Villains

Yui

Yui

Active Member
I am a very creative person who can try to make characters out of pretty much anything. (You can show me the blandest of pictures and I'll try.) But the one type I seem to always have a problem with are villains. I don't know what it is, but I seem to have so much trouble with it and end doing to usual 'insane maniac hellbent on world domination' trope and that's it. I can't seem to give any reasons for it. I have made only one villain character in my free time that can be considered good, but that's it.

Why am I throwing this out at you? Well, I'm looking for tips. How do you make a good villain?
 
Villains are people too. Most villains throughout history have thought as themselves as the heroes of the story. So stay away from the stereotypes and play them as an actual character with hopes and goals they want achieve. They just have a different idea of what is morally and legally acceptable to achieve those goals.
 
Evilgarison said:
Villains are people too. Most villains throughout history have thought as themselves as the heroes of the story. So stay away from the stereotypes and play them as an actual character with hopes and goals they want achieve. They just have a different idea of what is morally and legally acceptable to achieve those goals.
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I do look at other media with good villainess characters in them (Mostly Marvel and DC such as Lex Luthor) to try and get inspiration from those or examples when making my character, but I end up nearly just copying them and having to throw it away. It's not like I'm trying to, it's just been some problem I have.
 
Well first you need to know what theme or mood you're going for in the story overall. Sometimes the maniacal world conquering villain is what is needed for the hero to stomp into the ground without any remorse. The villain as a person I mentioned above is for a more morally gray story. So once you know what kind of story you're going for it is easier to tailor a villain to match. Also don't feel bad if your character has some similarities between evil characters you've seen before, if you didn't how would you even know the character was a bad guy. I would also say just don't worry about tropes and feeling like you're copying, cause there are tropes on top of tropes, or if you're a South Park fan "Simpsons did it." Just make a villain that's works well with your story and you would enjoy to write and/or role play about or with. Continue to look at others work for inspiration and add your own flavor to it.
 
To me, some of the scariest villain's are the one's that seem too real, meaning that they are easy to relate to. This may seem like an odd route to go, but what I often do is think of my worst qualities or the worst qualities of people around me and put them into a character. Then I add negative feelings and thoughts that most people have and have the character give in to them, unlike what most normal people would do. If you find yourself thinking, "I kind of feel bad for this guy" or "It's scary how real he is" then you most likely have the workings of a good villain.

I hope that this will help!
 
MadMax said:
To me, some of the scariest villain's are the one's that seem too real, meaning that they are easy to relate to. This may seem like an odd route to go, but what I often do is think of my worst qualities or the worst qualities of people around me and put them into a character. Then I add negative feelings and thoughts that most people have and have the character give in to them, unlike what most normal people would do. If you find yourself thinking, "I kind of feel bad for this guy" or "It's scary how real he is" then you most likely have the workings of a good villain.

I hope that this will help!
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This is kinda how I had managed to make my first villain character mentioned earlier named "Brietta Darkcrow" also sometimes referred to as Eclipse. I guess I could keep going with doing things like that when making villains.
 
Well, making a villain is definitely not easy. I've always found it hard because I don't like making them the bad guy even though that is what they are. This happens to me when I watch movies as well because I pity some of them and then feel bad when they get a bad ending. An Example would be the Phantom from Phantom of the Opera, I felt so bad for him!
 
Creating a villain is a very important part of any story and it is one of the hardest part. What i personally do when i can't come up with any good villain ideas is to imagine the opposite of what my main character is, a pure nemesis to the good guy in your story can be a bit cliché but it is a good place to base a personality off of though it is important build off that personality so the villain evolves and isn't just a broken mirror of your main character. Im no writing wiz but it's mostly how i come up with my villains base personality.
 
I get inspiration from villainous characters and build my character from there.. Also lets say they're a psychopath, I study up on how the psychopath thinks and acts. Also I use music from the series Dexter to inspire my darker muses but that could just be something that helps me. xD
 
I think that a great way to make villains is to establish the stakes of what they are doing. With proper established tension, and threat, a villain can properly thrive. As a villain, you've gotta slowly up the stakes, never go full mary sue and destroy everything, but put pressure on the other characters. You gotta ease into the role. From my own previous blunders, I found that most unconvincing villains had the persona, the character going, but the fear wasn't there. If you can steal a character's power, attack their family, etc., you can truly establish your villain as a threat.

