Split Personality Merge

File:HydeAndJekyllShakeHands.jpg

Jekyll and Hyde, BBFFs?

"You know, Nana! We're gonna live together from here on out!!" —Yaya, Othello

So Bob is also Charlie, maybe even with a little Albert hiding in there somewhere. There are many possible reasons for the existence of these split personalities, but this co-habitation is rarely peaceful or long lasting. It usually results in a Battle in the Center of the Mind to try and find out which personality will take over. Sometimes though, the winner might not reduce the loser to a tiny, powerless voice or destroy it completely, and instead offers to become one again. With a little Epiphany Therapy, Applied Phlebotinum or even actual psychotherapy, they merge into a single, whole person that is greater than the sum of its minds.

The resulting merged personality is usually a composite of the parts that is well and truly psychologically stable, this is especially true if they were an id, ego, and super ego. If they were moral or temperamental opposites, the resulting merged personality will keep traits of both. This merger includes combat ability and powers, so if the character had a moron and a badass coexisting, the united whole will be a Badass all the time... while occasionally tripping on banana peels. Similarly, if the reason for the personality split was to seal awesome cosmic powers away (resulting in a Super-Powered Evil Side; see both Enemy Within and Enemy Without) the united self will have full control over these powers without risk of Superpower Meltdown or corruption.

Truth in Television, what with being one of the recommended treatments for actual Split Personality Disorder.

Examples of Split Personality Merge include:

Anime & Manga

• Piccolo and Kami of Dragonball Z, who had become a Literal Split Personality decades earlier. (With a little Reincarnation in between. It's complicated.) Not to be confused with the time Piccolo fused with Nail, a completely different and unrelated (though identical-looking) Namekian.
• In Mobile Suit Gundam 00, Allelujah Haptism temporarily merges with his violent Split Personality Hallelujah Baptism to becomes "the Super Soldier" with the piloting skills of two men, or as fans call him, "Doublelujah". This is visually demonstrated by the fact that Allelujah always has his right eye covered by his hair, while when Hallelujah takes over, he sweeps the hair over to cover his left eye instead. When both personalities work together, both eyes are exposed.
  • Similar situation with Une in an earlier Gundam series, Gundam Wing. Une has two personalities, "Lady", a cold-hearted and ruthless military commander and "Saint", who is kind and gentle but ineffectual. At the end of the series, a new personality emerges which has Lady's strength of character and Saint's niceness.
• Houshin Engi has this with Taikoubou and Ou Eki. They later merge together to become Fukki. Although Taikoubou is the main, dominating personality.
• Change 123 is all about trying to merge the personalities of Motoko and HiFuMi and Zero.
• Happens at the end of the Mahoraba manga.
• Happens to Yaya in the end of Othello.
• Often overlooked, in Yu-Gi-Oh!, Yugi and the pharaoh usually combine their minds when dueling. The reason this is overlooked is because Yugi merged with the pharaoh looks pretty much exactly like the pharaoh all by himself. On account of the pharaoh looking like an older version of Yugi.
• In Yu-Gi-Oh! GX, this occurs during his final duel against Yubel when Juudai accepts that he is Haou, the Supreme King, and no longer fears or denies that power.
• In Bleach, Ichigo's power manifested in the forms of Zangetsu, his Zanpakuto, and his Inner Hollow. In time, he comes to dominate both of them, learning how to use their power for himself. He also tends to take on aspects of their personality and appearance when using their power, such as the coat he acquires in Bankai mode and the mask and personality changes that accompany his hollowfication. Recently, Zangetsu and the Inner Hollow merged themselves while Tensa Zangetsu was trying to teach Ichigo the Final Getsuga. The result seems to be Tensa Zangetsu wearing a white robe instead of a black one, and having the top part of the Inner Hollow's super evolved mask. However, his personality seems to remain as that of Zangetsu's.. And then this is turned in its head: the "old man" known as Zangetsu NEVER was his zanpakuto — but the incarnation of his Quincy powers inherited from his mother Masaki. The real Zangetsu, and therefore Ichigo's zanpakutou, is the Hollow, and only via understanding and accepting all of this Ichigo can properly draw out his own and fully potential.
• In Magical Project S, Misao becomes a lot stronger mentally when she accepts her Pixy Misa Dark Magical Girl persona. (And has full control when turning into Pixy Misa later.)
• Hikaru and Nova in Magic Knight Rayearth, when Hikaru comes to realize Nova was created from Hikaru's feelings of guilt and regret for killing Princess Emeraude, and finally learns to accept these feelings and forgive herself.
• In Rosario to Vampire, this is one of the prospect outcomes for the Inner and Outer Moka deal. And it's kinda what happens in the end: it seems to be Death of Personality after the rosary is destroyed, but Outer Moka's soul somewhat remains in Inner Moka's body (as she actrually had a personality of her own, based on Moka's missing Mom Akasha Bloodriver) and eventually merges back with her.
  

