McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Writing villains
o_O:
I am the opposite there - making me read about unrelieved triumph of good is like making me eat a pound of rock candy - cloying, nauseating, intellectually fattening. Even in small doses it is like cheap sweets - a quick rush followed by a low more depressing than before the start. More depressing because there is also the same self hatred after cheap indulgence that a trying-to-quit smoker gets after a cheat cigarette.
Triumph of good is also logically suspect - 'good' and 'evil' labels are more properly applied when consequences are known (or when the victors write history) - so during-the-fact cheering of a 'good' hero to me smells of bureaucratic artifice and causality violation both.
Aminar:
Right and wrong aren't that hard to see in a narrative. And the point of fiction is to escape like the point of candy is to taste good. If those things make you feel guilty you might want to look at why. Neither of those things is wrong when it doesn't hinder your ability to manage life. If indulging for short amounts of time makes you feel guilty you likely stress yourself out overmuch. If so, don't worry so much. Enjoy life. It isn't incredibly long and most of it isn't fun.(I apologize if this offends. Like I said. My empathy gene is overactive and the comments worried me.)
Besides which, everybody could use some good old fashioned heroic altruism beat into their brains. If everyone were aimed at helping people the world would be a much better place.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: trboturtle on August 16, 2012, 01:08:57 AM ---I see it this way -- evil has a goal and will do anything to acheive that goal, Need to seige a city and kill everyone inside? Evil does it. Need a super weapon and the only person who can create the weapons don't want to have anything to do with you? Grab his daughter and give him the orders. A little old lady between you and a fortune? A shove down the stairs.
In short, Evil will do anything it can to do its thing. Most heroes have some sort of line they won't step over.
--- End quote ---
I can't really go with this one; it works for a sort of chaotic take of evil, but it leaves out a whole range of plausible options for characters who have solidly defined moral compasses, and clear lines as to what they will and won't do, which lead them to evil acts.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: OZ on August 16, 2012, 02:51:26 AM ---I would have to agree with this at least for the most part. Specifically I tire of reading horrific stories with disgusting endings that are defended by people saying, "That's how real life works."
--- End quote ---
Thing is, that particular defence of a nihilist story doesn't work for me because real life also has wonderful stuff in; anyone who claims it does not will lose me.
--- Quote ---Having said that I would partially agree with Neurovore. There has to be plausibility. There also has to be tension. Evil has to be successful enough, at least for a while, that I can feel some fear that the hero will die or at least be permanently scarred.
--- End quote ---
I don't think dying is the relevant scale for me; there has to be a real possibility that the hero will fail at whatever their goal is; and for a hero in a long series, that possibility is not going to feel real unless the hero actually does fail some of the time.
OZ:
--- Quote ---I don't think dying is the relevant scale for me; there has to be a real possibility that the hero will fail at whatever their goal is; and for a hero in a long series, that possibility is not going to feel real unless the hero actually does fail some of the time.
--- End quote ---
I oversimplified. You put it in much better terms. I agree completely.
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