Antagonist

Character Role Analysis

Willie Mink a.k.a. Mr. Gray

We don't actually get to meet Mink face-to-face until the final fifty pages of this book. But he's the closest thing we get to an antagonist in this book. After all, the dude performs experimental drug therapy on Jack's wife and then makes her sleep with him to get more of his drugs. Boo! Hiss! Get him, Jack!

But Willie is kind of hard to hate by the time we actually meet him. For starters, he is a pretty beat-up looking guy: "His face was odd, concave, forehead and chin jutting" (39.16). Also, Willie's brain is so fried by the time Jack finds him that our antagonist can't understand who Jack is or what he wants.

Ultimately there are no super heroes or villains in this book—just suburban dads like Jack and weirdo pill-poppers like Willie. For DeLillo, that's just part of the how blasé and meh the modern world is.