Lately, I've been thinking a lot about one thing that most people love in a good story, be it a novel, a comic or a movie; the antagonist.
What is it that we like about antagonists? Perhaps because they create suspense and no good story exists without it? Maybe because, despite their nasty ways, they have philosophies that make sense? Or maybe, just maybe, we're secretly evil and want someone to relate to?
Whatever the reason, baddies are awesome. That's not to say I don't like heroes, I just appreciate a well-written villain.
Now, this is just my opinion, but from what I've learned and have seen for myself, antagonists always and I mean ALWAYS need to meet two requirements, be they human, animal or even something non-sentient. What are the requirements? Well...
1. They should be competent. Whatever it is they do, they should at least be good at it. That's not to say they should be perfect and never make mistakes, but they should be at least competent enough to let you know they don't screw around.
2. They should be a big enough threat. Whether they can break you physically, mentally or emotionally, being a threat creates suspense and a story without it is one that won't keep you interested, for then you'll know full well who will come out of the battle on top.
I have to ask; what is it about those requirements that are so hard? While most villains, setting aside saturday morning cartoon villains, can obey the requirements, I've seen a lot of them who will make me laugh because of how pathetic they are.
I've seen many of these villains do things like lose their spine and become pushovers during the final battle, die in an anticlimactic way, basically trip over their own feet, make an incredibly stupid choice or, worse yet, when they're nothing more than a comic foil.
Take, for example, in Twilight, the villain named James. Ol' Jimmy is a vampire (or Sparklepire, as people who are not fond of the Twilight series would call them) who loves hunting exotic prey for his din-din. Unfortunately for our heroine, Bella Swan, she happens to smell like Kobe beef to vampires and James has his eyes set on her, so it's up to her vampire boyfriend, Edward Cullen, and his family to protect her from being sucked dry by Jimmy.
I'm intimidated.
Sounds badass, right? I mean, SURE, he sparkles, but by that time in the book, you really wanna see Edward and Bella get torn apart, right? Plus, he also has superhuman strength and speed and he's supposedly more powerful than the heroes, right? And he shows it by totally breaking Edward in a one-on-one fight. Sadly, he was no match for a deus ex machina... the Cullen's arrived, and with ease, tore him apart and lit him on fire. Not so tough when outnumbered seven-to-one, huh, bitch?!
If he was a competently written villain, who would have done one of three things...
1. Had help. He traveled with two other vamps, including his girlfriend, and he knew how many Cullen's there were, so he should have considered that an ambush was possible. If he had his companions aid him, he may have gotten out alive.
2. Realize he was being overwhelmed and flee. Not the most dignified route, but it would have been smart and all is fair when you're being ganged up on. It'd give him later chances to ambush our heroes when they're alone or grow stronger in order to fight them all off.
3. Fought them off tooth and nail. I just gotta say, if you're going to have your villain lose because he was outnumbered, you'd better have him put up a REALLY good fight. And I mean, the heroes have to operate like a single machine in order to even get a single strike on the bastard! That'd let your reader know that the villain doesn't fuck around!
So, James was disappointing. Aside from the boring and annoying characters, the plotholes (or craters, if you will), the romance that's as healthy as cancer, the horrible plot (or, lack thereof) and great violations of the "Show, don't tell" rule, THAT is what made me hate Twilight!
Another example would be a villain from the famous manga, Naruto. I'm not going to name him, for I don't want to give anything away (despite the fact that I hate the Naruto), so I'm just going to call him O. Basically, O was a very powerful villain, who even successfully took down one of the most powerful characters in the series. Far as villains go, he was pretty cool; he was interesting, threatening and was pretty good at what he did. Why do I mention him? Well, later in the series, he's bed-ridden and sickly and he gets decapitated by one of the most obnoxious characters in the series instead of getting a well-deserved final battle.
This isn't so much as an incompetent villain, as it is an author who has no respect for his villains. Seriously, it's like if Darth Vader broke his neck getting out of the tub. Just not a suiting demise for a badass baddie, y'know?
See what I mean? Those villains did have SOME cool traits, but due to bad writing, they didn't get what they deserved or became laughably incompetent. In short, show more respect to the villain! He's there to create suspense, you know.
I apologize if the grammar isn't the best or if I rambled on a bit, but I'm a little addle brained after vacation. Thus, I'd like to conclude this rant about stuff. See'ya around!
