Hogarth Hughes

• Hogarth Hughes is a 9-year-old boy living a lonely existence in Maine, on the east coast of the United States. Raised by a single mother, Hogarth is given to creating his own imaginative playful indulgences, which cultivates an inner sense of adventure. After finding the iron man robot, Hogarth goes to great lengths to keep his new "friend" safe and hidden from a world that tends to shoot first and ask questions later.
  
  

The Iron Giant

• The Iron Giant is a robot that falls from space into the Maine countryside, and though childlike in its playful endeavors also has the capacity to destroy people and places if provoked or attacked. As large as any mature tree rooted along the Maine coastline, the robot has a propensity to eat metal (cars and power transformers) and imitate words spoken by Hogarth.
  
  

Dean McCoppin

• Dean McCoppin is a local junkyard dealer who, somewhat like Hogarth, is a tad reclusive and perhaps doesn't fit in with, or subscribe to, 1957 conservative Maine ideology. Similar in age to Hogarth's single mother, Dean acts as an character with both fatherly and brotherly traits towards Hogarth. Like the rest of Maine society, Dean is at first extremely wary of Hogarth's new "friend," but later realizes the Iron Giant's more human attributes.
  
  

Kent Mansley

• Kent Mansley works for the U.S. government, and comes to Maine to explore the possibility that a huge iron robot has been seen eating its way through people's cars and twisted metal. Kent's outlook towards the Iron Giant is the antithesis of the film's message, namely that we should not fear or rebuke the unknown with prejudice until we know all the facts. Kent attempts to befriend Hogarth while secretly manipulating him into giving away the location of the robot. Fortunately for both Hogarth and the Iron Giant, they stay one step ahead of Kent until near the conclusion of the film.
  
  

Annie Hughes

• Annie is the widowed single mom of Hogarth, who makes ends meet by working at a local diner. Most of her nonworking time is spent trying to curb, or channel, her son's boundless energy and "tall tails." Annie works hard, is self-reliant and has an independent streak, though romantic inclinations ensue when she realizes Dean McCoppin's positive character traits.