How would you write a evil character without making him "sexy" or cool?

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nyalathotep

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I notice in a lot of media there is a strong emphasis on the greatness of evil characters. They can often end up more popular than the good guys in the book or on the show, and overshadow everyone else around them.

Darth Vader is a good example. He is a despicable human being who has committed genocide and is responsible for the deaths of billions of people. Yet the common talk is of how much of a badass he is. His coolness has made him one of the most popular characters in history. He is on lunchboxes and has action figures, and people dress up as him in costumes.

How can you write an evil character while reminding the reader that he leaves behind real damage? That he causes suffering and pain to flesh and bone people without dwelling on how awesome he is while doing it?
 

JetFueledCar

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I notice in a lot of media there is a strong emphasis on the greatness of evil characters. They can often end up more popular than the good guys in the book or on the show, and overshadow everyone else around them.

Darth Vader is a good example. He is a despicable human being who has committed genocide and is responsible for the deaths of billions of people. Yet the common talk is of how much of a badass he is. His coolness has made him one of the most popular characters in history. He is on lunchboxes and has action figures, and people dress up as him in costumes.

How can you write an evil character while reminding the reader that he leaves behind real damage? That he causes suffering and pain to flesh and bone people without dwelling on how awesome he is while doing it?

First of all, I'm a cynic and a misanthrope. But I don't believe in evil. Evil, in my experience, is just a convenient way to dismiss the reality that other people have wants and needs and lived realities that aren't in sync with ours. That's not to say I don't believe in right and wrong--I do. There are things that are not okay and will never be okay no matter what your reasons for doing them. But the people who do them do them because they believe it *is* okay, and that idea comes from other people or from within them, not from some cosmic force whispering in their ear. Calling them "evil," in my opinion, is a way of giving them a pass. Darth Vader is actually a great example here. The prequels showed us why he did what he did and how he became what he did. It wasn't a result of evil. It was real, human decisions, driven by every small, shriveled emotion the human heart has, from selfishness and greed to fear and helplessness. Darth Vader *is* a villain, and did terrible things, but he is not evil. He is human, and that is much more dangerous.

On to the question.

In some genres, in some respect, your villain will always be seen as a badass. That's because villains in a certain kind of book must be highly competent at some things that are pretty cool, like magic and combat and getting their way, in order to pose a threat to your hero. A certain breed of fan will always equate that with badass.

But such villains *can* be managed and, if that's the desire, avoided. They tend to show up, as my memory tells me, in larger than life stories, with archetypal characters. The more human reality in the story, the less iconic or "sexy" the villain. Voldemort will always have his fans, and this isn't the place to debate Snape, but Ben Ladradun (Cold Fire by Tamora Pierce) is a small, pitiable man who was selfish enough to think the world owed him.

Part of what I'm seeing looking at my bookshelf is that the key to making a villain less "sexy" is making them less "evil." None of my own books have "evil" antagonists; most of them don't have "villains" at all. Snyder thinks he's looking out for Alec; Lindsey is trying to save her son from the fate our protagonist's father left him to. There is something small and scared at the core of such people, something that stops them from being "sexy."

Of course, it is pretty cool that Lindsey can rip out your still-beating heart and leave your skin intact.

The alternative, of course, is to make them MORE "evil." Check TV Tropes for Moral Event Horizon. Empress Berenene dor Ocmore (Will of the Empress, Tamora Pierce) is a wonderfully written villain and has beautiful shades of humanity woven through her--but I hate her because she condones the forced marriage of women in her country. In one of the fanfictions I'm writing for Kingdom Hearts, even if it was original and even though it's a fairly popular villain, no one would root for him as I've written him, because for ten chapters before we even learn his name we watch his victim struggle through panic attacks and flashbacks relating to the abuse they suffered at his hands.

And oddly enough, no, genocide and murder won't be that Moral Event Horizon, unless the genocide is of a group we're inclined to protect. Blowing up a random planet we don't care about = eh, for all we know it was a prison colony. Active affiliation with Nazis = your villain is now dead to almost all your readers.

(All of the above, of course, is my own opinion, based on what I've read and observed while reading and writing.)
 

