The Dynamics of Villainy: An Analytical Look

So I was thinking - as usual....... and I started thinking about all the villains in my favourite stories. Now I've known for a long time now that one of the most appealing things in a story is a strong VILLAIN. For me, the villain should be just as strong if not stronger than the hero. And usually when talking about a story I go on and on about how much I loved the villain of the piece. And I was thinking, well, why do I like the villains?

And I came to the conclusion that there are only two main types of villains that people can really get into and like.

1) Classically, the villain you're allowed to just simply HATE. I mean, they have to be EVIL, nothing nice about them. You WANT them to be brought down.You ever hear of when you love to hate something? That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.

2) The villain you're allowed to love. That's been a sort of trend happening with the villains of the pieces being "good on the inside" or whatever. That's a harder thing, because a sob story will often just seem sappy. These villains don't need to necessarily endear themselves to you, but they need to delight you. The kind of thing where everytime they appear on screen or in the book you go "YES!"

A good example of the latter is Spike, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He's a villain. But he's a softhearted villain who simply refuses to admit it. He would kill Buffy and Co. right as soon as he could, but he can't. So you know that whenever he appears he's going to bring laughs. You don't necessarily think you'd hang out with him real life - it's not that kind of love for a character I'm talking about.

The main difference between these two kinds of villains is that the ones you're love to hate, you just HATE. You just want them to be brought DOWN. But the ones you love are relatable, in a way that no one would openly admit, but they are. Like when Spike gets so frustrated with his situation. The thing with Spike is he actually brings a sort of humanity to what would traditionally be a cold and heartless villain, a classic good guy/bad guy scenario (nothing against the classic good guy/bad guy scenario.... that was basically my entire childhood.) And THAT'S the point, is when the villains start becoming HUMAN, that's when you start to be allowed to love them. That's what makes Spike awesome, that's what makes Hannibal Lectar awesome, that's what makes Artemis Fowl awesome. Spike, ironically unhuman, has such utter humanity about him - frustration and emotion and all this. He was even in love with Drusilla. Though Angel might be the one with a soul, Spike is the one with the most humanity. In this case, it makes him great because Joss Whedon takes it lightheartedly. Finding the humour in this is what makes Spike so damn lovable.

What makes Hannibal Lectar so epic is that he has such understanding for the human condition, for how fragile it can be, for the wonder of the human mind. He may not be as emotional as Spike, but where classically cold villains may take the human condition for granted, Hannibal Lectar simply doesn't. You know that not everything he thinks about is just killing and eating people. You know, for instance, that he used to visit a lovely little beach that he used to draw, before he was locked up. He's RELATABLE and HUMAN. That's also what makes him so frightening. Where Spike is great because it's taken lightheartedly, Hannibal Lectar shines because he's taken so seriously. We like the idea that everyone who's ever done something despicable is coldhearted and inhuman, that no one with a heart could relate to them, and what makes Hannibal Lectar so frightening is that he proves that that is just so untrue. What makes it so frightening is he's relatable..... and shows us that we all have a level of insanity in us. And he succeeds in this fear because he's just so damn reasonable sounding when he talks to Starling. Not to mention that we can be so delighted when he comes onscreen because in spite of our fear of him, he's undoubtedly a GENIUS. And even though no one would be best friends with him, we're allowed, and in fact encouraged to appreciate the fact that this is one incredibly intelligent and formidable individual.

And now we come to Artemis Fowl. I've spent far too much time thinking about this series of books (aimed at twelve year olds) but it's only because the characters in it are so freaking great, the plot is so freaking imaginative, the dialogue is so freaking hilarious and the series in general is just so freaking AWESOME. But the thing about it is that one of the main characters, Artemis Fowl, is, especially in the first book, undeniably the villain of the thing. And this is one of those rare villains where one of those "he's good on the inside" things is portrayed by a sad backstory, without making it sound like a sappy sob story. And Eoin Colfer (pronounced "Owen") succeeds in this because Artemis doesn't look for sympathy. He doesn't want it. In fact, he pushes that story away, because it distracts him from his current project (kidnapping a fairy and taking its gold for ransom). He's running the household and trying to regain financial footing that all went downhill after his father reportedly died in the Arctic Circle (attacked by the Russian mafia) and his mother went insane from grief and occasionally doesn't even recognize him anymore. Did I mention Artemis is twelve years old? That's important. Also, like Hannibal Lectar, Artemis is a genius. There are many references to this in the book that are both creative and humourous, (like how he checkmated the world chess champion in six moves) but he outsmarts fairies, basically, who in this series are extremely tough and ready to roll, and about fifty years ahead of humans in the field of technological advancement. He also both learns to speak their language fluently without ever being taught, and also learns to read it (they speak the language of Gnommish and their alphabet is the ancestor of heiroglyphics). And even though Artemis does some extremely despicable things in this series, we're allowed to and probably supposed to appreciate his intelligence and forgive him for the things he does and as a result, we sort of love him. The thing with Artemis is that he's very flawed, that's what makes him relatable as a character. He's essentially a boy looking to find his identity without any sort of guide, besides Butler, who is his bodyguard and also guess what, his butler. I strongly suggest everyone read this series by the way. It's frackin' amazing.

