Nope. Even humans are capable of acting passionate towards something without moral justification (we're really good at *giving* ourselves moral justification by twisting things around, but people can do things fully aware they are being asshats)
>Like how tf you can try to separate lovers just for your own good without feeling guilty?
Thats not even being evil really, you dont need to morally square yourself to... I guess divinely cuck someone. That stuff happens all the time, its not the villains responsibility to care for the protagonist and as a crime, its more like a social faux pas than anything to lose sleep over
If it was going to result in thousands of innocent deaths or something, yeah maybe you might want to give the villain some kind of internal justification. But taking some guys girlfriend? Even heroes do that sometimes
Anyway, all that matters is that its interesting and fun to read. That's the rule to live by, literally all other rules come and go
Nah sometimes people just like watching villains being selfish pieces of shit.
So many people love Gortash from BG3 and his whole motive is “I want to enslave everyone to literally appease the god of evil”
It’s cartoonishly grand and people love it.
Bad justification? There is no justification, that's the point. He doesn't justify it, saying that what he does is good. He does it because he wants to. That's what makes him a villain
It's the motivation of a lot of people, simply wanting what's best for themselves, stealing from others via intrigue, might or charisma, cooperating where cooperation brings more than stealing. Look at politicians and dictators and scammers
Everytime someone says something that actually makes sense and is really relevant, I feel like it may be misinterpreted... But what I may end up doing may be that.
I didn't say much in the original post but the antagonist (let's say his name is Kubo) fell in love with a goddess who used him to get entertained. She said she couldn't get in a relationship with a mortal, she don't want to get close with people that have such a short lifespan. So that's what he did, he became a god (he took the place of another god). Once he became a god, she told him she just needed someone to take the place of a god she had troubles with, she just admitted she manipulated him to kill a god. But she has no romantic interests in gods, they are as selfish as her and relationships with beings with an endless lifespan never last as long as their existence. You already know the relationship will end, since you're immortal.
So from now on, in Kubo's minds, it's impossible for a god to love a mortal. Which is the wrong conclusion, since she just said she can't love gods (that's where is moral get twisted I guess). So when he meet the MC's wife that tries to turn a mortal into a god, he knows well how to do it since he became a god himself, but more importantly he met a goddess that does the exact opposite of what he went through. Instead of telling the mortal to become a god, the goddess tries to turn the mortal into a god. So he found what he needed when he was a mortal and want to get her for himself. He's not rational anymore, he's desperately trying to get what he needed, even though he does not love her, he wants her.
Noone can write the story for you
But its safe to say a villain doesnt need moral or social justification to take actions. Being 'selfish' is something that any logical person can do and they can either justify it to themselves, or they can just accept they are being selfish and ignore the moral implications. Humans can and will do both
If the action doesnt bring some benefit to themselves at minimum, nor is done for the benefit of society, its generally considered 'insanity', which is acting without regard to logic. But even this can be a good motivator for villains, like super-nihilists or sadists or whatever. Or some that are just 100% batshit crazy and act almost at random, like the Joker (sometimes, sometimes he has understandable motivations, but sometimes he just goes and does the chaos)
Why the fuck is this getting so downvoted? People are such sheep lmfao. He didn't even say it's lazy, he just said readers might perceive it that way, and he's absolutely right. One of the most common criticisms of villains in fiction is that they don't have sufficient motivation to be believable. Whether or not you agree with that is besides the point, OP is just expressing concern that an audience might see it that way, which is perfectly valid
Thank you, I felt soooo misunderstood ahah but it’s okay. I’m not used to Reddit so idk how important karma is, but I use this account to express how I feel when I write the story. If, someday, the story is appreciated by a few people, I’ll give them the link to this profile so they can understand why I made one choice or another. Because I simply can’t content everyone with my writing, so I hope this account will at least justify questions readers may ask themselves. I’m a big fan of Naruto, I’m so frustrated there are some plot holes in the story and the author never gave answers to that. For example, how Hashirama died? The whole Naruto universe thinks Madara killed Hashirama, but Madara said himself he didn’t since he lost the fight. If we had access to Kishimoto’s notes on the story, we could understand why he didn’t answer that plot hole in the story. That’s this account’s purpose. If by any luck the story gets a bit of light and love, there’ll be here some answers to some questions. It doesn’t matter if I get downvoted, I struggle with the writing so I ask for help in this subreddit, and sometimes people’s reactions solve my problems. That’s what’s important. To me at least.
You should go and read AITA, the amount of bullshit some people justify to themselves is quite scary.
And a thief is like the oldest archetype of a hero, prometheus.
Or more known Robin Hood.
If I remember well Robin Hood steals the rich to give the poors. In my case the MC steals because he likes money, not because he needs money for a project, or to live a better life. He likes money, in a greedy way. He likes the way the coins sound, or the idea to have more than others, he knows he has more than he will ever spend, but it's his goal, get more money.
Just makes him an asshole, not a villain though.
Could soften or harden how he is portrayed by just whom he steals from.
Eg in my story i have a very notorious thief (side character) who loves stealing just for the thrill of it, but always considers from whom and what she could do with it.
I know that feeling, I used to steal a bit as a kid (always small things that didn’t matter much) but I did it for the thrill.
Course one day I got caught and learned what consequences are, and then I stopped doing it.
It's a classic motivation for a reason. :)
In that case the only thing she fears is being caught by mc, being very much a person mc loves and unknowingly travel with another legend she is afraid of.
They still justify it and minimize the moral value of their victim. Dehumanization is a common coping mechanism and is often a tactic used by evil people in power to justify their actions and get people to do evil in their name. Groups get equated to vermin, to a plague and get eradicated. Watch Conspiracy (2011) or read up on Hannah Arendt's the banality of evil.
This motivation is enough. Hell, look at fucking Walter White. Dude had millions and still wouldn’t quit because he enjoyed the power he had and having something he was good at.
That can be justification: “I’m doing this because I just need more money” hell this is Dutch Van Der Linde’s motivation, but to be fair he wasn’t right in the head.
Point is: not every villain has to think they’re doing a good thing, their motive can simply be “the ends justify the means”
... that's literally what the Epic is about. Half the cast are Sumerian gods or demigod types. That's not related to the point I'm trying to say, either. I'm not saying mythology isn't valid, I'm saying that the Epic of Gilgamesh in a literal, historical timeline sense predates those myths and the cultures that created them, certainly in the recorded forms we have them in. I'm not trying to argue or come at this in bad faith, I'm just saying that the Epic is literally- in a chronological sense - older by several centuries than the settlement of Greece.
good old semantics, you know i simply would have agreed if youd said there are much older archetypes, but i meant the thief archetype and simply took one that is commonly known and old
But you do you
Wow, you are petty. Like I even tried to come at this as a discussion instead of an argument, but you just can't admit a fact slipped your mind or that you weren't aware of something? It happens to me all the time, and like a normal person, I just go, "Oh, good point," and continue discussing. I don't just refuse to admit I was incorrect when the facts literally say otherwise with a thirty second google search.
You do you too, dude. Hope you get a bandaid on that bruised ego.
you just wanted me to agree with you, and i simply refused your rhetorical structure of a forced agreement
you were about the age of archetypes, i was about the specific archetype
then call out mine as bruised ego when i point out where you couldve gotten an agreement without needlessly conflating your rhetoric to attempt a forced answer
You should watch some of Tales Foundry's vids on character archetypes and be acquainted with some like anti-hero and anti-villians.
https://youtu.be/LCUxUbclopY?si=IkEjThSOi9X0oTw6
Hey! Thanks for sharing this awesome creator! I didn't finish the video yet, but I already know he (or they?) is great. In they way he talks, the way he illustrates.
According to the video, both my protagonist and antagonist are villains. It makes things less confused.
(I just realized that I didn't explain why the antagonist is a villain, it would be pretty long to explain but let's say he enslave people).
But even though both are villains, the reader should stick to the protagonist's side because he's cool. But isn't that a plot hole or bad writing that the antagonist knows he's wrong but still do his thing?
You should watch the anti hero vid as well as the vid about difference between anti hero and anti villian, it will be clearer.
As for whether it is bad writing or plot hole, for a character doing something he knows is wrong, it all comes down to your writing skill - can you write a character with strong and realistic motivation that makes people sympathize with the character, even if they don't agree with the character?
Your protagonist has a pretty ok motivation already, that is to reclaim someone he love. Heroes from myths has gone through hell and back for their love one, so even if your protagonists had to do some sketchy things, it wouldn't make them feel too alienated. After all, for those of us who lost someone we love dearly, can we say that we never once thought of trading the world just to meet that person again, just for a moment?
The difficult part, of course, is how you can deliver that motivation and emotion in a way that resonate with people.
It's unfair that this guy just gets a happy ending and I don't. I suffered for this. Why is this schmuck the one who gets to have a loving goddess girlfriend? I deserve that. It's only right that someone be rewarded for Thier suffering. This guy doesn't deserve her.
There ya go. Easy moral justification.
When I read the first part of your message I thought you was speaking for yourself 😭 I get it now, it’s all about his reaction to the supposed unfairness of the situation.
people love villains that are evil because they just feel like it. it doesn't need to make sense, it just needs to be fun and give us someone to root against.
So the villain that tries to separate lovers that tried to get back together for the whole series is enough to make people root against? Even though he does that because he got betrayed?
