James "Jimmy" Trivette is the current partner to Cordell Walker of the Texas Rangers. James Trivette, commonly known as "Jimmy", is Walker's loyal partner and the deurotagonist of the series. James grew up in Baltimore and got a chance to play professional football as a wide receiver, but seriously injured his shoulder which ended his career. Soon after, he joined the police force, starting first as a highway patrolman before graduating to Texas Ranger status.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
He grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, and has an older brother named Simon, who appears in the episode "Brothers in Arms". As a young man he was a famous football player, and he was a member of the Dallas Cowboys until a shoulder injury ended his rookie season and career. He later entered the Texas Rangers and became Walker's steadfast colleague...succeeding Walker's longtime partner Bob Mobley, who was killed trying to stop a robbery ("One Riot, One Ranger"). However, in the episode "Till Death Do Us Part", in which Walker ends up in a coma and his friends recall some of their greatest memories of him, it turns out their first meeting had taken place during a riot: while trying to calm the crowd, Trivette was ambushed and nearly killed, but was saved by his future partner.
Jimmy is highly tech-savvy and modern-themed…in contrast to Walker's "Wild-West”, “eye-for-an-eye”, “trust-my-instincts" personality. Walker's gruff character made their partnership initially difficult; Trivette had a devilish time gaining his respect and trust, but they ultimately became good friends. Trivette is very computer-savvy; he gets miffed when Walker (frequently) proves to know more about somebody than Jimmy does, without the use of electronics...and usually without Walker having even met the someone in question. Trivette often quarrels with C.D. “Big Dog” Parker about the latter’s famous chili, which never agrees with Jimmy; otherwise, the two are good friends.
Trivette is greatly professional and shows the utmost commitment to his work as a Ranger. Yet he is generally less-skilled than Walker; Jimmy’s best efforts at nearly anything tend to succeed only in highlighting Walker’s superiority at just about everything. Trivette frequently gets injured in the line of duty, forcing Walker to save the day on his own. Jimmy can be touchy; he is often the butt of jokes from Walker, C.D., and/or Alex…which adds insult to injury whenever Walker one-ups Trivette at something. Besides being Walker’s comedy-relief, Jimmy has faced several legal problems: he was accused of pocketing the spoils of a robbery (“Trust No One”); he injured a little boy during a shootout—or so it seemed ("The Hands of God"). Yet Walker never loses his faith in Trivette, even when C.D. and/or Alex do; he always proves Jimmy’s innocence in the end.
Trivette is single most of the series, despite occasional romantic attachments in some episodes, such as "Behind the Badge" when he falls for a journalist, but she is forced to leave, or "Angel of Death" Trivette reconnects with Angell his girlfriend in high school, but finds that she is a killer. Angel is also killed at the end of the episode. In the last episode of the series, Trivette meets old girlfriend Erika (who previously appeared in the episode "Justice Delayed") and they decide to get married, despite some initial doubts when Trivette is nearly killed by the one of the motorcycle gang who marked him as a target.
Dallas Cowboys[]
TBA
Texas Rangers[]
Personality[]
James is a good-hearted, brave and thoughtful person, with a sense of wrong and right. But at times, Trivette is often made fun of by Walker and friends for also looks for money-making opportunities wherever he goes.
Skills[]
James Trivette dominates his oppositions with his formal hand to hand combat skills. He is more of a boxer/brawler as he tends to often knock almost anyone out whilst incorporating elbow and knee strike combos and downward punches to the body. His hand-to-hand combat is improved somewhat as the series progresses, as he is able to perform judo style flips on enemies. (It's possible that Walker taught him this).
Trivette has also displayed considerable skill in marksmanship, as he is able to shoot enemies from various distances.
Due to his gifted athletic ability, Trivette can run faster than others and take down bad guys in seconds before they can react.
He is very proficient with computers, his intellect and computer knowledge often specializing in data-collecting as he easily draws up profiles for wanted suspects during the Rangers' investigations. During the first couple of seasons, Jimmy was the "youngster"--the sort of "new kid teamed up with the old gun-slinger" as Compared to Walker's "tough as nails" Dodge Ram pickup truck, Trivette drives more agile sports cars - in early episodes a red Pontiac Firebird, later a silver Dodge Stealth R/T and ultimately, a black Ford Mustang GT.
