Every villain is a hero
A helpful thing to remember when plotting out stories with a clear antagonist: he probably doesn’t know he’s the bad guy.
Alan Rickman’s character from Die Hard likely sees himself as George Clooney’s character from Ocean’s 11.
In Michael Clayton, Tilda Swinton is struggling to protect herself and her company. She sees it as a survival story, with herself cast as the heroic victim.
Even monsters, like the shark in Jaws or the velociraptors of Jurassic Park, can be heroes of their own story. In Aliens, the Queen is defending her brood. Once we understand that, the conflict is even stronger.
Whether you’re writing a thriller, a comedy or an action movie, always look at the story from the villain’s point of view. What is he trying to do? Besides the hero, what other obstacles are in the way?
Too often, we come up with the villain’s motivation (revenge, greed) and stop. Rather, look for what the journey is. We might only see a small part of it from the hero’s perspective, but knowing the whole arc gives us more to push against.
Have a little sympathy. Let your villain win a few times, but make him work for it.
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November 2nd, 2009 at 10:08 am
My favorite part of character development is finding ways to bring out the inner wounds of the villain to show a human side in him/her. The audience may not like him, but they will understand his inability to evolve to the “good” side. Just a whisper of humanity adds so much depth to the overall story. IMHO.
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:13 am
Super great insight. I always describe the relatonship between the protag and antag as “juxtaposed banalities.” The drug dealer is making money for his family. The hitman is doing his part to forward his boss’ agenda.
Even Hannibal Lecter is just living the only life he knows.
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:13 am
cant agree more!
Nothing is more interesting than an conflict between two good guys, yet with opposite motivations!
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:20 am
What a breath of fresh air – great post, John.
I like to imagine that the hero and villain are my kids – they might take different roads in life, but I love both regardless.
Don’t play favorites with your kids. :)
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:34 am
Alan Rickman is a great example – almost every role he plays is this kind of character that ‘believes’ he’s in the right.
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:41 am
Very well said. Every character is the protagonist in their own story. And, in real life at least, villains tend to think they’re doing the right thing.
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:44 am
Yes! I always try and explain this as the villain’s internal motivation. One of my faves is Syndrome from The Incredibles. EXTERNAL MOTIVATION: KILL ALL HEROES, INTERNAL MOTIVATION: BE A HERO HIMSELF.
It seems like villains often want reasonable things, but they are so deluded that they attempt to get them in unreasonable ways…
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:54 am
Awesome observation. Allow me to take it to a slightly different level: the best villains and heroes are exactly the same, separated by the thinnest of moralistic lines. Different sides of the same coin.
The Joker/Batman Darth Vader/Luke Skywalker Indiana Jones/The ‘evil’ archeologist from Raiders
If you think of your protagonist as simply a shade of the antagonist– and vice-versa– you may be surprised how much more richer your hero and villain can be.
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:10 am
The villain in a well-written movie will usually have a more interesting backstory and motivation than the hero, since he/she must go outside the bounds of morality to fulfill his/her needs. I always find that the most interesting villains carry with them the possibility of redemption; whether or not that actually happens in the course of the story, it makes for better drama. (Just like the potential of the hero to cross over to the dark side.)
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:17 am
Look at the “my main man” guy from “Three Kings.” He’s a torturing bastard, and both before and during the war clearly a supporter of Saddam, himself no humanitarian.
But the writer makes sure he’s no fool, and gives him at least one point to make that will make the audience say “hmm, he’s kind of right about that.” (see here: http://tinyurl.com/mymainman. NSFW). Sure, they also throw in the stuff about his family getting killed in the bombing of Baghdad, but this other observation about Michael Jackson is where you get a glimpse of what the Americans look like from the other side.
And here is where it gets really interesting – because in everyone’s mind (or at least most peoples. Or at least mine), this good point rattles around for a second, and then comes “yeah, but, that’s an extreme example; your generalization falls down; no significant number of people have bleached their skin in imitation of MJ; America can’t be summarized so crudely.”
And there, it’s done; the villain has become three dimensional, human, but wrong, and remains the villain. But much, much more intimidating and disturbing than some masked torturer slapping a face and screaming “Inshallah!” (See Man, Iron.)
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:20 am
This reminds me of a panel of x-men writers (including Stan Lee) who had a nearly 15 minute conversation on what made Magneto such a great villain: that he clearly saw himself as the good guy, protecting mutants from an angry and fearful human populace. Brilliant insight.
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:26 am
Excellent insight, personally I run a gaming blog and can see this as being more apt then just writing screen plays, any story could be adapted to have the character become more believable and the hero of their own story.