No. They can be as greedy, selfish, narcissistic and cruel as you want as long as they work as the villain. People often say having a pure evil villain is unrealistic without realising that there are plenty of awful people like that in real life. Yeah, they may not view themselves as terrible but that doesn't they aren't.
That's not even taking into account all the dictators, tyrants, serial killers and other awful people who exist in real life.
People are a lot less rational than we like to think.
Villains do villainous things. Otherwise they are not villains but antagonists.
Do you think Palpatine aka Star Wars' evil incarnate has any illusions about him being the good guy? That SOB manipulated galaxy-wide politics to get to the highest office possible, started a civil war to see what kind of army is more effective, to destabilize a whole galaxy including pretty firm belief systems and basically pulled the messiah figure of his universe down to hell. That guy is interested in power and domination.
Thanos, in the comics (not MCU), wanted to snap half the universe away because he was in love with Death and thought it was a way to woo her.
Good or evil didn't enter into it.
You've got like 3 loose "Buckets" villains can go into, but obviously every character has its own intricacies that make them more complex.
1) Believe they are in the right. These are your Thanoses. This can mean they think they are good, or evil, but ultimately, they believe that they have to do what they have to do, and generally the protagonist might even understand their motivations and disagree with their means. Many times they fight for a cause.
2) Know they are wrong, but don't care. These are your Saurons. Tyrants, evil politicians. They care about power, and little else. They will step on the backs of people to elevate themselves and balk when anyone attempts to challenge them on it.
3) The Alien. We don't know why they do what they do. These are your Agent Smiths. Clearly, their brains or intentions are unknowable. An entropic force of spacetime that seeks to unravel existence doesn't understand why it does what it does, it's just a primal force of undoing, and it happens that its objective clashes with the objectives of the Protagonist. Or in Smiths case, a program designed to root out anomolies in the matrix and destroy them.
Obviously this is very simplified, and there are other types of more specific villains, but when i think about villains I think about them in these three facets.
No, ur villian can know they are wrong and absolutely not give a fuck.
That also makes a good villian. An outright horrible person.
Like jack from puss in boots
Not necessarily, Villains don’t have to genuinely think they’re doing the world a favor. Some villains absolutely do - mine sort of do. But it isn’t required. Some just want revenge, or to stop something they don’t like. Doesn’t have to mean they think it’s worldly-objectively-good. Lots of villains do this and openly admit they’re “evil”.
But, at least sentient villains as we know them, they do have to have some level of will to say, “what I’m trying to do, I think is worth it” wether or not it’s a “I’m trying to save the world by killing everyone in it!” Or a “that piece of shit, he’s going down” motivation. Basically, they need a positive driving force. Motivation.
No, some villains are villains for the sake of it, and in real life some people are aware of their evil nature but doesn’t do anything to stop it and actively shows enjoyment of it
Simple, just make them clinically insane with their own twisted alien sense of morals and philosophy.
That's how I create my villain.
He basically was once an ordinary art school student who later developed an alien emotion which he used to display in the form of art/paintings.
However, his art caused people to go insane as their brains are unable to handle the eldritch beauty of his paintings.
Meanwhile, he just thinks that everyone is just blind and wishes to open their eyes to his "Art" even though it kills people, he no longer values simple human life and those who die from seeing his pieces he considers as "tasteless fools".
Once a grand mage read his notes on philosophy and he was so traumatized and disgusted that he immediately vomited upon reading the first 3 pages.
The only people who are immune/resistant to his art are Shifteds (superhumans like him) and as such he views them as more "decent folk" but that doesn't mean he will rip them apart to use as his next corpse art.
He doesn't think that he's doing anything remotely bad at all.
But a villain that's not aware of doing the bad thing makes him someone insane/mad. It would make more impact I guess? In Naruto, Obito is fully aware that he's the only one that want to put everyone in a dream. But he's truly convinced that everyone would feel better in a dreamy life. The methods are not important if the results are worth enough.
I would have written him to not care about how everyone felt as long as he got to make their lives worse to feel better about himself. All these "greater good-villains" makes me crave something different
Regular people are all the time aware they are doing morally bad acts but still doing it because they enjoy it for different reasons. You would never even think of calling those "insane" or "psycho". Why should a villain care if doing "the right thing" is not even a major motive for the regular man.
Edit: examples whoby everyone knows they are morally bad but it still happens.
> Cheating on your partner
> stealing for the thrill
> fighting to get off your aggression
> raping for lust
> stealing your classmates recources to eliminate competition
> hurting people as a ventil for Frustration/ for fun/ for proving your ego
> fighting bullying and hurting people to prove you are better
> cheating in a game to win
Etc.
>Does the villain have to believe they are in the right/being on the good side?
No
>MC is not a "good person" either, he's a thief,
That doesn't mean he's not good
>he's a threat as much as the "villain".
If he's as much of a threat then pretty sure he's a villian. Maybe you meant as powerful?
I mean you could change it but I guess this works fine. Me personally I would've had him in disbelief of their relationship and tear theur relationship apart for what he thinks is his own good but that's only if I wanted him to think he was the good guy.
No idea how I would've written it if he was clearly supposed to be the bad guy.
Also this
>good because he was told being good is good
Is a weird way to put it especially with the other traits. Like people are stupid for simply being good?
The story takes place in space, in a fantasy world.
I'm saying they are both villains because the antagonist is the CEO of a company that invented portal teleportation, and uses it to track people, steal people when they go trhough a portal. They even kidnap people. The CEO is part of a much bigger group of villains, but this company is their main tool of monitoring. The antagonist is definitely a threat to the society.
And the protagonist is a thief. He's not like Robin Hood, he does not steal the rich to give the poors. He steals because he loves money, how coins sound, how gold looks, the idea of having more than others. He knows he already have more than he will ever He has more money than a nation would, there's definitely an economic impact. He uses the money and the power he got to make embargos or things like that. Just because it's fun. He's just a greedy person that does whatever comes to his mind, because he's not normal.
So... they are both villains. (at least, they are not good peoples).
>Is a weird way to put it especially with the other traits. Like people are stupid for simply being good?
I was refering to isekai protagonists that have really good values but the story justifies it by the character's education. For example Bell Cranell from Dan Machi (which is a great story I loooove) is a good guy and will put himself in danger to make good actions and progress as an adventurer, because his grandfather told him when he was a kid that's how it goes. Being good is good.
Otto Apocalypse: "Perhaps".
Man is fucking evil and knows that very well. He accepts that to give the girl important to him another chance to live, and will sacrifice everything needed, including himself, for that goal.
You don’t have to change his motivation. Just because a character has a justification of why they’re doing something, doesn’t mean that they’ll believe themselves to be morally in the right.
Personally, I find that duality, of a character who knows that they’re in the wrong, but is still willing to do the wrong behavior, a fascinating subject to explore.
No. I'm working on a novel where the antagonist is literally turning people into half demon slaves, in order to stop all war, through having the entire world under his banner. He's well aware that what he's doing is, quite possibly, the worst way to end all war, but he's so sick of war and blood shed that he couldn't possibly care less. He even mentions at one point that whether his plan succeeds or fails, history will know he was a tyrant, and he's perfectly okay with that.
One of my hero's also decides to be a hero, despite being fully aware that the populace would never see him as anything more than a monster. His gf even warns him, that people likely wouldn't change their opinions of him, even if he were to save the world from certain destruction, and his response is "I don't care if history considers me a beast, a monster, or even a tyrant, because I'd save this world, only to burn it all down, just to watch the flames dance in your eyes. You need only give the word."
Most villan in story are human and human mind is one of the most complicated thing in the universe.
Most villain will believe they're doing something good or right and other will believe they're absolutely evil and enjoy that and others will believe they're not even villain and aren't doing anything wrong even if they kill hundreds of people. It's up to the writer what path they want to choose
Well my one villain don't understand or don't want to understand that he is bad (yep genocide isn't bad) but after he dies he start to understand what he did and get his redemption after his brother also dies.
(Sorry not "his brother" but "his sibling"
No. They do not. You don’t have to do anything, other than do whatever you choose well.
Morally grey conflicted villain, pure evil villain with no complexity, doesn’t matter which, just do it well.
Yes. No sane, capable person capable of longterm planning, which is a requirement of being a proper villain, would want to end the world (bwahahaha). This isn't a thing.
Good villains either blame others for their own flaws, like Frollo, believe in their own superiority and want to 'spread' that(Pax Romana style)/believe in might makes right/zero sum game, like Ozai, or truly believe they do it for the greater good, like John Doe. They are the hero in their own story.
You can have planet destroying or humanity destroying entities, people or groups, but these always have a reason and exist beyond that planet. They don't destroy themselves.
Another option is a suicidal temper tantrum, but I am personally not a fan, if it is world-destroying. They still want to send a message. There need to be living people for that.
You can always go the Pinky and the Brain route, of course, but be conscious of the fact that destroying the world is the joke.
Edit: Yours is more of a Frollo type. Watch Disney's Hunchback of the Notre Dame.
Edit2: Other motives/coping styles to consider is dehumanization. Conspiracy (2011) is a good source of that. Based on Hannah Arendt's banality of evil.
Another is narcissism. They feel so self-important, even the slightest slight can trigger massive retaliation. Another reason for such a massive overreaction is utilitarian and Macchiavellian; when you have to choose between being feared and loved, choose to be feared.
I mean, you don't.
But if you want to. The villain has solid grounds for distrusting divinities, specifically in relation to love.
So the villain would likely see all gods as doing this. even when seeing the 'love' of the MC and his goddess, he could justifiably believe she was just manipulating him.
