What Makes a Villain?

Excellent post by Declan Finn over at Superversive.

Hey, just because the character slashes someone’s throat and watches their lifeblood coming out of them in spurts, chuckling manically, doesn’t necessarily make them a bad guy. Though it could make them a fairly scary good guy? (If you ever get the chance, look up the first Mr. Moto film with Peter Lorrie. He plays a Japanese man in the 1930s, just as everything goes to Hell in the Pacific.  You seem him kill people in what looks like cold blood.  He always wears black gloves, black coats, and he always looks sinister. You have no idea what side he’s on until the very end.)

On the other end of the equation, there are people who try to tell me that MacBeth was a tragic hero … Really? That’s like saying that all of the murderers caught by Columbo were heroes, as opposed to a murder mystery told from the killer’s point of view. Here’s a lesson to being a writer: if you’re trying to make your hero tragic, don’t give him a body count in the triple-digits that includes innocent women and children.

My point: you don’t need a bad guy to be crazy for him to be evil. Nor do you need a sadist, a rapist, a pervert, sex-fiend, or Jack the Ripper.

Introductions Are In Order...

Greetings, and welcome to my humble corner of the Web.

Pull up a rock, warm your hands by the fire, and feel free to partake of the refreshments...except for that cauldron there.  That one probably wouldn't agree with you; it's reserved for...someone else.

Yes, I tell stories.

Sometimes, they're funny.  Every now and then, there's a lesson involved.  More often than not, my stories are simply meant to curl your toes, or tingle the hair on the back of your neck.  Or, perhaps, make you wonder what might be waiting, in the shadows, beyond the firelight, where you can't see...like that dark patch there, behind you, over your shoulder.

I didn't always tell spooky stories, of course.  For years, I avoided anything scary at all, but a friend handed me an H.P. Lovecraft story and an Edgar Allen Poe collection, and I realized maybe "scary" wasn't such a bad thing after all.

You're a little too close to the fire, there.  You might want to back up, just a bit, in case something comes wandering out of it.

I love a good spooky story.  Something with twists and turns, something that leaves you worried about the shadows under the bed, the creatures in the depths, the bump in the night.

...was that a footstep...?

-=ad=-