if you are any sort of criminal in chicago, you've more than likely worked for or with the cooper family at some point in time, whether you knew it at the time or not. the coopers have been on the top of the chicago mafia game since before prohibition and their reign isn't over yet. they're a pretty fucked up family when compared to your average american home, but they wouldn't have it any other way. all of them have been around the mafia and it's proceedings their entire lives so there was never really much hope for any of them. family is everything to the coopers. they have all learned at various points in their lives that friends come and go and fuck you over, but family will always be there. they may hit you before they're there for you, but they're there. while growing up, the four cooper sibling were extremely close. their mother was cold towards her children and their father was always too occupied with the family business to be a proper father, so they pretty much raised themselves and relied on each other.
please excuse my inability to summarize people in less than 1000 words, i just have a lot of feels for this family, so if you take one of them, be in it for the long haul, please! i promise it'll be fun. 8D
FIRST GENERATION
______ COOPER, JESSICA LANGE, 67, OPEN
after watching way too much arrested development, i have decided that momma coop needs to be on here and she needs to be lucille bluth. not necessarily face claim or anything, but in personality. she's constantly degrading her children and no matter what they do, they could have done better. she was born into a rich family and married rich, so she has never worked a day in her life. she's a judgmental, snooty, alcoholic (the gene had to come from somewhere, right?) bitch who is not afraid to say what she's thinking, no matter how crude or cold. she doesn't understand the whole 'other people have feelings too' thing. she and dom butt heads quite a bit because even though he's now in charge, she thinks that she still has power (though just the little bit that poppa coop let her have to shut her up) and is pissed that dom was put ahead of joseph because she doesn't think that dom tries hard enough, even though the operation is running much smoother ever since he's been in charge. she recently hired an assistant and has used her insane manipulative powers to keep her there.
she just likes to bitch about it because she and dom have always butted heads (because they're actually kind of similar and dom inherited her hard head and stubbornness) and she knows it causes tension between the two oldest cooper brothers. after poppa coop died, dick moved in with dom because after living alone with her for two weeks (he had lived with her and daddy since forever but it was always dad and dom that took care of him), he had been dropped off at dom's doorstep with a note actually pinned to his chest reading: 'merry christmas.' dom sent a homeless man to her house (she despises the homeless) on new years at midnight with a megaphone.
for further examination of this character i would like to offer you a visual helper (just imagine buster is dick, michael is dom, gob is joey, and lin is lyndsey in any of these situations and you have momma cooper).
CLICK HERE!
SECOND GENERATION
JOSEPH COOPER, JOHNNY DEPP, 47, TAKEN
joseph has always had a lot of problems controlling his temper and had a habit of cutting people's ears off a few years back which lead to a string of some pretty fun headlines. he has a sense of humor, but it's pretty dark and dry. when it came to his two youngest siblings, he was always a little cold, but they both understand that that's just him and they've learned to accept it. he was always the one who instilled the discipline in the youngest cooper siblings, his temper often getting the best of him when it came to the young ones. that's when dom would step in and take over, calming him all the while. he has always been the brawn to dominic's brains. they have been partners since birth, basically, and when their wonder twin powers activate, they basically become the macmanus brothers. even though they're both above petty street work now, they like doing odd jobs every now an then to be all sadistically nostalgic. 'remember the first time you cut someone's finger off?' 'oh, yeah! that guy that bit you when you tried to grab him.' 'i don't understand how that much blood came from one finger.' 'that fucker was a struggler. all i know is that was the last time i wore a light colored shirt on a job with you.' they had a falling out after dom was given the title of 'don' after their father's death years ago, resulting in both of them being put in the hospital for various injuries they'd given each other while beating the living shit out of each other. when dom came 'round two days later he was in the same room as his brother and everything was just suddenly fine again, because that's what coopers do. they beat the shit out of each other and get over it. he's now dom's underboss and his right hand man. i think it would be interesting if he didn't approve of dom and christopher. little snide comments, some cold shoulder here and there. he's married to
marion and they've got three kids: christian,
jared, and alexander.
