Martin Mertens

Martin Mertens (or Martin the Human) is Finn's biological father. Billy calls him "Dad the Human," similar to Finn's title "Finn the Human."

Reveal
Finn's father was intended to be revealed in "The Lich," as seen in unused storyboard scenes. He was a warrior who was unintentionally trapped in the Crystal Citadel, a prison that is difficult to enter and nearly impossible to escape.

In "Billy's Bucket List," he was officially revealed, albeit briefly. Billy explains to Finn that his human father is trapped in the Crystal Citadel, now renamed the "Citadel." The episode cuts to a brief scene that shows a silhouette of a man trapped in a crystal aboard a massive space station.

In "Escape from the Citadel," he is finally revealed, but has no clear memory of his son, Finn, or why he deserted him. He runs away from the problems at the Citadel as the Lich spreads his evil. He ultimately causes Finn's arm to be removed, as he tries to escape the Citadel while Finn is holding on to the escaping portal, causing Finn's grass sword to take over and remove itself and part of Finn's arm.

Appearance
Martin is an overweight man with long, dark blond hair and a mostly bald head, with the exception of a single, curling hair at the top, along with a long dark blond beard, making him resemble his Farmworld version. In "Escape from the Citadel," he wears a red leotard-type outfit with red spiked shoulders. He has red boots that almost go up to his knees.

Personality
Unlike Finn's selfless and moral personality, Martin is revealed to be an incredibly selfish, exploitative and narcissistic individual who barely acknowledges his son's presence unless it benefits him. From the moment he is freed, he is focused solely on saving himself, more shocked at the lack of escape than meeting his biological son, Finn. The extremity of his selfishness is shown when he does not even have a reason for abandoning Finn (suggesting he simply left his own baby son to die in the woods without any remorse) he simply says he doesn't remember, even attempting to shift the blame to Finn by saying "maybe YOU left ME," revealing just how immensely immature Martin is.

Martin is also a very emotionally barren person. He has absolutely no empathy and does not seem to understand how his actions affect others, such as treating Finn's emotional attempts to bond with little more than irritation and ingratitude. He then proceeds to manipulate Finn into fixing his leg by baiting him with paternal affection. Once his leg is fixed, he once again abandons Finn, completely unconcerned that Finn loses his arm in a desperate attempt to stop him. He also showed a total lack of sympathy for one of the collapsing Citadel Guardians.

However, like Finn, he is shown to be very persuasive, as he was able to convince the other escaped convicts to make him their leader. Martin does this using the same falsely charming smile and wink he used to get Finn to help fix his leg, emphasizing that, to Martin, others are just interchangeable assets to be exploited or manipulated for his own survival or gain and his son is no exception.

Issue about parenthood
Meeting Finn Mertens' birth father is a situation the boy can’t deal with by swinging his sword at a "bad guy," so this issue keeps him unable to move forward. When Finn finds out that The Citadel is a prison, he naively assumes that Martin is the warden, and Finn’s reluctance to draw negative conclusions about his absent parent sets him up for major disappointment when both meet.

Martin appears to be a darkly comic subversion of most absent parent storylines seen in cartoons or even anime (examples like Dragon Ball's Goku to his children; Naruto's Minato Namikaze to his baby-born child or even Hunter x Hunter's Ging Freecss who just left parenting to his cousin alone). When the child is finally reunited with the parent, he often finds out the parent left or abandoned him unwillingly in order to protect him from something or in the service of some greater cause. Martin, however, does not have a reason for abandoning Finn, and probably did it simply because he could not be bothered to raise him. This will create both sadness and hatred in Finn, an issue to be later solved in the episode "The Tower."

Major appearances

 * "Finn the Human" (Farmworld Martin)
 * "Jake the Dog" (Farmworld Martin)
 * "Escape from the Citadel"

Minor appearances

 * "Astral Plane"

Mentioned

 * "Billy's Bucket List" (debut in Ooo)
 * "Wake Up"
 * "The Tower" (hallucination)
 * "Breezy"
 * "The Pajama War"

Abilities

 * He is very resistant to pain, like his son, Finn. When he is shot by a laser from a Citadel Guardian in his leg (causing it to melt his flesh, only shows bone), he says, "It's okay. It's okay."
 * He is also talented at climbing and swimming, as he was able to climb a long vein and swim through the molten center of the Citadel.
 * Like his son, Finn, he is incredibly persuasive, convincing the ancients (Demons that have committed cosmic crimes) to make him their leader.

Trivia

 * Martin originally was supposed to appear in "The Lich" after Billy told Finn about him; however, the postmortem spirit of Billy eventually tells Finn about Martin's existence in "Billy's Bucket List."
 * As seen in the original storyboard of the episode "The Lich" in the scene 118/panel C, it's possible to read in the description of the holographic animation about Billy's hands pulling Martin to the Crystal Citadel, presuming that Billy knows about Finn's dad because he was the one who put him in the Crystal Citadel.
 * Jake is shown to dislike Martin, referring to him as a "loser."
 * Martin's beard looks similar to the elderly Finn's beard in "Puhoy."
 * Martin's final words before disappearing into the void were "Hey, what about air?" implying that he cannot survive in space like the ancients and may have possibly died upon entering the void. This was confirmed to be false at the end of "Astral Plane."
 * Since his first appearance, Finn is shown to hate Martin, even attempting to take his arm as revenge for losing his own in "The Tower," though Finn still refers to Martin as his "dad," but in an unfriendly way.

Cultural references

 * Martin's spiked shoulders on his leotard could be a reference to devil horns, supporting the fact that he is a careless person and doesn't have any sympathy for others. However, they seem like giant cone shoulder pads, making Martin looks completely ridiculous.