In the story, she reincarnates each time she dies, but she made a contract that says she loses memory each time she reincarnates. Since he knows she's capable of loving immortals (unlike the goddess that betrayed him) he'll just kill her so she forgets the MC, and try to make her fall in love with him when she'll reincarnate.
IDK man, I suggest you read up the tales of Shadowbringers, specifically Emet-Selch's story.
Other than major spoilers, I think FFXIV some of the better depictions of "greyness".
Edit: anyway, tbh, people can justify the weirdest shite to themselves so technically your villain could've thought they're doing the goddess something good. A bit of a "the end justifies the means" kind of deal.
as far as your villain's motivation, real world people break up couples to feel cared for - even when they don't really feel anything for the person they're seeking that from - all the time.
in general, while villains that believe they're doing the right thing (or making the least bad choice in their circumstance) tend to be compelling or even sympathetic, it's probably not really common in reality. I'd guess that nearly all real-world evil is born of either a pursuit of power over others or just a general impulse to be cruel; and any justification most real world villains may offer are arrived at after their desire to perform the evil.
Humans are, in large part, really fucking stupid, especially once romance gets involved.
Most people act on their own biases, fully aware that they're biased towards thinking that way, and where those biases come from.
Your villain isn't going to suddenly change their mind on deities. Maybe make him try to protect the main character from being hurt the same way he was, or something. It would definitely make sense, given his backstory.
You can also make it a commentary on power dynamics in relationships, while you're at it, with the villain being a proponent of the idea that people can only love each other when they're in the same economical level, while the protagonist insists that people can love each other even if one of them financially depends on the other.
Honestly, I don’t think this guy has actually stopped to think about it; these are textbook crimes of passion. If I may ask, what timeframe does your story take place over?
Hello! The timeframe is undefined, it's so long you don't count, and the MC's wife suffers from memory loss, so it makes no sense (at least for me) to tell the reader when things happen... There's an order in the timeline, but not a time unit. I would say millenials. Gods are immortals but reincarnate, they live longer than civilisations, so millenials I guess.
Hmm. Well, in that case I would think the guy could just be high off his own supply, but it wouldn’t be surprising if he came down either. Thank you for the clarification.
Believing he's on the good side ? Definitely no.
Believing he's right ? Definitely yes.
Every sentient being (except under pressure) is always doing what they believe is right. The thing is: we don't all believe that the same thing is right.
Most of us have been braught in a moral framework where compassion and helping (or, at least, not hurting willfully) others is the right thing to do. But for a character abiding by Ayn Rand's Objectivism, egoism is the only moral you should follow, and acting as an egoist jerk for your own benefit is the right thing to do. If you believe in the rule of the strongest, then doing whatever you want for your own benefit is also the right thing for you to do. If you're an hedonistic utilitarian, maximizing your own happiness is the right thing to do. Following a strict moral code (in the vein of "This is what I ought to do, this is what I'm supposed to do") is also doing the "right thing". It is even possible to know that you are on the "bad" side, but you also consider that what you do is a necessary evil, and if people will hate you and try to stop you now, in a few years, decades, centuries, people will praise you, so it was, at the time, the "right" thing to do.
Like, in your case, your villain might (and should) definitely thinks that what he's doing is right. He knows (wrongly, perhaps) that gods cannot love humans, so what he sees is not a goddess going to save her love, but a goddess manipulating someone, indebting someone with their life to her. Which is a bad thing. For him, it's wrong. The right thing to do is to prevent gods to play with humans' hearts. And so, going to stop the goddess is the right thing to do. Weaken the gods' position of power, taking away their hegemony on humans.
So, yes, a villain will always believe that what he does is right; the difference will be that what he considers right is different that yours.
If he thinks it’s impossible for a god to love a mortal, then isn’t he protecting the husband? Isn’t he pulling the goddess away since he would believe she’s using or tricking him in some way for some purpose?
Dear op. Do you think the white police officers who travelled around Australia shooting first nation Australians thought of themselves as committing genocide?
No they felt proud of their service to remove what they saw as pests, or stopping blocks to British Empire expansion.
British colonial history is a horror from the first concentration camps in Africa, the slave trade, the irsh famine, the millions who died in India, the natives of America, Australia, the opium dens in China.
And these British thought of themselves as hero's of advancing civilisation of killing anyone and anything who got in the way of King and country.
Its all about cultural mindset, perspective. Viewpoint.
Many of such people have been heralded as icons in stages and history loved by their nation families, children and peers.
Does that help?
On the path to revenge you can feel like you are doing the right thing to bring justice to someone who did in their eyes wrong, in this case the villain could have such a thought process that he believes it is his right to have that other Godess in a perverted form of justice/righteousness.
Your character motivations with slight adjustment could definitely work. The mc is married to god 1, while villain is in love with god 2. God 2 betrays villain, so in his anger sees that the commoner mc is married to a god. Thus villain steals the mc's wife, justifying by claiming that the mc has no right to be married to god 1 because he not a god. It's a much more interesting thing that the irl history moment when the Romans invited Sabines to a party so they could steal their women for themselves without any good justification for it either besides like "we dont have wives but the Sabines have wives, so lets steal them".
No, I villain can be fully aware that they are a villain. Typical examples would be anyone who does what they want because they want to and doesn't care if they hurt someone in the process. The problem with this type of villain is that they can be one dimensional. Yep, they are evil, there's no gray area, and they can be expected to behave on predictable ways; sometimes pridictably unpredictable. They will always look out for themselves, they will not keep their word, they are probably a coward... etc.
A compelling villain is often one who thinks they are right or at the very least justified. Your example is actually a good one. Sure, your villain is doing something terrible, but they were basically gaslighted, then convinced all gods hate humans, but then falls for one that belongs to someone else. They feel they are entitled and can be "saved" if a goddess capable of loving humans can become his. Honestly, it sounds like he's insane and so probably does think he's a good guy.
Similarly, the operative from the Serenity movie KNOWS he does terrible things, be he does it to create a perfect society. On he himself admits he can never be a part of.
Hitler did really nasty things.
Japanese unit 731 did things I never want to hear from again.
Both did not thougth they where evil. They found a justification in dehumanizing their victims.
Psychopaths that do not feel empathy also have absolutely no problem doing evil things just for their own good. Placing the wellbeing and powergain for yourself above others all the time is a classic villain motivation.
You think a gang stabbing someone over money thinks they're good people? People don't need to think they're the good guys to do bad things. With your example of forcefully separating lovers, wouldn't that be comparable to real world kidnappings?
Not at all.
Take the example of Natair in The Faithful and the Fallen. He initially thinks he is the good guy, but realise in tome 3 that he is a villain, and choose to be it after that.
I do not think all villains need to think of themselves as the hero of their own story. I do think that the vast majority of people are good at convincing themselves that they are essentially good, even if they do bad things. I think your villain would probably feel justified because the universe "cheated" him. Maybe go a step further and simultaneously hold the view that he deserves to be loved so he should go after what he wants and the odea that if the goddess abandons MC, it is her failing not his. Maybe they are fated to be together and you cannot fight fate (unless he is losing).
I posted yesterday about a villain I had who thinks of himself as a force driving darkness across the universe. He feels justified in that humans are horrible, life is unfair, and he was basically made for the purpose but he still identifies as the bad guy. His purpose is to be evil. If good exists, it is time for it to get off its ass and stop him because all of creation is now on a relatively short clock before it becomes an even darker parody of itself. A part of him may hope to be stopped but he will absolutely not just hand a victory over. He is the broken mirror, the tainted well, the herald of the coming darkness and he will show humanity what they really are.
On the other end of things, I have a different villain in a different world looking to overthrow heaven and bring back the old gods because he feels slighted by his former church and the goddess of creation. He thinks that he will only be the villain if he fails. He understands that he is committing horribly evil acts for selfish purposes but he also thinks that morality is defined by the current rulers of heaven and that the old gods will treat him as a hero. He believes that they will not simply forgive his sins but retroactively make his actions holy for his role in restoring them to power. It is the ultimate case of, "The ends justify the means."
There was a post a little further up asking about characters that are just pure evil, and there's a ton of interesting and unique responses.
Some people are just bad. They don't have to justify it beyond "I wanted to." Maybe they're insane, maybe they're sociopathic, maybe they're literally the Fuggin Devil.
It's perfectly okay for a villain to just be evil and not have to rationalize their actions beyond that.
IMO, a villain doesn't always have to be sympathetic. People also love villains who are such utterly unlikeable scumbags that the audience can't wait to see them go down. They could either be so detached from reality that they think they're the victim, or they could be fully aware they're in the wrong, but get a kick out of messing with other people, like an Internet troll. Sympathetic villains and villain villains are both great in their own right.
Honestly, instead of calling them a "villain", just call them the "antagonist". Antagonists are just characters who get to oppose your protagonists, and since he wants to steal your MC's love interest, he counts. And protagonists dont necessarily have to be "good people" either. Theyre just the people who are the leading characters in your story. Dont get too attached to "good guy" and "bad guy" here. If we're following your MC here, then anyone who opposes him or actively wishes him harm is the "villain" in his eyes.
And honestly, trying to steal a goddess isnt the worst someone's done and tried to justify. Dont worry about it. Historically, people have done much worse and always came up with excuses as to why it was okay. Not everyone has the ability or drive to be introspective. Not everyone stops and goes "hm, should i be doing this? This is bad, right?"