Thanks for the inspiration.
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:32 am
“When I sell liquor, it’s called bootlegging; when my patrons serve it on Lake Shore Drive, it’s called hospitality.” — Al Capone
November 2nd, 2009 at 12:06 pm
BELLOQ You and I are very much alike. Archeology is our religion, yet we have both fallen from the pure faith. Our methods have not differed as much as you pretend. I am but a shadowy reflection of you. It would take only a nudge to make you like me. To push you out of the light.
JONES Now you’re getting nasty.
November 2nd, 2009 at 1:24 pm
The Joker thinks he’s Batman.
November 2nd, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Well, respectfully, this doesn’t work for every film in my opinion. Is Michael Myers really be considered a hero of any kind in “Halloween?” How about the alien in “Alien?” Pazuzu/Captain Howdy in “The Exorcist?” Or, how about Anton Chigurh in “No Country for Old Men?”
That line of thinking just doesn’t seem to hold up for at least some of the above examples to me, and also, I personally have no problem with a villain that sees or believes what he is doing is wrong (and enjoys doing it all the more) as long as the character is developed enough and engaging.
To me, there’s something scarier about someone or something that relishes or loves the fact that what they are doing is destructive or causing suffering of some kind.
November 2nd, 2009 at 3:52 pm
A good thing to remember “in real life” too.
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:28 pm
@J. Warner:
I’m not familiar enough with Halloween or Exorcist to make any useful comment.
In the original Alien, it’s not hard to see things from the alien’s point of view. Its only goal is to feed and spread its DNA. The creature isn’t particularly intelligent, but you have to respect its tenacity. It certainly doesn’t see itself as a bad guy, any more than a shark does.
Anton Chigurh (in the film at least) is a methodical, apparently remorseless killing machine. But the fact that he’s selective shows some greater arc to his life. The movie chooses not to show it, but there’s a reason why he started killing for money, and ultimately consequences for the choices he made. You can envision a story in which he’s the protagonist, and maybe even the hero.
But for the record, I have no problem with a villain who knowingly does evil. Or even one whose motivations are ultimately opaque. But I think most stories can be improved by asking — if not necessarily answering — how the villain is heroic.
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:32 pm
J Warner,
Actually, Michael Myers is three-dimensional. His backstory/motivations (or lack thereof, just as creepy fyi) are told through the doctor. And as for Anton Chigurh, not sure you watched the same film I did. He absolutely sees himself as the hero of his own story and lives by a certain code of morality. As for Alien, a creature that has no means of communication can’t really be called a “villain,” ala the shark in Jaws. However, in both instances the creatures terrorized humans because it was in their nature to do so. They weren’t acting evil. They were simply existing.
John,
This was probably your best post of the year. Excellent advice to young and seasoned writers alike.
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Sorry for the overlap, you must have posted while I was typing my response.
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:55 pm
Some definite solid points, John and it ultimately is all subjective and up to the eye of the beholder. I just don’t think trying to see how the villain may be a hero automatically improves the character or that it makes them more three dimensional.
To each their own, quite obviously! Keep up with the awesome advice for us aspiring scribblers, August!
November 2nd, 2009 at 5:48 pm
This speaks so clearly to what I’m working on right now. Thank you for the perspective. A villain with a motive is one-dimensional. The greatest villains are the ones we can almost get behind. Almost.
November 2nd, 2009 at 6:19 pm
How about Blade Runner? The replicants are the heros. They are on a quest that will save their lives. Deckard has to kill them. But Rachel saves Deckard’s life and Roy saves Deckard’s soul. In a bold move in the thrid act Roy the villain is revealed as the hero. “All these memories, like tears in the rain.”
November 2nd, 2009 at 6:44 pm
There’s actually some debate as to how intelligent The Alien actually is. (“How can they cut the power?!? They’re animals!”) James Cameron often points out that the Queen Alien is at least smart enough to use an elevator, get around the auto-guns, hide on the dropship, and presumably order her drones to cut the power (if not in that order!) It’s safe to assume the warrior Aliens aren’t as smart but aren’t just operating from blind instinct either. (The Nostromo Alien seemed to realize the shuttle was safer then the ship, for instance.)
So how smart are they? My guess is that the the warriors are maybe up there with the smarter canines, while the Queen would be at the level of a very bright chimpanzee or gorilla. (Or maybe the Queen would even be higher then that, maybe more like the intelligence of a dolphin.) Not much capability for abstract or higher thought, but great problem-solvers. (The main problem being the same one that coyotes or foxes are very good at solving, which is mainly, how do we get inside there to kill our prey.)
