Writing Passionates discussion

I find villains really hard characters to write about. A villain can't be two-dimensional, if you know what I mean. They have to have a purpose, a reason for turning against the protagonist. He/she can't just be "the bad guy". A villain may be the protagonist's enemy, but he/she is still a human being, not a robot. I've often had problems with a villain's dialogue. I'll end up making them say really stupid things, like "You thought you could escape me. But you were wrong. Mwa ha ha." In my opinion, the best villains are ones who are not completely evil; you might even feel bad for them. What do other people think?

I agree completely. If you have a villian who is entirely evil and all that, it might even have a comical affect, and usually you don't want that. So someone that is bad but has a good side is much more mysterious and intriguing. But if you are writing a fantasy, sometimes the best villians are the ones that scare you. Like in Peter and the Shadowthieves, the villian is someone that is not human- he is like a talking dementor. I had nightmares about him for days.

Yeah. Totally emotionless villains can also be really scary. :o

Yeah, like the villian in Peter and the Shadow Thieves- he didn't feel anything. He was completely ruthless, and he wasn't even human.

My villains, so far, haven't really been villains. They've just done bad things, and then are sorry. Really weird.

The best advice I ever received about writing a villain was this: The best villain is the one that thinks he's doing the right thing and his actions are justified.

That makes a lot of sense to me. If the villain's actions are justified in his mind, you can't completely hate them.

right. like i was saying before, you might even feel bad for a villain because you can understand what his/her goal is.

I agree, the best villians are the ones who think they are doing the right thing. Then again, no villian considers himself a villain!

actually, i think that some villains DO consider themselves villains--they realize that what they're doing is evil, but they can't do anything to stop themselves.

If they really believe in what they believe in, they wouldn't think of it as villainy. More of a step in the right direction. Would someone killing someone else who is murderous be a villain? Or would they be your hero for killing the murderer? Either way, he's still killing someone.

yeah. sometimes i like the villain more than "the good guy". how is the hero killing the villain justified, while the villain killing the hero is unjustified? it all depends on your perspective.

I know. You could think that the hero is just as bad as the villian himself if he kills him, even though the villain has killed millions of people.

Confusion. Party of one! Are you saying that the hero is becoming the villian when he kills the 'villain'?

well, what i think is that 'hero' and 'villain' are opinions. it depends on your perspective. the hero is the one who the reader/writer thinks has the right goals and actions, while the villain is the one who the reader/writer disagrees with. so the writer might intend for one character to be a villain, but a person reading it might sympathize more with the 'villain', and the 'villain' becomes their hero. does that make sense?

Yeah. That's why a good villian allows the reader room to decide for themselves.

Alright. I totally understand now. And I agree. It all depends on how you take it.

A good question to think about it, when you write about your villain, do you want the reader to sympathize with them, and consider maybe not consider them a villain, or do you want them to be considered villains all the way?

I believe in both types; ones who have no feelings and those who do. Those with no feelings are dull, though. My villain, Bruce, went from a loving friend and father to a murderous scientist inventor for a stupid reason (not making it in to high wizard school while his other friends did. Vry stupid)
Anyway, near the end, he realizes his stupidity (and he almost kills his daughter >_<)
Also, in a fan-fic of mine, my superbly evil character who seems to have no heart at all you feel bad for when his third girlfriend (who happens to be his triplet sister i know sick) almost gets killed by her because SHE'S heartless. I think it depends on what you want the reader to feel.

mi amiga and i composed an...interesting list of "ways to be evil". it's mostly comic relief, but seriously helpful if you're trying to create the perfectly unique and memorable villain.

if anyone wants it, im gonna type it up later in the "my writing" section, and i'll notify you.

but be forewarned, that may take awhile, i generally get pretty busy.

sella, in answer to your question:
you don't want your reader to sympathize too much with the villain, but you still want to leave some room for sympathy. a villain is still a human being, and has to have some sort of goal or desire just like everyone else.

I agree. I like it when the villain is someone you can sympathize, not one with no emotion who you seem remote to.

i've read in some books that the "villain" is the main character but then that just means that the "villain" is the good guy in the authors view
but when you divide the book into two parts half is the "hero" while the other half is the "villains" perspective, but you make the "hero" have a half perspective where he has half good ideas and half bad ideas, but the "villain" has the half good ides (that the"hero thinks are bad.) while the other half of his ideas are bad (which the "hero" thinks are good.)
i always liked it when the author takes the perspective of the "villain" and makes him the main character so i want the people that read this comment to read my writing so i can find out if most people like the perspective of the "hero" or the perspective of the "villain"

I agree. they can't be completely evil- not the basic take-over-the-world without reason. They have to have a reason. But also, emotionless ones can b good 2, that that r just kinda spooky

Yeah, like Lord Ombra in "Peter and the Shadowthieves" if anyone read that.

So, talking about villains, I think that a range of villans are good to have. They need to be deep real characters. Take an example from history. Hitler was one of the greatest real villains of our modern world, and he was justified in his mind for everything that he did. Heck, a vast amount of medical science that we have today was discovered during the sick experiments that they did to people during that time. In Hitler's mind, he was building a perfect world.