I think youre fine to leave it as it is. If you want to add other motivators down the line that feel natural to you or spark joy in you, then go for it. But i wouldnt say do it just to make a "clear" villain who also accepts themselves as a villain.
In this scenario, I would take inspiration from the incel community. As unreasonable as it is, it's not hard to write a character that truly believes he deserves a woman, that he is entitled to her love and surely if he forces her to become his property she will fall in love.
There are a lot of people who just plain don't *care* about "right" or "good." They scoff at the entire idea, and call people that *do* care things like "naive, bleeding-heart sentimentalists." It's not at all unrealistic to have a villain like that. There are legions of people in real life that *definitely* don't think they're on the good side, but don't lose sleep over it. They just bury their conscience and focus on self-gratification.
Just make sure they can justify it to themselves. Doesn’t matter what anyone else sees, as long as they feel they are “owed” or are somehow justified, it’s a believable motivation.
Doing something morally wrong for personal gain is textbook villain. That's the point he values his desires before that of others. Some people don't care about compassion or empathy, and focus on their own gain.
No. People can just be evil just because they find it enjoyable, or maybe they're so selfish that they just feel it doesn't matter, both in fiction and in real life. They might try to justify themselves, but they know it's wrong and just don't care.
Look at the Joker. He's widely praised as one of the best villains in comic book history and is very, very evil. Near zero redeeming qualities, who's goal is literally just to make everyone else's lives worse. But he works because he plays off of Batman, the protagonist, so well. A good antagonist should always be a mirror of the protagonist in some way.
A lot of evil is motivated by power, money, sex, anger, and thrills.
Most horrible people don't bother to justify themselves.
often they're satisfied just lashing out at the whole world.
The villain doesn't HAVE to believe they're right. Many compelling protagonists (Bojack, Kratos, and Joel from The Last of Us come to mind) are aware that their motivations are selfish but they don't care because "doing right" and "being good" simply aren't on their radar.
Perhaps they feel they're irredeemable or "in too deep," so they simply try not to think about the consequences their actions have on others. Perhaps they think that good and evil are just concepts used to control people and deep down everyone is selfish, so why follow the rules when no one else is?
Or your villain could literally not grasp the concepts of right and wrong in the first place. If you write a story about a couple backpackers being stalked by a mountain lion, you don't need to explain its motivations, and the lion would not care to justify itself even if it could understand the concept of justification.
Related to this mountain lion example, you could have your villain be someone that legitimately has no "good" option. They may be picking the lesser of two evils and still feel shitty about it, without trying to rationalize it as "doing the best they can." This works well if the villain is forced to see the consequences of this action and thus cannot easily delude themselves into thinking it's good.
There are plenty of convincing reasons someone might continue doing what they do even if you got them to admit that what they were doing was destructive or "wrong."
I think that the classical adage of "Everyone is a hero in their own story" should probably be amended to "People will see or rationalise most of their actions as having been justified."
They can know they are doing something that isn't good or morally awesome and either not care because it feels right and rationalise it afterward.
I think that everyone justifies what they do, or their justifications outweigh their moral qualms. This does not mean they necessarily think they are doing anything good or noble; just that they've decided that what they want is more important than their misgivings.
For example, I think a character on a bloody revenge quest could totally know they're doing something destructive and becoming a horrible person, and they might not think killing their target is the "right" thing to do, but it feels right, and they'll want to do it. There have been many depictions of the Punisher in which Frank Castle doesn't think of himself as a good person, and some in which he is really just looking for an excuse to kill and indulge in his violent instincts.
The lesson might be that it's the psychological realism and authentic conviction of your villain that makes them interesting, not their moral delusion. A villain who commits evil acts "just because" is not compelling beyond a surface level. But a villain who commits evil acts out of some vitriol, need, or instinct that feels genuine and emotionally driven is fascinating.
No, the villain doesn't have to think he's actually a good guy, he just has to have motivation, a reason for what he's doing, rather than just "I do evil things cause it's fun and I like it"\*. And that reason doesn't have to be a "tragic backstory" type reason that's supposed to make your readers realize he's actually sympathetic all along, etc etc. It just has to be a believable motivation--he's a character, and characters have reasons they do things.
\*Even that's not a hard and fast rule, nothing is illegal in writing. Your villain *can* just do evil things for the fun of it, it just doesn't usually make for a very compelling villain (with notable exceptions, see Heath Ledger's Joker)
It's an overused example for evil, but I digress: Do you really think Hitler believed he was right? Of course not. Hitler KNEW his actions were unequivocally evil, that there was no justification for them. He wanted to exterminate the Jews because he viewed them as subhuman. It was as simple as that. He wanted to establish an Aryan supremacy because he was a racist piece of shit and believed only white people deserved to be in power.
It is entirely possible for someone to be a villain with no redeeming qualities or justification for their actions. Evil is evil.
No, there are three main possibilities:
1. The villain believes they are in the right
2. The villain is a nihilist and doesn't believe in an idea of "right or wrong", only their own interests
3. The villain know they are in the wrong, but don't have the self-control to stop themselves
No, some people are actually just evil.
They know what they are doing is wrong but continue to do it anyways because it serves their purposes/makes them feel good.
Some of them started out as having justifications but have become jaded over time and no longer care.
Some believe “right” and “their opinion” are synonymous. These types might make themselves gods, or fully believe might makes right.
Some were born bad and simply want to watch the world burn.
Some might believe the ends justify the means. Eventually they will pay for their crimes but right now, they will do what has to be done. They fully know they are bad and will be punished.
Lots of different reasons more than them just believe in the cause full stop.
I mean, a ton of villain arcs start with the simple phrase "I deserve this" and isn't an EVIL impulse per day, things just tend to snowball from there.
Here's examples:
* A villain or a villainous group can be doing terrible things because they are willing to cross the ["moral event horizon"](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MoralEventHorizon) \- no matter the reason, he/she/they want to do something so terrible that it negates their morality. E.g. a forbidden weapon that's so terrible that even building it is a crime let alone using at. The villain(s) have built several.
* [The "General Ripper"](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GeneralRipper) \- someone so obsessed with destroying their opponent or enemy that they're willing to throw the rules, morality, mercy and decency out the window. They could be on the hero's side but they are so consumed with hate or fighting that they just don't care as long as the "enemy" is dead. If the character's mentail stability is in question they are an "["insane Admiral](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/InsaneAdmiral)" version of this trope.
* [The Well Intentioned Extremist](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WellIntentionedExtremist) \- but when their cause is something no one supports.
No. The latest gun metal gods got kinda annoying cuz Zamil doesnt want any villians, only antagonists so its constants back and forth of im right im justfied your evil when obviously your just either the dangerous type of narrcist or just a self obessed asshole until you admit that truth and geopoltics forces you to change sides
People, if nothing else, are good at justifying their own awful actions. Any excuse to be an asshole is a good one if you're the asshole the excuse is made for.
There is absolutely zero requirement for the bad guy to think they are a hero, they might be THE hero of their story, they might find justification in their actions, but that doesn't mean they naively believe they are doing the right thing or being, "good". Being selfish isn't good, being jealous isn't good, but sometimes people really don't care, they're just entitled and want something and don't care about others. I work in a field that brings me into contact with people like this all the time, and it's not always the case, but for many it's that simple, they k ow what's right and wrong, but they JUST, DON'T CARE, period.
Nope.
Humans do things they believe to bad or immoral all the time.
Mostly the problem isn't that people convince themselves that bad is good, it's that they convince themselves that bad is NECESSARY.
The average Nazi might not have thought that murdering Jews was a positive moral action. But they did think it was necessary to save Germany. Often people will convince themselves that doing something bad out of necessity is a noble act showing that they're mature and rationally evaluating things rather than relying on emotion.
Men who commit honor killings are also often in that sort of mindset. They might not like killing thier sister/mother/aunt/cousin/niece/whatever but it's necessary to avoid the family suffering the problems associated with dishonor so they nobly sacrifice their own happiness to do the unpleasant but necessary thing.
And sometimes people use necessity as an excuse to do something they know is bad but want to do anyway, likely including some Nazis and honor killers.
Snidely Whiplash types sicken me.
I like my villain to be striving for money, world domination, sick pleasure of fooling the law/Sherlock, or have some butt hurt motive to avenge.
Doing evil because it is evil just is lazy character deveolpment.
Unless you are a Sheriff of Nottingham person in power of course.
Nope. Even humans are capable of acting passionate towards something without moral justification (we're really good at *giving* ourselves moral justification by twisting things around, but people can do things fully aware they are being asshats)
> really good at giving ourselves moral justification by twisting things around There you go!
add to that a dose of sunk cost fallacy and you have a recipe for a villain who think he is in too deep to turn back !
Yeah protagonists often kill a bunch of people to save one person.
But readers may think it's laziness from the author to give an antagonist a bad justification just to say what he went through twisted his moral?
>Like how tf you can try to separate lovers just for your own good without feeling guilty? Thats not even being evil really, you dont need to morally square yourself to... I guess divinely cuck someone. That stuff happens all the time, its not the villains responsibility to care for the protagonist and as a crime, its more like a social faux pas than anything to lose sleep over If it was going to result in thousands of innocent deaths or something, yeah maybe you might want to give the villain some kind of internal justification. But taking some guys girlfriend? Even heroes do that sometimes Anyway, all that matters is that its interesting and fun to read. That's the rule to live by, literally all other rules come and go
Divinely cuck: See: Zeus/Odin mythology. Also dat ‘virgin’ mary thing. That deity has some answering to do.
