{"id":462,"date":"2013-07-18T14:24:41","date_gmt":"2013-07-18T21:24:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/?p=462"},"modified":"2018-10-07T09:29:42","modified_gmt":"2018-10-07T16:29:42","slug":"hero-is-a-four-letter-word-part-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/hero-is-a-four-letter-word-part-4\/","title":{"rendered":"The Villain Breaks Out!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Excerpted from “Hero” is a Four-Letter Word<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The Villain Breaks Out!<\/b><\/p>\n

A villain is the dramatic antithesis of a hero, and therefore has the following four attributes:<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is the Antagonist<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is the Influence Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is second in prominence to the Central Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is a Bad Guy<\/p>\n

By definition:<\/p>\n

The Antagonist<\/i><\/b> is the Principal Impediment in the plot \u2013 the chief obstacle to the achievement of the story\u2019s overall goal.<\/p>\n

The Influence Character<\/i><\/b> is the most persuasive character \u2013 the one who argues the devil\u2019s advocate position to that of the Main Character regarding the personal or moral issue the story seems to be about.<\/p>\n

The Second Most Prominent Character<\/i><\/b> is the one who stands out most strongly among the players, save for the hero.<\/p>\n

The Bad Guy<\/i><\/b> is the standard bearer of immorality \u2013 the character whose intent is to do the wrong thing.<\/p>\n

Putting it all together then, a villain tries to prevent the goal from being achieved, represents the counterpoint to the audience position in the story, it the second most prominent character, and seeks to do the wrong thing. Now we can see that when we created a hero who was a bad guy and another who was an antagonist, we were actually borrowing attributes from the villain. In the same manner, the villain can borrow attributes from the hero. For example, we might fashion a character with the following four attributes:<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Antagonist<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Influence Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Second Most Prominent<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Good Guy \u2013 (An element from the hero, rather than Bad Guy)<\/i><\/p>\n

Such a character might be a friend of an anti-hero (who is a hero that is a Bad Guy<\/i>), trying to prevent him from making a terrible mistake. Imagine that the anti-hero is trying to achieve a goal, represents the audience position, is most prominent, but has ill intent. The Good Guy variation on the villain would have good intent and would therefore try to thwart the anti-hero\u2019s evil plan (antagonist), change his mind (impact character) and would be the second most prominent player next to the anti-hero.<\/p>\n

Another variation on the typical villain might be:<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Protagonist<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Influence Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Second Most Prominent<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Bad Guy<\/p>\n

In fact, it is this combination that is used most often in action\/adventure stories. This character gets the ball rolling by instigating an evil scheme (protagonist\/bad guy), tries to lure the \u201chero\u201d to the evil side (influence character), but is second to the \u201chero\u201d only in prominence.<\/p>\n

As we can see, swapping attributes between the hero and villain opens up a world of opportunities for creating more interesting and less typical characters. But, these are not the only ways to swap attributes. For example, just because the hero is a Good Guy doesn\u2019t mean the villain has to be a Bad Guy.<\/p>\n

Suppose we have the following two characters:<\/p>\n

Typical Hero:<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Protagonist<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Main Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Central Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Good Guy<\/p>\n

Atypical<\/i> Villain:<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Antagonist<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Influence Character<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Second Most Prominent<\/p>\n

▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Good Guy<\/p>\n

Here we have a story about two people, one trying to accomplish something, the other trying to prevent it. One representing the audience position in the story, the other being the most influential with an opposing message argument. One is the most prominent; the other second in audience interest, but both believe they are doing the right thing.<\/p>\n

These two characters are dramatically opposed. They are in conflict, both externally and internally. Yet each is driven to do what he believes is right. So who is right? Well, in fact, that is what a story built around these characters would be all about!<\/p>\n

Indeed, the author\u2019s message would center on convincing the audience that one of these characters was misguided and the other properly grounded. Such a story would provide an excellent opportunity to explore a moral issue that doesn\u2019t easily fall into black and white clarity. It would stand a good chance to come across as deep, thoughtful, and provocative \u2013 and all by simply having two Good Guys duke it out.<\/p>\n

At this point, it should be pretty clear that if you\u2019ve only been writing with heroes and villains, you haven\u2019t been doing anything wrong, but you have been limiting your creative opportunities.<\/p>\n

And yet, there is still another technique to help make your heroes villains less stereotypical\u2026.<\/b><\/p>\n

“Hero” is available for Kindle<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Hero\"<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Excerpted from “Hero” is a Four-Letter Word The Villain Breaks Out! A villain is the dramatic antithesis of a hero, and therefore has the following four attributes: ▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is the Antagonist ▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is the Influence Character ▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is second in prominence to the Central Character ▪\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He is a Bad Guy By […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-characters"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p36xpN-7s","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=462"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":465,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462\/revisions\/465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}