Comicbooks

• Doc Samson once pretended to have done this to the Hulk and Bruce Banner, via Epiphany Therapy. But eventually the change in premise became too much of a problem for the Hulk's title, and the writers made use of the fact that Therapy Does Not Work That Way to establish that Samson had really just created a new, if more stable, alternate. Tossing out the fact that Doc Samson wasn't really in control of the process and didn't fully understand what was happening at the time.
• Professor X's wayward son Legion had his personalities integrated... into one guy who was far worse than his previous selves put together. The result was the Age of Apocalypse.
• The Green Goblin has undergone this after his 1996 comeback, the Goblin previously veering between being an outright Split Personality of Norman Osborn, a psychotic break from reality and the power fantasy of an unstable Corrupt Corporate Executive who just won the Superpower Lottery. Naturally, the amalgation of a mentally ill white collar criminal with his homicidal maniac alternate persona did not exactly make things better- the new Norman Osborn was a Magnificent Bastard Complete Monster who developed particularly twisted views on his emnity with Spider-Man and graduated from millionare industrialist to head of SHIELD (because Humans Are Morons). Recently, the Goblin has shown signs of making a comeback, in the form of delusions and homicidal mania.
• Deaths Head II gained independence after the Minion cyborg assimilated the minds of 105 of the most deadly minds in the universe, only to have its last target (the original Death's Head) take over its programming and form a gestalt personality.

Fan Fiction

• The Doctor Who comic The 10 Doctors demonstrates a rare version of the trope. As the title suggests, the Doctor's regenerations 1 through 10 all band together to save the universe. At one point, Ten gets captured by the Daleks and is brainwashed into "Dalek Tor". In order to defeat the programming there is a Battle in the Center of the Mind where the Doctors all form one persona- an amalgam of his multiple personalities.
• Occurs to Twilight Sparkle near the latter end of Ponies Make War. Earlier in the story, the psychological trauma of being transformed into Nihilus had caused her mind to split in two — the dominant, peaceful-to-a-fault Sparkle, and the more brutish Twilight. The two personalities spend quite some time arguing, with Twilight pushing for a merge to restore themself to a full and equal mind, but Sparkle being too afraid that Twilight will pull a Split Personality Takeover and be as monstrous as Nihilus was. Eventually, Titan captures Sparkle and tortures her. The pain and desperation causes Sparkle to accept Twilight and fuse back with her, recreating the real Twilight Sparkle. Cue asskicking.
• Pops up in Pinkie Pie's reharmonizing chapter in the Pony POV Series: Angry Pie, a Split Personality representing Pinkie's anger, attempts a Split Personality Takeover by absorbing Pinkie and her other personalities. In order to defeat her, Pinkie and Pinkamena fuse together, and the resulting being defeats and absorbs Angry, before fusing with the other personalities, restoring Pinkie's mind to its full state for the first time since she got her cuite mark.

Film

• The author and his cartoon character are merged in Monkeybone.
• "I'm calling the shots from now on, Hank. I don't need you to fight my battles for me. If you can back down from something this important, you're nothing at all. YOU'RE NOTHING AT ALLLLLLLLLLLLLL!"
• "That's my secret, Captain. I'm always angry."