Another key part, is recognising, as others said, the humanness of the villain. They're typically not motivated by 'pure-hatred', or their 'psychopathic tendencies', they have direct goals and aspirations that thy work towards. These goals and aspirations just happen to conflict with the morally-aligned characters, however, causing them to actively work against each-other. Your aim has to be based in reality, and influence the other characters as well. Always place the success of this goal over the defeat of your adversaries, (unless that is your character's goal).

Scale is an essential part of villainhood. Your plans cannot be too large. Recognising that you cannot just murder everyone in the blink of an eye, or tear down the entire overarching political system in a single post, is essential. You take on these things in bite-sized pieces. Work towards gaining the power to do so, if that's your aim. Just don't expect to have this stuff handed to you on a silver platter. What the other characters have created takes time to make. You can't just reverse the efforts of another writer's efforts in a day. You have to be realistic in your actions.

Relationships are the next key aspect. As a villain, you can't just cut off from everybody, and be a 'silent killer in the night'. You've got to make relationships, establish alliances, etcetera. When you fight the other characters, doing so alone is suicide - and if you do succeed, it's typically due to a misunderstanding of scale, as highlighted before. You must be willing to combat the other characters with the help of other characters. Don't just limit yourself to physically assaulting them. Emotional manipulation, fear, destruction of property, etc, work. As a villain, you have a diverse toolbox of strategies to strike down the opposition. Don't limit yourself to knives and guns.

The final key part, is recognising change. Your character can change. He can lose and die. He can turn into a good guy. He can become even worse of a villain. Don't be static.
 
I like a good betrayal. If you have all the villain's kind actions towards the main character seem genuine, it makes them seem more ruthless and unfeeling when they turn around, especially if the main character tries to talk to them, remind them of the good things they did, and it doesn't work. Maybe that's just me though.
 
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For me, my favourite villains are the ones who use their brains. In most fantasies, I got tired of the old villain-outnumbers-good-but-good-still-wins stories. For me a villain doesn't spam minions but instead use HIS minions carefully enough he wins even when outnumbered.
I am a villain fanatic and prefer villains over "good" guys. Villains like Kane from C&C or Archaeon from Warhaer Fantasy are my favourite a because they use their BRAINs and win when outnumbered.
 
I'm honestly a little surprised people are still replying to this. Then again, it might just be because I haven't been using this site in a long time. Anyway, I wanna thank you all for helping me out with this. I think I can try and make a better villain now.
 
Yui said:
I'm honestly a little surprised people are still replying to this. Then again, it might just be because I haven't been using this site in a long time. Anyway, I wanna thank you all for helping me out with this. I think I can try and make a better villain now.
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Have the villain use brains! Not brawn! :)
 
LORDKHAOS said:
Have the villain use brains! Not brawn! :)
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Brains actually is what I'm going for with a current fantasy horror (if that makes sense) story I'm working on. I've got most of the characters and setting done at the moment.
 
(I'm a noob so you're free to take my advise with a grain of salt since these other peeps seem to know what they are doing better)

With that said; Villains are my favorite - as a matter of fact more often than not I prefer writing and fleshing out an evil character than a good one.

Here's the thing with Villains, they are the reflection of the hero in their story - they basically represent the evil that *must* lurk within the hero himself. [i.e: A Lawful Good character that follows rules to achieve their own goal, shares THAT VERY trait with a Lawful Evil character - in the sense they will follow their moral code to achieve their goal]

I mean truthfully, a hero can be his own villain in the sense that an inner debate can turn into this full inner-monologue about self-doubt and that is the thing with Heroes, they are by nature, conflicted about literally everything. Overall, the villain will always be the truth the hero wants to hide, the way I see it, the villain is the "evil" people try to oversee by being like "I know stuff is getting blown up but... this dude saved like 32 puppies last week so that is some good stuff right there #FaithInHumanityRestored #Blessed"

Like sure, that is not always the case, but I mean... that kind of is the case a lot of the time. Humans, or anything/anyone with a *human aspect* to them, fears evil or the idea of evil. Villains are a play off this, can you imagine a villain cowering to another villain? Heck no. That is because villains *are* their own brand of evil, and in their eyes, they are the bad of the bad. The prime rotten apple.

Last thing; a Villain is literally the force that should propel the hero. A villain is the stone that makes the hero evolve into a savior or into a "hero" - in the end without our friendly neighborhood serial killer and gun-slinging baddie, we would not have a law enforcer.