And as much as I adore these characters, and I get why I love them and they're great villains, my favourite thing has always been the villain that you're allowed to just HATE.

The first one that comes to mind is Capricorn, of Inkheart. He's not relatable, he's barely even human. More than once the author describes him as being made of stone. But that's what makes him so intriguing, is that he's just so cold and emotionless. He only does things if they benefit him. He doesn't mind killing people, it's just that he's not particularly motivated to.... unless he becomes motivated to. If you cross Capricorn, or if you have something he wants, then he will do whatever it takes to get vengeance or get what he wants. But it's not what he does for fun, if that makes sense. But he has no empathy, he has no thoughts for others and he doesn't care about others, but uses them when he so needs to. But he's not stupid. He's not a genius, like Hannibal or Artemis, but he's certainly not stupid. But what makes him so intriguing as a villain is his utter disregard for anything that doesn't serve him. You're allowed to just hate him, but you reread the book over again because he's a great villain.

And there it is. There's the answer to this type of villain. Where the other type was based on humanity and relatability, this type is the complete opposite. These villains are supposed to intrigue you. They're supposed to be foreign and strange and jarring to your mind. Because people are intrigued by things outside their realm of consciousness, and so to have something so utterly without feeling, without empathy, without a drop of care in their body for anyone besides themselves, one could even describe them as a little bit sadistic depending on the character.... it's just so alien to us, and that's why we love to read about them and to watch them in movies.

I'd just like to mention that in this same book we have Basta, who is just as evil and clever as Capricorn with none of the restraint. Capricorn would only kill someone if they crossed him. Basta would set the world on fire just to watch it burn. (Basta was always my favourite by the way. I liked how cold and heartless Capricorn was, but I was always simply enthralled by Basta's unabashed glee at seeing others terrified and/or in pain.) They're two very different kinds of villains, Capricorn and Basta, but they both inspire eager hatred from the audience and they're both incredibly intriguing. They're probably one of the main reasons I've read Inkheart so many times. That's another book series I strongly recommend, by the way. The movie was awful, but the books were fantastic so you should all check it out.

Another villain is Mr. Curtain, from the Mysterious Benedict Society. Undoubtedly intelligent, his main goal was to take over the world, his one weakness his narcolepsy that gets worked up when he's angry. Also his love for the adorably and hilariously stupid S.Q Pedalian. I wouldn't mention this one, except to point out the extent of how intriguing I find downright evil characters. He has kidnapped four children and locked them in a rundown prison where he repairs his invention. Mr. Curtain has invented these gloves. When he wears them he feels nothing, but if he touches a person they are electrocuted. He has threatened the use of these gloves on them if they try any "funny business". Kate, the most physically capable of the four children, attempts an escape by climbing out the window and finding the exit, but is captured by the "Ten Men" (the henchmen Mr. Curtain hires). Mr. Curtain enters the room, pulling on his gloves. Kate says "Fine! I did it, I'll deal with it! Just do it already!" Curtain says something like "With pleasure" and then electrocutes Reynie (one of the other three kids). You have no idea how many times I've read that scene over and over and over again, just wondering, why Reynie? Kate was the one that escaped. Just - the utter....... evil conveyed in that scene just gets me everytime, and no matter how many times I read that scene (and I do flip through the book months later just to find it) I always get a chill up my spine. The Mysterious Benedict Society is another great series by the way. Everyone should read it.