Then there are villains who just desire control and power. Greed is a very real and powerful human motive. Revenge is also a motive.

As for villains being heroes and heroes being villains, what made Robin Hood and good guy and what made Prince John a bad guy? Prince John was oppressing the poor, and thats bad, but Robin Hood was stealing. isn't that bad? the difference is that RH was fighting for a just cause.

But then there can be villains who are good guys so stolidly committed to a just cause and so passionately pursue it that they leave great destruction and many broken lives in their wake.

Villains must be diverse and real. Pieces of them must be identifiable with ourselves, but remember, evil is real and villains really can be evil. don't be afraid to create them however you want.

Lord Ombra is a perf. example, yea. And if anyone has read the Alex Rider books, most of the bad guys think that they are doing the right thing, or are completly insane.
But I'm sorry, I can never sympathize with Hitler, even if he was crazy in the head.

well i definitely don't think that hitler should be sympathized with... but still, there must have been one instant when he was nice to someone at some point... you know. nobody can be evil all the time.

i suppose....

He did a good job of it. But, you know, from his perspective, he was doing the world a favor.

i kno, but i can't sympathize with him or even see from his point of view, it was just so crazy

Me neither, but you do have to take into account what he was thinking.

ya i guess

i wasn't saying that i agree with hitler; i mean i think that he was totally evil and out of his mind. but it's just like we've been talking about in this discussion: in his mind, his actions were justified. fictional villains should be the same way--they should think that they're doing the right thing.

I didn't think you were agreeing with him. I know what you meant. He sees things like a 'villain' does. He sees what he wants, and what he'll have to do to get it. Not caring who he hurts to gain it.

ya, i kno ur not agreeing. im struggling with a evil character like that. I'm trying to think of some reason for him to be evil, but it's not working. Im considering making him insane.

Insane people are always fun. Especially if you write in their point of view.

ya, i'm planning on doing that

I did a writing peice in first person. I had him think he's insane for about a chapter. It's on my profile, under 'Brainwashed,' check it out if you like.

sounds cool... i will check it out L8R

One of the best ways (in my opinion) to deal with the Villain Problem is to not have anyone be "evil", and make the conflict out of differences in ideology or something. For example, in my story, there are the numines (angels) and vigiles ("fallen" angels), and neither is right or wrong--the numines are all for law, order, and control, and the vigiles consider free will more important. Neither is right or wrong, and the main character doesn't really sympathize with either. Of course, black-and-white evil can work well too--look at Tolkien, The Dark is Rising, even Harry Potter.

hmmm... idk. sometimes i get confused when i read books like that, where there are no villains, cuz i don't know which side to choose. but i don't really like the whole black-and-white evil/good thing either, because i feel like it kinda labels the characters as "good" or "bad". well, i guess that the story that i'm writing right now, soul stealer, does not really have a villain... i guess that "the villain" could be an imaginary object, like fear or something too.

I like it better when the villian is obvious, or at least there are clearly bad guys. I like books that aren't too, just not as much.

I like every book that I read, and it only matters if it was well written and has a good plot. The ones with the black-and-white evil and good don't make you think as much as the one's that aren't clear.

However, in many of the books I read, the "villain" is, in fact, the situation. Or the villain isn't really evil, they are just a grouch or someone who is just really mean to the main character. Or the villain becomes good and another one takes their place. Most of the time, there isn't someone who is truly evil in the stories I read. Well, except Harry Potter.

And you know, if you think about it, Harry Potter is about the Holocaust, except there is one person saving the world. Voldemort is Hitler, the Death Eaters are Nazis, and the muggles and muggle borns are like the Jews.

And now that I have gotten my self well and thoroughly off track, I think I had better shut up before I start to ramble about whatever comes to mind, leaving everyone else behind in the dust, wondering where the heck what I think of comes from.

I once read an article on how to make your villianas bad as you want or need to be. First, you make a list of say 10 things yo don't want to happen to you, then have the villian do one or all to the list. For me, my top three was being scalped, skinned alive, and burned at the stake or die by being burned.
hope this helps.
G W Pickle

yeah i get what u mean... villains can't be completely bad or they're just unrealistic. unless they're zombies or something.
that's kinda why i'm struggling w/my story, shades. cuz the villains are obviously the shades. they need some kind of weakness, but i can't figure out what that is yet.
if anyone has any suggestions, pleez let me know. XD

oooh, villains are easy for me, now at least.
The story I'm writing right now, was all about Villains, it's so good! I really get into character when I'm angry ... hee hee

I love getting into my villain characters...

Brigid
Actually when I created Bishop (the main bad guy in my book SENTI)I wanted a villian with no redeeming qualities. He uses fear of being tortured to death and the same fate to your family and sometimes friends to make you follow his rules.
As for the weakness part, Bishop is what you would call Lawful Evil. He has his own set of rules he'll follow reguardless, even if it means he'll die. It's his code of honor.
G W Pickle

a great villian is one who is only revealed at the end, hoodwhinking everyone including the reader. Smart , and multi-facetted ,a person that can be anyone or just a nobody hiding in the text but clear as day when all is revealed.Hard as a hobnailed boot to pull off