I Hate Writing Villains

[Mastered_again]

Do they twirl their mustaches and say, "Nyah hah haaah!" ?

More like lumbering gorillas.

 

[nice90sguy]

More like lumbering gorillas.

But they're cute and furry

 

[AchtungNight]

I've written some nasty femme fatales. They are indeed fun.

 

[intim8]

I am only slightly mollified by the inevitable comeuppance

Maybe they're not villainous enough to make you long for the comeuppance?

Have you tried writing or at least thinking of a compelling backstory for your villains? Most real-world villainy is done by people who either think of themselves as heroes or people who have "no choice." Your villain can be much the same.

This, and it helps to write it for yourself even if most of it doesn't make it into the story.

 

[StillStunned]

I'm afraid mine come out as stereotypes

It's much more fulfilling to call them archetypes.

 

[Mastered_again]

It's much more fulfilling to call them archetypes.

I called them drunk and obnoxious (actually Frank and Tony)

 

[Bazzle]

Villains show they are villains by doing villainous things to my heroines and I don't like that. I am only slightly mollified by the inevitable comeuppance and I absolutely hate slogging throught the villainy to get to that point.

Sorry, just at that point in my writing and whining. Carry on.

I'm currently trying to write a really bitchy protagonist. It's hard work. Because if she is too nasty no one will like her and get bored of the story. It people easily get bored of my charming characters...so goodness what I am doing!

 

[Bazzle]

I called them drunk and obnoxious (actually Frank and Tony)

most of my protagonists are extremely drunk..

 

[pink_silk_glove]

most of my protagonists are extremely drunk..

Fun things happen more when you're totally wrecked. Why is that?

 

[lovecraft68]

Villains show they are villains by doing villainous things to my heroines and I don't like that. I am only slightly mollified by the inevitable comeuppance and I absolutely hate slogging throught the villainy to get to that point.

Sorry, just at that point in my writing and whining. Carry on.

I feel you. My work here, other than the Sibs with Benefits series is mostly erotic, a few trainwreck instances of real life issues, but nothing too bad

But in my erotic horror work, my first novel was very much a I spit on your grave Homage with a supernatural spin. It pissed me off to have to write what happens to her, but I ended up skipping to the part where she gets her revenge so that when I wrote it I was amped up, pissed off, and delivered a scene that a friend told me made him cringe like nothing else had short of Jack Ketchum's Off Season, and that was high praise if you're a horror fan.

What I want to add is readers, especially these days with sensitivity readers and PC out of control etc, is to portray a villain, they have to be a D-bag because you want people to cheer when they meet their end. I have had my antagonists use racist slurs, sexist slurs, homophobic, to show what an asshole they are, and I've taken some heat from the flake crowd who seems to think I'm that character, but whatever, want the reader to hate someone, make him a shit stain.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Without a villain, there is no hero. If you want to write a hero, if you want him to grow, to overcome adversity, to make a sacrifice, then you need to have a well-written villain. Making a relatable villain, one who is a bastard but has some motives to be a bastard, is what a good story of that type needs.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I like a good villain. They're exciting and fun. They do unexpected things and keep you on your toes. Here's to the Hanibal Lectors, the Darth Vaders, and the bent-fingered aliens chasing Roy Thinnes. Lift a glass to Dracula, the wolfman, Fritz and his torch tormenting the Creature (only in the movies), the guy in the truck behind Dennis Weaver. The voice on the CB in the original Wrong Turn (Ted Levine), the making a body suit in Silence of the Lambs (Ted Levine again), and Leather Face. What's not to love?

Villains show they are villains by doing villainous things to my heroines and I don't like that. I am only slightly mollified by the inevitable comeuppance and I absolutely hate slogging throught the villainy to get to that point.

Sorry, just at that point in my writing and whining. Carry on.

 

[mildlyaroused]

Clearly something has to change. Don't think of them as "villains", think of them as characters just like your protagonist. If you could swap around and exchange your villains for one another, they are not doing their job well enough. A villain shouldn't just serve as a foil for the protagonist; they are their own person, and they should be written as such. Give them backstory. Give them eccentricity. Give them flavour.

The easiest way to make a villain not entire superficial is to ask, "What is the thematic core of my story? What character arc is my protagonist going through?" Then your villain should be the antithesis to this theme. They are in direct (thematic) contradiction with your protagonist, which has more depth than just plot. This is the most basic structure. Then you can start adding nuance, giving the villain valid arguments, having many different arcs and themes intertwine, etc.