I mean like I said, it's like nature to me to create baddies so I have no real way to describe how I do it, or anyway to guarantee it will work for you.... but I hope I helped in some way ; v ; ♡
 
Yui said:
I am a very creative person who can try to make characters out of pretty much anything. (You can show me the blandest of pictures and I'll try.) But the one type I seem to always have a problem with are villains. I don't know what it is, but I seem to have so much trouble with it and end doing to usual 'insane maniac hellbent on world domination' trope and that's it. I can't seem to give any reasons for it. I have made only one villain character in my free time that can be considered good, but that's it.

Why am I throwing this out at you? Well, I'm looking for tips. How do you make a good villain?
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I usually pick a controversial topic and build a sort of philosophy or belief system around it. Usually you want to stay in the gray area, and on these topics they really seem like a huge gray area, so both villain and heroes will have some questionable positions on them. I try to make the villains position be a bit more morally correct than that of the heroes. The key difference will be that the villain is trying to impose his worldview on everyone else, and I use the leverage that being morally superior on that particular subject offers in order to justify the villains deeds. Everything will flow so naturally from there. The villain becomes reletable but at the same time overall the evil guy.

If we are talking about roleplay, just study the world your villain lives in, and pick the controversial topic.
Is there a war plaguing the society? The villain wants to stop that with assassinations and acts of terrorism against his own government.
Is there a state religion that has some morally dubious, or outright wrong practices? The villain will try to free the people of the shackles of such faith, killing the leaders and when he realizes that for each one he kills, a new one steps up he looks for a more permanent solution that will jeopardize the whole society.
In every scenario his intentions must be good, his means escalate to the point there is no doubt he must be stopped, and he will inevitably kill good people along the way.
Emotionally he must be the guy people root for, but rationally a threat that must be stopped no matter how good his intentions. Like in the movie Law abiding citizen where the guy who killed his family goes free and he kills him, starting a crusade against the justice system which he sees as broken, and he is not too far from the truth. He holds the whole city hostage killing some good, innocent people along the way. And in the end you are still left with the impression that he was right and even justified, and what happened was unfair, because you can relate on an emotional level.


EDIT: i forgot to mention that your villain doesn't have to be the usual ruthless, self-righteous kind of guy. Or even a coold blooded killer. Maybe he knows that he has crossed the line, and he is now in the wrong, morally speaking, but he feel like a martyr, taking those actions so others don't have to in order to bring about the change the world needs. He tries to convince the heroes to switch sides, he wants to minimize the collateral damage and killing and doing what he is doing makes him suffer. Maybe in the end he wins and, now that he made the world a better place, unable to cope with what he has done and in order to make the world an even better place, he commits suicide.

I mean, creating a villain is not too hard. Sky is the limit. Use your imagination.
 
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I think one thing to remember is that no one does evil for the sake of evil. This is where a lot of villains fall short in movies, because they are portrayed as doing evil just because they like doing evil. This is really never the case in real life. People do things that are evil for various reasons: pleasure, self-fulfillment, the belief of justice, revenge, etc. But it is never because someone likes evil as a concept that much. It doesn't make sense and it isn't relatable.
So with your villain, flesh out the reason for being evil. Were they hurt? Are they acting out of pain? Are they angry? Is it revenge? Do they have a warped sense of justice? Do they believe in their cause? If you are moving to a more sinister place, do they like pain, and if so, why?
Then, balance and integrate these with the rest of their personality. No character is one dimensional. Shakespeare's Othello may have killed his lover in a blind rage, convinced that she was cheating. However, behind this is a black and white view of the world that can extend positively, making him a good soldier and overall a person bent toward justice. The character that is convinced their cause is right may murder an entire family of people they perceive as against it, but be kind and charitable to other people in different contexts in order to further that same vision. The villain acting out of revenge may have a strong sense of loyalty that makes them a great friend to others.
Generally speaking, make your villains human. Some may not give you enough time to do that, which is okay. However, the last thing you want to do is create some maniacal cartoon stereotype. Making a convincing bad guy usually means making them realistic human—like all true "bad guys".
 
Apologies for not exactly hitting up a topic that's 'fresh' relatively speaking. But I've had writing on the mind lately and figured that I'd go ahead and try to contribute something to this. Using two examples of villains I feel work very well.

Frieza from the Dragonball series and Father/The Homunculus from FMA.