Literature

• This happens to the main character at the end of City of Illusions by Ursula Le Guin.
• Dandra and Tetkashtai in the Dragon Below trilogy merged into one person at the end of the second book, combining Tetkashtai's psionic power and academic knowledge with Dandra's stubbornness and mental stability to form one psion much more powerful than the sum of her parts.
• Susannah Dean in The Dark Tower. She originally alternated between the personalities of Detta Walker (kind of psycho and seriously badass) and Odetta Holmes (a wonderful person, but often completely useless). Forcing them to notice each other led to them merging into Susannah, who keeps Detta's ferocity and Odetta's kindliness and feelings for Eddie. Still, the merge isn't perfect; at one point, Susannah has to let Detta take over again because she learned a lesson Odetta never did. "Poetry-readin' bitch like her never had the time for a little ars mathematica."
• Rand Al'Thor suffered a long time clashing ever more obviously with the voice in his head (which could take over his body at times), that of his previous incarnation, Lews Therin Telamon, and finally snapped in a long overdo psychotic break. Eventually he becomes insanely homicidal and then nihilistic, raving about destroying all humanity as everything is pointless. He and his pervious incarnation (which as he seemed to be able to take over Rand's body and control of Saidin can be seen as a split personality) reach a kind of epiphany and he manages to step back from the brink. Afterwards the narration makes clear he will never again hear the voice of Lews Therin again, likely because he at last accepted the simple truth, 'that they were not two people, and never had been'.
• Happens to Tahiri Veila and her implanted Vong personality, Riina Kwaad, in Force Heretic 3: Rebirth. Riina, being a Proud Warrior Race Girl, had attempted a Split Personality Takeover, but settled on the compromise when she realized that "killing" Tahiri would be disastrous for both of them.
• Robert Sheckley has a story where a man underwent a treatment in his childhood by having his extra personalities siphoned away into artificial bodies. The story is about him searching for them all over the Solar System. In the end, he collects them all, expecting them all to reintegrate into his, only to have all the parts, including himself, merge into a completely different persona.
• The Animorphs starfish book ended with an Erek-mediated merging of the two halves.

Live-Action TV

• In the Buffy episode The Replacement, Xander's personality is magically split into two bodies - one being confident, competent Xander and the other being awkward, pathetic Xander - and then merged again at the end.
• In the season 6 finale of Supernatural, Sam is stuck in a Mental World where his identity has split into three personalities: Sam, Soulless Sam, and the Sam who's been tortured in the Cage. Finding his way out of there requires the other two to merge back into him.

Music

• There's an unusual one at the climax of The Who's Rock Opera Quadrophenia. In "The Rock," as Jimmy's life flashes crawls before his eyes, the musical themes representing aspects of his personality merge into one. Hm? You say I can't possibly get all this information from an instrumental? You're right: It's all there in the manual liner notes.
• In another Rock Opera example, Green Day's American Idiot has this happening to St. Jimmy, the evil side of Jesus of Suburbia ("Jimmy died today; he blew his brains out into the bay").

Tabletop Games

• This is a central mechanic of the game, Vox, where characters incorporate the voices in their head as a part of themselves they have 'forgotten,' growing closer to perfection each time.
• Changeling: The Lost has an Enemy Without variant with regards to the fetch, an impostor made from a fragment of the changeling's soul to fill their place after they're taken by the Gentry. Most changelings are just content to kill their fetch - either in an attempt to reclaim their life or destroy one of "their" tools - but it's possible for a changeling and a fetch to come to a deep, intricate understanding of how each one reflects aspects of the other's personality and being. If that happens, the changeling and fetch merge into one being, with the changeling's Clarity going up a level. Keep in mind this is a long, difficult process, and odds are other changelings won't look on you so kindly for attempting it...

