[]
Johnny Garland is a private detective in 1929 New York City. Johnny lost his family in a fire before the start of the game. With the money he inherited and his late father's servant, Lenny Curtis, Johnny opened the Garland Detective Agency to help his neighbors and keep a breast of any excitement in the neighborhood however most of Johnny's cases involved things such as messing cats or lost bus passes. However Johnny gets his first semi-serious case when he is contacted by a Professor Gilbert of Arkham University. Gilbert sad he had bailed a colleague of his, named Marlow Brown, out of jail and Marlow had run off. As bound guarantor Gilbert would own quite a lot of money if Marlow did not show up at his trial and so he needed Johnny to find Marlow and if possible persuade him to return to Gilbert's custody. Johnny was thrilled to get his first real case and accepted Gilbert as a client.
Though the job was Johnny's first legitimate case it did not seem too complicated and Johnny soon found a trail that lead him to the old Erick Theater in Chelsea. The theater was condemned but it had become a refuge for various thugs and fugitives. After investigating Johnny became convinced Marlow was in-fact held up inside and actually had made a place for himself in the top loft. Johnny made his way up and through a variety of the criminals a cut-throats until by nightfall he had finally managed to reach the top loft and Marlow within. Marlow seemed disconnected from the world, whether this was inebriation or a mental disorder is never stated. Marlow's blank stare and sedated mannerisms changed once Johnny announced who he was and Marlow got close enough for a good look at him. Shortly after convincing himself the intruder was real and not some sort of hallucination Marlow suddenly became frantic and terrified. Johnny pressed forward assuring Marlow he was a private detective and not the police and that all he wanted to do was return him to his friend's but Marlow kept backing away in a panic.
Once Johnny had safely cornered the frantic man a portal miraculously appeared behind Marlow. Marlow screamed in terror a monster emerged from the portal and tore him apart. Once the monster had finished with Marlow it proceeded towards Johnny. Before the eldritch horror struck though a winged woman crashed through the skylight to help Johnny fight the monster. Curiously Johnny found himself with an inexplicable power to project a red energy from his switch-knife. With the help of white winged woman Johnny defeated the creature, however the sudden ability to project strange energy, the sight of an real flesh and blood monster, the sight of seeing a man carved to shred in front of him and the arrival of an angelic savior all took a rather strenuous toll on Johnny and he passed out shortly after the monster was killed.
Johnny awoke in the Garland Detective Agency the next day, the woman had carried him back to while he was out. The strange woman, now looking quite like a normal human, was a Native American shamaness named Shania. Shania had the power to form pacts with various spirit guardians and Johnny had encountered her in her Thunderbird form. After briefly awakening Johnny to the concept of magic and monsters Shania explained it was not luck that she happened to be in the area. She had been hunting an evil creature that could open portals like the one that appeared in front of Johnny and had been tracking down the phenomena to Marlow, unfortunately since he was dead she could not get information from him so she wanted to know all Johnny knew instead about Marlow, the portal that had opened and the energy Johnny was apparently capable of creating. Johnny told Shania the energy was completely new to him and told her about Gilbert's request to find Marlow. Shania decided that Gilbert would be a good place to pick up the trail of her prey and wanted to follow Johnny Arkham to see if the professor could answer any of her questions about Marlow's research or the portal which she called a Window. Johnny let her and her bodyguard, Natan, tag along when he went to return Gilbert's money and report the death of his friend. Aside from simply preforming a follow-through as a private detective Johnny wanted too know himself what had happened to Marlow and why he had suddenly gained strange powers. Curiosity about what he had seen aside Johnny was also somewhat enamored with Shania. Johnny set off to explore the new supernatural world he realized he was a part, joining Shania's hunt for the Lady who represented vengeance for her and answers for him.
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