Behind the Scenes[]
Personality Change/Episode Presence[]
James could be described as a good cop, good friend, etc. but over time on the series, Trivette would embark on several character and plot-arcs that would noticeably change his direction in the series. James Trivette has often been a victim of bad relationships, often with him being unable to hang on to his potential matchups or otherwise just having a falling out with women. Because of this, Trivette has never had a solid relationship (until the later seasons of the series, 2000 & 2001). His more high-profile matches during the series included once dating a woman who was hired a killer. She came back into his life in a sort of cat-and-mouse chase as Trivette struggled with his policeman's duty and his personal feelings for her. In the end, she eventually died in his arms by the episode's conclusion. Trivette has successfully developed a relationship with a young college student named Erika Carter (played by http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0870206/ Tammy Townsend) who he helped in the episode "Justice Delayed". Agreeing to help Erika, led Trivette on a quest to prove her father's innocence in a crime he didn't commit some years earlier. James and Erika reunited (on-screen) in the last two episodes of the series finale wherein they joined Walker and Alex's family/friend picnic at Walker's ranch.
Trivette has also been the victim of racial prejudice, personal vendettas and media conspiracies which brought out ugly and otherwise embarrassing sides of Trivette's persona which usually did not help his cause during these situations. When he first thought he shot a young boy during a night-time gunfight, Trivette took an emotional dive which caused him to drink a lot, fight in bars and simply just become a miserable human being in his own self-pity and loathing. It took Walker to help James Trivette retrace his actions during the scene of the gunfight to realize he never shot the boy. However, he almost got shot by the boy's brother who foolishly accused Trivette of murdering his brother. After a heartfelt speech, James talked his way out of eating a bullet and broke through to the older brother's common sense and morality.
The issue of racial prejudice came in an episode where a news station headed by a black reporter and supported by her husband was targeted by a white supremacy militant group. Trivette was boiling during the course of the episode, (due to the group being responsible for his cousin's murder) and even was tempted to kill one of the supremacy members, who had committed the murder, during a fight, he and Walker were involved in before the news station takeover. Ultimately Trivette and Walker defused the hostage situation and subdue the militant group, saving dozens of lives both white and black, including Alex Cahill who was scheduled to make an interview appearance before the station takeover.
James has had his battles with the media as well, including accusations in one of the episodes of him stealing money from a crime scene that involved a drug money bust he and Walker were on. When James confronted the studio reporter about the accusations, he was secretly recorded on camera, providing the medial mogul the material he needed to twist Trivette's words into a threat against the news anchor. Eventually, Trivette was able to clear his name but his conduct during the course of the episode depicted him as foolish and brash, totally steering away from his usual good-natured and much-smarter self.
Trivette's family relationships have also seen some strains: His older brother Simon, a semi-crippled former FBI Agent, became an informant for a crime syndicate (which cost him his FBI career and 18 months to prison) and later an important member of an international Drug Trafficking Ring, based outside the Dallas-Ft. Worth area; their relations came to a breaking point when Simon was assigned to assassinate both Jimmy and Walker. Jimmy's relationship with his mother grew stronger, after his brother's incarceration, however, it ended, sadly, when she died after having suffered a stroke, to which Jimmy attributed to his brother's fall from grace.
During the course of the series, James Trivette teamed up more with the rookie rangers Sydney Cooke and Francis Gage as Walker virtually "withdrew" from actively participating in investigations to focus more on his home life with Alex. Thus James became the "lead" in the roster of rangers patrolling Dallas. And while Trivette advanced to this take-charge status, he still acted more in the role of a comical, easy-going sort.
Trivia[]
- Real-life Texas natives Patrick Swayze and Forest Whitaker, both accomplished martial artists, were considered for the role of James Trivette...before the producers decided on Clarence Gilyard. Swayze's brother Don would guest-star in The Guardians.