Cleon

“	It's still on, and we're goin'. Cyrus sent an emissary this afternoon to make sure. Now, Cyrus don't want anybody packed, and he don't want anybody flexing any muscle, so I gave him my word that the Warriors would uphold the truce. Now, everybody says that Cyrus is the one-and-only... I think we'd better go have a look for ourself.	„
	~ First lines in the film

Cleon was the leader and founder of the Warriors. He formed the gang in 1978, along with Vermin, after being betrayed by Virgil, the leader of the Destroyers. He was played and voiced by Dorsey Wright.

Description[]

Cleon wears a leopard print durag on his head, he wears two ornamental beaded necklaces along with the Warriors vest, red jeans, and brown sneakers.

In Roots when he was still in the Destroyers, he wears a black bucket hat, a Destroyers vest, a white and navy baseball t-shirt with light blue lines down the sleeve, distressed light wash blue jeans, and blue and white Converse sneakers.

Cleon was the co-founder of the Warriors, alongside Vermin. Beforehand, the Warriors and the Destroyers both fought on numerous turf wars for Coney Island. The rivalry began when both Cleon and Vermin were originally soldiers serving within the gang as top ranking members and right hand men for Virgil.

Later on, Virgil began harbouring paranoid thoughts about the two, and he betrayed them by plotting to have them murdered in a bogus drug deal with the Satan's Mothers. Packing their duffel bags with fake drugs, knowing the Satan's Mothers would kill them for supposedly trying to rip them off. Barely escaping with their lives, they knew of the betrayal and vowed revenge against Virgil for what he had done. This began the formation of the Warriors.

Personality[]

Cleon is a charismatic and intelligent leader possibly from being Virgil's right-hand-man in the Destroyers, and bringing the Warriors up from nothing to one of the toughest gangs in the city. Cleon also seems to have quite a temper and little patience when it comes to other gangs, as well as a temper on his own 'soldiers' when they do something without his permission, evident in the mission Writer's Block, stating to Rembrandt, that if he were to "ever make a move without my say so again, I'll wreck your punk ass", showing his low tolerance for people who defy or disobey him.

Cleon is also clear-headed as seen when he is angered by Ash's death, he is still capable of making a good strategy to make sure the Destroyers defeated without his brothers getting harmed, this shows he has good emotional control while under pressure.

In The Film[]

Cleon only appeared in the beginning of the movie, leading the Warriors to Cyrus' meeting. After Cyrus' death, Luther blames Cleon for shooting. He is attacked and beaten to death by the Gramercy Riffs.

In The Game[]

Cleon plays a much larger role in the video game. Cleon was formerly a member of the Destroyers, and Virgil's right hand man. Unfortunately, Virgil soon became convinced that Cleon was plotting against him, and set him and Vermin up with the Satan's Mothers, with fake drugs during a drug deal between the two. The Mothers attempted to kill both of them in Tack's warehouse, but they made their way through, and even won a fight against the Mothers' leaders, Spider and Tiny. Cleon and Vermin made their way back to Virgil, and after a heated argument, Cleon declared war on the Destroyers and (along with Vermin) created the Warriors.

In The Novel[]

In the novel, Cleon closely resembles Papa Arnold, the leader of the Coney Island Dominators. However, Papa Arnold survives and meets up with the rest of his gang in Coney.

Jailbreak[]

In a scene that takes place before the movie, Ajax and Swan fight for the title of Warchief. Swan wins, but Cleon helps Ajax up and reminds Swan to never leave a Warrior behind.

Fighting Ability[]

Cleon is a very strong fighter, being able to take on the Satan's Mothers' leaders, Spider & Tiny, and win. He also shows his strength against the Hi-Hats and the Destroyers. He seems to use martial arts (including karate) in his fighting style. He is stronger than Swan and weaker than Ajax, but uses more style than the two.

His standard ground combo is shared with Bopper lieutenants, while his standing rage combo is shared with the Savage Huns lieutenants, but only as a standard attack. He shares his exact fighting style with Bopper lieutenants, whilst he shares his fight stance with Vermin and Ajax.

The second blow of his ground raging combo (jumping on opponent's back) does much more damage than the first blow (elbows opponent's face), but less damage than the devastating third blow (twisting feet on opponent's back).

Cleon is playable at the end of the Armies of the Night, fighting against the Ghost of Cyrus. He is also a ghost himself.

He is not playable in Street Brawl.

