McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Writing villains
o_O:
--- Quote from: the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh on August 17, 2012, 07:55:17 PM ---
Fair comment; the more general idea was why the dilemma is so much more often framed as torturing the antagonist rather than bribing or seducing them and I think that stands as a more general point, though.
--- End quote ---
Bribing and seducing are generally perceived as 'cleaner' than torture and the writer is trying to be edgy and immediate instead of trying to explain the diffuse badness (or slow corruption) of bribing/seduction?
OZ:
--- Quote ---Consider this, then. Group A get hold of time-travel technology. Group A see this as an opportunity to prevent historical atrocities, and set about doing so.
--- End quote ---
I have somewhere in the last year or so read an interesting story where someone goes back in time to kill Hitler as a baby or young child but finds themself unable to kill a child in cold blood. A very interesting dilemna. I like stories that make me think.
--- Quote ---(well, unless they were An*ta Bl*ke, for whom it would be business as usual in the last eight books or so)
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You caught me off guard with this one. Luckily I wasn't drinking anything or I would have flushed out my sinus cavities.
OZ:
DP are you wanting the villain to be the main guy from the beginning and working through catspaws, a minor villain in the beginning that receives some sort of "power up", or someone who is not a villain in the beginning but becomes one for one reason or another? Of course the first two can sometimes be combined. You can have a minor villain that is scheming from the beginning to acquire more power and when successful becomes a more serious villain.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: OZ on August 18, 2012, 03:59:28 AM ---You caught me off guard with this one. Luckily I wasn't drinking anything or I would have flushed out my sinus cavities.
--- End quote ---
Ok, so that one's only half a skull on the side of the keyboard.
Snowleopard:
As with everybody else - this is just my opinion.
On TV, Movies and in books - I truly hate the UberVillain.
The guy who seems to be bad for evil's sake and is rather like an ebony Energizer bunny always
coming back again and again and making the good guy(s) dance to his or her tunes.
Red Jack on the Mentalist, whoever killed the lady police officer's dad on Castle, Jack and Jill from the Profiler. (I truly hated that show because it seemed to me - to be about some sicko making the profiler play his twisted game. It was, in a sense, a form of rape and, as I said, I dispised it.)
Kay Scarpetta by P. Cornwall has had to deal with that kind of UberNut.
I've written different kinds of villain sdepending on what I needed. The female villain in my big work is a business woman from a culture where woman aren't usually business CEOs. This has made her cold and ruthless and driven to succeed but she has a reason for what she does - not usually motivated to torture or maime. Her second in command is male, outspoken, and not involved with her. (Didn't want villain and second being a couple - doesn't always work so well.)
The hero is picked to be the scapegoat for a horrific crime simply because he's not impressed by her, nor seducible by her and is something of a leader among the others of his station.
Conversely in another story - the villain, again female, is bat-shit crazy but very smart - and very, very driven - she does like to torture and torment.
(Hmmmm, just noticed I seem to have several female villains - Not so sure what that means. ???)
The Sociopath works for some villains and the driven/going about it the wrong way works for others.
It's what you need your villain to be and/or do that's gonna shape what you create.
I do agree with not being graphic with violence - I don't need to read 30 pages of blood and guts. For some they like that kind of thing - I don't. You can show/illustrate violence without soaking the pages in blood and body fluids. Like in the first hellboy when the old professor is killed - you see a splatter of blood on the bible - not a lot of dwelling on it. More poignant and more powerful.
I will say that I once heard an actor who often played villains say that playing villains was more fun than playing heros. Because a hero is constrained, usually unless it's an anti-hero, to a certain set of actions while a villain can be anything from good to pure evil.
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