On Villain Complexity & the Doom Villains

Yahoo Mail reformatted itself. Why? Because the Internet is Gehenna, I guess.

I am out of town for YALLFest this weekend, so I am pre-writing this before Friday. Actually, I should be writing these before the final day, anyway, but most of the time the week overwhelms me.

This one was prompted by some discussions I’ve seen about Dragon Age, though this Note isn’t actually about Dragon Age.

Also, “Villains of Dune” sounds like a really crappy Herbert novel.

On Villain Complexity & the Doom Villains

Critics, in general, seem to like complex villains. I’ve also noticed, however, that in many instances, the main villains in epic fantasy, or escalated, important villains who threaten to do something like take over the world, are often dismissed by those critics as ‘less interesting’ than the smaller villains with more complexity. And my gut reaction is that these critics don’t know what they’re talking about; sometimes, villains don’t need to be complex. The more I thought about it, though, I kind of get what they’re trying to say here. At least, I think so.

Consider: Luke Cage. The TV show had two big villains: Cottonmouth, and Diamondback. Cottonmouth, played by Mahershala Ali, is widely regarded as the more interesting and compelling, but he’s killed partway through (in part because of the actor’s commitments to other projects), to be replaced by a new villain who shows up out of nowhere with a power suit that lets him fight Luke on even terms. Diamondback’s out for revenge, whereas Cottonmouth is a gang leader trying to maintain power and juggle several balancing acts to do so. Diamondback’s not quite an End-of-the-World Villain, but I think it gets the point across that in many cases people like villains who aren’t simply out for revenge and with power to crush their enemies.

And there’s something to be said for that! It’s interesting when we can see our emotions reflected in a character, even when they’re villains. Sometimes, especially if they’re villains. Hopefully, they’re not making the choices we would make, but they’re making choices that we can understand from their perspective. That doesn’t happen with villains whose goal is to destroy the world, or even to kill all our heroes for revenge. That’s not something most of us can even begin to grasp.

I think part of this is a problem of scale. The bigger you’re trying to go with the narrative, the harder it is for the villain to be relatable. Sauron is not going to be a relatable villain, no matter how you spin it, because he’s the Dark Lord trying to take over Middle-Earth (although I’d argue he’s more interesting than some give him credit for). The Outsiders are not going to be that complex in Dresden Files because they’re just trying to burst into our world and kill everything. Kronos in Percy Jackson is just a guy out to destroy civilization. 

In short: if you’re building a world-threatening enemy up in the story, it is very difficult to convincingly make them morally complex or identifiable, because they’re working on a scale we can’t hope to reach. Attempts to make them sympathetic often fail; there’s a scene in Castlevania where someone tells the guy out to kill all humans, “Wait, if you kill all humans, you’ll get rid of the good stuff about them, too!” And Mr. Kill-All-Humans is like, “Huh, I never thought of that!” which is such a bizarre thing for a guy who decided to kill all humans years ago to not think about.

Of course, it is possible. Look at Loki in the MCU, back when he was a villain. He was a very interesting, complex character, even when he was trying to take over the world. There was a lot of work put into that, though.

There is another way around this, too. Sometimes, the main villain isn’t very complex or interesting, but his minions and supporters are. Saruman is a fantastic example of a garbage person who is really interesting to me. In Dresden Files there are a bunch of really complex villains throughout who aren’t on the Outsiders’ level, but still plague our hero through his adventures. And Percy Jackson gives us Luke, Kronos’s right-hand demigod who has a rivalry with our hero and his own moments of sympathy. Heck, Luke’s motivation gets so much more attention than Kronos’s.

[In general, Riordan’s main villains follow this pattern–it’s a shame that after the original series, he doesn’t do anything as interesting as what he did with Luke. There are plenty of other villains in the vein of Kronos, and very few that are like Luke. Guess it was too much work?]

I admit that I am a little afraid that writers look at the criticism of big ‘Doom Villains’ and say, “Well, now we can’t do those anymore, they’re boring!” Well, no, a giant demon monster out to destroy the world isn’t boring, just because it doesn’t have a traumatic backstory. At least, it shouldn’t be. But if your worry is about a complex character arc being absent, that’s not an insurmountable issue.

Yes, with the big-scale villains, you often don’t get that level of humanity and complexity; that’s just how the game goes. It is possible, though, to achieve it, and even if you can’t with the main villain, his (or her!) flunkies can certainly give it to the audience. Not every villain needs to be complex, but that doesn’t mean you can’t tell complex or interesting stories with those villainous characters.

—