_____ COOPER, MARION COTILLARD, 41, OPEN
marion is a very strong willed person who isn't afraid to speak her mind. she can be quite blunt at times, but she never really means too much harm. she loves joseph with all her heart, but his cheating gets to her every once in a while. she tries her best to ignore it because she knows her husband and knows that he doesn't actually care about any of the women he gets with, but sometimes it's too much. the two have been known to get into some pretty intense fights, but the angry sex always makes things better and the make up sex reassures her that joseph still cares for her. she is the only decent mother in this bunch (besides christopher, maybe) and she and joey took eli and juliette in quite a few times when they were younger due to dom's inability to stay sober for long. she was the only one who actually had the guts to say something to dom when he was such a wreck, and i think that he needs her to step up again and say something to him about his behavior. she and dom have a older sister/younger brother relationship despite the fact that dom is older than she is. they have always been pretty close and dom feels as though he can actually talk to her about the issues he has because he won't get an excessive amount of sympathy (none of that 'ohhhh, sugar! lemme get that for you, you poor dear' shit) and she won't bullshit him, which is what dom needs. she has three kids with joey: christian,
jared, and alexander. i would like her to be involved with the mob somehow, but if you have another occupation in mind i am willing to overlook that small detail ahaha.
DOMINIC COOPER, RDJ, 43, TAKEN
this is dom, the brains behind this whole fucked up operation. poppa cooper's brother took dom under his wing pretty much from the time he could talk and used various military techniques to sharpen his memory that had been tweaked to focus on things that would make him the king pin, which it eventually did. dom has always been
very protective over his family and always has been. while growing up, dom was always super protective over his siblings, even his older brother, though he didn't get coddled or anything like the younger ones did. when it came to his older brother they just did the younger ones. when it came to his older brother, he and dom just did the whole boondock saints thing and beat some ass. but he made sure that both dick and
ellen were always out of harms way and sheltered them a bit, but it was because he didn't want them to be exposed to the things he had been exposed to at such a young age. when his baby sister was born he was determined to keep her out of the life he had been a part of for so long. he pretty much raised
ellen and he's proud of her for making something of herself. when poppa cooper died, dom offered dick a place in his guest room for a couple of days and he hasn't left. whereas most people would have ripped his bear out by now, dom approaches taking care of dick like one would approach taking care of a wide eyed child who watches too much porn (and much like chris takes care of him): one step at a time. he has always had great patience when it came to dick (and any other child or childlike creature) and he actually enjoys his company, despite his often agitating behaviors (dom doesn't see it, but he and dick can be kind of similar when dom enters manchild mode, especially after a few drinks). charisma has always just oozed from dom and he has a certain arrogance to him that some find appealing and some find appalling (it depends on who you ask and when you ask them). he's a very friendly and likable guy, despite his many flaws. lately he's been going through a rough time and he's not the kind of person to address it or talk about it, so he's going to need his family to at least offer to babysit him sometimes (he likes to wander out of the house at odd hours of the morning and have casual conversations with the prostitutes and homeless men when he gets strung out). he's always been a drinker and he's always done drugs, but lately things are getting out of control. dom uses coke and opium (amongst other things) to keep him up for days at a time because he can't stand to sleep alone. while he's up on those binges he's normally pretty fucked up due to the massive amounts of alcohol and drugs he put in his body. after a couple of days he normally drinks himself into a coma an wakes up days later having no idea what it is (he never really knows what day it is anyways, though, in his defense). when he gets in one of his drunken moods he refuses to listen to anyone except for christopher, but his family tries to keep him contained sometimes. most of the time when they try they end up texting chris for help. the last time dom was this bad was when his ex wife left him, which was the lowest dominic has ever been in his life (he doesn't see what he's doing now as a problem and therefor doesn't count this as a low point in his life. not yet, at least). the last time he was this bad he ended up nearly dead on more than one occasion and if someone doesn't stop him, he's headed right back to that.
