Mike Banning

"Whatever you think you accomplished, you won't be alive to see it."

―Mike Banning confronting Kang Yeonsak

Mike Banning
Mike Banning on Olympus Has Fallen
Name:	Mike Banning
Gender:	Male
Hair color:	Black
Nationality:	United States of America
Residence(s):	Washington, D.C.
Affiliation:	United States Secret Service
Profession:	Secret Service agent
Marital status:	Married
Spouse(s):	Leah
Status:	Alive
Played by:	Gerard Butler
Film:	Olympus Has Fallen

Mike Banning is a former Special Forces soldier who now works for the United States Secret Service and the main protagonist in Olympus Has Fallen. He is portrayed by Gerard Butler.

Character Biography

Early Life

Banning was a former Special Forces soldier from the 75th Ranger Regiment. Later on he joined the Secret Service, where he would join the Presidential Detail of President Benjamin Asher.

He is married to Leah who is a nurse at a Washington, D.C. hospital.

Olympus Has Fallen

*This part is under construction*

Tragedy in Camp David

On December 25, 2011, at a icy night at Camp David, Mike and President Asher we're boxing each other at the ring downstairs. Then another Secret Service agent, Dave Forbes, tells them that they have to leave in 10 minutes. While they we're taking their boxing gear off, Asher jokingly remarks to Mike that he is not supposed to hit a president and Mike replies he knows that.

Minutes later, Mike changed to the tuxedo for they are taking the President and his family to a campaign fundraiser on Christmas. Mike knocks on the door and tells the president that they are to leave to 5 minutes. Then First Lady Margaret Asher comes up and shows off whatever she should wear the long or the short earrings. Mike suggests she should wear the small one because it would be a classic look for a classy lady.

Then Mike goes to Benjamin and Margaret's son, Connor, was playing Uncharted 3. Mike tells him that the bloodbath will start if Margaret catches him playing it and turns off the TV. Connor remarks to Mike that he sucks as he shuts off the game console and Mike replies that he sucks worse as they prepared to leave.

Banning and other Secret Service agents picked up the President and First Lady.

As Banning, along Agent Roma and O'Neil drive Connor in their vehicle, Banning reminds Connor to put his seat belt on. Then he goes over with Connor on number of emergency exits in the West Wing, how many feet from the Oval Office to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) elevator and the number of the security cameras that have audio. Banning says that they make the Secret Service agent out of Connor yet and Roma remarks that he just needs to remember to put his seat belt on.

While traveling in a limo, President Asher and Margaret, were involved in a car accident. Though Asher attempted to save her, he was pulled from the car by Mike.

The car plummeted to the frozen river below, killing Margaret on impact.

White House Taken

Banning heard the unusual sound of the plane flying close by and sees the customized C-130 attacking Washington. He rushed out the Treasury Department and ran outside. When he sees the C-130 making an attack run, Banning yells out to everyone get out of the way. As the plane fired at the street killing Secret Service agents and civilians, he pushes two civilians into the car and covers himself and the civilians into the car to avoid the attack. As the plane went by, he tells the two civilians he saved to stay down in the car as he ran towards the White House and yelling everyone to take cover.

As Banning made it to the White House, he sees the White House was damaged by the C-130 miniguns and numerous bodyguards we're killed. He sees the South Korean flag in the limousines. Then a bus explodes and destroys a nearby police car, causing everyone around it to panic, Banning sees two Korean men coming to close to the front fence. He yells to the two men to get down. When they refused to and are about to suicide bomb the fence, he kills one of them. But the other man detonates the bomb and destroys the fence. As he was blew away by the blast radius, Banning was temporary dazed by the blast. As the group of Korean men began their operation to attack the White House, Banning tried to contact anyone on the radio, but getting no response. As the terrorists went in the North Lawn, Banning grabbed his P229 pistol and entered the front lawn during the gunfight, killing two terrorists from behind. As he went to one of the trees, one of the terrorists spotted him and fired at him. But Banning kills that gunman.

As the Korean terrorists we're advancing to the White House, DC Metro police officers fired at them from the outside. But a female Korean sniper kills them. Banning carefully aims his pistol at her and shot her in the head, killing her instantly. As Banning goes cover to cover by the trees, he reloads a new magazine into his pistol. When he sees one of his friends got shot in the neck, Banning kills one of the advancing terrorists to go to the front entrance and has the wounded agent into the ground behind cover. He tried to help the agent, but the agent dies. Banning reloads his last magazine and asked his former co-workers where President Asher is. One of his friends says he doesn't know.

