Young Writers Society

Okay, so Stella is stuck with her villains, and instead of posting in writing tips, she more just wanted to have a discussion with everybody here to see if inspiration strikes.

So tell me:

1) what do you think makes a good villain?

2) who's the villain in your story? What's their motivation? Why do they make a good villain?

3) who are some of your favourite literary/film/TV/etc villains?

Go wild, darlings!

-Stella x

I think the best villains are the ones that have a defined and realistic motivation for their villany. For instance, in Shakespeare's Richard III, Richard has a few people in his way between him and the throne. In the world of the play, Richard was born horribly deformed, and as a result, finds that he is undesirable to basically everyone. Basically, this turns him into this really manipulative person that only has a lust for power. Along with a commentary on unruly masculinity, Richard III is really worth reading (or if you're not up for voluntary reading of Shakespeare, Sparknotes' No Fear Shakespeare is a nice, easy way to get through the poem.
If you're not as much into Shakespeare, Scar from The Lion King is my favorite villain, also with a nice, well defined motivation (though that one's based off of Hamlet, so...).

Another thing that makes a good villain is a character with a desire or motivation that conflicts with the protagonist's motivations and desires. In this type of villain, it's much easier to make a "gray area" character on both sides, if it's just a case of conflicting desires.

Uh, I'm writing a novel, but the villain hasn't really made an appearance. I know that he looks exactly like one of my English professors, and speaks very softly and politely, and wears a three piece suit. Brown.

My favorite villain is Joffrey from Game of Thrones (or A Song of Ice and Fire if you prefer). He's so bad that you forget it's a TV show sometimes.

Dang, I didn't mean to write an essay.

I think my favourite villain is Iago from Othello. He's just so shamelessly villainous (but doesn't let anyone know that) and his evil deeds leave no traces, because he makes other people do them for him. He's just fabulous. xD

@magpie and @Demeter I'm so glad you actually both mentioned Shakespeare because I was thinking last night about what amazing villains he has. I was thinking especially about Shylock in The Merchant of Venice... even though his actions are kind of weird (but hey, it's a comedy), his motivations were so real- he felt ostracised and belittled by Antonio and wanted that to end. I haven't read Richard III or Othello (Othello has been on my list for literally years at this point) but they're both pretty fantastic examples, and Claudius from Hamlet was pretty cool too!

Joffrey is also pretty cool, but while he is incredibly evil (and beautifully played by one of Dublin's own), I don't think I would count him as a villain. He doesn't have any grand plans or schemes, he's just a little boy who likes causing pain. His grandfather is the real villain but, let's face it, Tywin Lannister is also pretty horrendously brilliant. Ruthless, cold, Machiavellian. I really like him too, although perhaps he's a little bit too ordinarily evil to be put in, like, a list of the world's top villains.

In my Novel my Villain is a She's a Witch, who's in reality the Devil's daughter, and her Goals are less world domination and more the breaking of the human spirit. My novel is a cross between high fantasy and spiritual warfare so its hard to explain...

I think Good Villains are ones that are fully fleshed out. its all well and good to have a beautifully turned hero, but if your villain is only a shadow, a paper tiger of a person the tension and drama won't really be there because your Hero isn't facing off against a real physical villain but the /idea/ of one.

@StellaThomas I would count Joffrey as a villain because he is an example of what happens when a villain gains power. While he didn't have any grand schemes, what would any villain do when faced with the completion of their goal? Cause pain needlessly. That's my two cents on it.

That sounds cool, @Shadowlight! But what's her motivation for doing it?

I think that fully fleshed out villains are the best as well. In my novel,Chasing Dragons the villains are the Queen and the school headmistress. They've been scheming for years to keep the world order just the way they like it - they oppose progress and they're supremacists - they want to keep people with magical powers in positions of power, while the King (yes, the Queen's husband, and in fact the ruling monarch, she's just his consort, but due to his poor health she's taking control) and many others are for modernisation and not clinging to those kinds of archaic ideas. The two ladies are playing the long game - they have been plotting together since they were teenagers how they're going to make the world a better place.

Magpie - interesting point! I hadn't thought of that

Well Stella, her motivation is survival. she consumes the souls of those she corrupts and damns to the underworld. her hunger for life is insatiable and she thinks if she consumes enough innocents she will finally be satisfied.

1) what do you think makes a good villain?

Some of the worst criminals in history had no great reason for their crimes, they just wanted to have fun, no trauma endured, no pain that broke their minds. They just wanted to have fun, and someone elses pain did that marvelously. The best villeins are ones so shocking because of how violent they are and how surprising it is that such a happy go lucky person could be such a monster.