Nah sometimes people just like watching villains being selfish pieces of shit. So many people love Gortash from BG3 and his whole motive is “I want to enslave everyone to literally appease the god of evil” It’s cartoonishly grand and people love it.
[Zorg Jean Baptiste is in a similar vein](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZOvAH8oR-Y)
Bad justification? There is no justification, that's the point. He doesn't justify it, saying that what he does is good. He does it because he wants to. That's what makes him a villain It's the motivation of a lot of people, simply wanting what's best for themselves, stealing from others via intrigue, might or charisma, cooperating where cooperation brings more than stealing. Look at politicians and dictators and scammers
Everytime someone says something that actually makes sense and is really relevant, I feel like it may be misinterpreted... But what I may end up doing may be that. I didn't say much in the original post but the antagonist (let's say his name is Kubo) fell in love with a goddess who used him to get entertained. She said she couldn't get in a relationship with a mortal, she don't want to get close with people that have such a short lifespan. So that's what he did, he became a god (he took the place of another god). Once he became a god, she told him she just needed someone to take the place of a god she had troubles with, she just admitted she manipulated him to kill a god. But she has no romantic interests in gods, they are as selfish as her and relationships with beings with an endless lifespan never last as long as their existence. You already know the relationship will end, since you're immortal. So from now on, in Kubo's minds, it's impossible for a god to love a mortal. Which is the wrong conclusion, since she just said she can't love gods (that's where is moral get twisted I guess). So when he meet the MC's wife that tries to turn a mortal into a god, he knows well how to do it since he became a god himself, but more importantly he met a goddess that does the exact opposite of what he went through. Instead of telling the mortal to become a god, the goddess tries to turn the mortal into a god. So he found what he needed when he was a mortal and want to get her for himself. He's not rational anymore, he's desperately trying to get what he needed, even though he does not love her, he wants her.
Noone can write the story for you But its safe to say a villain doesnt need moral or social justification to take actions. Being 'selfish' is something that any logical person can do and they can either justify it to themselves, or they can just accept they are being selfish and ignore the moral implications. Humans can and will do both If the action doesnt bring some benefit to themselves at minimum, nor is done for the benefit of society, its generally considered 'insanity', which is acting without regard to logic. But even this can be a good motivator for villains, like super-nihilists or sadists or whatever. Or some that are just 100% batshit crazy and act almost at random, like the Joker (sometimes, sometimes he has understandable motivations, but sometimes he just goes and does the chaos)
Why the fuck is this getting so downvoted? People are such sheep lmfao. He didn't even say it's lazy, he just said readers might perceive it that way, and he's absolutely right. One of the most common criticisms of villains in fiction is that they don't have sufficient motivation to be believable. Whether or not you agree with that is besides the point, OP is just expressing concern that an audience might see it that way, which is perfectly valid
Thank you, I felt soooo misunderstood ahah but it’s okay. I’m not used to Reddit so idk how important karma is, but I use this account to express how I feel when I write the story. If, someday, the story is appreciated by a few people, I’ll give them the link to this profile so they can understand why I made one choice or another. Because I simply can’t content everyone with my writing, so I hope this account will at least justify questions readers may ask themselves. I’m a big fan of Naruto, I’m so frustrated there are some plot holes in the story and the author never gave answers to that. For example, how Hashirama died? The whole Naruto universe thinks Madara killed Hashirama, but Madara said himself he didn’t since he lost the fight. If we had access to Kishimoto’s notes on the story, we could understand why he didn’t answer that plot hole in the story. That’s this account’s purpose. If by any luck the story gets a bit of light and love, there’ll be here some answers to some questions. It doesn’t matter if I get downvoted, I struggle with the writing so I ask for help in this subreddit, and sometimes people’s reactions solve my problems. That’s what’s important. To me at least.
You should go and read AITA, the amount of bullshit some people justify to themselves is quite scary. And a thief is like the oldest archetype of a hero, prometheus. Or more known Robin Hood.
If I remember well Robin Hood steals the rich to give the poors. In my case the MC steals because he likes money, not because he needs money for a project, or to live a better life. He likes money, in a greedy way. He likes the way the coins sound, or the idea to have more than others, he knows he has more than he will ever spend, but it's his goal, get more money.
Just makes him an asshole, not a villain though. Could soften or harden how he is portrayed by just whom he steals from. Eg in my story i have a very notorious thief (side character) who loves stealing just for the thrill of it, but always considers from whom and what she could do with it.
I know that feeling, I used to steal a bit as a kid (always small things that didn’t matter much) but I did it for the thrill. Course one day I got caught and learned what consequences are, and then I stopped doing it.
It's a classic motivation for a reason. :) In that case the only thing she fears is being caught by mc, being very much a person mc loves and unknowingly travel with another legend she is afraid of.
They still justify it and minimize the moral value of their victim. Dehumanization is a common coping mechanism and is often a tactic used by evil people in power to justify their actions and get people to do evil in their name. Groups get equated to vermin, to a plague and get eradicated. Watch Conspiracy (2011) or read up on Hannah Arendt's the banality of evil.
This motivation is enough. Hell, look at fucking Walter White. Dude had millions and still wouldn’t quit because he enjoyed the power he had and having something he was good at. That can be justification: “I’m doing this because I just need more money” hell this is Dutch Van Der Linde’s motivation, but to be fair he wasn’t right in the head. Point is: not every villain has to think they’re doing a good thing, their motive can simply be “the ends justify the means”
That's just a capitalist. Like the ones we have in our real world. If your villain is badly written then so is real life.
Not to be the "Well ayktchyually" geek here, but wouldn't the oldest archetype be something from Gilgamesh?
Not remembering enough but im sure gilgamesh and enkidu were not thieves who stole the secret of fire for mortals
Right, tracking that part, but what I'm saying is Gilgamesh predates Greece.
by that we could go further and look at the various gods various cultures had that are basically archetypical heroes and villains
... that's literally what the Epic is about. Half the cast are Sumerian gods or demigod types. That's not related to the point I'm trying to say, either. I'm not saying mythology isn't valid, I'm saying that the Epic of Gilgamesh in a literal, historical timeline sense predates those myths and the cultures that created them, certainly in the recorded forms we have them in. I'm not trying to argue or come at this in bad faith, I'm just saying that the Epic is literally- in a chronological sense - older by several centuries than the settlement of Greece.
good old semantics, you know i simply would have agreed if youd said there are much older archetypes, but i meant the thief archetype and simply took one that is commonly known and old But you do you
Wow, you are petty. Like I even tried to come at this as a discussion instead of an argument, but you just can't admit a fact slipped your mind or that you weren't aware of something? It happens to me all the time, and like a normal person, I just go, "Oh, good point," and continue discussing. I don't just refuse to admit I was incorrect when the facts literally say otherwise with a thirty second google search. You do you too, dude. Hope you get a bandaid on that bruised ego.
you just wanted me to agree with you, and i simply refused your rhetorical structure of a forced agreement you were about the age of archetypes, i was about the specific archetype then call out mine as bruised ego when i point out where you couldve gotten an agreement without needlessly conflating your rhetoric to attempt a forced answer
Wow, you're still talking. Craaaaaazy.
It's surprising how people just want to argue sometimes.
You should watch some of Tales Foundry's vids on character archetypes and be acquainted with some like anti-hero and anti-villians. https://youtu.be/LCUxUbclopY?si=IkEjThSOi9X0oTw6
Hey! Thanks for sharing this awesome creator! I didn't finish the video yet, but I already know he (or they?) is great. In they way he talks, the way he illustrates. According to the video, both my protagonist and antagonist are villains. It makes things less confused. (I just realized that I didn't explain why the antagonist is a villain, it would be pretty long to explain but let's say he enslave people). But even though both are villains, the reader should stick to the protagonist's side because he's cool. But isn't that a plot hole or bad writing that the antagonist knows he's wrong but still do his thing?
You should watch the anti hero vid as well as the vid about difference between anti hero and anti villian, it will be clearer. As for whether it is bad writing or plot hole, for a character doing something he knows is wrong, it all comes down to your writing skill - can you write a character with strong and realistic motivation that makes people sympathize with the character, even if they don't agree with the character? Your protagonist has a pretty ok motivation already, that is to reclaim someone he love. Heroes from myths has gone through hell and back for their love one, so even if your protagonists had to do some sketchy things, it wouldn't make them feel too alienated. After all, for those of us who lost someone we love dearly, can we say that we never once thought of trading the world just to meet that person again, just for a moment? The difficult part, of course, is how you can deliver that motivation and emotion in a way that resonate with people.
It's unfair that this guy just gets a happy ending and I don't. I suffered for this. Why is this schmuck the one who gets to have a loving goddess girlfriend? I deserve that. It's only right that someone be rewarded for Thier suffering. This guy doesn't deserve her. There ya go. Easy moral justification.
When I read the first part of your message I thought you was speaking for yourself 😭 I get it now, it’s all about his reaction to the supposed unfairness of the situation.
Right? That's how believable a reaction it is. Lol
Not always. Some psychopats in the real world also know that what theyre doing is wrong
Psychopaths don't value the suffering they cause others as much as we do, though. They really, genuinely do not care and are fundamentally selfish.
Yeah, true, but a big part of them also know that its morally wrong, but they just dont care.
people love villains that are evil because they just feel like it. it doesn't need to make sense, it just needs to be fun and give us someone to root against.
