What A Good Villain Needs

Yes, it’s another post about villains, but I do have good reasons for that. Villains are important for the quality of a story, so they should be good (at being villains, of course, they’re all evil). We all have a good idea about what makes a hero, but not about what makes a villain. There’s three basic qualities a good villain must have: opposition, motivation, and threat. Only a villain who has all three of them can really do their job in the story, so let’s take a closer look at them.

Opposition happens when the hero and the villain of a piece (or the protagonist and the antagonist, if you want to be less extreme in your word choice) are at odds about something important. Usually, they want the same MacGuffin and thus only one of them can win. Sometimes, they also represent opposite principles or ideologies, such as freedom/control or order/chaos. In a romance story, the villain/antagonist is the second person who wants the love interest. In an espionage story, the villain is the evil genius who wants the plans for the ice beam. In a superhero tale, the villain is, well, the supervillain of the week who is usually out for world domination or something similar. A good villain is in clear opposition to the hero from the very beginning, so it is clear that this is where the biggest conflict of the story comes in (and conflict doesn’t mean violence - two people wanting the same love interest also create conflict, but that conflict is rarely resolved with weapons or fists).

Motivation is the reason why the villain is doing what they are doing. We’re long past the time when a villain did evil for evil’s sake. They need a better reason than ‘I am evil’ to do what they’re doing. The audience needs to be able to understand why they’re acting that way - not to accept it or even root for them, but to understand it. Motivation doesn’t have to be complicated, for a purely evil villain who will not have a redemption arc or suchlike, something simple, such as ‘money,’ ‘power,’ or ‘world domination’ can be enough. A sympathetic villain, on the other hand, should have a motivation the audience might even support, even though their way of going about their business is wrong. A villain’s motivation is often coupled with their opposition. The second suitor in a romance story is motivated by getting the love interest, though the reason is often something like their money or simply that they are both part of an arrange marriage. They don’t have the ‘right’ reason for wanting the love interest, unlike the hero. The villain in an espionage story might truly believe than humanity is weak and needs a strong leader - and thus the villain must have the ice beam, so they can enforce their leadership. The motivation has to be understandable, it’s not necessary that the audience supports it (in most cases it’s better if the audience doesn’t support it).

Threat is made up of two components: power and competence. Threat as a such stands for how dangerous the villain is - the higher the threat level, the higher the tension, which is also important for the story. Power defines all the resources a villain has, no matter whether they are the support of the love interest’s parents, minions to do their bidding, or real superpowers. Competence defines how well the villain can use those powers. A villain who is powerful, but incompetent is not a threat, but laughing stock. A villain who is competent, but doesn’t have enough power to endanger the hero is not supporting the story enough. The ideal power balance between a hero and a villain is very unbalanced in favour of the villain, because only a powerful villain makes the much-less-powerful hero look heroic.

Once all three aspects come together, a villain can really shine. So, let’s look at a villain from recent years who really has all of their qualities together: the Joker from “The Dark Knight.”

Opposition: The Joker is the polar opposite of Batman. Batman stands for order, the Joker for chaos. Batman fights crime, the Joker is a criminal. They have instant and lasting opposition.

Motivation: The Joker wants to prove that, underneath the civilized veneer, all humans are agents of chaos. That it takes little to push them all from civilisation into anarchy - and that anarchy is the ultimate fairness, because there everyone has the same chance. (Or all of this is a bold-faced lie, since the Joker is anarchy personified.)

Threat: The Joker proves early in the movie that he’s competent - during the bank heist. He proves himself intelligent, a good tactician, but also a cold-blooded murderer. While he doesn’t have big resources, his competence shows in his use of them. Especially his skill with military-grade weaponry gives him an advantage over Batman who, as we all know, doesn’t use guns. He has both power and competence to make Batman’s life hard and challenge him.

The Joker has it all: opposition, motivation, and threat - and that is why this Joker works, whereas the version from “Suicide Squad” doesn’t work, simply because he has no real motivation. Being anarchic alone does not a Joker make…

A strong villain makes for a good hero and those three qualities make for a strong villain. What they mean is down to the kind of story you are writing, but they always must be there. As long as the villain is in opposition to the hero, has an understandable motivation, and presents a threat, you’re doing it right.