Villain Psychology!

GreenLight24 and I wanted to start a topic talking just about villains! The way their minds work can be really interesting. The more messed up they are in the head the more they make awesome complex characters.

One of the villains I love is the Joker from Batman. Trying to understand his mind is like trying to answer the question "What is the meaning of life?". The majority of the time he is unpredictable and always keeps things interesting. Even though Batman manages to catch him at the end every time the Joker still wins because of the destruction he causes. This villain is pure crazy, always out for himself and a genius. The fact he can't remember his past (even though it is revealed in the comics) adds to his craziness because he has no traumatic experiences that he can remember to cause him to want total chaos and destruction. It seems his only goal as a villain is to take down the hero (Batman) and bring us all to the same kind of crazy that he is. Honestly, I don't know how Gotham City has lasted this long. The Joker is one of a kind when it comes to villains, in my opinion, and he always gets the last laugh. No matter what he does I love him; he brings out my sinister side.

So, what villains do you think are interesting? Which one's make you cheer them on even though they are the bad guys? Which one's do you love the most? And which villain do you think is the most complex?

We want to hear about all kinds of villains that you like and why you like them!

Hey everyone! Welcome to our official VP forum!!! I'm really excited to hear about your favorite bad guys! There are so many things that go into creating a good villain, and I think that the single most interesting factor would have to be the psychology behind it all. I've found over the years that the most complex and interesting minds are often villains, and that mentally complex villains not only to create a more entertaining conflict with the protagonist, but also develop into characters who, in and of themselves, are works of art. As has been stated, this forum is for anybody who would like to share something about a villain or other mentally disturbed character that they find to be interesting, or simply happen to like. Nothing beats a good mental breakdown every now and then! ;D

I would like to start out by sharing a story about my favorite nutcase that some of you out there might already be familiar with. (that is, if you ever watched Nickelodeon...its impossible to grow out of cartoons.) If you haven't ever seen or heard of the show, I'll try to make this understandable. Anyways, it's the story of ATLA's (Avatar the Last Airbender) Princess Azula. Here's the gist: Azula is the princess of the feared and immensely powerful Fire Nation. She's the daughter of Fire Lord Ozai and Fire Lady Ursa, who is largely an enigma for the entire series. Azula was not only gifted intellectually, but was a skilled firebending (the art of manipulating fire as a means of battle) prodigy from a very young age. She was also a master in the art of manipulation, which she often employed in her endeavors during the series. After her older brother, Zuko, fails to capture the Avatar (the main protagonist who must save the world from the fire nation's conquest) Azula is sent by her father to do the job instead. She is well-composed and spiteful, shows mercy to no one, and is hands-down the most feared (and respected?) character on the show. Another reason this character is so awesome is because of her unbridled ambition towards world domination and her love for causing pain to those who stand in her way. Azula was, in many ways, the perfect weapon of mass destruction. She had been groomed that way from an early age by her purely evil father.

BUT, there's a catch. Her brother was banished from their homeland for speaking out of turn at a wartime meeting, and has a scar to prove it...but this isn't about him hahaha. He was denounced as weak and as a disgrace to the royal family. Azula was "born lucky", while Zuko was "lucky to be born." Or was it the other way around? The mother of the two, who mostly appears during the series through flashbacks, always had a soft spot for her eldest, Zuko. Most mother's do love their children. But the sad reality was that their mother had always favored Zuko over Azula, and even denounced her as her daughter. The only times she is ever shown talking to Azula, she is scolding her, never once having shown any kind of motherly affection to her daughter. So, Azula looked to her power hungry father for love. I think you guys can see where this ends up.

While it would seem that Zuko is far inferior to his sister, and that she has everything he wants, (honor, respect, position, etc.), he has the one thing that Azula was always starved of: love. I think it's safe to say that there isn't one character who loves or genuinely cares about her on the show. Even her two closest "friends",Mai and Ty Lee, only hang with her because they are afraid of what she'll do to them if they don't. I find this to be very sad. To an outsider looking in, it looks like Azula has no feelings, and doesn't need them. She's on top of the world, literally. The sad truth is that Azula was morbidly depressed and even begins to go insane with the trauma of having to live each and every day behind a facade of unlimited strength and unbroken composure while hiding the pain of never having felt good enough to win her mother's love.

In the final episode of the series, An extremely paranoid Azula is finally being crowned the new Fire Lord as her father travels to fulfill his plans of becoming the supreme ruler of the world. No one is in attendance at this coronation, as the Princess had gone on a crazed banishing spree, banishing anyone who she felt she could not trust... so basically everyone. By doing this, Azula eliminates the very last people still loyal to her, the servants at the palace. (Mai and Ty Lee betrayed her and her father refused her request to go with him to fulfill his plans) The night before her coronation, she is alone at the palace and has hallucinations of her mother speaking to her in a mirror. She has an altercation with the vision, asking it to go away (like shes seen it many times before), but the hallucination persists and insists that she does love her daughter. Azula refuses to believe this because her mother abandoned her, and throws a hairbrush at the mirror, shattering it and ending the hallucination. Right as she is about to be crowned Fire Lord in front of absolutely no one, her brother shows up. (he joined the good guys) and challenges her to a sacred duel. For the very first time, he was actually matching her blow for blow, and she begins to succumb further and further into insanity as the battle goes on. Azula, cackling with madness, aims a lightning bolt at her brother's friend, who wasn't in the duel (only fire benders are allowed) and Zuko dives in front of it to save her. Azula then engages in a fight with this person, and is chained down to a drain in the courtyard after being subdued by her freezing ability. Azula struggles to free herself from the chains, but can't, and is forced to watch as her brother's companion goes over to him to heal his wounds (she has a healing ability). While Azula never was able to find someone to love her and to care for her, her brother has found yet another such person. This is the last straw, and the defeated princess falls into an insane fit, crying and rolling around on the floor hysterically while breathing blue fire as the two look on. She basically loses every shred of dignity she once had. Not only did she lose to her brother yet again (she lost her mothers love to him), but she has also lost everything that ever mattered to her. I believe that seeing that Zuko had found another person to care for him while she had nobody is what really made her snap. VERY SAD. But that's the reason that this character is so great. Nothing like a sympathetic villain!

Just in case any of you wanted a more vivid image of this character, you can check out this waaay awesome music video I came across on YouTube some two years go lol. I think this song goes along perfectly with this character.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMMmcXMtQe0

-GL24

Hey, are you peeps gonna be doing original villains too? 'Cuz the title really caught my attention since I've had a few good VP arguments/discussions with a fellow writer friend of mine.
And since this is a VP forum, I would be remiss without mentioning Peter's Evil Overlord list [www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html]. Best list of Villainy I've ever come across.

For not-my-own-character favorite villain, Moriarty always drew me as a kid. His mental sparring with Sherlock Holmes was so captivating, especially for a SH 'fanboy' [yes I will admit to that]. Don't know what else to say about him other than he was one of my favs for villains.
Princess Azula scared me witless, especially in the final showdown between her and Zuko. Creepy lady...
I've always felt slightly akin to the Joker's twisted sense of humor and odd-ballishness (? don't think that's a word). As a nerd/semi-social outcast, I've always had the 'do what you are, not what will keep people from freaking out' kind of mentality, and his antics always felt vaguely familiar in an odd kinship sort of way.

Waiting to hear back from you about the orig. villains...Have fun y'all!

Hey guys. I just thought I'd chime in real quick to let you know about an Azula short I published this morning. It's called "The Candle." and is just a little scene I wrote a while ago about Azula on a lonely night in the asylum. It's be sweet if u checked it out!