Villains that would surprise the audience

[srebak]

When some people write the antagonist of a story, they usually end up being too obvious of villains, myself being no exception. For example: a Mustache twirling guy in a black set of clothes and/or a Wicked ugly witch. But if you could come up with an antagonist that seems unorthodox as far as villains go, what would it be?

For me, in one of my fanfiction ideas, i have two ideas that seem to fall into this category: 1.) A cute little girl with a sweet disposition, who is in fact the daughter of the main villain, and soon reveals herself to be just as cruel and wicked as he. 2.) The Goddess of Love herself, Aphrodite. People are always focusing on Hades, Hera, Poseidon, Eris and Ares as villains, how would it look to have Aphrodite as a villainess?

 

[Jabrosky]

A cute little girl with a sweet disposition, who is in fact the daughter of the main villain, and soon reveals herself to be just as cruel and wicked as he.

Make her the main villain instead and I'm sold. If she's a Disney-style princess, that would be even more awesome.

 

[Spider]

A cute little girl with a sweet disposition, who is in fact the daughter of the main villain, and soon reveals herself to be just as cruel and wicked as he.

I had a nightmare last night where I was walking home, slightly spooked because the streets were so empty. I heard footsteps behind me, spun around, and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that it was just a little girl. She’s cute, I thought.

Moments later, she pulled out a knife and stabbed me in the stomach. (...Yes, my dreams can be disturbing sometimes.)

Bottom line: youth definitely has the potential to make a villain more unpredictable. I think the best way to make a villain surprising is to give him/her relatable or even “innocent” qualities. After drawing the readers in and getting them to actually like the character, snap back into reality and show them the true nature of the villain.

As for Aphrodite, I think it would be neat if you experimented with her character and gave her some motivation for being the villain. Maybe instead of embodying the valued aspects of love, she can be a force that ruins the relationships among people-- perhaps out of vengeance or jealousy?

Also, I’ve learned that antagonists don’t necessarily have to be villains. They can be likeable, humane characters who simply oppose the protagonist or get in the way of the protagonist’s goals.

 

[srebak]

I had a nightmare last night where I was walking home, slightly spooked because the streets were so empty. I heard footsteps behind me, spun around, and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that it was just a little girl. She’s cute, I thought.

Moments later, she pulled out a knife and stabbed me in the stomach. (...Yes, my dreams can be disturbing sometimes.)

Bottom line: youth definitely has the potential to make a villain more unpredictable. I think the best way to make a villain surprising is to give him/her relatable or even “innocent” qualities. After drawing the readers in and getting them to actually like the character, snap back into reality and show them the true nature of the villain.

As for Aphrodite, I think it would be neat if you experimented with her character and gave her some motivation for being the villain. Maybe instead of embodying the valued aspects of love, she can be a force that ruins the relationships among people-- perhaps out of vengeance or jealousy?

Also, I’ve learned that antagonists don’t necessarily have to be villains. They can be likeable, humane characters who simply oppose the protagonist or get in the way of the protagonist’s goals.

1. Oooh, i like that idea for Aphrodite, mind if i use that?

2. True, but let's be honest; antagonist and villain have sort of become synonymous with each other.

 

[Feo Takahari]

This might be a stupid question, but what's the purpose of surprising your audience with your villain? Or to frame that differently, is surprising your audience, in and of itself, one of the things you want your villain to accomplish, or is it a thing that will happen as a result of the things you want your villain to accomplish?

I guess you could say I tried for surprise in Dulling the Pain.* The FMC is friendly, kindly, and wants the best for everyone. Everything she does that's morally questionable is out of a desire to help or protect someone, but as the story progresses, her actions get harder and harder to defend. By the time she's discussing how best to conquer and mind-control humanity, she's become the closest thing the story has to a villain, despite being a better and more likable person than the MMC. Still, I left the possibility for the MMC to be viewed as the villain to her heroine--his actions get pretty questionable as well.