Before we even get a glimpse of Frieza's power in combat, we, the audience and Goku are informed by King Kai (aka Mr. Exposition in this case) how terrible of a monster Frieza is and how Goku should absolutely under no circumstances cross him while traveling around on Namek. Goku being the guy that he is, has a hard time swallowing the idea of passing up a potentially grueling and exhilarating fight but reluctantly agrees to do so. Then the perspective switches and we're introduced to Frieza as Gohan and Krillin watch him ordering his mooks to brutally murder a village of defenseless Namekians. All without lifting a finger on his part(in the anime at least, I believe? I think he has Dodoria kill Dende's brother in the anime and he kills him himself with a death beam in the manga) and keeping up his faux polite attitude all while casually having his minions murder children when his demands are refused.

It's a nice sign that beneath Frieza's seemingly polite exterior is an insane madman who's more than willing to kill and destroy anything that gets in his way. Blowing up entire planets and wiping out entire civilizations on a whim or even just on a paranoid fear and then laughing like a loon at the aftermath. When Goku finally goes Super Saiyan and beats Frieza down, even as Frieza's little more than a floating torso surviving only off the energy Goku was so gracious enough to spare him, he doesn't know when to back down and attempts to murder Goku. Only for that to fly right back into his face(literally!) This trait of determination of defeating his foes against all odds would be respectable in any kind of hero character but in a character like Frieza, it's disgusting and makes you wish he'd give up and get gone.

Even death doesn't keep him from swearing vengeance on Goku and the Z-Fighters. After his death at the hands of Future Trunks and then Goku(see Resurrection F and or the adaptation of it in Super), Frieza spends his time while trapped in Hell doing nothing but pure and mental concentration, running various hypothetical scenarios in his head, all of which end with him murdering Goku in horrible and graphic ways. All of which ties back to the fact that while Frieza speaks with someone with sophistication and class, he's just a lunatic with too much power. That's what works as a good villain to me. Someone who claims to be higher than the heroes both physically and mentally but when you get right down to it, he always ends up outclassed at the end of the day and the 'sophistication' falls away to reveal the seething and roaring tyrant willing to do anything to win.

He's back now in Super thanks to Fortuneteller Baba bringing him back for 24 hours to help the Z-Fighters. On the terms that he'd be brought back to life when they win. That arc is still on going and according to the creators, will stretch into March of next year. I dunno what's gonna happen but I feel it'd be a waste to simply kill off Frieza again. The idea of him being kept around as a psychopathic god of destruction who's kept in line by his Angel/attendant would be an interesting dynamic I could get behind.

~~~

Now, as for Father he's similar to Frieza in that he speaks to the protagonists with an air of class and politeness that underlies and contrasts with his brutal and horrifying actions(blowing up Planet Vegeta/Namek or in Father's case destroying the entire civilization of Xerxes) but unlike Frieza who gets furious at the idea of 'dirty monkeys' getting the better of him and being emboldened at the idea of using the Tournament of Power(current Super arc, check out the wiki for more. I'm not your nan and gonna explain a long and convoluted arc out on a post that's already long in length.) of potentially getting one over on the gods, Father wishes to BECOME God, actually consuming what he believes to be God and seeing humanity/alchemists as little more than insects beneath his notice.

Another way that Frieza differs from Frieza is that when confronted by overwhelming odds, Frieza's mooks all attempt to go running back to him to beg for his overwhelming power to save their lives. They go running back to the same person who told Zarbon that if he didn't have Vegeta back in....I dunno five minutes(?) he'd murder him. That's how cruel Frieza was and his minions knew it but they also knew that until SSJ Goku came along, he'd murder anyone who stood in his way.

Father doesn't get off his ass until he's finally confronted in his lair and it's actually one of his minions who turns on him/helps turn the tide of battle against Father. Whereas Frieza's minions are simply too horrified/scared into submission to even humor the idea of turning against him. Where Father assumed they'd be loyal to him and would do whatever he said, regardless of how he himself acted towards them.

More so while Frieza has to be horribly mutilated/obliterated in order to finally keep him down for good, even in Hell he's still plotting against the protagonists. When confronted with the idea of 'death' or rather a fate worse than one by The Truth, Father turns into a sobbing pathetic mess who pleads with the Truth/'God' as far as he's aware to tell him what he did wrong, to give him a second chance. While we always know Frieza's too damn evil/stubborn to let something like death stop him, it's oh-so satisfying to see Father/Homunculus get his fate. : )
 
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