The Word Cloud

Hey guys. Not really sure if this is the right place to put this, more of a conversation starter than anything else, but how do you feel about Evil heroes?

Evil heroes make fabulous protagonists / main characters. The best ones, are those that don't even know that they are heroes until the finale! There are tons of fantasy characters that fall into this catagory, especially in vampire stories; Charlaine Harris's Eric the Vampire for instance from the Sookie Stackhouse collection.
You can make these characters do awful, sickening things and then show one small section of light & your reader loves them.
Look at Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs; sick beyond belief but the fact that he warms to Clarice and helps her with the "Bill" case, makes you sort of glad he gets away in the end!!

You go for it! The best stories are the ones where the bad guy comes good (in a believable way of course).
Kiki :)

For the reader to want to follow them through the novel compelling is an even more important characteristic of an MC than likeable (I see a lot of manuscripts with the opposite problem: the central character is perfectly nice - 'likeable' in that sense - but too passive and dull. It's not a coincidence that the Austen heroine who more people dislike than any other, and who's rarely filmed, is Fanny Price.).

I do think, though, that to be compelling there needs to be a reason to their awfulness. Not necessarily a pop-psychology terrible childhood, but certainly a logic to their actions: a way in which they do the extreme things we wouldn't dare to. Even psychopaths are logical - it's just not anyone else's logic. Like those fun/silly revenge stories one reads, or the glamorous baddy women in things like Dynasty - they act out all the things we'd love to do if we could let our hatreds or ambitions or vengefulness have full rein.

The advice I was given (cos one of my protaganists is a bit self-centred and a cad with women) is that if your hero has a dark side, they should either be fascinating and have an absorbing life history, or really good fun to read about.

I got to a point where I got bored of good guys and only wanted to be and write about the bad guys.

I don't know if there really is 'a line' that goodies cross into becoming bad, unless it's a turn in the plot, such as a betrayal or something. Bad and good tend to be archetypal characters, but it's so much fun to turn them around and give a little taste of the other side. Plus it depends on how you write the character, in whether we ever stop liking them. Bad characters can kill and such but you still love them (eg Gisbourne from Robin Hood, who by the way is part of my wall collage) and equally good characters can kill and you still love them (Jack Crowe in JCV's)

It is a very interesting topic idea, I will most probably have a google and then come back :) x

Well, if you want to know what I think of evil heroes, have a look at this. It's an experiment I wrote ages ago that starts off with an anti-hero, an amoral biker who finally goes to far.

I found it a lot of fun to write, there are less restraints and more scope for insisdious remorse.

I think the best characters are the bad ones. As for the lines they can cross I think this is just a matter of opinion. Look at Freddy Krueger. He was a child murderer yet is one of the greatest horror icons ever (Robert Englund, not the rubbish remake) This just goes to show that a character can do anything and as long as he/she has a few witty one-liners and a funny personality they can be brilliant.

Oh good. Maybe I'll post up this insidious character up one day and you'll see what I'm talking about. Have to say, they are super fun to write (and they do indeed have EXTREMELY good justification for what they are doing.)

Classic fiction is 'hero' versus 'protagonist' - where the hero has morality, courage etc. and overcomes everything that the protagonist tries to do - eventually.

But this is 2010. Some publishers want fiction shown from the protagonist's POV - it seems to be a trend. There is a dark side to all of us, scary scenes make for interesting fantasy and escape from the everyday routine.

Any one who could come up with a believable anti-hero is on a winner.

The best recent example I can think of this is Finn by Jon Clinch, which chronicles the early life of Huckleberry Finn's father. Definitely worth a read Babblefish; one of the most well drawn and conflicted anti-heroes I've ever come across. In case you've seen (or read) it, the tone and tragedy is very similar to The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.

There's another good one - written in the early 1900's by two French writers about someone called Fantomas. He was basically an assassin. After reading that it really got me thinking that evil heroes are probably more interesting because they have questionable morals - a guilty pleasure (excuse the terrible pun) if you like!

wouldn't it usually be 'hero' versus 'antagonist' stephen?

Extract from Wilkpedia
It is entirely possible for a story's protagonist to clearly be the villain, or antihero, of the piece, as is evident with characters like Vic Mackey (from The Shield), Tony Soprano (The Sopranos) , Walter White (Breaking Bad) and ZIM (Invader ZIM)

However for the sake of consistency shall we agree on hero versus anti-hero, or protagonist versus antagonist.

You should never use wikipedia as a source of information Stephen unless it is to reconfirm something you already know. Even then you ought to find a different route for your extract/sources

You seem prone to stating your opinion as an absolute fact Killphill. Certainly Wikipedia should not be used when trying to reference formal reports, but as a source of everyday information I don't see any reason not to use it, particularly if all you want is a general definition. Also, it should probably be noted that Stephen probably did already have a good understanding of hero's, anti-hero's, protagonist and antagonists, and was thus just, as you say, confirming what he already knew.

Well does it really matter ? - A good guy against the bad guy is all I need to know. The fact that the bad guy could take the lead role seems to be a market trend - such is the perverse nature of the human mind.

Anyway, I'm bored with this topic - I think I'll go and read some Wikipedia...