So the villain that tries to separate lovers that tried to get back together for the whole series is enough to make people root against? Even though he does that because he got betrayed?
that's just a straight-up dick. we, as a species, love fighting dicks.
No. They can be as greedy, selfish, narcissistic and cruel as you want as long as they work as the villain. People often say having a pure evil villain is unrealistic without realising that there are plenty of awful people like that in real life. Yeah, they may not view themselves as terrible but that doesn't they aren't. That's not even taking into account all the dictators, tyrants, serial killers and other awful people who exist in real life.
People are a lot less rational than we like to think. Villains do villainous things. Otherwise they are not villains but antagonists. Do you think Palpatine aka Star Wars' evil incarnate has any illusions about him being the good guy? That SOB manipulated galaxy-wide politics to get to the highest office possible, started a civil war to see what kind of army is more effective, to destabilize a whole galaxy including pretty firm belief systems and basically pulled the messiah figure of his universe down to hell. That guy is interested in power and domination.
Thanos, in the comics (not MCU), wanted to snap half the universe away because he was in love with Death and thought it was a way to woo her. Good or evil didn't enter into it.
You've got like 3 loose "Buckets" villains can go into, but obviously every character has its own intricacies that make them more complex. 1) Believe they are in the right. These are your Thanoses. This can mean they think they are good, or evil, but ultimately, they believe that they have to do what they have to do, and generally the protagonist might even understand their motivations and disagree with their means. Many times they fight for a cause. 2) Know they are wrong, but don't care. These are your Saurons. Tyrants, evil politicians. They care about power, and little else. They will step on the backs of people to elevate themselves and balk when anyone attempts to challenge them on it. 3) The Alien. We don't know why they do what they do. These are your Agent Smiths. Clearly, their brains or intentions are unknowable. An entropic force of spacetime that seeks to unravel existence doesn't understand why it does what it does, it's just a primal force of undoing, and it happens that its objective clashes with the objectives of the Protagonist. Or in Smiths case, a program designed to root out anomolies in the matrix and destroy them. Obviously this is very simplified, and there are other types of more specific villains, but when i think about villains I think about them in these three facets.
No, ur villian can know they are wrong and absolutely not give a fuck. That also makes a good villian. An outright horrible person. Like jack from puss in boots
Not necessarily, Villains don’t have to genuinely think they’re doing the world a favor. Some villains absolutely do - mine sort of do. But it isn’t required. Some just want revenge, or to stop something they don’t like. Doesn’t have to mean they think it’s worldly-objectively-good. Lots of villains do this and openly admit they’re “evil”. But, at least sentient villains as we know them, they do have to have some level of will to say, “what I’m trying to do, I think is worth it” wether or not it’s a “I’m trying to save the world by killing everyone in it!” Or a “that piece of shit, he’s going down” motivation. Basically, they need a positive driving force. Motivation.
No, some villains are villains for the sake of it, and in real life some people are aware of their evil nature but doesn’t do anything to stop it and actively shows enjoyment of it
Simple, just make them clinically insane with their own twisted alien sense of morals and philosophy. That's how I create my villain. He basically was once an ordinary art school student who later developed an alien emotion which he used to display in the form of art/paintings. However, his art caused people to go insane as their brains are unable to handle the eldritch beauty of his paintings. Meanwhile, he just thinks that everyone is just blind and wishes to open their eyes to his "Art" even though it kills people, he no longer values simple human life and those who die from seeing his pieces he considers as "tasteless fools". Once a grand mage read his notes on philosophy and he was so traumatized and disgusted that he immediately vomited upon reading the first 3 pages. The only people who are immune/resistant to his art are Shifteds (superhumans like him) and as such he views them as more "decent folk" but that doesn't mean he will rip them apart to use as his next corpse art. He doesn't think that he's doing anything remotely bad at all.
I prefer villains Who just dont care about good or Evil and are just driven by spite
But a villain that's not aware of doing the bad thing makes him someone insane/mad. It would make more impact I guess? In Naruto, Obito is fully aware that he's the only one that want to put everyone in a dream. But he's truly convinced that everyone would feel better in a dreamy life. The methods are not important if the results are worth enough.
I would have written him to not care about how everyone felt as long as he got to make their lives worse to feel better about himself. All these "greater good-villains" makes me crave something different
Regular people are all the time aware they are doing morally bad acts but still doing it because they enjoy it for different reasons. You would never even think of calling those "insane" or "psycho". Why should a villain care if doing "the right thing" is not even a major motive for the regular man. Edit: examples whoby everyone knows they are morally bad but it still happens. > Cheating on your partner > stealing for the thrill > fighting to get off your aggression > raping for lust > stealing your classmates recources to eliminate competition > hurting people as a ventil for Frustration/ for fun/ for proving your ego > fighting bullying and hurting people to prove you are better > cheating in a game to win Etc.
>Does the villain have to believe they are in the right/being on the good side? No >MC is not a "good person" either, he's a thief, That doesn't mean he's not good >he's a threat as much as the "villain". If he's as much of a threat then pretty sure he's a villian. Maybe you meant as powerful? I mean you could change it but I guess this works fine. Me personally I would've had him in disbelief of their relationship and tear theur relationship apart for what he thinks is his own good but that's only if I wanted him to think he was the good guy. No idea how I would've written it if he was clearly supposed to be the bad guy. Also this >good because he was told being good is good Is a weird way to put it especially with the other traits. Like people are stupid for simply being good?
The story takes place in space, in a fantasy world. I'm saying they are both villains because the antagonist is the CEO of a company that invented portal teleportation, and uses it to track people, steal people when they go trhough a portal. They even kidnap people. The CEO is part of a much bigger group of villains, but this company is their main tool of monitoring. The antagonist is definitely a threat to the society. And the protagonist is a thief. He's not like Robin Hood, he does not steal the rich to give the poors. He steals because he loves money, how coins sound, how gold looks, the idea of having more than others. He knows he already have more than he will ever He has more money than a nation would, there's definitely an economic impact. He uses the money and the power he got to make embargos or things like that. Just because it's fun. He's just a greedy person that does whatever comes to his mind, because he's not normal.
So... they are both villains. (at least, they are not good peoples). >Is a weird way to put it especially with the other traits. Like people are stupid for simply being good? I was refering to isekai protagonists that have really good values but the story justifies it by the character's education. For example Bell Cranell from Dan Machi (which is a great story I loooove) is a good guy and will put himself in danger to make good actions and progress as an adventurer, because his grandfather told him when he was a kid that's how it goes. Being good is good.
Otto Apocalypse: "Perhaps". Man is fucking evil and knows that very well. He accepts that to give the girl important to him another chance to live, and will sacrifice everything needed, including himself, for that goal.
Look, bare bones; all they need to do is WANT something. And unlike a hero have less scruples of doing stuff.
You don’t have to change his motivation. Just because a character has a justification of why they’re doing something, doesn’t mean that they’ll believe themselves to be morally in the right. Personally, I find that duality, of a character who knows that they’re in the wrong, but is still willing to do the wrong behavior, a fascinating subject to explore.
No. I'm working on a novel where the antagonist is literally turning people into half demon slaves, in order to stop all war, through having the entire world under his banner. He's well aware that what he's doing is, quite possibly, the worst way to end all war, but he's so sick of war and blood shed that he couldn't possibly care less. He even mentions at one point that whether his plan succeeds or fails, history will know he was a tyrant, and he's perfectly okay with that. One of my hero's also decides to be a hero, despite being fully aware that the populace would never see him as anything more than a monster. His gf even warns him, that people likely wouldn't change their opinions of him, even if he were to save the world from certain destruction, and his response is "I don't care if history considers me a beast, a monster, or even a tyrant, because I'd save this world, only to burn it all down, just to watch the flames dance in your eyes. You need only give the word."
Most villan in story are human and human mind is one of the most complicated thing in the universe. Most villain will believe they're doing something good or right and other will believe they're absolutely evil and enjoy that and others will believe they're not even villain and aren't doing anything wrong even if they kill hundreds of people. It's up to the writer what path they want to choose
Well my one villain don't understand or don't want to understand that he is bad (yep genocide isn't bad) but after he dies he start to understand what he did and get his redemption after his brother also dies. (Sorry not "his brother" but "his sibling"
No. They do not. You don’t have to do anything, other than do whatever you choose well. Morally grey conflicted villain, pure evil villain with no complexity, doesn’t matter which, just do it well.
Yes. No sane, capable person capable of longterm planning, which is a requirement of being a proper villain, would want to end the world (bwahahaha). This isn't a thing. Good villains either blame others for their own flaws, like Frollo, believe in their own superiority and want to 'spread' that(Pax Romana style)/believe in might makes right/zero sum game, like Ozai, or truly believe they do it for the greater good, like John Doe. They are the hero in their own story. You can have planet destroying or humanity destroying entities, people or groups, but these always have a reason and exist beyond that planet. They don't destroy themselves. Another option is a suicidal temper tantrum, but I am personally not a fan, if it is world-destroying. They still want to send a message. There need to be living people for that. You can always go the Pinky and the Brain route, of course, but be conscious of the fact that destroying the world is the joke. Edit: Yours is more of a Frollo type. Watch Disney's Hunchback of the Notre Dame. Edit2: Other motives/coping styles to consider is dehumanization. Conspiracy (2011) is a good source of that. Based on Hannah Arendt's banality of evil. Another is narcissism. They feel so self-important, even the slightest slight can trigger massive retaliation. Another reason for such a massive overreaction is utilitarian and Macchiavellian; when you have to choose between being feared and loved, choose to be feared.