Jade Rothwell

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But the people who do them do them because they believe it *is* okay, and that idea comes from other people or from within them, not from some cosmic force whispering in their ear. Calling them "evil," in my opinion, is a way of giving them a pass.

that's actually a really interesting perspective, and one I agree with. (it extends past fiction, as well, leading to cruelty being excused as the person isn't 'evil' therefore, could not have done it. but that's a whole other discussion.) for stories, I'd say that there's no way to guarantee your character won't be misinterpreted and/or their actions excused :( all you can do is write the character in a way that feels right for the story
 

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I believe the secret to writing a compelling villain lies in this phrase: "Every villain is the hero in his own mind". As a writer, you have to give your antagonist solid goals, a clear motivation and a backstory. What event/events in their past led them to act the way they are acting? As JetFueledCar said, people have a reason for behaving the way they behave, and that reason usually lies in their past (trauma, the way they were raised, past relationships etc). The key here is to EXPLAIN the villain's behavior; that is, show why they act that way so it is clear to readers. But never JUSTIFY it; that is, do not excuse him for the horrible acts of violence he may do. Showing what he has gone through and what are the motivations behind his violence can make the villain compelling and stir emotions in readers. Why do so many people like Loki? Because they sympathize with his struggles. They do not excuse his actions (killing 80 people in 2 days), but they may identify to a certain extent with the reasons behind them.
The point I am trying to make is to simply try your best to craft a compelling character, using your knowledge on that aspect of the craft or your innate story sense. The moral judgement of your character's action is upon the reader to make.
 

Curlz

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How can you write an evil character while reminding the reader that he leaves behind real damage? That he causes suffering and pain to flesh and bone people without dwelling on how awesome he is while doing it?
Make your villain and their deeds truly repulsive. When Darth Vader blows up a planet, we don't really see the damage. We see one big colourful boom! resembling fireworks. There is no real pain and suffering to be seen in that scene and we don't know anybody on that planet to empathise with. If the movie showed closeups of torn bodyparts, maybe the Vader fandom would be smaller. But then again, in the real world all sorts of convicted criminals get loads of fanmail. There will always be some sort of fandom for a baddie. Then, think about the villain in Schindler's List, the one played by an incredibly handsome Ralph Fiennes. Due to the character actions within the movie, he didn't get quite such a fanbase as Vader because not many people want to be him.
 

AnthonyDavid11

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I will say this. Your villain must be every bit as strong as your protagonist and by that, I mean he must be stronger. Darth Vader is cool because of marketing and his intro music, etc. If you only had the story itself, he might still be cool because he can make a guy start to choke without being in the same room with him. I mean, that's cool any way you look at it. But he is also a very imposing leader who will crush anybody with the emperor's say so.

However, I'd say he's memorable because he does actually turn against the emperor eventually. If he didn't have that moment of redemption, he wouldn't be as cool, in my opinion. I mean, is Voldemort as cool as Darth? Just as evil for sure if not more so, but as cool? I think not. Darth is cooler than any sci-fi or fantasy villain that I have seen or read which admittedly is not a lot since it's not my genre.
 

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Well, it might be the no brainer approach, but one way to make a villain not appear cool or sexy is to make a villain that is... neither cool, nor sexy.

If you want to see a perfect example of this, you only need to look at something like Terry Gilliam's 1980s movie, Brazil, which has Michael Palin putting in an amazing performance as someone that appears to be a dull, uninteresting, family-oriented bureaucrat, who also happens to be one of the single most frightening people in the entire movie. I won't go into too many details, but the trick here is that this particular character is neither exceptionally physically attractive, nor is he portrayed in a way that hints, at least in the beginning, that he is anything other than another dull person you might meet at the subway who's more than happy to whip out his wallet with his family photos and chew your ear off about his kids. He is, in every way, to superficial appearances, a dull, average, nondescript person who just happens to be very good at some job that seems to require a lot of paperwork and organization. He only becomes memorable, and terrifying when it is finally revealed what he actually does for a living.

Villains become cool and sexy when writers go out of their way to make them so. Don't make your villain physically attractive and he or she won't be considered sexy. Don't make your villains do impressive, spectacular things with crazy action sequences, and they won't be cool. A person that just sits at some kind of assembly line, factory style setting, reading comics books to keep himself amused while pushing a button that gases 10 children every five minutes, for example, is neither cool nor sexy. The very banality of the evil is what makes it terrifying. That someone could be so disconnected from what they are doing that reading a comic book to keep himself amused while executing children is clearly villainous, but few people would watch a small, average looking person doing this and think, "Wow, that person just oozes sexiness and the way he pushes that button to kill those kids is so bad ass! I totally admire him!"

I suppose the easiest way to make a villain that isn't cool or sexy is to play it safe and go the complete opposite. Challenge yourself to create a villain that is both uncool and unsexy. Find qualities, actions and personality traits you find unattractive and build them into your villain. Chances are if you don't think this person is very appealing, most other people won't either.
 

blacbird

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As a reader, and perhaps I'm not representative a most readers, I don't find "evil" villains and "good" heros of much interest. I need more complexity than that. Otherwise, it's "The Perils of Pauline", the heroine being tied to the railroad tracks by the mustache-twisting villain for little or no reason.

