What are the key points to creating a complex and deep villain?
When creating a story, it is important to make the protagonist and his companions attractive characters, but it is equally or even more important to create a deep and attractive 'villain'. Author
Minrose Gwin on Creating Complex Villains ‹ Literary Hub
https://lithub.com/minrose-gwin-on-creating-complex-villains/
Stories are always filled with villains who get in the way of the protagonist, oppose the protagonists, or try to destroy the world. The conflict between the protagonist and the villain makes you feel anxious, and you can feel cathartic when you defeat the villain and overcome the obstacles. For example, a YouTube channel that analyzes movies and dramas categorizes villains in Disney movies into 'outcasts' and 'tyrants,' and points out that stories in which the villain is an 'outcast villain' tend to focus on the hero's innate personality, while stories in which the villain is a 'tyrant villain' tend to focus on the protagonist's innate personality. As such, the nature of the villain affects the tendency of the story and the nature of the protagonist.
What are the roles of the two types of villains in Disney movies, the 'outcast' and the 'tyrant'? - GIGAZINE
It's important to have a villain in your story, but if you just make them an obstacle or a loser, your story can feel shallow. 'Villains cause trouble, and trouble makes for good stories,' Gwynne said. 'But you have to create a central character who's not just a villain, but who's complex and even sympathetic. That's really hard.'
Gwynne quotes 20th century American author Eudora Welty as saying, 'A fiction writer needs to write with love, and with love, he can write with pure rage.' Welty argued that writing with both love and rage is fundamental to understanding a particular character, whether hero or villain, as a 'complex human being with good and flaws.'
Echoing Welty's words, Gwynne said, 'When it came to creating villains, I wrote with more anger than love.' In fact, when he was writing his debut novel, ' The Queen of Palmyra ,' his editor pointed out that he was 'making the villain too villainous' with the murderer who appeared as the villain. Gwynne reflected on the reason for this, saying, 'The villain was a cheesy characterization, with no context or real meaning as to why he became such a loathsome character. The early characters were too simple, too predictable.'
Based on his own experience, Gwynne shared three questions you should ask yourself when creating a villain.
- Does the villain have an attractive charisma that draws in readers even who know a lot about the villain, such as the specific crimes he or she has committed and his or her natural temperament?
Does the villain have a somewhat understandable past that makes them lose their empathy and kindness?
- Does the villain raise a larger issue about human nature, our tendency or weakness toward evil or injustice?
Among the three questions, Gwynne points out that the third one, 'Does the villain raise big questions about human evil and injustice, or about weaknesses?', is particularly important. Striving to evoke the unpleasant possibilities of malice and victimhood that exist in all of us gives depth to the role of the villain. At the same time, Gwynne says that you should be able to write with both love and anger while understanding the character, as Welty says.
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