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Villains!



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Tue May 13, 2014 2:47 pm
StellaThomas says...



@Snoink - actually, I was going to mention Voldemort but the thing is, I can't decide if I like him or not as a villain! To be honest I never found him particularly menacing - because Harry beat him every single time! And I actually wrote a whole paragraph out about how I didn't like him as a villain, and then I thought of all the reasons why I did like him, and then I got stuck and deleted it all. He is a very well formed villain - with a background, a clear motive and plans that aren't just "I'm going to take over the world!" I kind of loved the Ministry scene in Book 7 for showing us how on a very mundane, bureaucratic level, things were changing. And I think that that is pretty cool.

Umbridge as well is pretty amazing and on that theme Rowling used her to show how evil comes through really banal sources. It's not all magic rings and world domination. And this isn't really something I've thought of before!

@Blackwood - but what about stories where there are no villains?

Desire is very important and that is something that I've personally noticed I fall down a lot on - I come up with something the villain is doing, but I can't understand their motivation for doing it. Having a very clear cut "this is what I want" makes that so much easier to translate over.
"Stella. You were in my dream the other night. And everyone called you Princess." -Lauren2010
  





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Tue May 13, 2014 6:59 pm
Snoink says...



Oh, Voldemort was a terrible villain. He was kind of good in the beginning, but then he became more cliched as time went on. The last book he was pretty much insufferable. I was going to write a cheesy monologue in Voldemort's perspective in the aforementioned radio script, so I went to the seventh book for inspiration. Well... that lame thing that Voldemort says about cockroaches and whatnot? Yeah. I pretty much lifted that completely from the book and changed the pronouns. It was that cheesy.

As far as Umbridge goes? Oh man! I loved her as a villain. Because she was only doing what was right -- legalistically, that is. In fact, she never did anything wrong, in that regard. Yes, she made up dictatorial rules -- BUT she was given that power! So, it was technically not wrong for her to make up laws. She was simply a a paper pusher with too much power. There are so many people like her in government today that I am glad she got a representation!

Also, maybe it's just my secret love of the Screwtape Letters or the fact that my dad had a foray into government politics (which is incredibly messy and he hated it all throughout, by the way), but I love bureaucratic villains. The ones who are doing the right thing, because their laws say it is right and they are just forcing everyone to comply, whether they want to or not. Does it matter if some people are morally outraged by these laws? Nope! Does it matter if you're the one who makes up a law, based on your own prejudices? Nope! Because it is law and what is law is what is final, and if you don't obey the law, then you must be punished. Simple. A moralistic absolutist way of looking at things!

The only one whom I trust with that kind of interpretation is God Himself, because He makes a big point on mercy being just fine with Him and how He will ensure that things are both just and merciful. And since I trust Him, that's cool with me. Every other moral absolutist is scawy. :P

Also, I feel the need to post this section from Larry Niven's Inferno:

Spoiler! :
Benito tapped my shoulder and pointed. "There is our way out. The rubble from the bridge."

It had been a bridge, high and arching like those we'd crossed before. Now it was a sloping pile of shattered rock. I looked at it curiously, but it didn't seem different from any other rock I'd seen, and I could see that normal laws of material strength didn't hold down here. It wasn't a
surprise.

"What happened to it?" I wondered. "Earthquake?"

"I am told that all Hell shook at the moment of Christ's death," said the ex-priest.

"So says Dante," Benito added. "Afterwards, He came to Hell and threw down the great gate in the Wall of Dis."

"He must have been mad about something. I suppose being crucified could do that to you."

"I would be less flippant, Allen. Look around you." Before I could answer, Benito had started climbing the ruined bridge.

It was still a ridiculous picture. Christ was supposed to be gentle. Using a whip on the temple money-changers was one thing; behaving like a comic-book hero was something else. I tried to imagine the bleeding, wounded, near-naked figure ripping those tremendous iron gates from their hinges, while the halo flamed angrily about His Head--

Then gave it up and climbed up after Benito. I tested each foothold, but some of the slabs slid down anyway. Near the top the rockslide ended, and we climbed by fingerholds and toeholds. There it was that I had to repress a sudden, violent urge to giggle.

Benito wouldn't have appreciated it. But-- no wonder Christ was so upset. Some clerk must have tried to hand Him Form D-345t839y-4583.


By the way! I love that book by Larry Niven. It's an homage to Dante, and it's written in the perspective of a writer (Allen) who dies and has to be led through Dante's hell in order to get to heaven. The problem? Allen doesn't believe in God at all and thinks that he's just landed in some sick and twisted Dante-inspired theme park. It is amuuuuuuuuuuusing.
Ubi caritas est vera, Deus ibi est.

"The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Master calls the butterfly." ~ Richard Bach

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