CHRISTOPHER CHAPLIN, JUDE LAW, 38, TAKEN
christopher is an honorary cooper and i feel as though half of the stuff i say in here won't make sense unless you can refer to choop's page, so here he is. christopher is an extremely gifted lawyer who works for the cooper family. it is his job to keep their asses out of the slammer, which can be quite the challenge when you work for a criminal family with a long history of both anger issues and alcoholism. he comes off as uptight, but he's not as bad as dom makes him out to be. he was just raised properly by a rich family of lawyers, which means he was taught mannerisms that many of the cooper family never even thought to teach their children. elbows off the table. straighten your tie. your hair is starting to grow around your ear. too shaggy. ever since being generally accepted throughout most of the cooper family, christopher started to relax a bit. can you blame him for being tense? sitting in a room full of mobsters (when you have never even so much as cheated on a test) and eye fucking their brother isn't a situation that puts most people at ease. the cooplets/chooplets (dom's kids) have choop wrapped around so tightly around their fingers that he may start cutting off circulation soon enough. he is a mother hen if i've ever seen one and he may coddle you to death if you give him the opportunity. even though he's growing more and more use to the lifestyle, there are a lot of things that are still foreign to the lawyer. he doesn't understand how dom can just sit there casually on his phone after being informed hat his son was in jail. he sits there casually because he's been dealing with the situation since eli was much younger and to get upset would be a waste of energy. he'll be out by this time tomorrow. whereas dom has no problem letting people sit in jail for a couple nights if they did something to deserve it because to dom, jail is no big deal, but to christopher it's... well, jail. so if you end up getting put up for the night and you want someone to bail you out, don't call dom, call christopher, because he will get in his gay ass prius and drive his fine ass down to the station in record time. unless it's dom who's sitting on the cold, cement floor. then he has no problem taking his time. when it comes to the mafia members, chris opens them with open arms. he's almost turned into something of a mob therapist because he's the only one within miles who actually cares about what's going on with skinhead jim's daughter who is awaiting approval from an all exclusive preschool. it seems that everyone is pretty taken with him (except for the oldest cooper) and he
pretty much is family. any of the coopers will tell you that christopher is dom's better half (probably because he's the only one who can get dom to sit down, stop fidgeting, and use his inside voice). he's the first person dom's let himself get attached to since his ex wife, alice. the fact that he's married with a daughter (who loves dom) is the driving force behind dom's current problems and he knows it and feels horrible, but leaving his psychotic wife just isn't an option at this point.
RICHARD 'DICK' COOPER, ZACK GALIFINAKIS, 36, TAKEN
oh, dick. dick, dick, dick. after the passing of their father, dominic asked dick if he wanted to stay in his guest bedroom for a little while he got over the whole 'dad being gone' thing (he, unlike the other cooper brothers, was extremely upset when he got the news and is still having problems coping). that was over a year ago and dom still wakes up with him cuddled up next to him (or at the foot of the bed if christopher's over), though he won't go in dom's room and sleep if he's got some bitch all up in his bed because he has major stranger danger/trust issues, but he's comfortable enough with choop to plop himself right between him and dom while they're sleeping. he is basically a mix between a large toddler with a rather impressive beard and a mentally handicapped puppy that has a tenancy to run into walls. where as joseph gets annoyed with dicks antics, dom actually finds a lot of it kind of entertaining (he's never been one to care all that much about material things, so if runs up dom's credit card, dom doesn't really care all that much, unless he was already pissed off beforehand). he has been known to blow up at dick, but he always apologizes within a couple of hours, which is very unlike dom, because he refuses apologizing for things because apologizing means admitting you're wrong. but things are different with dom and dick. they had a very classic older brother/younger brother relationship, but normally people grew out of such relationships after the younger brother turns about thirteen, but dom doesn't think that dom ever made it past thirteen when it came to brain development. he has a very childlike demeanor and way of doing... well, everything. he has no sense of shame or filter and he doesn't understand personal space, which tends to get him in trouble around people who don't know him.
BLAISE COOPER, ELLEN PAGE, 24, TAKEN
the baby cooper sister here was definitely an accident. ma and pa cooper were getting up there in age and both of them had been through the whole parenting thing (or so they said they had been) and were totally over it by the time this one came 'round. dom had been in the business for a few years by the time he heard his mother's news and he knew that he couldn't let this innocent baby go through the same thing he had gone through. she could be better than that. dominic made sure that
ellen was out of the room before any business went on, a simple gesture that his father was too busy to be bothered with. it made him sick to know that his father put so much before his children. because he knew what kind of life she would grow up to have if she would have been left alone, dom made it his job to make sure that
ellen had a chance. while dom had been encourage to sit in on the mafia meetings and was even allowed to speak out loud and make suggestion, he made sure that
ellen had none of that. dom helped her with her studying, with her boyfriend troubles (she has not seen the boyfriend she had been dating when she was seventeen since he broke up with her), with everything. she had been the first cooper to graduate high school and go to college and dominic couldn't be prouder of her.
THIRD GENERATION
ELI COOPER, AARON JOHNSON, 22, TAKEN
eli was dom's first kid who popped out when dom was twenty one and his mother was only nineteen. he's a lot like his father with his recklessness and his inflated ego, though his ego is nowhere near as large as dom's yet. he knew from the start that he wanted to be a part of the family business and started selling when he was in his teens. he wants to take over for his father when the time comes, but he's got some work to do before he will be considered for the position. his slacker attitude makes it kind of hard to work towards such a large goal. eli is a womanizer (just like most of the other male coopers) and he can be a charming bastard when he wants to be.