As more reinforcements from the Secret Service we're coming to the front door, Banning was about to fire back at the terrorists when he saw them going down. Then he sees a FN M240D Machine gun hidden in the garbage truck and tries to warn the agents to go back inside. But a majority of the agents we're killed by the machine gun fire as Banning watched in horror. Then he looks back out and sees a terrorist about to fire a RPG rocket. He yells out to the agents with him as the rocket destroys the front door and kills three Secret Service agents nearby. Banning yells to the two agents with him to get inside the building. As Banning makes it inside the White House, the other two agents we're killed by the terrorists. Then he retreated to the stairway. Then Banning watches as the Korean terrorists entered the White House as he finds out he ran out of ammo in his P229 pistol. Banning further retreats upstairs to avoid detection.

Lone Intruder

As the White House was taken, Banning explores around to find any weapons and checking out if any agents are alive. He finds Roma's body, having been shot death. Banning briefly looked at his body somberly. When the terrorists shut the power down in the White House, Banning realizes that the surveillance feed is still operational and heads for the control room. Then he kills one of the terrorists by stabbing him repeatedly with his knife and finishes him off by slashing him in the throat. As Banning takes the terrorist's pistol, he finds a picture of Connor, realizing that they are looking for him. Banning pushes in the code penal and gets another pistol from a lockbox. Then he gets access to the computer. Then Banning uses his thumbprint on the thumbprint to access the computer and disables the surveillance cameras so the terrorists wouldn't find him and Connor easily.

As Banning reaches the Oval Office, he tries to reach The Pentagon on the phone, but finds out that each phone are down. Then he goes behind a picture where a safe is at and opens the safe where the President's sat phone is at. Then contacts The Pentagon with it. While waiting to patched through, Banning sees C-4 explosives on the windows of the Oval Office.

Then he was patched into the Situation Room in the Pentagon where Jacobs, Speaker of the House Allan Trumbull and US Army Chief of Staff General Edward Clegg are at. Banning tells Echelon 4 and gives Jacobs his designator code. The surprised Jacobs asked where he is at. Banning confirms to her that he is in the Oval Office while getting a pistol from the desk. He asked if President Asher is in the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (P.E.O.C.) bunker. After place on hold for a few seconds, Jacobs confirms to Banning that the president's is in the bunker, where he is being held hostage. After Banning gets the pistol, he asked Jacobs what do the terrorists want. Jacobs says that they are still trying to find out and Trumbull says he's the Acting President. The Speaker asked Banning if there any other survivors with him and Banning says all of the agents in there are wiped out and gives everyone at The Pentagon the situation report. While doing so, he gets into the President's laptop and deletes the classified files so no one will get their hands on it. He asked where Connor is at and Jacobs says that they don't know his location, but it's presumed to be inside the White House. He tells them that the terrorists are looking for him and tells everyone to use him.

After briefly looking at the pictures of the President and his family briefly, he goes on and sees a Korean terrorist coming at the Oval Office. Then fights him. Despite the terrorist's fighting prowess, Banning soon overpowers him and bashed his head with the statue of Abraham Lincoln, killing the terrorist.

Banning takes a picture of the Korean tattoo of a terrorist's nape and sends it to the Pentagon. Jacobs asked if the commando's alive and Banning only replied, "Ask me a serious question." Nobody in the Pentagon recognized the tattoo and Trumbull has someone to get it over to Langley. Trumbull tells Banning that they want to them to recall the Seventh Fleet and pull their troops out of Korea. He reluctantly also tells them that a Cerberus code has been entered. While loading the dead terrorist's weapons, Banning asked what Cerberus is and General Clegg said it's classified. Banning persuades to tell them what it is. Trumbull informs him that Cerberus is a highly-classified three-prong fail-safe device that self-detonates any U.S. nuclear missiles during an abort. Three top U.S. government officials have the partial output on the codes to activate Cerberus; President Asher, Secretary of Defense Ruth McMillan and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Joe Hoenig. Jacobs says if they get those codes and self-detonate the nukes, it will leave America vulnerable for a nuclear strike. Banning tells them to change the codes, but NSA Deputy Director Ray Monroe says that they can't do that since Cerberus is designed to a self-contained, isolated program and the only way to change the code is the at computer in the bunker itself. Banning suspects that they are out to get Connor to make President Asher reveal his code. Trumbull says the President will hold out as long as possible, but they get Connor and hurt him, Asher won't hold out under those circumstances. He authorizes Banning to find Connor and get him out of White House. Banning readily heads out to find Connor.