I don't think I've written anything else with a "surprise" villain. They're mostly recognizable as villains early on, which gives me a lot of time to establish their motivations and show what makes them tick.

* So many of my posts about writing come back to Dulling the Pain. It may have been an out-and-out failure, but it still contained a lot of experiments I'd like to repeat.

 

[Penpilot]

You want a villain that will surprise the audience, give them depth. Everything else is window dressing.

Also there's nothing wrong with a moustache twirler as long as they're not boring. One of the best villains from Buffy the Vampire Slayer was Spike. He was a moustache twirling villain that relished in the chaos he caused. Then when that schtick ran its course they added depth to his character and turned him into something more complex and eventually redeemed him.

A villain with who happens to be a cute girl with a sweet disposition will get you through the first bit of a story as a cool novelty, but after introductions, if she has no depth, she's just a one trick pony much like what the classic moustache twirler is. She'll just look different. And you'll find these types of "surprise" villains all over the place. A change of looks does not automatically make a surprising villain.

But like I said there's nothing wrong with a moustache twirler even a cute and bubbly one as long as they're interesting. Just understand that surprising goes beyond skin deep. A black cloaked villain that steps on stage and proclaims, "I'm the F@cking villain," can be surprising too if you give them depth.

 

[Ophiucha]

I've watched too many vampire movies to be fooled by little girls. And Aphrodite wasn't really good to begin with. She cursed a girl to fall in love with her own father, her idea of taking pity on the resulting incestuous child involves giving him to Hades and Persephone to raise, there's that whole Medusa thing, she used her beauty to drive the gods to violence, she cheats on her husband with the god of war, she basically started the Trojan War, and the incestuous child from earlier gets castrated by the god of war from earlier because she's sleeping with them both. I mean, chaotic neutral at best.

If you want a surprise villain, I think the best bet would be someone who fades into the background in other stories. Cute little girls aren't in novels at all unless they are important, good or evil. A surprising villain would be the hero's wife who 'tragically was killed by the enemy' at the beginning of the story, or the innkeeper who helps oil the rumour mill around town. On the complete opposite note, a surprising villain could be one of the protagonists, maybe the main character. Spend the whole novel convincing the reader that they're fighting for a good cause and then have them commit mass genocide at the end. Can't go wrong with that.

 

[Mythopoet]

I love it when the villain goes from being bent on the destruction of the heroes to being their ally. This happens all the time in anime and it came as a surprise to me. I kept expecting the villain who switched sides to end up betraying the heroes, but no. It's very often a sincere change of heart. And I just love it.

 

[Queshire]

I don't know if I can pull it off, but I would like to do a surprise villain, someone the heroes trust, who they work with everyday, maybe their boss. I dunno, is the boss turning out to be the big bad too cliche / obvious? My current thought is that he wants to destroy the current laws of magic and create new ones which would benefit humanity, but I might string it along Harry Potter style.

 

[Scribble]

I love it when the villain goes from being bent on the destruction of the heroes to being their ally. This happens all the time in anime and it came as a surprise to me. I kept expecting the villain who switched sides to end up betraying the heroes, but no. It's very often a sincere change of heart. And I just love it.

That reminded me of a Robert Ludlum spy novel, The Materese Circle. After the cold war, the top US agent (in retirement) versus the top ex KGB agent, who must team up to face the faceless Materese Circle, a kind of hidden cabal. The first part has them at odds against each other, they have a kind of grudging respect/hatred from years of antagonism. Since the book is US-centric, the Russian appears to be the villain, then you get to realize they are the same, just on different sides.

So, part of the "de-villainizing" of the villain is a change in perspective that is fed to the reader, as the new villain arises.

These being gruff and tough agents, the change of heart is subtext and comes only after they have been forced to work together.

I haven't read many Ludlum, and its been many years since I read that one, but I remember being gripped by the story.

 

[Mythopoet]

These being gruff and tough agents, the change of heart is subtext and comes only after they have been forced to work together.

