Who Is Four in Divergent?
A trainer with a number for a name and a past he keeps locked away
In a city where people take the name of a virtue, the trainer of the Dauntless initiates goes by a number. Nobody seems to know his first name, he never explains the tattoos on his back, and he watches Tris as if he already knows her secret.
The answer to who he is arrives in a single scene, and it changes how you read everything before it.
Four is Tobias Eaton, the Dauntless trainer who teaches Tris and the other transfer initiates, and later becomes the person she loves.
He is called Four because his fear landscape, the simulation every Dauntless member faces, holds only four fears, far fewer than almost anyone else.
Why is he called Four?
When Tobias went through Dauntless initiation, his instructor Amar was amazed to see a landscape with just four fears, and he gave him the nickname on the spot. Tobias kept it gladly. A new name let him leave the old one behind, and with it the son of one of the most powerful men in the city.
↑ Back to the topWhat are Four's four fears?
His fears are heights, being shut in a tight space, being forced to shoot an innocent woman and his father, Marcus. When he lets Tris walk through his fear landscape with him, the last fear tells her who he really is.
That last fear explains most of his life. Marcus, a respected Abnegation leader, was harsh and violent at home, and Tobias left Abnegation for Dauntless at sixteen to get away from him.
↑ Back to the topTobias's family and past
Tobias grew up believing his mother, Evelyn, had died. In Insurgent he learns that she is alive and leading the factionless, the people who live outside every faction. That makes him the son of two rival leaders, and much of the second and third books is about refusing to become either of them.
↑ Back to the topTris and Four
Four is strict and cold with Tris at first, partly because he knows she is Divergent and wants her to hide it. He is Divergent too, and he understands how dangerous that is. Their relationship grows from trust in training to partnership in the war that follows, and the trilogy is told by Tris until Allegiant, where the chapters alternate between her and Tobias.
↑ Back to the topWhat happens to Four at the end?
Allegiant reveals that Tobias is not genetically Divergent after all, a discovery that shakes him more than any battle. By the end of the book he survives, but he loses the person he loves most. The epilogue two and a half years later shows him learning to live with that loss in a changing Chicago.
↑ Back to the topTheo James as Four
Theo James was cast in March 2013, about ten years older than the character, and the films quietly aged Four up to match. Veronica Roth said she knew within seconds of seeing his audition that he was Four. He played the role in all three films.
↑ Back to the topFour at a glance
| Fact | Answer |
|---|---|
| Real name | Tobias Eaton |
| Born into | Abnegation |
| Chose | Dauntless, at 16 |
| Age in Divergent | 18, two years older than Tris |
| Parents | Marcus Eaton and Evelyn Johnson-Eaton |
| Why Four | Only four fears in his fear landscape |
| Played by | Theo James |
More about Divergent
Books Like Divergent
InsurgentVeronica Roth
AllegiantVeronica Roth
Catching FireSuzanne Collins
The Maze RunnerJames Dashner
The Death CureJames Dashner
The Scorch TrialsJames Dashner
The Hunger GamesSuzanne Collins
MockingjaySuzanne CollinsThis guide discusses the whole plot, including the ending.