And you can write a pure-evil villain. Sometimes that works, especially in blockbuster entertainment. But you still have to make them unique. They have to have some sort of thematic crux in the story beyond just villainous behaviour (unless villainous behaviour is the crux of their character; think the Joker). Again, if you can swap your villains around with little effect on the narrative and characters, they don't have enough of a stake in their stories.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I'm working on a series of short stories for a sale site (not Amazon and such) about a serial killer. He's also a rapist and plays with his victims for days before the inevitable end. Not that all of his "play" will be told about. He's relating the story to a writer, who, once Charlie's gone, will publish his manifesto. Charlie tells the man he has cancer. He does have a nasty coffee and a bad habit of smoking and apparently has done so since he was 16 years old. The only name he gives is Charlie Blu, and makes it clear that he has had other names but will use only his "real name" while he tells him the story.

I don't think Charlie is an unreliable narrator, but with one short story finished, I rather like him. I have outlined three stories and won't publish the first until at least those are finished. There is a third personal frame that the first-person narrative fits inside of, with breakouts for conversation here and there between the young writer and the older killer.

After I’m dead, tell the story, but tell it as I relate it. Do not put your opinions, views, or morality into my account. What I do is against the law, but it isn’t immoral, not for me. A doctor, a psychiatrist, once said I was psychotic. That I perceived the world differently than ordinary people.

I prefer to think of it as recognizing my superiority, and because I am, I don’t need to follow the rules conventional people impose on those like themselves.

 

[Voboy]

Villains are some of my favorite people to write. I find them fascinating, mostly because the capacity for villainy is present in everyone under the wrong circumstances. I like showing that villains aren't one-dimensionally bad, but then I also like showing that heroines or heroes are not one-dimensionally good.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Villains are some of my favorite people to write. I find them fascinating, mostly because the capacity for villainy is present in everyone under the wrong circumstances. I like showing that villains aren't one-dimensionally bad, but then I also like showing that heroines or heroes are not one-dimensionally good.

And some villains are great at drawing out that latter point. One of the villains I've enjoyed writing (and hope to write again) sees most people as inherently flawed and corrupt, and considers it her role to expose that by offering them choices. She's invariably delighted on the rare occasions when somebody refuses the temptation dangled before them.

One of the best "villain" stories I've read recently is Natalie Zina Walschot's Hench, about a woman who becomes chief assistant to a Luthor-tier supervillain. I don't think many people would come away from that book thinking of Anna as "just misunderstood"/"victim of circumstances", but the story makes her choices understandable (as opposed to excusable) and the failings of that world's "heroes" are a big part of why she becomes a villain and how she becomes an effective one.

 

[HordHolm]

I always look at villains as people innately frustrated by the incompetence around them, and that is one of the things (alongside their general villainy) that drives them onwards.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I hate writing villains. So I don't. Life provides enough sources of conflict, and events to push characters around. I'm not great at character conflict, either, but get round that by doing it in as few lines as possible and moving on to the effects on my protagonists.

I did enjoy writing a hellbeing in Erotic Horror, who feeds on sexual thoughts. I'll revisit them, sometimes.

 

[RetroFan]

I'm the opposite - I love writing villains and unlikable protagonists. Like Cornelius and his father Alistair from my 'Crazy Cornelius and the Magic Pills' story series. Cornelius is a stupid and sadistic sociopath who wreaks havoc wherever he goes, while the father is an abusive, tyrannical bigot.

 

[THBGato]

I don't bother. I mean, in Lesbian Sex it's very easy to have a villain - the ex, the controlling father, the uptight religious mother who insists their daughter stay in the closet. I'm not knocking those stories, and some of my favourites have those type of antagonists.

However, I think it's far more interesting for the frustration/nightmare stage of the plot be caused by flaws or hang-ups within the protagonists themselves: their own insecurity and self doubt; their guilt; their concern with the way the world sees them; their fear of rejection. They become their own antagonists and the story is about them accepting themselves. I would say 7 out of the top ranked 10 stories in the genre follow this path.

The closest I came to a villain was Lucy in Eve & Lucy, but she was more of a foil character than a villain and, anyway, doesn't turn up until Chapter 3. By that point the protagonists were already doing a great job of screwing things up for themselves.

So, if you don't like writing villains, then do away with them altogether. (That was advice to the OP by the way: if writing villains are your bag, then more power to you naturally.)