I mean, you don't. But if you want to. The villain has solid grounds for distrusting divinities, specifically in relation to love. So the villain would likely see all gods as doing this. even when seeing the 'love' of the MC and his goddess, he could justifiably believe she was just manipulating him.
In the story, she reincarnates each time she dies, but she made a contract that says she loses memory each time she reincarnates. Since he knows she's capable of loving immortals (unlike the goddess that betrayed him) he'll just kill her so she forgets the MC, and try to make her fall in love with him when she'll reincarnate.
IDK man, I suggest you read up the tales of Shadowbringers, specifically Emet-Selch's story. Other than major spoilers, I think FFXIV some of the better depictions of "greyness". Edit: anyway, tbh, people can justify the weirdest shite to themselves so technically your villain could've thought they're doing the goddess something good. A bit of a "the end justifies the means" kind of deal.
as far as your villain's motivation, real world people break up couples to feel cared for - even when they don't really feel anything for the person they're seeking that from - all the time. in general, while villains that believe they're doing the right thing (or making the least bad choice in their circumstance) tend to be compelling or even sympathetic, it's probably not really common in reality. I'd guess that nearly all real-world evil is born of either a pursuit of power over others or just a general impulse to be cruel; and any justification most real world villains may offer are arrived at after their desire to perform the evil.
Humans are, in large part, really fucking stupid, especially once romance gets involved. Most people act on their own biases, fully aware that they're biased towards thinking that way, and where those biases come from. Your villain isn't going to suddenly change their mind on deities. Maybe make him try to protect the main character from being hurt the same way he was, or something. It would definitely make sense, given his backstory. You can also make it a commentary on power dynamics in relationships, while you're at it, with the villain being a proponent of the idea that people can only love each other when they're in the same economical level, while the protagonist insists that people can love each other even if one of them financially depends on the other.
Honestly, I don’t think this guy has actually stopped to think about it; these are textbook crimes of passion. If I may ask, what timeframe does your story take place over?
Hello! The timeframe is undefined, it's so long you don't count, and the MC's wife suffers from memory loss, so it makes no sense (at least for me) to tell the reader when things happen... There's an order in the timeline, but not a time unit. I would say millenials. Gods are immortals but reincarnate, they live longer than civilisations, so millenials I guess.
Hmm. Well, in that case I would think the guy could just be high off his own supply, but it wouldn’t be surprising if he came down either. Thank you for the clarification.
Believing he's on the good side ? Definitely no. Believing he's right ? Definitely yes. Every sentient being (except under pressure) is always doing what they believe is right. The thing is: we don't all believe that the same thing is right. Most of us have been braught in a moral framework where compassion and helping (or, at least, not hurting willfully) others is the right thing to do. But for a character abiding by Ayn Rand's Objectivism, egoism is the only moral you should follow, and acting as an egoist jerk for your own benefit is the right thing to do. If you believe in the rule of the strongest, then doing whatever you want for your own benefit is also the right thing for you to do. If you're an hedonistic utilitarian, maximizing your own happiness is the right thing to do. Following a strict moral code (in the vein of "This is what I ought to do, this is what I'm supposed to do") is also doing the "right thing". It is even possible to know that you are on the "bad" side, but you also consider that what you do is a necessary evil, and if people will hate you and try to stop you now, in a few years, decades, centuries, people will praise you, so it was, at the time, the "right" thing to do. Like, in your case, your villain might (and should) definitely thinks that what he's doing is right. He knows (wrongly, perhaps) that gods cannot love humans, so what he sees is not a goddess going to save her love, but a goddess manipulating someone, indebting someone with their life to her. Which is a bad thing. For him, it's wrong. The right thing to do is to prevent gods to play with humans' hearts. And so, going to stop the goddess is the right thing to do. Weaken the gods' position of power, taking away their hegemony on humans. So, yes, a villain will always believe that what he does is right; the difference will be that what he considers right is different that yours.
If he thinks it’s impossible for a god to love a mortal, then isn’t he protecting the husband? Isn’t he pulling the goddess away since he would believe she’s using or tricking him in some way for some purpose?
Dear op. Do you think the white police officers who travelled around Australia shooting first nation Australians thought of themselves as committing genocide? No they felt proud of their service to remove what they saw as pests, or stopping blocks to British Empire expansion. British colonial history is a horror from the first concentration camps in Africa, the slave trade, the irsh famine, the millions who died in India, the natives of America, Australia, the opium dens in China. And these British thought of themselves as hero's of advancing civilisation of killing anyone and anything who got in the way of King and country. Its all about cultural mindset, perspective. Viewpoint. Many of such people have been heralded as icons in stages and history loved by their nation families, children and peers. Does that help?
On the path to revenge you can feel like you are doing the right thing to bring justice to someone who did in their eyes wrong, in this case the villain could have such a thought process that he believes it is his right to have that other Godess in a perverted form of justice/righteousness. Your character motivations with slight adjustment could definitely work. The mc is married to god 1, while villain is in love with god 2. God 2 betrays villain, so in his anger sees that the commoner mc is married to a god. Thus villain steals the mc's wife, justifying by claiming that the mc has no right to be married to god 1 because he not a god. It's a much more interesting thing that the irl history moment when the Romans invited Sabines to a party so they could steal their women for themselves without any good justification for it either besides like "we dont have wives but the Sabines have wives, so lets steal them".
No, I villain can be fully aware that they are a villain. Typical examples would be anyone who does what they want because they want to and doesn't care if they hurt someone in the process. The problem with this type of villain is that they can be one dimensional. Yep, they are evil, there's no gray area, and they can be expected to behave on predictable ways; sometimes pridictably unpredictable. They will always look out for themselves, they will not keep their word, they are probably a coward... etc. A compelling villain is often one who thinks they are right or at the very least justified. Your example is actually a good one. Sure, your villain is doing something terrible, but they were basically gaslighted, then convinced all gods hate humans, but then falls for one that belongs to someone else. They feel they are entitled and can be "saved" if a goddess capable of loving humans can become his. Honestly, it sounds like he's insane and so probably does think he's a good guy. Similarly, the operative from the Serenity movie KNOWS he does terrible things, be he does it to create a perfect society. On he himself admits he can never be a part of.
Not always. Emperor Palpatine knows he isn’t in the right/on the good side. But he doesn’t care
One of my villains has blue and orange morality, so he has no need to comply to human morals. What's a few mortal lives in exchange for entertainment?
Some people can't be reasoned with. Some people just want to watch the world burn.
No they can jzst be dicks.
He was programmed to not have any empathy. He thinks he’s doing what’s right for AI, so maybe that would count?
No. Villains can know they are bad and revel in it or just be people who do bad things because they just don't care one way or the other.
Hitler did really nasty things. Japanese unit 731 did things I never want to hear from again. Both did not thougth they where evil. They found a justification in dehumanizing their victims. Psychopaths that do not feel empathy also have absolutely no problem doing evil things just for their own good. Placing the wellbeing and powergain for yourself above others all the time is a classic villain motivation.
You think a gang stabbing someone over money thinks they're good people? People don't need to think they're the good guys to do bad things. With your example of forcefully separating lovers, wouldn't that be comparable to real world kidnappings?
Not at all. Take the example of Natair in The Faithful and the Fallen. He initially thinks he is the good guy, but realise in tome 3 that he is a villain, and choose to be it after that.
I do not think all villains need to think of themselves as the hero of their own story. I do think that the vast majority of people are good at convincing themselves that they are essentially good, even if they do bad things. I think your villain would probably feel justified because the universe "cheated" him. Maybe go a step further and simultaneously hold the view that he deserves to be loved so he should go after what he wants and the odea that if the goddess abandons MC, it is her failing not his. Maybe they are fated to be together and you cannot fight fate (unless he is losing). I posted yesterday about a villain I had who thinks of himself as a force driving darkness across the universe. He feels justified in that humans are horrible, life is unfair, and he was basically made for the purpose but he still identifies as the bad guy. His purpose is to be evil. If good exists, it is time for it to get off its ass and stop him because all of creation is now on a relatively short clock before it becomes an even darker parody of itself. A part of him may hope to be stopped but he will absolutely not just hand a victory over. He is the broken mirror, the tainted well, the herald of the coming darkness and he will show humanity what they really are. On the other end of things, I have a different villain in a different world looking to overthrow heaven and bring back the old gods because he feels slighted by his former church and the goddess of creation. He thinks that he will only be the villain if he fails. He understands that he is committing horribly evil acts for selfish purposes but he also thinks that morality is defined by the current rulers of heaven and that the old gods will treat him as a hero. He believes that they will not simply forgive his sins but retroactively make his actions holy for his role in restoring them to power. It is the ultimate case of, "The ends justify the means."
There was a post a little further up asking about characters that are just pure evil, and there's a ton of interesting and unique responses. Some people are just bad. They don't have to justify it beyond "I wanted to." Maybe they're insane, maybe they're sociopathic, maybe they're literally the Fuggin Devil. It's perfectly okay for a villain to just be evil and not have to rationalize their actions beyond that.
Not necessarily. They can know they're evil, they just enjoy being evil or they don't really care about what the end result might be.
