Pete

Pete is a secondary antagonist in the Kingdom Hearts series. Once a steamboat captain at Timeless River who employed a young Mickey Mouse, he used to live in Disney Town, but was cast into the Lanes Between by Queen Minnie Mouse for causing mischief. Maleficent releases Pete from his prison in return for his loyalty, and throughout Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days and Kingdom Hearts II, he goes on various missions for her to rebuild her power base of allied villains and Heartless minions after her disastrous defeat in Kingdom Hearts. However, Pete is a chronic bumbler, and as Sora puts it, "not smart enough to tie his own shoes." He serves as Maleficent's second-in-command and is the only villain who still cooperates with her throughout the series.

Pete also serves as a Dimension Link and Command Board opponent in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep. As Captain Pete, he temporarily serves as an assistant fighter in Timeless River.

Before Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep
Many, many years before Kingdom Hearts, Pete worked as the captain of a steamboat. His deck hand was none other than the future king of Disney Castle, Mickey Mouse. This past association causes Pete to refer to Mickey as "the Boat-Boy King."

When Sora travels back in time to find the reason for the evil surrounding Disney Castle, he is quick to blame Captain Pete, unaware that he is not the Pete they are dealing with. However, when Sora, Donald Duck, and Goofy point their fingers at Captain Pete, to answer his question of if they saw any bad guys, the shipmaster is visibly offended, but instead of fighting them, he merely goes off to find his stolen steamboat. But Sora, Donald and Goofy still attack him, and it is only when Captain Pete nurses his injuries and does not summon any Heartless that Sora and company realise that they have made a mistake. Sora promptly apologises to Captain Pete for the misunderstanding and offers to help him recover the steamboat to make amends.

Later on, Sora meets Captain Pete again, this time arguing with his future self over the steamboat. Present Pete, subtly hinting that his past self's incarnation's life is at stake, wins the fight, knocks his past self away and steals the steamboat. Captain Pete aids Sora and company in the battle against Pete, and succeed in defeating him and chasing him off. To show his gratitude, Captain Pete (still completely unaware of Present Pete's true identity) allows Sora, Donald and Goofy to take a ride in the steamboat, since Mickey has not shown up.

Sometime later after Sora, Donald, and Goofy has left, Captain Pete rides his steamboat up the river as Mickey jumps aboard.

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep
Pete appears in Disney Town as a resident and plays under disguise as Captain Justice and Captain Dark. Captain Dark and Captain Justice are supposed to be two different people played as Pete who are entering into the Million Dreams Celebration in Disney Town. The goal is to get as many popularity votes as possible to win the Million Dreams Award.

He became Captain Justice to help people in order to gain popularity votes so that he could win the Million Dreams Award, but whenever someone needed help, he used an excuse and ran away.

After Queen Minnie announces that Terra, Aqua, and Ven win the award, Pete jumps on stage and creates an uproar. When Queen Minnie says that some people do care for him and that he got their votes, Pete says that he doesn't care for their "lousy" votes, he just wants the prize. He is then taken away by a squad of "security" brooms. He is sent into the Lanes Between by Queen Minnie where he hears Maleficent's voice telling him that she can free him if he helps her conquer the worlds. She then opens a dark corridor, which Pete walks into and vanishes from his prison.

Between Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep and Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
In return for his freedom, Pete became a commander in Maleficent's Heartless army, and traveled around many worlds building up more and more legions of Heartless to help her plot of universal domination (considering there is more than one world).

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
While searching for Jafar's Lamp in Agrabah, Pete is followed by Axel and Roxas when they come across the villain in the Marketplace as he was looking for a secret entrance out of town to the Cave of Wonders. Pete eventually escapes Organization XIII's sights, not appearing until Roxas finds him during another mission in Agrabah, this time with Xion. While investigating the Cave of Wonders, Roxas and Xion end up battling him.

Later, Pete appears in Neverland, making fake treasure maps for Captain Hook to follow, relying on the pirate's greed to conjure up tons of Heartless in his mad quest for riches. Roxas winds up destroying these Heartless anyway, and Pete's manipulation of Hook eventually leads to the creation of the Ruler of the Sky, Pete's "Prize Heartless", yet that too is defeated by Roxas.

Kingdom Hearts II
Pete first meet Sora while standing outside Yen Sid's Tower, having sent in a squad of Heartless to turn the powerful sorcerer Yen Sid into a Heartless to act as Pete's bodyguard. Sora, Donald, and Goofy informs him of Maleficent's demise, and in anger Pete calls an army of Heartless to attack. After Pete tells them who lives in the tower, Sora, Donald, and Goofy run inside in excitement, leaving Pete to lose his temper and leave.