At which moment I discover this in a piece of writing, I go looking for another piece of writing to read.

caw
 

frimble3

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Why do more people dress up as Darth Vader than Obi-Wan Kenobi? Same skills, a heroic figure, clearly on the side of right, etc. Darth Vader has a cool uniform. Obi-Wan - brown cape over a plain martial arts outfit. And, remember when Darth Vader was unmasked? Try making a 'cool' hero out of a saggy, wrinkled old man.
So, make your villain mundane, as the above posts suggest, make him physically unattractive, and give him an annoying personality. Make him bluster, make him whiny. These are not 'majestic evil' traits.
 

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I notice in a lot of media there is a strong emphasis on the greatness of evil characters. They can often end up more popular than the good guys in the book or on the show, and overshadow everyone else around them.

In any good story where there is a villain, the reader/watcher has to believe the villain is capable of defeating the hero or there's no tension. It seems natural for H/V to be two sides of one coin, so if we love the hero, we see the villain's strengths, too. If we don't the villain won't be a very believable foil.

How can you write an evil character while reminding the reader that he leaves behind real damage? That he causes suffering and pain to flesh and bone people without dwelling on how awesome he is while doing it?

Show the damage, either physically or psychologically. I don't think anyone's rooting for Cersei Lannister, and she certainly isn't overshadowing the other characters. Jaime, on the other hand...
 

Thomas Vail

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It's easier to write a 'cool' or 'badass' villain because that gives you easily accessible hooks to get a reader interested in a character, and redeeming features of some sort make it much easier for a readier to internally justify liking a bad guy. It's much harder to write an interesting villain without these handles, but whatever they're doing, it needs to be interesting and understandable. You can do an off their rocker villain who does horrific things just because, but it's really hard to make them interesting. It's like the mention of Snidely Whiplash up above. 'Just because' doesn't hold onto reader interest for long.

A good modern example of real world evil would be King Leopold II of Belgium. The Congolese were not real people to him, and as long as it kept making him rich, he really had no care at all how many millions died so long as they kept lining his pockets.

Actual evil really is quite banal. It's the king who finds genocide irrelevant to personal gain. It's the person paving their way to hell on good intentions, their own myopia and ignorance keeping them from understanding that their 'help' is anything but. A bureaucrat whose greater concern is that rules and regulations are followed than doing what is right.
 

DancingMaenid

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First of all, I think it's worth keeping in mind that villains can be "cool" in different ways. Sometimes people like a villain because they're charming or larger than life. Sometimes they like them because they really are chilling, creepy people and that can be interesting in fiction.

Another thing to keep in mind: what will serve your story? There are definitely ways you can ramp up a character's villainy by showing the destruction they cause, but I think it can be obvious (and kind of patronizing) when a writer goes overboard trying to make people hate the villain. Sometimes a little goes a long way.

With Star Wars, I think it's important to remember that the original trilogy, in particular, is not exactly gritty realism. Yes, there are some dark moments. Luke's home is burned down. A planet gets blown up. But it's a space opera that was popular with children. We don't see the extent of Darth Vader's cruelty, but we also don't see too many horrific things happen to (or committed by) our heroes. Any horror is more implied. The distancing of the violence is part of the tone.
 

Luciferical

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The alternative, of course, is to make them MORE "evil." Check TV Tropes for Moral Event Horizon. Empress Berenene dor Ocmore (Will of the Empress, Tamora Pierce) is a wonderfully written villain and has beautiful shades of humanity woven through her--but I hate her because she condones the forced marriage of women in her country. In one of the fanfictions I'm writing for Kingdom Hearts, even if it was original and even though it's a fairly popular villain, no one would root for him as I've written him, because for ten chapters before we even learn his name we watch his victim struggle through panic attacks and flashbacks relating to the abuse they suffered at his hands.

One of the hardest concepts to take in, it seems, is that the reader is not obligated to see what you want them to see. A powerful antagonist that operates by his or her own rules, and won't surrender to your hero, he's going to be cool. Voldemort is mention down-thread, but even he has followers among readers of the Harry Potter world.

Or Oz. The Wicked Witch of The West has no redeeming qualities that I can think of. And yet she was so fascinating as to inspire the play "Wicked." Likewise Maleficent.