JULIETTE COOPER, MILA KUNIS, 21, TAKEN
juliette (or jj as she's referred to by many) is the perfect mix of cooper and normal. after bugging her father (dom) for months he finally agreed to let her take the occasional job. being the one who taught her to shoot, he knew that she was good, but he had always been his baby girl and he didn't really want to see her get involved in the family business because she has potential to become something much greater with a higher survival rate. she's become an almost regular member of the 'team' now, though, and takes as many jobs as she can handle between her college work. she is going to become a pianist and hopes to one day make a career of it (probably almost as much as dom wants her to). despite the fact that she's a cooper and kills people from time to time, juliette is quite the innocent sweetheart. it seems as though the insanity genes skipped over this one.
KIERAN HAYES, INDIO DOWNEY, 16, TAKEN
kieran is dom's 'oopsies' child. he had no idea that he had another kid out there, though he, like the rest of the people who know him, wasn't really all that surprised when he showed up. after dealing with abuse from his mother's boyfriend for three years, kieran ran away from his mother's home in philedelphia to go find the man who he thought was his biological father after finding a picture of dom and kieran's mother. he is quiet and is normally a polite kid. kieran is constantly putting people before himself and because of that selflessness he is often kicked while he is down by the people who hurt him in the first place. even though he seems nice, you should refrain from messing with the people he cares about because he will stand up for them, even if he won't always do the same for himself. the abuse he went through pushed him and made him realize just how much tolerance he has for bullshit.
______ HAYES, SUSAN DOWNEY, 35, OPEN
susan and dom met after she moved to chicago for college after graduating high school. the two had a short relationship and the two had a lot of fun together in that time. she had a promising future, but after the pregnancy she dropped out of college and moved back home where she was forced to settle for a mediocre job that she was overqualified for. she has always been a headstrong free spirit with a good sense of humor and she is one of the most loyal people you will ever meet. she had been in the dark about kierans abuse and didn't put it together until he ran away one night (which she is still kicking herself for). after he left, husband showed very little concern for his stepson and even seemed to get annoyed that she was upset about it. after a really bad argument she left for chicago having no idea that kieran was there. all she knew was that she couldn't stay in pennsylvania (because her husband was no doubt going to find her if she stayed around there) and the only place she had ever been happy other than her hometown of philadelphia. after debating for a couple of days she decided to seek dom out. she had been weary because of the fact that she had left without saying a word to him after she found out she was pregnant with kieran, but after a few days of being by herself she needed someone she could trust. the two had always gotten along swimmingly and she needed the friend she knew that she could find in dom. after showing up on his doorstep, everything came out: the pregnancy, the abusive husband, his penis. she and dom have been spending quite a bit of time together, but he hasn't said anything about kieran being here because he's unsure if kieran wants her to know and he doesn't feel that it's his place to tell her if he doesn't want her to know.
CHRISTIAN COOPER, JENSEN ACKLES, 25, TAKEN
as the oldest cooper in this generation, kit has always been like an older brother to all of the cooper kids. he wants nothing more than to be just like his father an his uncle and is always seeking their approval. he can be a grouch and if he's pissed, you might get nothing but a grunt in reply to anything you may say to him. he's great at his job and takes pride in his work, as any good soldier should. kit is married but having an affair with a prostitute by the name of brody easton that he keeps spending more and more time with.
CARTER COOPER, JARED PADALECKI, 23, TAKEN
jared's entire childhood he looked up to his older brother, his father, joey, and his uncle an thought that they were the coolest people to ever exist. he was constantly asking either dom or joey to take him out for target practice, to teach him how to fight properly, or how to break someone's arm in just one move. but as he grew older he realized that the he just w asn't cut out for the mob. he cared too much about people and hated hurting people unless they thoroughly deserved it. so instead he took his skills to the other side of the law: the right side.
jared enrolled in the police academy after graduation and has become quite awesome at his job. as much as he loves his job, though, his family will always come first, which is why he uses his power to lead the authorities away from the cooper family and has even planted evidence against rival gangs to help the family out.
[SIZE=5MATTHEW COOPER, ALEXANDER GOULD, 16, TAKEN[/SIZE]
the youngest cooper and probably the most insane of them all.
alex has always been a wild child and was born with a blatant disregard for pretty much any rule that someone in authority puts into place. he was the kid who blew up frogs and then took astick to look around at its insides after.
alex is a sarcastic bastard who loves to frustrate people and push them until they reach their breaking point simply because he thinks it's funny. he's already doing small jobs for the mob, but his mother has no idea. he has no problem curb stomping some asshole who called him a 'psycho' or taking a baseball bat to someone who owes money to the mob.