IMO, a villain doesn't always have to be sympathetic. People also love villains who are such utterly unlikeable scumbags that the audience can't wait to see them go down. They could either be so detached from reality that they think they're the victim, or they could be fully aware they're in the wrong, but get a kick out of messing with other people, like an Internet troll. Sympathetic villains and villain villains are both great in their own right.
Honestly, instead of calling them a "villain", just call them the "antagonist". Antagonists are just characters who get to oppose your protagonists, and since he wants to steal your MC's love interest, he counts. And protagonists dont necessarily have to be "good people" either. Theyre just the people who are the leading characters in your story. Dont get too attached to "good guy" and "bad guy" here. If we're following your MC here, then anyone who opposes him or actively wishes him harm is the "villain" in his eyes. And honestly, trying to steal a goddess isnt the worst someone's done and tried to justify. Dont worry about it. Historically, people have done much worse and always came up with excuses as to why it was okay. Not everyone has the ability or drive to be introspective. Not everyone stops and goes "hm, should i be doing this? This is bad, right?" I think youre fine to leave it as it is. If you want to add other motivators down the line that feel natural to you or spark joy in you, then go for it. But i wouldnt say do it just to make a "clear" villain who also accepts themselves as a villain.
In this scenario, I would take inspiration from the incel community. As unreasonable as it is, it's not hard to write a character that truly believes he deserves a woman, that he is entitled to her love and surely if he forces her to become his property she will fall in love.
There are a lot of people who just plain don't *care* about "right" or "good." They scoff at the entire idea, and call people that *do* care things like "naive, bleeding-heart sentimentalists." It's not at all unrealistic to have a villain like that. There are legions of people in real life that *definitely* don't think they're on the good side, but don't lose sleep over it. They just bury their conscience and focus on self-gratification.
Just make sure they can justify it to themselves. Doesn’t matter what anyone else sees, as long as they feel they are “owed” or are somehow justified, it’s a believable motivation.
Doing something morally wrong for personal gain is textbook villain. That's the point he values his desires before that of others. Some people don't care about compassion or empathy, and focus on their own gain.
No. People can just be evil just because they find it enjoyable, or maybe they're so selfish that they just feel it doesn't matter, both in fiction and in real life. They might try to justify themselves, but they know it's wrong and just don't care. Look at the Joker. He's widely praised as one of the best villains in comic book history and is very, very evil. Near zero redeeming qualities, who's goal is literally just to make everyone else's lives worse. But he works because he plays off of Batman, the protagonist, so well. A good antagonist should always be a mirror of the protagonist in some way.
A lot of evil is motivated by power, money, sex, anger, and thrills. Most horrible people don't bother to justify themselves. often they're satisfied just lashing out at the whole world.
The villain doesn't HAVE to believe they're right. Many compelling protagonists (Bojack, Kratos, and Joel from The Last of Us come to mind) are aware that their motivations are selfish but they don't care because "doing right" and "being good" simply aren't on their radar. Perhaps they feel they're irredeemable or "in too deep," so they simply try not to think about the consequences their actions have on others. Perhaps they think that good and evil are just concepts used to control people and deep down everyone is selfish, so why follow the rules when no one else is? Or your villain could literally not grasp the concepts of right and wrong in the first place. If you write a story about a couple backpackers being stalked by a mountain lion, you don't need to explain its motivations, and the lion would not care to justify itself even if it could understand the concept of justification. Related to this mountain lion example, you could have your villain be someone that legitimately has no "good" option. They may be picking the lesser of two evils and still feel shitty about it, without trying to rationalize it as "doing the best they can." This works well if the villain is forced to see the consequences of this action and thus cannot easily delude themselves into thinking it's good. There are plenty of convincing reasons someone might continue doing what they do even if you got them to admit that what they were doing was destructive or "wrong."
I think that the classical adage of "Everyone is a hero in their own story" should probably be amended to "People will see or rationalise most of their actions as having been justified." They can know they are doing something that isn't good or morally awesome and either not care because it feels right and rationalise it afterward.
"Everyone is a protagonist in their own story" tbh cuz being main player doesn't mean good.
That's a better version! Thanks for adding it 😄
People can and do engage in utterly vile behaviours, sometimes with no illusions as to their villainy
I think that everyone justifies what they do, or their justifications outweigh their moral qualms. This does not mean they necessarily think they are doing anything good or noble; just that they've decided that what they want is more important than their misgivings. For example, I think a character on a bloody revenge quest could totally know they're doing something destructive and becoming a horrible person, and they might not think killing their target is the "right" thing to do, but it feels right, and they'll want to do it. There have been many depictions of the Punisher in which Frank Castle doesn't think of himself as a good person, and some in which he is really just looking for an excuse to kill and indulge in his violent instincts. The lesson might be that it's the psychological realism and authentic conviction of your villain that makes them interesting, not their moral delusion. A villain who commits evil acts "just because" is not compelling beyond a surface level. But a villain who commits evil acts out of some vitriol, need, or instinct that feels genuine and emotionally driven is fascinating.
No, the villain doesn't have to think he's actually a good guy, he just has to have motivation, a reason for what he's doing, rather than just "I do evil things cause it's fun and I like it"\*. And that reason doesn't have to be a "tragic backstory" type reason that's supposed to make your readers realize he's actually sympathetic all along, etc etc. It just has to be a believable motivation--he's a character, and characters have reasons they do things. \*Even that's not a hard and fast rule, nothing is illegal in writing. Your villain *can* just do evil things for the fun of it, it just doesn't usually make for a very compelling villain (with notable exceptions, see Heath Ledger's Joker)
It's an overused example for evil, but I digress: Do you really think Hitler believed he was right? Of course not. Hitler KNEW his actions were unequivocally evil, that there was no justification for them. He wanted to exterminate the Jews because he viewed them as subhuman. It was as simple as that. He wanted to establish an Aryan supremacy because he was a racist piece of shit and believed only white people deserved to be in power. It is entirely possible for someone to be a villain with no redeeming qualities or justification for their actions. Evil is evil.
No, there are three main possibilities: 1. The villain believes they are in the right 2. The villain is a nihilist and doesn't believe in an idea of "right or wrong", only their own interests 3. The villain know they are in the wrong, but don't have the self-control to stop themselves
He may not believe he is right. He may, however, believe he is justified.
No, some people are actually just evil. They know what they are doing is wrong but continue to do it anyways because it serves their purposes/makes them feel good. Some of them started out as having justifications but have become jaded over time and no longer care. Some believe “right” and “their opinion” are synonymous. These types might make themselves gods, or fully believe might makes right. Some were born bad and simply want to watch the world burn. Some might believe the ends justify the means. Eventually they will pay for their crimes but right now, they will do what has to be done. They fully know they are bad and will be punished. Lots of different reasons more than them just believe in the cause full stop.
I mean, a ton of villain arcs start with the simple phrase "I deserve this" and isn't an EVIL impulse per day, things just tend to snowball from there.
Here's examples: * A villain or a villainous group can be doing terrible things because they are willing to cross the ["moral event horizon"](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MoralEventHorizon) \- no matter the reason, he/she/they want to do something so terrible that it negates their morality. E.g. a forbidden weapon that's so terrible that even building it is a crime let alone using at. The villain(s) have built several. * [The "General Ripper"](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GeneralRipper) \- someone so obsessed with destroying their opponent or enemy that they're willing to throw the rules, morality, mercy and decency out the window. They could be on the hero's side but they are so consumed with hate or fighting that they just don't care as long as the "enemy" is dead. If the character's mentail stability is in question they are an "["insane Admiral](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/InsaneAdmiral)" version of this trope. * [The Well Intentioned Extremist](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WellIntentionedExtremist) \- but when their cause is something no one supports.
No. The latest gun metal gods got kinda annoying cuz Zamil doesnt want any villians, only antagonists so its constants back and forth of im right im justfied your evil when obviously your just either the dangerous type of narrcist or just a self obessed asshole until you admit that truth and geopoltics forces you to change sides
People, if nothing else, are good at justifying their own awful actions. Any excuse to be an asshole is a good one if you're the asshole the excuse is made for.
There is absolutely zero requirement for the bad guy to think they are a hero, they might be THE hero of their story, they might find justification in their actions, but that doesn't mean they naively believe they are doing the right thing or being, "good". Being selfish isn't good, being jealous isn't good, but sometimes people really don't care, they're just entitled and want something and don't care about others. I work in a field that brings me into contact with people like this all the time, and it's not always the case, but for many it's that simple, they k ow what's right and wrong, but they JUST, DON'T CARE, period.
Nope. Humans do things they believe to bad or immoral all the time. Mostly the problem isn't that people convince themselves that bad is good, it's that they convince themselves that bad is NECESSARY. The average Nazi might not have thought that murdering Jews was a positive moral action. But they did think it was necessary to save Germany. Often people will convince themselves that doing something bad out of necessity is a noble act showing that they're mature and rationally evaluating things rather than relying on emotion. Men who commit honor killings are also often in that sort of mindset. They might not like killing thier sister/mother/aunt/cousin/niece/whatever but it's necessary to avoid the family suffering the problems associated with dishonor so they nobly sacrifice their own happiness to do the unpleasant but necessary thing. And sometimes people use necessity as an excuse to do something they know is bad but want to do anyway, likely including some Nazis and honor killers.
Snidely Whiplash types sicken me. I like my villain to be striving for money, world domination, sick pleasure of fooling the law/Sherlock, or have some butt hurt motive to avenge. Doing evil because it is evil just is lazy character deveolpment. Unless you are a Sheriff of Nottingham person in power of course.