Yeah, I've come across that before. But what I love about the anime version is that the change of heart usually happens after an epic confrontation between the villain and heroes in which the villain is shown the error of their ways and accepts the truth or during an epic confrontation the villain comes to have such respect for the heroes that he/she chooses freely to join them. A good example can be seen in Avatar: The Last Airbender in the character of Prince Zuko who sets out at the beginning to capture the Avatar and after seeing how the Fire Nation are really the bad guys he joins Aang and his group to defeat his own people. It was a great character arc.

 

[Scribble]

Yeah, I've come across that before. But what I love about the anime version is that the change of heart usually happens after an epic confrontation between the villain and heroes in which the villain is shown the error of their ways and accepts the truth or during an epic confrontation the villain comes to have such respect for the heroes that he/she chooses freely to join them. A good example can be seen in Avatar: The Last Airbender in the character of Prince Zuko who sets out at the beginning to capture the Avatar and after seeing how the Fire Nation are really the bad guys he joins Aang and his group to defeat his own people. It was a great character arc.

Very good example.

I had myself a experience in gaming. I was running a guild of justice knights in Ultima Online, and a fellow declared a new guild and charter, claiming lands under his clan, and that any trespassers would be attacked.

I responded saying that while I respect his claim, if he would attack members of groups on our "peaceful and protected" list, that would put them at odds with us, and they may end up being marked as criminals and marauders.

We met often in game and clashed - always with honorable combat. One day he came to me and wanted to join with me. He became my squire and was eventually knighted. We ended up becoming great friends and he helped shape our city (we called Wintermoor). He became the best friends I ever made in a game world, one of our fiercest warriors, and the respect that grew between us was born out of our conflict.

 

[Queshire]

Boop! Relevant: Main/Defeat Means Friendship - Television Tropes & Idioms

One of my favorite anime series Nanoha has a reputation of the main character "befriending" people by blasting the shit out of them. (Also I consider Avatar to be specifically western anime, there's no functional difference but I'm weird like that)

 

[Spider]

Oooh, i like that idea for Aphrodite, mind if i use that?

Sure, go ahead!

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

If you're going to use Aphrodite you might consider her the basic blonde (In my imagination) home wrecker bombshell. Because that's what she was in mythology. She was faithless as a wife to Hephaestas, and had affairs with half the heavens. So I'm not really sure that general sluttiness counts as a true villainous nature. Of course there might be a lot of wives and jealous / angry boyfriends who would disagree.

If you want a Greek goddess as an interesting villain could I suggest the fates - Moirai. One spun the thread of life / destiny, one measured and one cut. But it was all according to some celestial plan. Now what say they go off plan - have a little fun with the mortals. Start hitting that "smite" button just for fun! Sort of a power corrupts thing.

Cheers, Greg.

Cheers, Greg.

 

[Helen]

if you could come up with an antagonist that seems unorthodox as far as villains go, what would it be?

I thought Will (Depp) in Transcendence was unorthodox in that he turned out to be doing the right thing.

Leads into an interesting discussion as to what a villain actually is.

 

[monyo]

I thought Will (Depp) in Transcendence was unorthodox in that he turned out to be doing the right thing.

Leads into an interesting discussion as to what a villain actually is.

I don't mean to sidetrack with a discussion about the movie, but I had some thoughts on it that seemed kind of relevant. Just got back from seeing it and thought it was quite good, despite the incredibly bad reviews (20% critics/44% audience on Rotten Tomatoes, currently). I think there are two reasons it has such negative reviews, the first being that the premise is probably too much for a lot of people to buy into (considering that AI research is basically my day job, and writing a side hobby, I'm probably in a minority of viewers in finding it completely plausible).

More relevant to the thread though, it broke one of the cardinal rules: don't alienate your audience. The audience will gladly cheer on soldiers mowing down people with machine guns by the hundreds, so long as you show them watching football and playing with their dogs ahead of time, while showing the "enemy" massacring civilians to clearly frame them as the one the audience is supposed to side against. I've noticed that movies (and probably novels too) that go in a "look how evil human nature is" direction tend to automatically get trashed by most viewers. I think Transcendence is a good example of a victim of this, meaning alienating the audience by painting them as the bad guys. The Divide was another one I liked that got similarly trashed by critics and viewers alike, I think mainly for the same reason.