Saving Sparkplug

While eluding the commandos in the hallways, Banning quietly gets to the Lincoln bedroom. After noticing the footsteps of the commandos, he sneaks into the hidden tunnels behind the Lincoln bedroom walls. As he was quietly looked in the wall, he finds Connor, who hid there during the attack. Connor was relieved to see Banning. Banning then informs The Pentagon that he found Connor (under his Secret Service codename Sparkplug) and is going to bring him out. Connor asked Banning about his father and he assures the boy that his father will be fine. Then a few tense moments, Banning waited for the moment and then he and Connor sprinted toward the other secret door as the terrorists fired at the walls. Banning blinds fire at them and wounds one of them. As he and Connor made it to the door, Banning dove down to the his side and fired the last two rounds in his pistol at the door of the Lincoln bedroom and quickly lets out the other pistol. He asked Connor if he was alright and Connor nodded. Then Banning tells The President's son to stay close to him. He quickly escorts Connor out of the living quarters before the terrorists in the Lincoln Room can see them.

Banning get Connor to the sub-basement storage area and heads for the ventilation shaft that leads to the ground floor. He tells Connor to watch his back in case if any commandos come in as he unscrews the vent crate and informs The Pentagon will be coming out in the ground floor through the ventilation shaft in the northwest corner. After Banning finished unscrewing the vent grate, Connor asked if he was coming with him. Banning tells the boy that he has to go get his dad. He ten reminds Connor climbing the shaft is like doing the climb that Banning taught Connor in the Rose Garden wall. Banning then gives Connor his own badge as he tells that he is a honorary Secret Service agent now. He lifts Connor to the shaft and Connor begins his climb to the top of the shaft. Banning informs the Pentagon that Connor is on his way up. Then he sees a shadow of one of the terrorists coming in the storage area. He tells Connor to wait up to prevent noises.

As the terrorist sees Connor in the shaft, Banning snuck up and grabbed the terrorist from behind, strangling him with his arms and then breaks his neck. He tells Connor it's just a false alarm and tells to continue his climb. As Connor was climbing up, Banning tells Jacobs he's coming up. After a few tense moments, Jacobs tell Banning that Connor is out of the building safely, to his relief. The pleased Trumbull then authorizes Banning to try to get President Asher out. Banning acknowledged as he went out to try to save Asher.

Getting information

"I just ask them nicely."

―Banning replied to Jacobs after interrogating two of the terrorists.

Meanwhile, Banning ambushed two of the commandos and knocks them out. He takes them to the Oval Office and ties them to the chair. He demands to know who is running the group. Banning asked them if them speak English and did they learn that language where they come from. He them said he is trained on how to extract information. The terrorists just laughed at him. Banning sarcastically says that it is funny. Then he stabs one of the terrorists in the neck to scare the other one. Banning then says he is guessed he is little rusty and sarcastically says to the other terrorist that his friend was a funny guy. Then he demands the name of his leader and how many men they have. When the terrorists speaks in the Korean language, Banning covers his mouth with his hand and stabs him in the leg, having the terrorist screamed out in pain. Banning tells them to speak in English.

After learning the leader's name is Kang Yeonsak, the head of the KUF, a paramilitary organization and that 40 commandos breached the front gate and they are 28 men left, he informs the Pentagon of the information. Jacobs asked Banning if they can trust the information and he replied he just ask them nicely. Monroe runs the name Kang Yeonsak. They finds out that Kang is one of the most wanted terrorists in the world. Banning listens to Monroe's information on Kang as he learns that Kang was brought across DMZ as the child after his father was executed for crimes against the North Korea, but when they we're crossing the border, his mother was killed by an American landmine. Kang masterminded the 2004 bombing of the British Embassy in Seoul and funneled Pyongyang the uranium enrichment technology from Pakistan. He was never before photographed or identified by any Western Intelligence agency and nobody thought to look for him inside the South Korean government. General Clegg said with the force that size, he has men who can swept them out in a short order. Banning tells the general that the terrorists are very tough. General Clegg says he's got the toughest guys in the world and that they need to know how to get in the PEOC bunker. Jacobs say that they don't get in there once the blast doors closed and it's nuclear-hardened. She also says to General Clegg that there used to be some old tunnel, but they we're sealed up years ago. Banning tells Trumbull that they need to know what they are going to walk into and warns him not to launch anything until he did some reconnaissance.

Discovering a traitor

"You know what. Why don't you and I play a game of f*** off. You go first."

―Mike Banning confront Kang Yeonsak on the radio.

As Banning left the Oval Office, Kang contact him through the intercom and taunts him. Banning responds, saying what took him so long. Kang taunts to his intruder that he knows about his failure to save Margaret and that he will fail to save the President, stating that failure seemed to be the habit with Banning these days. Banning says that maybe he owns them for giving him a chance to make up for that today. Kang just says that he admires him for acknowledging his own failure, but states there is no going back and nothing he can do tonight can atone for his disgrace. Banning states that maybe he can't atone for his disgrace, but tells him that he might want to take a headcount and that Connor is out of the White House. Kang then taunts Banning again, asking about Leah and he knows about her too. Banning, fed up with Kang and quietly distressed by Kang mentioning Leah, just finished the conversation, saying that let each other play a game of "f*** off. You go first." and shuts off the radio. Then he continues on to the White House hallways.