He returns to Hollow Bastion to see if what his foes had told him is actually true, finding Maleficent's fortress devoid of any kind of activity; he also finds the place gloomy. Now thinking that their plan for universal domination is a bust, Pete is shocked to see her pet raven, Diablo, arrive and caw at him. He sees this as a foreshadowing of Maleficent's return.

Pete then appears in Olympus Coliseum to help Hades defeat Hercules, planning to turn the great hero into another one of his Heartless when he falls. As part of Hades' plan to trick Sora into unlocking the Underdrome, Pete kidnaps Megara and imprisons her inside it. He fight Hercules and Sora long enough for the Hydra to attack the Coliseum, fleeing the Underworld and returning to Hollow Bastion.

Arriving, he is questioned by Maleficent as to why none of their allies have come for a meeting. Pete suspects they all had better things to do than attend a meeting, infuriating Maleficent. He then explains that Organization XIII has been giving him nothing but trouble with carrying out their agenda while she was away. Though Maleficent ignores this, Pete manages to get her attention by mentioning Sora's interference as well. After informing her of all that happened in the previous year, Pete is scolded for trying to take her place and failing constantly; he is no longer needed.

Saddened, Pete begins pining for his early days as a steamboat captain, causing a portal to Timeless River to open up. Showing Maleficent the portal, Pete is tasked with going back in time to destroy Disney Castle's treasured Cornerstone of Light to allow them to take over the castle to replace their crumbling fortress. However, Pete is stopped from fulfilling their plan by Sora, along with his past self. His portal was sealed behind him by the Keyblade, preventing him from ever going back.

He next appears in Port Royal, where he teams up with Captain Barbossa to lend a hand in removing the curse of the gold medallions. He also gave them fair warning about the Keyblade's otherworldly magic being effective on their skeletal forms. Pete also helped double-cross Will by leaving Heartless and rigged gunpowder barrels on the Interceptor while taking him hostage. After "the tide has changed" during Barbossa's battle with Jack Sparrow, Pete summons the Illuminator Heartless to absorb moonlight to assist. However, once it's defeated, Pete flees.

Deciding to resume his quest to find Jafar's lamp and turn him into a Heartless, Pete returned to Agrabah to search the Cave of Wonders. While searching, he overheard Sora's group mention the Peddler had Jafar's lamp. Leaving a squad of Heartless to keep them busy, Pete tracked the Peddler down and chased him to the palace gates. However, just when it seemed he succeeded in acquiring the lamp, interference from Iago and Genie, causing him to lose it. After the Blizzard Lord and Volcanic Lord that he summons are defeated, he runs off in a fury.

He next appears in the Pride Lands, lending Scar control of the Heartless to secure his reign as king. When it looked like Sora, Donald and Goofy would be done in by Scar's hyena minions, Pete took his leave. However, he had a hidden agenda; upon Scar's defeat by Simba, he used the anger and jealousy in Scar's heart to turn him into a Heartless to establish his and Maleficent's control over the Pride Lands. However, Scar was defeated by Sora and Simba, forcing him to once again flee.

During the invasion of Hollow Bastion, Pete commanded the Heartless alongside Maleficent. However, once seeing that their troops were no match for the Organzation's Nobodies, he fled; "I don't know about you, but I'm out of here, sister!"

He and Maleficent turn up one last time in the Castle That Never Was, seeking to take it for their own. When Ansem the Wise's Kingdom Hearts Encoder explodes, it causes the creation of thousands of Heartless. Knowing that the Sora and his friends are the only ones who can stop Xemnas, Maleficent volunteers to hold off the Heartless, on the condition that when they've destroyed them all, the castle would be hers. Pete suggests fleeing, causing Maleficent to dismiss him. However, Pete meets Mickey face to face for the first time in a decade, and a brief conversation encourages Pete to stand and fight. He and Maleficent charge the Heartless army while Sora and company go on to defeat Xemnas. After the castle is destroyed, the two of them are forced to retreat.

Kingdom Hearts coded
Some time later, Pete appears in Disney Castle while King Mickey, Donald, Goofy and Jiminy were trying to uncover the secrets of the Journal. The moment they were taken to the data world, Pete was taken with them, but to a different location. He calls Maleficent to him, and the two decide that the data world could be used for their plans to plunge the world in darkness.

Pete makes his first reappearance in the data version of Olympus Coliseum, where he mistakes Data-Sora for his counterpart. He then travels to Data Agrabah, where he gives the data version of Jafar a lamp created from glitches, which gives him power over his world. Maleficent and Pete then appear together, and Maleficent destroys Data-Sora's Keyblade. They then take Data-Riku hostage, infected him with bugs. In the digital Hollow Bastion, Pete fights Data-Sora, and then forces him to fight Riku. After Sora defeats them and debugs Riku's data, the Journal begins erasing itself. Maleficent and Pete attempt to fight Sora's Heartless, but are quickly defeated. Before they can be erased, however, Data-Riku retrieves them, and they return to the real world shortly before Mickey.

Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance
Pete returns to Disney Castle with Maleficent and aids her in taking Queen Minnie hostage to force Mickey to give them access to the Data Worlds again, but Mickey refuses and Lea appears, throwing a chakram at Pete. Pete narrowly dodges, but loses his grip on Minnie and she escapes to safety. All but defeated, Pete leaves with Maleficent.

Sora and Riku also come into conflict with a past incarnation of Pete in Country of the Musketeers, set in the past when Pete was the captain of the Royal Musketeers under Princess Minnie. However, Pete schemes to overthrow Minnie with help from the Beagle Boys and become King himself, but the three Musketeers, Mickey, Donald and Goofy, aided by Sora and Riku, put an end to his evil plans.

Personality
Pete is very mean, selfish and, shown at various points, cowardly. He tends to get scared in the presence of characters with overwhelming power, or in situations of being outnumbered. He is quite loyal to Maleficent, although his cowardice interferes from time to time. He has the tendency to run at the mouth, bragging and insulting, even with people such as Hades. Whenever he is defeated, he runs off in a huff. Though Pete appears incompetent, his heart has strangely been strong enough to resist the darkness.

Despite his cowardly appearance, Pete is one of the sneakier villains in the game. This is shown first in the Underworld where he tricks Sora into opening the Underdrome by losing a fight to Sora. Next at Agrabah, he uses Sora and his friends to find Jafar's lamp so he can steal it and turn him into a Heartless. Later, during his fight with Sora at Timeless River, he continuously changes the scene to give himself an edge.

When he was a captain, Pete had many of the same personality traits he would later be known for, such as his gruff demeanour and generally rude behaviour. However, Captain Pete is shown to be much more benevolent than Pete, and appears to have no intention whatsoever of harming other people for any reason. It is never explained how Captain Pete evolved into his ruthless and conniving self, but a possible explanation is resentment and jealousy over his cabin boy Mickey's ascension to King of Disney Castle, especially given the fact that Mickey once used to work for him, suggested when Pete refers to Mickey as "the boat-boy King".

Appearance
Pete is a portly, black furred, anthropomorphized cat (often confused for a dog). Like Mickey, he wears a heavily modified version of his usual outfit in the modern cartoons; in Pete's case, suspenders and a shirt.

Abilities
Pete is capable of throwing explosive bowling balls at his opponents. He can also use fireworks to immobilize his opponents.

Another attack involves throwing a close-range "temper tantrum".

Lastly, he can generate a shield with regenerating and protective properties. He has been shown to be able to conjure items and telekinetically throw them, as he did while trying to make off with the Cornerstone of Light.

Besides that, he does have some magical talent, as shown when he somehow conjured a portal to the Past while reminiscing, a surprising feat for Pete, and he evidently has a strong Heart as he is likely able to use the Corridors of Darkness to travel the Worlds to gather Heartless without being strained by the Darkness. He also seems to have some power of teleportation as when he appeared alongside Maleficent to stop the Heartless and allow Sora and his friends to continue on to battle Xemnas. He obviously has above-average strength, and unlike Maleficent, was strong enough to resist the darkness. He has also shown some decent swordsmanship as the captain of Queen Minnie's royal guard.

D-Link
In the European, North American and Final Mix versions of Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, Pete is a D-Link ally to the player, and the only D-Link that needs to be unlocked. To unlock, play the Command Board (except as an Event in the Mirage Arena), if you or another player lands on a Special Panel, and Pete as either Captain Justice or Captain Dark appears this unlocks Pete as a D-Link at the conclusion of the Command Board session.

Origin
Although Peg Leg Pete's debut dates back to 1925 in Alice Solves the Puzzle in which he was portrayed as a bear-like creature, it was not until Steamboat Willie in 1928 that he made his first full-fledged appearance as Mickey Mouse's feline antagonist. Despite this, he holds the distinction of being the oldest surviving Disney character. Coincidentally, Pete's role in Steamboat Willie is relatively minor compared to Mickey and Minnie, appearing only at the beginning to throw Mickey back onto the deck to work, and at the very end when he stops Mickey and Minnie from their mischief and punishes Mickey by ordering him to peel potatoes.

While most portrayals of Pete give him an antagonistic role, in some cartoons, he was shown to have a somewhat caring side, including to his children in the show Goof Troop, his son in the Goofy Movies, and most recently, in the children's show . His design in the Country of the Musketeers is based on his look from the film Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers, in which he is the main villain.

Notes and references
Pat (Rétro) Käptn Karlo