Another is the guy/girl who suffered a extreme pain, something that could have happened to anyone but usually does not go quite as wrong as it did for them, something that drove them over a edge, where they are stuck with no way to go but deeper into the depravity they started themselves on.

If its some guy in power with the goal of ruling the world that used to go on: "smart but rash, confident thus careless, and violent because he/she wants to be" he/she is in control he/she has every right to be confident, because hes/shes already won as far as the world why would anyone else matter?

If its some guy/girl who wants power but the main character keeps stopping him/her, smart guy/girl but social idiot. Knows what their projects are about but loose points on how any of it would actually lead to the intended goal, often thinking up things that would work only on the short term, or hurt himself/herself just as much as everyone else.

Always a rule is that the villain should never see themselves as evil, and if they do, treat the concept as a joke or consider it a side effect of their cause. Everyone in the world thinks their right in the end, its just a battle to see who is the MOST right, a villain just happens to be the person that from the readers perspective is not, the best stories make the criminals not clear cut, and that if you saw from their perspective, you can clearly see the logic of why they think they are right.

2) who's the villain in your story? What's their motivation? Why do they make a good villain?

I listed examples of what I have done in the past, their motivations are often because they see no other way, under their logic it makes perfect sense, their emotions have gone to a boil and broken their minds.

3) who are some of your favourite literary/film/TV/etc villains?

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I'm an inexperienced writer, but villains—I could talk all day. It's great fun mapping them out, not so much fun writing them.

Hope you don't mind me blending the questions. I'll go backwards and interfuse One and Three.

3) Who are some of your favorite literary/film/TV/etc. villains?

Sméagol, hands down. He began an ordinary hobbit. Similar to Bilbo. Then he transformed, became greedy, violent, insane, all at the working of the Ring.

As for least favorites ...

That isn't difficult. Sauron. There was nothing extraordinary about him. Sure, you wouldn't walk by him on the street, but he fit the typical villain.

1) What do you think makes a good villain?

There's this famous quote, I recall: "The best stories come not from 'good vs. bad' but 'good vs. good." My interpretation goes something along the lines of planting doubt in the readers' minds. It's strange, though; it's a breed that flourishes in darkness. Foreshadowing. Subtle hints. And it's not only strange, it's annoying. It's the cause of my villains becoming cardboard.

Think of it like a trial, I suppose. It wouldn't be a trial if the defendant didn't possess solid evidence. Even the prosecution doubts. In the end, it's the attorneys who determine the innocent, aka you, the author.

Then there's the clichés to handle. Just to name a few:

1) Invincible villain. Story concerns locating their Achilles heel.

2) Bullied villain. Villain unique in appearance, race, sexuality, etc. For example, Silas from The Da Vinci Code.

3) Power-thirsty villain. Villain with intentions to rule the world.

4) The Evil Lord of All Doom. *cough* Sauron.

The reader requires justification for the villain's ... villainess. Voldemort wasn't born craving death and gore. Sure, a violent person, but an innocent child.

I'm surprised you guys are mentioning Shakespeare villains. I always thought they were terrible, improperly supported by their environment, and borderline-Machiavelli (excluding Aaron, who blatantly admits to being one). Shylock and the Queen from Andronicus were probably the only logical I can think of, but even they were flawed. Richard III was a clear attempt to keep too close to history that it clashed with the original traits he gave to his villain.

Anyway, to answer you questions:
1) what do you think makes a good villain?
I'm always the type to sympathize with the villain. Villains are not born evil and most don't consider themselves evil. A good villain is a pathological liar. My personal favorite villains are the ones that can make you hate the protagonist, because their intentions/situation make you sympathize with them, even if they're wrong. Also, simple is usually better. It's cool to have an all-powerful villain, but sometimes a simple clash can be as effective. For example: your protagonist and antagonist could be buddy-buddy until that one time when one person corrects the other. Then your protagonist just keeps noticing all the flaws in their 'friend'

Just because someone doesn't SAY they have a reason, they do. Think of you getting in trouble with your parents. "Billy, why didn't you do your homework?" 'I dunno' "Why didn't you clean your room?" 'I dunno' -- Yes you do. You're a lazy kid who's gonna exploit the system as long as you can. And if you admit 'why', you loose your trump card for exploitation.

2) who's the villain in your story? What's their motivation? Why do they make a good villain?

I have so many. xD I guess I'll just list my two favorites:
-One is from a superhuman story where some of the characters get their powers by donating their body to a god. One of the gods, who's a minor-antagonist, is the god of hellfire, who essentially is pure fire. His motivation is to destroy things. Because of this, he has to be constantly monitored to keep him from destroying only what his 'employer' wants from him. For this reason, the person he's sealed in with (Cal) is in total control of the body, but looses control the more time he dies. Eventually leading to the final battle when the god is released to do damage. The reason I like him is because he's the only character of mine that I could think of to make him logically incapable of any personal thought.