Later in the hallway near the state's dining room, Banning sees someone coming and puts the gun to the man's head. To his surprise, it was Dave Forbes, who currently works a private contractor in Prime Minister's Lee security detail. As he stood down, the surprised Banning asked Forbes what was he doing in the White House and Forbes says that he was with the South Korean delegation when all this went down. Forbes asked the same thing to Banning since he knows Banning works in the Treasury Department and Banning says he came in through the front door.

Here to stay

"There is no again. You're gotta die down there alone, cut off from the rest of the world. My advice, save the last bullet for yourself. Because if you don't, I'm gotta stick my knife to your brain."

―Banning taunting Kang on the video chat

Banning finally calls Leah, who has been working in the hospital since the invasion, and gets a hold of her while his treats his own injuries. Banning tells her he's just checking in. When Leah asked how his day been, he only said to her that he's been busy, not wanting to tell her that he's inside to the White House to worry her. Banning asked his wife if she was okay, Leah says that she's alright and that she had to stay in the hospital longer than she thought. He replied that he had to stay longer too. When Leah asked her husband if he can come home tonight, Banning replies that he will and they got a date to do soon. Then Banning says he has to go and only said to Leah that paperwork is starting piling up, not wanting to worry Leah about his current situation. Banning tells Leah that he loves her before hanging up to do his job. Once he patches himself up, Banning went to work.

At the security room, Banning disables the communications in the bunker and speaks to Kang on the video conference. He taunts the terrorist that it he looked like he seen the ghost after having Forbes tell him that he's dead. Then Banning says that there will be no televised executions, no chopper and no more negotiating with him. When Kang says he send President Asher's body out, Banning says it won't matter because whatever Kang thinks he accomplished, he will not be alive to see it. Kang unhappily orders his computer expert, Lim, to shut the video chat down. But Banning says that he is not shutting him down and is here to say. Kang admits that he underestimated him and that it will not happened again. Banning says that there will be no again because he will die down in the bunker alone and cut off from the world. He advices Kang to save the last bullet for himself or he will stick his knife to his brain. Then he taunts that he send photos of his body to the press, because he knows Kang he likes that kind of stuff before shutting down the video chat and locking out Kang's video access, before heading out to lure to where Kang will go to leave the bunker.

As Banning arriving the stairway near the front lobby, where Kang intends to kill Secretary McMillan outside the White House in front of the media, he uses a scoped rifle to kill Kang's henchman Cho. As he tried to shoot at Kang, Banning kills another one of Kang's men. As he headed downstairs to get away from gunfire, Kang retreats back to the bunker and U.S. troops pulled McMillan to safety. As two of Kang's men we're coming to the stairway, Banning kills one coming in the stairway and blind fires his pistol to mortally wound the other one before finished him off swiftly. When Trumbull checks in, Banning tells him that Kang got away and is back in the bunker. Trumbull tells him he give it a good shot and that he saved McMillan as Banning continued on to try to stop the threat.

Epilogue

By dawn, Banning takes the wounded President Asher out of the White House. As they went to the front entrance, Banning apologizes for the damage on the White House. President Asher says that he believes the building is insured as the US Troops took the President from Banning as they left the building. As Mike was being escorted, he sees Connor hugging his father outside the ambulance and felt so relieved to see that as he was escorted by troops to the ambulance. While he about to checked on by paramedics, he sees Leah was waiting in the ambulance. Leah comes over to him and they embraced.

Days later, Banning is reinstated to the Presidential Detail as he, along with Connor, Jacobs and General Clegg, watch President Asher addressing the public about the aftermath of the attack on the lives lost and his assurance that America will rebuild from the attack. After the speech, Mike and President Asher shook hands. As Benjamin and Connor left the press room, Mike stands proudly knowing he has redeemed himself.

Trivia

• Banning killed 24 terrorists in Olympus Has Fallen.
• Banning is skilled with the use of knives, which he used to kill four terrorists in the White House (which includes Kang Yeonsak and Dave Forbes).

Olympus Has Fallen Characters
Heroes	Mike Banning - President Benjamin Asher - Allan Trumbull
Villains	Kang Yeonsak - Dave Forbes
Allies	Lynne Jacobs - Secretary of Defense Ruth McMillan - General Edward Clegg - Ray Monroe - Roma
Henchmen	Lim - Cho - Yu
Other characters	Leah Banning - Margaret Asher - Connor Asher