What is it that we like about antagonists? Perhaps because they create suspense and no good story exists without it? Maybe because, despite their nasty ways, they have philosophies that make sense? Or maybe, just maybe, we're secretly evil and want someone to relate to?
Whatever the reason, baddies are awesome. That's not to say I don't like heroes, I just appreciate a well-written villain.
Now, this is just my opinion, but from what I've learned and have seen for myself, antagonists always and I mean ALWAYS need to meet two requirements, be they human, animal or even something non-sentient. What are the requirements? Well...
1. They should be competent. Whatever it is they do, they should at least be good at it. That's not to say they should be perfect and never make mistakes, but they should be at least competent enough to let you know they don't screw around.
2. They should be a big enough threat. Whether they can break you physically, mentally or emotionally, being a threat creates suspense and a story without it is one that won't keep you interested, for then you'll know full well who will come out of the battle on top.
I have to ask; what is it about those requirements that are so hard? While most villains, setting aside saturday morning cartoon villains, can obey the requirements, I've seen a lot of them who will make me laugh because of how pathetic they are.
I've seen many of these villains do things like lose their spine and become pushovers during the final battle, die in an anticlimactic way, basically trip over their own feet, make an incredibly stupid choice or, worse yet, when they're nothing more than a comic foil.
Take, for example, in Twilight, the villain named James. Ol' Jimmy is a vampire (or Sparklepire, as people who are not fond of the Twilight series would call them) who loves hunting exotic prey for his din-din. Unfortunately for our heroine, Bella Swan, she happens to smell like Kobe beef to vampires and James has his eyes set on her, so it's up to her vampire boyfriend, Edward Cullen, and his family to protect her from being sucked dry by Jimmy.
I'm intimidated.Sounds badass, right? I mean, SURE, he sparkles, but by that time in the book, you really wanna see Edward and Bella get torn apart, right? Plus, he also has superhuman strength and speed and he's supposedly more powerful than the heroes, right? And he shows it by totally breaking Edward in a one-on-one fight. Sadly, he was no match for a deus ex machina... the Cullen's arrived, and with ease, tore him apart and lit him on fire. Not so tough when outnumbered seven-to-one, huh, bitch?!
If he was a competently written villain, who would have done one of three things...
1. Had help. He traveled with two other vamps, including his girlfriend, and he knew how many Cullen's there were, so he should have considered that an ambush was possible. If he had his companions aid him, he may have gotten out alive.
2. Realize he was being overwhelmed and flee. Not the most dignified route, but it would have been smart and all is fair when you're being ganged up on. It'd give him later chances to ambush our heroes when they're alone or grow stronger in order to fight them all off.
3. Fought them off tooth and nail. I just gotta say, if you're going to have your villain lose because he was outnumbered, you'd better have him put up a REALLY good fight. And I mean, the heroes have to operate like a single machine in order to even get a single strike on the bastard! That'd let your reader know that the villain doesn't fuck around!
So, James was disappointing. Aside from the boring and annoying characters, the plotholes (or craters, if you will), the romance that's as healthy as cancer, the horrible plot (or, lack thereof) and great violations of the "Show, don't tell" rule, THAT is what made me hate Twilight!
Another example would be a villain from the famous manga, Naruto. I'm not going to name him, for I don't want to give anything away (despite the fact that I hate the Naruto), so I'm just going to call him O. Basically, O was a very powerful villain, who even successfully took down one of the most powerful characters in the series. Far as villains go, he was pretty cool; he was interesting, threatening and was pretty good at what he did. Why do I mention him? Well, later in the series, he's bed-ridden and sickly and he gets decapitated by one of the most obnoxious characters in the series instead of getting a well-deserved final battle.
This isn't so much as an incompetent villain, as it is an author who has no respect for his villains. Seriously, it's like if Darth Vader broke his neck getting out of the tub. Just not a suiting demise for a badass baddie, y'know?
See what I mean? Those villains did have SOME cool traits, but due to bad writing, they didn't get what they deserved or became laughably incompetent. In short, show more respect to the villain! He's there to create suspense, you know.
I apologize if the grammar isn't the best or if I rambled on a bit, but I'm a little addle brained after vacation. Thus, I'd like to conclude this rant about stuff. See'ya around!
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