November 2nd, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Reg the Shark in Jaws: I dunno, that thing seems to have kind’ve of a sadistic streak somehow. One of Jaw’s great qualities is that it somehow suggests that the shark is maybe something more then just a predator, more then just another great white shark….that there might be something…differant…about this one. Maybe even something supernatural…It isn’t pursued very deeply, just touched upon, but there’s that great moment when Quint and Hooper, the two shark experts, just stare out at sea, utterly lost for words, and can only mutter, “You ever seen one do this before?” “No…Never….”
November 2nd, 2009 at 7:10 pm
My favorite example of this is in FALLING DOWN, with Michael Douglas’ line “I’m the bad guy? How’d that happen?”
November 2nd, 2009 at 7:20 pm
I recently read an article about this, but applied as a DND campaign villain. The main point was to establish a goal for the villain, and how he would achieve said goal instead of just being generally opposed to the hero. I think it makes the story more real when the villain has a life outside of accosting the hero. They each have their own goals and desires, and they just happen to be completely opposite to the point of conflict.
November 2nd, 2009 at 8:21 pm
More than this, we see some villains as heroes.
In Friday the 13th, Jason is this expressionless killer hidden behind a mask who kills people. Consider though, who he kills. He kills people who are about to get it on. We may watch Cinemax and porn, but we’re not really happy for those about to get their freak on. He’s killing people who are getting some we aren’t, and no matter how much we get, we don’t want others to get some.
In Nightmare on Elm Street, Freddy for the most part kills kids from the upper middle class popular cliques. No matter how popular we were in school, there was always someone else who was more popular, and while we would like to imagine being on top, being the underdog is even more attractive for the sympathy vote. He’s killing the jocks and cheerleaders from Revenge of the Nerds in high school, and they are all noticeably beyond good looking and made up, and older than high school students. We’re not sympathizing with Johnny Depp.
In Halloween, Michael Myers is going one step beyond the Halloween practical joke that takes it to the edge, and doing what we’ve considered in the worst parts of our minds as predatory mammals. Hunt, kill, move along, who cares. No compassion, no after effects, no more than a hungry cat taking down a squirrel. We all have that buried deep. On top of this, he’s after his sister and willing to lay low anyone who gets in the way. Anyone with a sibling who ticked them off… This is where you get to be the ancient god of vengeance, a force of nature that cannot be stopped.
In a way, there’s nothing we humans cannot come up with that does not speak to some part of our natures that we probably find at the very least embarrassing, and at the worst, something we’d deny to our dying breath but we would take with us knowing how horribly true it was.
I’m taking a psych course and the reading is killer stuff.
November 3rd, 2009 at 4:41 am
Speaking of villains, just saw the Prince of Persia trailer…
Can we please call a moratorium (another for the list) on villains, just as they’re preparing to put their nefarious plans into action, saying – “It is time”.
Not only do villains always say that, they always say it in trailers.
November 3rd, 2009 at 5:05 am
Masanisa: It doesn’t require too much effort to see “Blade Runner” through the Replicants’ eyes, as the film is quite morally ambivalent anyway. The film is “told” (visually) as much from their perspective as from Deckard’s, and most of the human characters are depicted as stunted, clownish grotesques – it’s easy to see where Ridley Scott’s sympathies lay.
November 3rd, 2009 at 5:22 am
I always thought that a key factor in judging whether a superhero movie is working or not is how strong the villain’s motivation is. My favorite example for a weak villain motivation is the Green Goblin in the first Spider-Man. Basically, once he destroys his former co-workers on that balcony in Times Square, his reason for existing is over. The rest of the movie he just sticks around to annoy Spider-Man, which is a rather weak reason to have a villain stick around. As opposed to Lex Luthor in the first Christopher Reeve SUPERMAN, who was going to sink California for his real-estate deal anyway, even before Superman showed up. Superman just became an obstacle.
November 3rd, 2009 at 7:02 am
John mentions the villain “Chigurh”. I’ve read many a post where people discussed the name and how cool it is.
I speak German (2nd language) and immediately noticed it is very close to “Chirurg”, which means “surgeon” in German, Slovak, and probably many other languages. Makes sense.
I’m guessing that’s how the Coens developed the name, and I’m guessing they won’t respond to this post, lol.
