President Stone

President Stone
Japanese Name	ストーン大統領
Other Names	Dufus Stone (comic adaptation)
Gender	Male
Race	Human
Occupation	Politician
Residence	Metro City
Japanese VA	Takaya Hashi
English VA	Donald Sutherland

President Dufus Stone is a rogue president of Metro City and the main antagonist of the 2009 Astro Boy movie. He is cold and callous, and sets in motion a series of events that not only get Toby Tenma killed, but almost destroy Metro City as a whole. He physically merges with Peacekeeper, and tears apart the city while trying to kill Astro.

Appearance

Stone taunts Astro

Stone is a tall, lean human man aged somewhere in his late 40s to 50s. He has a long, rectangular face, arched nose, and heavy brow line. He has short, slicked-back black hair with a widow's peak. In many regards, he appears to be an interpretation of Acetylene Lamp.

President Stone is only seen wearing his political fatigues. He wears a trim navy blue jacket, slacks, and tall black boots. He can be most often seen standing straight, arms folded behind his back, and glowering.

Personality

President Stone is the egotistical, ruthless and rogue president of Metro City, constantly focused on an upcoming election he hopes to be re-elected in. Stone is intent on impressing the city's voters with the Peacekeeper robot, demanding it be made to protect the city from a possible attack from the surface world. His insistence that the Peacekeeper be installed with the Red Core causes it to malfunction, sending forth a laser blast that kills Toby Tenma. He is also dangerously reckless, as demonstrated by sending numerous troops to capture Astro in the middle of Metro City. While he enjoys weapons and machinery, he thinks very little of robots, openly mocking Astro when he gets captured. Stone only sees robots as machines that need to do what they are told.

Stone also has a strangely goofy and inept side under the surface. At one point he is shown arm-wrestling with his assistant, remarking, "I win again." Much of his personality and actions seem to reference the American political climate of the era during which the movie was being developed. 2007-2008 was the last two years of the Bush-Cheney presidency, during which an enormous amount of jokes were made in popular media about inept, war-hungry politicians. Some reviewers of the film have directly equated Stone to the Cheney parodies of the time.

President Stone's backstory is never fully elaborated on. It is remarked in the film Stone dropped out of college in his early 20s. The film's official comic and novel adaptations contain a scene cut from the film's script that reveals Stone always had trouble in school. Hamegg recognizes Stone, whom he calls by his first name, and reveals that he used to do Stone's homework when they were in the same third grade class. His name is a pun of the word Doofus, showing his low intelligence.

Artillery

Stone has an enormous army of armour-clad guards, many of whom he uses to try and capture Astro. He always has at least a few guards around him that are armed with laser guns. He often flies around in his own personal shuttle, a mobile monitoring headquarters equipped with radar. From this ship he is able to launch Stinger Interceptors, a type of airborne shuttle that can grab a target with suction tubes. For more reckless moments, Stone sends out an enormous warship/drone called the Spirit of Freedom that is capable of firing huge laser beams. It is presumed that all this military force is paid for with taxpayer money.

President Stone takes a heavy interest in Peacekeeper, due to his paranoia that the surface world may attack Metro City. He insists the Red Core goes into it instead of the Blue Core, believing the Blue Core's positive attributes would essentially nullify the Peacekeeper robot, citing he would want "a fighter, not a lover."