Another villain of this kind is Howard Payne. Name sound familiar? No? I doubted it. He was the bomber in the movie Speed. Remember that movie, with Keanu Reaves and Sandra Bullock? That movie was awesome. Anyways, the thing with him in that movie, the thing that makes him so easy to hate, is that he just has no motivation (this is the bomber, by the way, not Keanu Reaves). He literally only does it for the money, and he's put so much time and effort into this when he could have, I dunno, gotten a job, maybe? And when he kidnaps Sandra Bullock at the end? I mean, sure, some of it is just flimsy plot structure probably - critically analyzed that movie is as flimsy as a rubber pylon holding up St Mark's Basilica - but the thing is, he had the money (or what he thought was the money) but strapped a bomb to Sandra Bullock anyways, and why? Well, maybe to make Jack suffer for getting the people off the bus, but mostly he's just plain crazy (my favourite quote from that movie, by the way, is "No no no! Poor people are crazy. I'm eccentric.") But, again, he's also a genius. He was one step ahead of Jack the entire time and only started to falter when he got cocky. He was a strategic genius. Which brings me to my next point.

We want our villains to be strong. We want them to have at least one strong trait that make them hard to beat. Essentially, we want our villains to be impossible to defeat. That's what makes the story fun, is to see how the hero of the tale can go up against such a formidable foe and come out of it victorious. We want to be thinking "He's impossible to defeat" because what comes from that is "So how are they going to do it?" That's what makes the story interesting.

And going from that, that's what makes the heroes...... heroes. Basically, we want them to accomplish something that we don't think we could ever accomplish. If we think "Well I would just do that, that's easy......." then we don't end up liking the story as much, do we?

Reverting back to my point about the two kinds of villains (I'm sorry my rant is very disorganized) there are a few examples of villains where the writer of the book/movie didn't just choose one, or tried to have both. And that doesn't work. You need to choose one, because otherwise it just makes the villain wishy-washy and therefore less strong and less difficult to defeat. Like the Dark Knight movie. The Joker was just.... I didn't feel anything about him. Sure, he's a bad guy, I get that. But I wasn't delighted when he came onscreen - he simply wasn't humanized and interesting enough, but I wasn't looking forward to his defeat either because he didn't give Batman a particularly difficult challenge in the first place. Also, "Ooh, someone knifed my face now I'm going to murder a bunch of people". Yeah, well, so? Clearly you don't have a conscience (a trait of the hated villain) and yet why would you tell us that story if you didn't want us to sympathize with you (a trait of the loved villain). It was as if the writers wanted to have it both ways, and that simply doesn't work with villains.

Anyway, that's what I've been thinking about for the past little while.

I should teach a class.

Writing Update: Randy

Hello, peoples! I'm back!
Okay, well first of all, you don't know what the stories are about. I don't have titles for any of them so for now I just call them by the main character's name. You'll notice the title says Randy. That's because in one of my stories the main character's name is Randy. It's a fantasy book. The main plot is that this guy, Randy, skips school. He's sort of a rebel. Anyway, he goes to the forest so that no one will find him there. He finds a cave. He goes into it. On the other side of the cave, it's sort of a parallel universe. He has two friends back in his realm. Margie and Crystal. Margie is just his friend who happens to be a girl, and Crystal is his actual girlfriend. But he doesn't like her that much as a girlfriend. Anyways, in the parallel universe, there are two more girls. Juniper and Tempera. Juniper is a water nymph/ tree nymph. She looks exactly like Crystal. Tempera is a young storm goddess, in the loosest sense of the word "goddess". It simply means that she can control rain, thunder, lightning, wind etc. As you may have guessed, Tempera looks exactly like Margie. There's also Dizzy, who is a pixie. She only talks to Juniper, for reasons unknown..... even to me. It sounded good though, so I kept it. Anyways, he finds them and hangs with them for about a day. Then they find out that Dizzy is the one who opens and closes the cave every year. I haven't explained this part have I? No. Okay, well the cave that Randy came through, it opens only like once a year, for like three minutes. So they find out that Dizzy is the one that opens the cave every year and that if she saves her energy enough, she can open it without the schedgule....... again, in the loosest sense of the word. So she opens it, Randy sort of reluctantly goes through and comes out the other side. His mom freaks out at him and grounds him for like a month. Thus ended chapter eleven, and part one. Now I am officially on PART TWO!!!! I finished chapter twelve and now I'm on chapter THIRTEEN!!!!!!! EXCITEMENT!!!! And there was over a hundred pages in part one. And now I'm on PART TWO!! I'VE SAID THIS ALREADY BUT I CAN'T STOP!!!! PART TWO!!! CHAPTER THIRTEEN!!!!!! WHOOOHOOO!!!!!!!!!