November 3rd, 2009 at 8:44 am
Um, Cormac McCarthy developed the name, dude. Adapted from the novel, remember? : )
November 3rd, 2009 at 8:58 am
I don’t really see Chigurh as a villain in the normal sense of the word. For me he’s more like a force of nature. Kinda like the asteroid in Armaggedon. We don’t know his real motivation, his real problem. It’s like he IS Destruction. He IS Darkness and Violence.
I like it, but if you’re going to have a “villain” like that, I guess you’d need to create a different conflict for your hero and push the force of nature to the background, a little bit. I hope I made sense.
November 3rd, 2009 at 1:48 pm
much like in the dark knight, “you die a hero or live long enough to become the villain” sometimes we need to remember some of our villains were once heroes.
November 3rd, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Regarding Blade Runner…
The more technical terms for these roles are Protagonist and Antagonist(s). Although strictly speaking a villain is a bad/evil person, it’s generally synonymous with antagonist in drama. No matter how many people Deckard kills, or how many the Replicants save, he’s still the protagonist (a.k.a hero) and they’re still the antagonists (a.k.a villains).
November 3rd, 2009 at 2:28 pm
I agree with João that sometimes you want a mythic, force-of-nature adversary. The monster in Cloverfield wouldn’t be improved by giving it some lame motivation like protecting its young. It stands for Death, same as the truck in Duel or the forces of nature in The Perfect Storm.
Most of the time, though, writers are not aiming for some kind of mythic metaphor, and in those cases the villain definitely needs a strong and credible motivation. Even Hitler thought he was the good guy.
Grant, I can’t agree with you on Blade Runner. Roy Batty is the one who is changed by the story (massively: he learns the value of life and decides not to kill his enemy) which is one of the measures of the protagonist. And then you’ve got protagonists like Macbeth who sure kill a lot of people. It’s not moral stance that defines which character is the hero, though it is likely that we’ll find it easier to relate to a hero whose moral stance we aspire to.
November 3rd, 2009 at 4:22 pm
Some memorable, three-dimensional villains might well find themselves knowingly doing evil, but they usually feel forced into it. I’m thinking particularly of Iago in Othello, who sets out resolving to do wrong – but feeling that Othello has left him no choice and deserves this ultimate breach of trust, friendship etc.
(And in fact, I’ve always felt the story of Othello is far more Iago’s tragedy than the Moor’s.)
November 3rd, 2009 at 5:28 pm
I think that it’s another Michael Myers that best illustrates this point:
In Austin Powers, Dr. Evil’s sole objective is to be evil. His criminal endeavours themselves (like his $100 ransom) are of little importance to him; they are no more than the necessary activities of a villain.
This magnificent character creation proposes that a baddie who’s goal is to be bad, is laughable.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:51 am
I’ll have to respectfully agree to disagree with you, Rachel. To me, it does not matter if I can see myself in any way, shape or form getting behind a villain’s mindset or deeds as if the character themselves is not interesting or engaging-enough to me than anything else about them is extra-moot.
Again, for me the scariest, most threatening and best villains are those which love and revel not only in the darkness, destruction and suffering that they bestow upon the world but absolutely passionately love the darkness or “evil” that it is merely inherent within them. They are “bad” or villainous simply because that is who they are or what they find to be the most satisfying path to embrace. They don’t see what they are doing as the “right” thing to do and cherish that blackest of black feelings from the moment they arise to the moment they fall to slumber.
Villains who are simply misguided, mentally-ill or otherwise have a much tougher time for me to feel greatly threatened or in danger by them as I end up feeling sorry for them or too much sympathy (i.e. the character becomes too tragic), or I feel there is a very solid chance they can be reasoned with or bribed in some fashion.
Side Note: How could Alex DeLarge of “A Clockwork Orange” be viewed as a hero at all?
November 4th, 2009 at 11:31 am
@J Warner:
Alex in Clockwork Orange is a classic antihero. Rather than expecting us to find something in Alex that we admire, Burgess is inviting us to see the world through his eyes – to imaginatively roleplay what it might be like to live in that society. Alex’s violence is a product of that society, and his stand against conformity is like a darkly refracted version of McMurphy’s in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.
Both those movies belong to the genre Blake Snyder labelled “Institutionalized”. The only difference is that when we turn off our “negative capability” and surface out of the world of the story, we most likely still would empathize with McMurphy but most of us would not with Alex. He’s still the protagonist, however.