-The other is the protagonist of her story. I'm not sure whether to call her an anti-hero because of this, since the story starts out with her trying to gain the audience's sympathy for all the wrong that's happening to her. She doesn't intend to do any wrong, it just happens. Basically, she wants attention with minimal effort. I think she makes a good villain because you can tell she's flawed from the beginning, and even more so when she does some wrong prior to the major scene at the end of the novel. But you can sympathize with her because you've heard her side of the story and can't quite see what others accuse her off because you can still give her the benefit of the doubt. It's not until the very last two scenes that you realize that she has caused all of these problems herself (because you were there to see she's a liar).

3) who are some of your favourite literary/film/TV/etc villains?
Aaron Stampler from "Primal Fear". Spoiler: There was a part of me that doubted his multiple-personality skit when he CONVENIENTLY switched to his negative persona in court. But his final line wins the cake for me, because it was a complete OJ Simpson "If I Had Done It, This Is How I Would've Done It" moment. You want to kill the kid, but you still feel the need to applaud his brilliance.

Agreed, I loved Smeagol more than Sauron and often forgot about the later. xD

Hello Stella, the villains in general have a serious role to play. They are the reason why your story exists. 'The Joker' from Dark Knight is my favourite. He's cruel, cunning and fabulous. Not just because of Heath Ledger, but the way he behaves in every situation.

In my story, I haven't focused on a really bad villain. Instead I'm creating an environment to justify my villain. He's not a dark character, but someone who behaves bad because of bad situation. He's not a mainstream villain, maybe because my story is a feel-good one.

Good villains for me would be those who have their own identity. They aren't influenced by any cliches. They oppose your main character because of a strong reason. A good villain is the one who makes your main character impressive. Conquering him should be an uphill task for your MC.

Amazing answers coming in guys, thanks! I really love hearing people's takes on this!

@GoldFlame - I agree, I never really cared about Sauron. I think, from what I can remember of LOTR (it's been a while since I read the book!), you also never really see much of him. He is just this sort of ever-present darkness and you never really get much of a sense of what he's going to do apart from "spread darkness" and you never really understand what that means or how he will do it. Or why. As far as I understand that kind of thing is discussed in Tolkien's other books but I think that you're right, he is just an archetypal villain.

I don't really like stories about villains who want power for power's sake. Because with power comes responsibility and I always thought - I mean, do you really want to rule this country and sort out its taxes and budget and health system? (Or the equivalents in any world!) But maybe that's a personal thing - I am not the kind of person who would ever want power, so I don't understand that motivation. But I do like villains who want power for a specific reason - because there is something they believe they can fix about their country/their world, but they need to be in charge to do that.

@rawrafied - it's funny I think, if we make the distinction between villains and antagonists. At least in terms of my own novel, the villain is the Queen - but one of the primary antagonists is a girl called Laurel. Laurel's been fairly indoctrinated by the Queen and she really really hates the protagonist, Astrid. At first it's assumed that Laurel is just a nasty girl but actually it transpires a little later on that Laurel sees it the other way around - in her eyes Astrid has been bullying her and being awful to her for years. And Astrid has no idea that the feud may have started on her side. I like Laurel, because she has that different perspective that shows a vaguely darker side to my goody-two-shoes heroine.

Your villains sound amazing by the way, especially the Hellfire one! That's such an interesting concept, that he wants to destroy for the sake of it!

@Gaurav009 - you bring up some really interesting points not about the character of the villain but the role of the villain. I agree that a villain should appear really unmanageable, that readers should feel like, "How are they ever going to beat them?!" But then your MCs do- and it's a better story! That's a really interesting point that I had never thought of - that maybe rather than just inspecting and dissecting the villainous personality, we need to go against our instincts of making them a fully formed character and instead ask, "Are they doing what they should be doing in this story?" And if the answer is no, then maybe we have to rethink them a little bit.

Thank you all for your input, this is great! And definitely giving me loads of novel thinks

Keep 'em coming guys!

I can't believe that nobody's mentioned Harry Potter, or the main villain behind the series...

For me the villain is the most important character, and exist transcendentally over the hero. Using a simple context, such as a superhero or adventure/action, you don't have heroes at all without villains. I sometimes find it difficult to define a villain sometimes because in almost all of my writing the story is told form the perspective of the 'evil one'.
In good movies I often find myself rooting for the villain because the hero is completely overshadowed by their supremeness.
A villain, most of all, should have desires. They want something and they want it bad.