Video Games

• Happens with Kain in Final Fantasy IV the After Years.
• Kingdom Hearts 2, with Sora and Roxas. To make things even messier, Xion comes into the mix in 358/2 Days.
  • And in Birth by Sleep, it's revealed that Ven also merged his heart with Sora's heart and in fact had been in him throughout almost his entire life and all of the Kingdom Hearts games long before Roxas and Xion came into being. However it might not be the case here since Sora's really only holding his heart for safe keeping and isn't receiving anything from Ven. However, if what the endings of coded and Birth By Sleep seem to be implying are true, the merges are only temporary, and the plot of the upcoming games will most likely focus, in part, on giving Ven, Roxas and Xion their own bodies.
  • Also in Birth by Sleep, Ventus merged with Vanitas, the personification of his heart's darkness. So Sora's about five different people at the end of Kingdom Hearts II. Yeah, it's kind of a Mind Screw.
• Not quite a merger, but in Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines, in the climactic dialog with Jeanette/Therese, with high enough stats you can persuade them to make amends and tolerate each other, in which case they bury the hatchet and peacefully coexist.
• Fei in Xenogears merges with no less than three (possibly four, though that one was an Empty Shell) alternate personalities after convincing them to. This is remarkable since he wasn't the original, but the third personality.
• In The Darkness videogame, Jack Estacado manages to control the Darkness, a demon spirit that existed in his family since WWI, not through guns but by absorbing it into his own spirit. This allowed him to control the Darkness, but the Darkness reminded Jackie "with each life you take. I grow closer to owning your soul!" Guess what he has to do next to reach his Uncle Paulie?
  • Even Death is not enough to escape: Jackie commits suicide after Uncle Paulie kills his girlfriend before his eyes while he's being restrained by the Darkness itself, but comes back with the Darkness still possessing him.
• In the Warcraft storyline, the first Lich King, Ner'zhul, has mostly total mental control over all the undead. He chooses his Champion, Arthas, to be the host of his soul which has been trapped in the frozen throne. It could be argued that Arthas's taking of the title of Lich King is one of these.

Arthas/Ner'zhul: Now, We are one.

• • It was later revealed to be a Split Personality Takeover.
• It's not fully explained, but this happens in the Dimensional Vortexes in the DS re-release of Chrono Trigger.
• In the Fallout: New Vegas DLC Dead Money, with a high enough Speech skill you can do this to God/Dog to help him peacefully. Not only is Dog freed from his endless hunger and Father Elijah, but God is freed from the responsibility of looking after Dog.
• In the normal and good endings of Tales of Symphonia Dawn of the New World, Ratatosk's personality comes to terms with the part of himself that is Emil and the two accept each other as parts of a whole.

Webcomics

• Minmei Wu and Professor Sorgaz in The Wotch, once Minmei is made aware of her status as a gender bent teacher dunked in the Fountain of Youth. Perhaps a slight twist on this trope, Minmei is perfectly willing to go away so Sorgaz can return to his normal life. It is Sorgaz who proposes merger to live out a Second Chance.
• This is one of the possible explanations for the ending of the Aiden and Brownwyn arc in Misfile. It wasn't made terribly clear, but Rumisiel did force the Wraith-thing to into Bronwyn's psyche and told it to stay there, and Bronwyn did regain her affection for Aiden as a result.
• Inverted in Homestuck. Gamzee Makara begins with the stable merged personality when stoned. Then he sobers up, the personalities splits, and both of the resulting personalities are Ax Crazy.
  • When Jade Harley ascends to the God Tiers, she's merged with her dream self which had branched off into its own different personality, Jadesprite, for a time.
• Attempted a few times by Jix and her alternate personalities Remula and Lamerix. The first time it seemed to work for a while, but broke down when she was cloned and Remula was seemingly transferred to the clone they were actually copied. Another time a psychologist tried to get her personalities to destroy each other.

Web Originals

• Happens to Sasha and Abby when Sasha dies while mentally linked with Abby in the Metamor City novel Making The Cut.
• The goal of the Meta (a gestalt entity of A Is created as Literal Split Personalities) in Red vs. Blue: Reconstruction is to reconstruct the original Alpha AI from which they were split off. According to Word of God, the first AI in the Meta (Sigma) intended to rebuild the Alpha with itself as the leader.