IMO, the more you try to take away your villain's "coolness" or sexiness, the more you're going to find people fascinated by him or her. So... don't try. As top tier philosophers like Yoda and Nike say. Just do it. :D

Make the villain. Make him or her real. Let the reader see why he or she is the villain. And accept what the reader does with that.
 

Twick

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I notice in a lot of media there is a strong emphasis on the greatness of evil characters. They can often end up more popular than the good guys in the book or on the show, and overshadow everyone else around them.

Darth Vader is a good example. He is a despicable human being who has committed genocide and is responsible for the deaths of billions of people. Yet the common talk is of how much of a badass he is. His coolness has made him one of the most popular characters in history. He is on lunchboxes and has action figures, and people dress up as him in costumes.

How can you write an evil character while reminding the reader that he leaves behind real damage? That he causes suffering and pain to flesh and bone people without dwelling on how awesome he is while doing it?

You can have non-awesome villains, but the problem is that they're not going to go down in history as great villains because they're, well, non-awesome.

If we're going to discuss fanfic, I have one where I have, I think, a non-awesome villain. He's essentially a drug dealer, selling an addictive electronic drug and then forcing his customers to lure in more victims. He's racist, cruel and dangerously deceptive. But his aim is simply to make more money than he has right now. He's not building an empire, seeking revenge, or following a fiery but misguided ideology. He's just common, dishwater-dull selfish. I was rather pleased with him, in a "banality of evil" way. But he would probably suck in a longer novel, because he's got no quirks or virtues serving the cause of vice, like Vader.
 

BenPanced

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Or the villain's attractiveness/beauty can be a major distraction to the hero/heroine. Case in point: the James Bond series. How many times has Bond seduced the beautiful girl only to find out she's the honey pot sent by the main villain?
 

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JetFueledCar wrote a very thoughtful response to the OP's question, and it covered most of the points I could have made.

One way to get a handle on how to present a villain who won't turn into a "sexy" villain, or a mustache-twirling caricature of evil, one is to dissect and examine novels where the author created the kind of antagonist you're looking for.

IMO, it helps to keep the reader well grounded in the main character, and while you should show the villain's motives if they are relevant, you should never let the reader forget the negative effect the antagonist or villain has on the main character and on others who are sympathetic. Would fans have been as willing to forgive Darth Vader for blowing up a planet if the movie had spent time on that planet and bonded with some of hose who would be killed by his act? What if the story had focused more on Leia and on post traumatic effects of witnessing the death of the world she called home? The death of Luke's aunt and uncle were more salient to the viewer than the death of an entire planet, but even so Luke appeared to leave the horror of that behind pretty quickly.

That was the kind of story the original Star Wars was, though--always looking forward with little emphasis on protagonist angst. Ironically, there was more focus on Anakin's post-traumatic issues in Episodes 1-3.

Also consider that a villain doesn't have to be especially witty or attractive or flashy in their talents to be a threat. Look at some of the figures that have done great evil in RL history. Look at some of the figures and world leaders that many of us regard as horrible threats today, people who may go down in history as villains of one kind of another.

A common kind of antagonist is the Jungian mirror of the protagonist. This can work very well, as it emphasizes the things they have in common and there's a constant threat/fear of the protagonist going too far and becoming what they are fighting. This kind of villain tends to attract fans because they are so close to or similar to the protagonist. Not all antagonists have to be Jungian mirrors (or shadows) of the protagonist, though.

Another possibility is to write a story where there isn't a single antagonist. Sometimes a protagonist is working against a system, group, or organization. Antagonists can even be forces of nature, or the protagonist themselves.
 
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I also think jetfuledcar wrote a comprehensive reply. *Evil* is made not born, so write the full back-story or character sketch of the villain. A villain is still a human and not a natural disaster like a hurricane that has no purpose other than to destroy. A villain has a reason and a purpose. There was this great article on Antifa the other day. It made a great point of separating the means from the end. You could understand/or agree with a group's goal and disagree with thier means, or you could disagree with both. Maybe the villain has a goal you could understand, like, hey, I don't want people to treat me like crap anymore, but goes about it in a way that is terrible, like I'm going to kill every girl who won't go out with me. Anyway, unless the villain is a natural disaster type character I think they need to have something that makes them human.
 

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Villains are often attractive because villains are often active.

Absolutely this. Inquisitor Glokta in Joe Abercrombie's The First Law series is hideous, crippled, lame, and a professional torturer. He even shits the bed ffs, and he's STILL most people's favourite character in the books. Why? He's witty, and more importantly he Does Stuff.

A villian who just signs paperwork that gets people killed all day isn't cool, one who gets off his butt and makes people dead kinda is.
 
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