Okay, this essay is also in video form on my YouTube channel so if you'd rather watch the video click on this link here: Writing Villains Video
If not... continue to the essay!
So, I
had a fellow young author ask me in a class “Is it better to have a villain who
is not necessarily a villain or is it better to have a straight-out evil
person?”
And I
thought that was a really good question, and one that a lot of people seem to be
wondering about too. And so, here’s my answer to that question:
It
depends on two things:
One:
What tone of story do you have
And
two: Which do you want?
Stories
are a totally subjective thing so deciding what happens in a story, what tropes
to have, what characters to have, what antagonist you want to have, is
up to the creator. But I want to offer some guidelines to follow in terms of
this question.
This
question can be summed up into a shorter length and this particular question is
asked a lot as well: “Should my villain be morally grey or just pure evil?”
There
is a rule that is stated in writing that I’m pretty sure most are familiar
with, it’s used about as much at the “show don’t tell” rule, and this rule is
“Everyone in the story, villain or hero, believes that they are doing
the right thing.” Even if it’s knocked completely out of the majority’s moral
ballpark. This rule is true whether you choose to write a villain that is
morally grey or a completely evil villain.
But
here’s the thing about this rule of your villain. They believe what they are
doing is correct, but this is only by their standards, their
morals. You see what defines a villain, what makes your villain a villain,
isn’t how much bad they can do, how evil they can be. But it’s where they set
their boundaries. What is the limit of their morality?
Now
with this information, let’s take a step back now and look at the two answers I
gave a moment ago. I said that the answer to the question of a morally grey vs.
completely evil villain, was:
One:
What tone of story you have.
And
two: Which do you want?
Let’s
expand on the first one:
We
all know that in the books and movies we read and watched as a younger audience
always had that “muahaha villain with the twirly mustache.” You know the one at
the end who always either died as they were maniacally laughing their head off
or came crawling to the foot of the hero begging their forgiveness after they
were shown the power of friendship. And at the time this kind of story was
fine. Especially since those stories usually included the mainstream hero’s
journey arc. An antagonist has the job of being the total opposite of the
protagonist so the stereotypical villain provides the perfect character foil
for the standard hero arc.
But
eventually we were introduced to more types of protagonists in stories which
also requires different villain arcs. But as we learned more about stories and
the real world, the tone of the stories we watched or read changed as well. As
tone changes it often becomes more and more realistic which is why the
characters in many of these stories aren’t just the embodiment of darkness and
light without reasons to be so. They’re realistic people with flaws.
However
just because your villain is a totally tragic, complex character doesn’t instantly
make your story feel darker or more realistic.
And
this leads me to my next answer: Which type of villain do you want?
Remember
what I said earlier: what makes your villain a villain, isn’t how much bad they
can do or how evil they can be. But it’s where they set the boundary line of
their morality.
You
can have an evil character who isn’t really morally grey and is leaning more
towards the evil side of the spectrum. But this character still needs to
believe that what they’re doing is totally within the boundary of their own
morals.
Using
some examples here:
Sozin,
from Avatar: The Last Airbender, believes that by conquering the world, he is
sharing the Fire Nation’s greatness with the rest of the world.
Zaheer,
from The Legend of Korra, believes that the natural order of the universe is
disorder and that he is providing peace to the world by bringing down world
leaders and letting chaos reign.
Both
of these characters lean more towards the evil side of the spectrum, but still
believe that they are doing what is right. If you want to take it even further
down the dark side Darth Sidious from Star Wars and Sauron from Lord of the
Rings both want power and want to rule the world. They still don’t believe what
they’re doing is necessarily wrong, but that’s because their morals are
completely messed up and out of whack.
Now
if you’re leaning more toward the side of having a morally grey antagonist,
you’re in for a lot more work. This person needs to have somewhat relatable
morals, maybe even be considered somewhat of a good person… kind of… but at the
same time also needs to clearly be a villain. Sometimes these morally grey
villains can even turn into a redemption arc, but that’s a whole other topic
and can only be done if written extremely well.
A lot
of the time these morally flawed characters also deal with phycological issues.
Something else important to remember is that a lot of the time these characters
were good at one point and experienced something traumatic which caused them to
turn.
Honestly
the best example is:
Anakin
Skywalker, who definitely had phycological issues as well as many, many, many
traumatic experiences. Now a lot of people say that this is not a good example
because what happens to him in Revenge of the Sith isn’t enough to drive him
that far. I agree with this, but Revenge of the Sith only showed the surface of
the experiences Anakin faced. The experiences that Anakin dealt with in Revenge
of the Sith are merely the last sparks that lit the fire. If you read the books
or watch the Clone Wars series, you’ll see what I’m talking about. But, to
avoid spoilers for anyone interested, I won’t go into that.
See you guys next time!
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