So I guess if you want mass appeal, it's fine to have an unorthodox villain, but people will hate your stuff if you make them seem like they are that villain. Of course there are probably counterexamples of things that manage it successfully, given the huge amount of film, literature, and such out there, though I can't think of any at the moment.

 

[Helen]

I don't mean to sidetrack with a discussion about the movie, but I had some thoughts on it that seemed kind of relevant. Just got back from seeing it and thought it was quite good, despite the incredibly bad reviews (20% critics/44% audience on Rotten Tomatoes, currently). I think there are two reasons it has such negative reviews, the first being that the premise is probably too much for a lot of people to buy into (considering that AI research is basically my day job, and writing a side hobby, I'm probably in a minority of viewers in finding it completely plausible).

More relevant to the thread though, it broke one of the cardinal rules: don't alienate your audience. The audience will gladly cheer on soldiers mowing down people with machine guns by the hundreds, so long as you show them watching football and playing with their dogs ahead of time, while showing the "enemy" massacring civilians to clearly frame them as the one the audience is supposed to side against. I've noticed that movies (and probably novels too) that go in a "look how evil human nature is" direction tend to automatically get trashed by most viewers. I think Transcendence is a good example of a victim of this, meaning alienating the audience by painting them as the bad guys. The Divide was another one I liked that got similarly trashed by critics and viewers alike, I think mainly for the same reason.

So I guess if you want mass appeal, it's fine to have an unorthodox villain, but people will hate your stuff if you make them seem like they are that villain. Of course there are probably counterexamples of things that manage it successfully, given the huge amount of film, literature, and such out there, though I can't think of any at the moment.

I enjoyed it. I don't think it deserves the bad ratings.

One thing that occurred to me: with Will turning out to be the good guy, it reinforces an unconventional viewpoint - that all the technology can be good. I'm not sure if people want to be told that.

 

[Feo Takahari]

So I guess if you want mass appeal, it's fine to have an unorthodox villain, but people will hate your stuff if you make them seem like they are that villain. Of course there are probably counterexamples of things that manage it successfully, given the huge amount of film, literature, and such out there, though I can't think of any at the moment.

I can list three video game examples off the top of my head (Iji, Undertale, Spec Ops: the Line), and I think I could reach ten if I did some digging. All the non-game examples I can think of were either somewhat subtle (Gladiator) or got a mixed response (Funny Games.) I think it's different for games because you're actually controlling the character as he shoots virtual civilians or whatever, whereas if you're just watching a movie, you don't necessarily feel like you're responsible for what's going on.

 

[Feo Takahari]

New post for a new subject. I've been thinking about this some more, and I'd like to introduce the villain who surprised me most.

This cute and cuddly abomination hails from Puella Magi Madoka Magica and calls himself Kyubey. He's introduced as a combination mentor and mascot, recruiting the protagonists to fight witches and collect the magical artifacts known as grief seeds from their corpses. He frames it as being about protecting people from the witches, but his personal stake is in collecting the grief seeds, the bigger the better. He will do anything, save tell an outright lie, if it means getting more grief seeds, and he's quite good at telling people exactly the right information to make them do things they wouldn't have done otherwise. At various points, he instigates a conflict and then plays every side of it, implies that someone who would inconvenience his plan is likely to succeed at something he expects her to die trying, tells the harshest truth he can muster to break the spirit of his greatest enemy . . . Yet he's never sadistic or pointlessly cruel, and he's not intentionally evil so much as aggressively amoral. Every bad thing that happens in the series is either indirectly his fault or something he took advantage of for personal gain, but he's never the main enemy, he's just someone who sets the problem in motion.

Or, as SF Debris summed it up, "Bunnycat's a DICK!"