An absent Big Bad

[Queshire]

Today I've been inspired to try something and I'd like you guys to mull over the idea and give me you opinion. The idea is essentially a big bad whose reach and influence spreads throughout the story but in which he never physically appears. How would you do this? What would you include or not include?

I've got some ideas of my own, but I'd like to hear what you guys can come up with first. =P

 

[eliec]

Look up Lord Foul from Stephen Donaldson's Covenant books. He kicks off the plot, but after that we hear about him many times but he never appears until the conclusion

 

[Svrtnsse]

Another example of this would be the Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos. It contains a lot of incredibly powerful badnesses that never actually appear in the stories but who still have a great influence over them - or so I've heard. It's been a while since I read any.

It's a good idea.

 

[skip.knox]

Or Sauron. Dr Moriarty. There are plenty of examples. Keeping the villain off-stage for a while is a time-testing technique.

 

[hots_towel]

interesting that I would find this. It definitely does give the antagonist more mystery. Can you imagine what it must have been like for people in the middle ages only hearing about the mongol invasion, but not even knowing what a mongol is or what one looks like? Or maybe a simple citizen in Russia or italy during the time Napoleon was mowing over Europe. Those are all just names with a large sphere of influence, but the average person would never come face to face with these people.

I did have an idea to put into my WIP where there is a character who is only mentioned. Not in detail, in terms of personality or appearance. It's just a name, but definitely has an impact on the characters and their conflicts. Mind you, this shadow person is not a main villain, nor are they going out of their way to be secretive. Its just not in the main characters best interest to go out hunting this person down. However, to the read, this person has a lot more mystery shrouded around them

 

[ThinkerX]

One variant of this I've considered is having the 'big bad' get himself killed along about Chapter 4 (or the first third of the book)...and the MC fails to realize this because his minions keep acting as though 'big bad' is still alive - even though they know differently.

 

[Abbas-Al-Morim]

Sauron seems like the best example, since he never really appears in the story - at least not in corporeal form. There's the occasional shot of the Great Eye in the movies, but I wouldn't really count that as a stage presence. In fact, the whole plot of Lord of the Rings revolves around stopping Sauron from coming back. Of course you could argue that there were plenty of villains, but they were all henchmen and ultimately expendable. The real puppeteer never made an appearance, beyond lurking in the shadows. And to be even more correct, Sauron isn't the ultimate bad guy. That honor goes to Morgoth, and Sauron is just a servant to him.

 

[Feo Takahari]

I was gonna mention Bigger Bad, but this seems more appropriate: Villainous Legacy

Two examples come to mind offhand. The Mocking Program takes the direct approach--the villain set up a computer program to handle all his affairs, and even though he's dead, the program is still managing his financial activities and paying for the murders of his enemies. Ace Attorney is more subtle--much of what goes wrong in the first three games is fallout from the same incident, and even though the perpetrator is executed, his crime continues to create new villains and new victims.

 

[eliec]

You could also take the ontological inertia approach: The villain's dead or defeated, but his plans are still proceeding without him. Let's say he pulled off a ritual that attracted an asteroid to the planet: He dies before the asteroid actually makes contact, but the heroes don't know that and are still looking for him because they think that killing him might stop the rocky bullet.
That would make one hell of a twist towards the end, assuming you leave enough time for yourself to write a way out of the catastrophe without an asspull.

 

[Terry Greer]

Keeping the big bad out the way for a while (even a long while and several books) is a good idea to rack up the tension and suspense - but unless they make an eventual appearance in some way (even if that involves a significant plot twist) the story will end up unsatisfying.

cf. the following link:
Chekhov's gun - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It's not cliche - its dramatic expectation that has to be satisfied in some way.

 

[Michelle Ann]

I'm not going to add to the list of villians suggested here as they are an excellent bunch of example, but I was going to add to from my experience of writing my novel.

My big bad is actually dead, killed years ago but her prescence in the people's mind still lingers that it developes a new big bad. For what it is worth, I've noticed it's a difficult path to take because a lot of people what a big bad to focus on, it's human nature (I'm not just talking Sauron, Lord Voldemort but also Nigel Farage, Gerry Adams... etc) to want something to dislike or hate and see eradicated. If you remove that element, I've found a lot of people flouder unless you pull off several characters that show several shades of grey (by which I mean they could belong to either side, not how they flog their 'lovers' with a horse whip). For example, one of my main characters is a raging psychopath who for the wrong influence could easily be the villian, another character is actually a very dipolmatic guy, but due to influence is seen to be on the wrong side. So you can play with that to mask your intentions over who the bad guy is while still giving people that archor they seem to require.

 

[spurt_reynolds]

So despite the fact that the big bad is dead the main threat comes from the memory? Still afraid regardless of her inability in hurt them?

 

[jpoelma13]

I don't see any reason why you have to introduce the Big Bad early in the story. However, you will need to have characters talk about him/her if you want to use this create tension.

 

[Terry Greer]

The legacy of a big bad doesn't need to be fear. It can be a power vacuum, famine, a land that's been trashed, population displacement, bankruptcy, something released that needs to be contained again. A damaged world/weather system/ecology.

It could be the aftermath of an invasion when the world has to put itself together again, or after a comet has wiped out 955 of everything.

Its a good idea - and with lots of potential avenues to explore.