Heavy: Mugging, Resisting Arrest                    Strength: 6/10
Solid: Tagging, Lock Picking                        Stamina:  9/10
Lame: Stealing, Uncuffing                           Health:   9/10
                                                    Rage:     8/10

Quotes[]

"Let's move it." - LET'S GO
"Yo, hold up!" - HOLD UP
"This way, soldier." - LET'S GO (shadows)
"Stay down, guys." - HOLD UP (shadows)
"Take 'em apart!" - WRECK 'EM ALL
"Get my back!" - WATCH MY BACK
"Trash everything!" - MAYHEM
"Clean this shit-hole out!" - MAYHEM (store)
"Split up, soldiers!" - SCATTER
"Fuck, man. They can't hear me." - OUT OF RANGE
"I bet they're fuckin' knocked out somewhere." - OUT OF RANGE (wrecked)
"Come on, man! I'll break your face!" - Threat
"Bring it on! What are you gonna do, punk?!" - Threat
"Come here! Lemme show you my elbow!" - Threat
"Come here, pretty boy! I'll knock your teeth out!" - Threat
"You got no fuckin' clue!" - Threat
"Let's go! I wanna slap you." - Threat
"You don't wanna tussle with me, boy!" - Threat
"I'm gonna bust your head up good!" - Threat
"Bring it on, fool!" - Rage
"I'm gonna show you pain!" - Rage
"I'm gonna slam your ass down, toy!" - Rage
"You wanna fuck with a Warrior?!" - Rage
"Here comes the motherfuckin' Warchief, asshole!" - Rage
"What's goin' on, man?" - Greeting Warrior
"Gimme that, brotha." - Taking weapon from ally
"There ain't no style in this hat." - Wearing a hat
"This SHIT is low-class." - Wearing a hat
"I'm gonna need to get some cash, brotha" - Requesting protection money
"Yo, man. I need some payments, dig?" - Requesting protection money
"Let's see some bread, man." - Requesting protection money
"Alright. That's enough, already." - When you angrily beat a corpse
"Yo, man - check your head, snap out of it." - When you angrily beat a corpse
"What ya doin' there? That ain't right, man." - When you angrily beat a corpse
"Don't hit me, man!" - Response to friendly fire
"You're crossin' the line, soldier!" - Response to friendly fire
"You paranoid FUCK! You just started a WAR, and I'm gonna be the last motherfucker you see before it's over!" - To Virgil, on his betrayal
"Open your eyes, motherfucker. You ain't nothing but ashes." - Before killing Virgil.
"No sweat. This conclave is gonna be a real big idol. Every gang in the city's gonna be there." - To Swan, waiting for the train to the meeting
"You got the stuff?... I want you to hit everything in sight. I want everybody to know that the Warriors were there." - To Rembrandt, waiting for the train to the meeting
"You just soldier and keep your mouth shut." - To Ajax, waiting for the train to the meeting
"Man, you crazy, I didn't do nothing." - Response to being blamed for Cyrus' death

Trivia[]

Though he appears to be the protagonist of the film at first, he is only in the film's first sixteen minutes.
In a deleted scene, he is shown prior to the meeting with his girlfriend, telling him she has a bad feeling about the meeting.
As Warlord, Cleon is always controlled by the player in missions. However, you can command Cleon in the war party once, when playing The Best, the player will play as Swan until the end and while attacking LC's hangout Cleon and Vermin will join, the player will remain as Swan instead of Cleon.
He is one out of the three Warriors that don't make it back to Coney, the other two being Fox and Ajax.
It's likely he was killed off due to the fact that actor Dorsey Wright was filming two movies at the time and couldn't negotiate a contract with Walter Hill. He later revealed this in an interview.
In the game, he has a unique walking animation, which he shares with nobody.
He is one out of the three Warriors that dies, the other two being Fox and Ash.
His "HOLD UP" command has a rather unique error. The first time, he says "Yo! Hold up!", the second time, he repeats the exact same piece of recorded dialogue. Only his third "Yo, hold up" will be a different piece of speech.
His last two rage quotes, "You wanna fuck with a Warrior?!" and "Here comes the motherfuckin' Warchief, asshole!" are not available in Roots, as he is not a Warrior, nor the Warchief, during this time.
- Despite this fact, none of the other Warriors follow this 'flashback rule', like when Cochise says "You wanna see a Warrior?! I'm gonna MANGLE you!", or when fox says "A Warrior won't back down!", or when Ajax says "You fucked with the wrong Warrior!", they can all be said even as pre-Warriors.

In Rumble Mode, Cleon's ghost skin always has the standard fighting moves (two-hit finishing moves, etc.), rather than his own. This happens both in Rumble Mode and in Armies of the Night. The same problem occurs with Fox's ghost.
Cleon's standing rage combo (or the standing regular combo of the Hun Lts) is the only combo in the game that uses slow motion twice in the same (full) combo.
Oddly, his regular grapple combos are, realistically, more devastating than his raging grapple combos.
Like most Warriors, he reacts negatively to wearing hats, even if it's his own.
Despite being killed off early in the movie, Cleon still has some action figures made of him along with Swan and Ajax.