November 6th, 2009 at 1:44 am
This post is kinda epic; deals with right and wrong in society. Are we doing the right moves, and are villans just victims of the bigger perspective. As humans are put in one group, who as a body of a collected understanding and meaning, are desperate to evolve in a direction not controlled by one goal of collected happiness. In our world it
s nation up against nation and most nations are proud. Too proud. Osama is a great villain. Using the ancient tools of punishment, heroes and villains are moving towards a shared future. Theyre own presented destiny. May it be right or wrong.Haha :=) Thanks again for this great site. Im learning so much all the time, and its free. Very rare in todays society. -Thank You-November 8th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
That’s a moral relativist point of view which denies the existence of objective concepts of good and evil. Abolish the notion of evil and we fall into a Hobbesian war of all against all. Mankind’s only purpose is that which advances his own interests to the exclusion of the interests of others. One doesn’t even seek mutually beneficial agreements.
In the absence of the concepts of good and evil, the universe is indifferent between me loving and caring for my children and me torturing them to death and eating them.
Ignoring for the moment a motive of attaining some eternal reward or avoiding eternal damnation in the afterlife, if there is a stable equilibrium of interpersonal behavior which maximizes human welfare and longevity as a species, it is more likely to be attained from good behavior than evil. Just because evil can make a persuasive argument for its actions, doesn’t mean we must accept its sophistry. Evil is as evil does.
When we entertain the notion that evil-doers such as Alexander de Large, Al Capone, Bonny and Clyde, Jesse James, Timothy McVeigh, or Nidal Hasan might have had well-reasoned good intentions from their point of view, we are merely releasing pressure from our own internal mechanisms of self-control. I can vicariously cheer Alex beating up the bum, raping the snobbish socialite, and flaunting authority. But I don’t commit acts of robbery, murder, rape, violence, or disorderly conduct – not merely out of fear of retribution but out of regard for right and wrong. Simply put, I know better. “Do unto others” is indeed the Golden Rule. A man of good will and good intentions resorts to violence only as a last resort and only on those whose disregard for the well-being of others is a danger to everyone around them. I much prefer to live in a safe, orderly society of mutual rules which abridge existential freedom than suffer the perpetual fear of chaotic society.
November 9th, 2009 at 4:46 am
I definitely do not advocate behaving like Alex and his Droogs in real life. Part – indeed, the major part – of the function of storytelling is to let us safely experience other situations and viewpoints. We need had the imaginative opportunity to examine our moral “goodness” which, after all, is hardly put to the test if you are well-to-do, well-educated and live in a free society. It should be unsettling to be invited into the mindset of a teenage thug, a tyrannical Scottish warlord or the man who planned 9-11. We most likely leave that mindset reinforced in our determination to be morally good, because now we have confronted our own dark side. That’s the essence of catharsis.
November 9th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
Is the villian in “the nines”, Ryan, and the character totally rare in the play takes the victory, becoming the hero? As i take the bible, Ryan should be playing the anti-christ, but is he? Maybe that`s a little off topic.
The nines is about loving only one person. And conflicts discussing that theme in spesific, but i could be wrong. A movie without any villians really. All those people just love eachother.
November 9th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
is a villian a person off track, or is he evil? and how far do persons affected, and the people, respond to brutal acts performed by a person or group. can society in any case be blamed for actors behaviour alone or in groups for making an error in what is expected from they
re tasks. if society let villians do villian behaviour, do we want villians, or dont we know why we are creating them?November 9th, 2009 at 5:30 pm
When the protagonist of a story is “a bad guy”, we usually refer to that character as the antihero rather than the villain of the piece. In Public Enemies, for instance, Dillinger is the protagonist. It’d be a bit of a stretch to call him a hero in the classical sense, but he’s not the villain either.
A story certainly doesn’t have to have villains. The Greeks versus the Trojans – a great story, neither side is evil, on both sides we see admirably heroic characters. In real life, many bad people may be weak, despicable or insane – but they don’t make the best villains in stories. As John’s original post explained, the most effective villains are the ones we can understand. They see themselves as being in the right. We don’t have to agree with them (we are able to see the moral flaw that they can’t perceive in themselves) but they will be more memorable for not simply being portrayed as doing evil for the sake of it.
Best example I can think of: Unbreakable, where we essentially have two protagonists. For a long time it looks like a hero-&-mentor story, but look how their arcs are complementary. (I won’t give any spoilers here for where that ends up.)
November 9th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
I don
t think the nines can ever be spoiled. if youre not having it in your shelf, you cant be very much into film. In Troja, the movie suggests the Hero went beyond war when he punished for the loss of his cousin. It was he who brought him to war.As I read into it. Unbreakable is a cool flick. Willis suffers for the villains mistakes. Without him he dont need powers.