Villain and anti-hero obscure the central notion. The character at the center of the story is the protagonist, regardless of his or her morality. Whether someone is heroic or villainous is a value judgment that can depend on the reader's beliefs, and how the author presents the character. The protagonist is at the focus of the story. The author's skill helps paint the character as complex or black and white, tragic or triumphant, and so on.
When I create my characters I try to make them relatable. I want people to empathize with my MC. If he is a hero I want people to admire his bravery. If he is a anti hero I want them to appreciate his unorthodox style, rebellious nature, or etc. If I create a pure evil MC not many people are going to empathize with him and therefore they won't become emotionally involved in the story. I gather you don't want to hear this but society does not root for the bad guy, they root for the hero, the good guy with a flaw, the anti hero who doesn't want to be there. We don't root for Darth Vader, Leatherface, the Aliens from Independence day, etc. Take advantage of this knowledge. Write a story where the bad guy wins at the end and really throw people for a loop.
MilesTro, have you read the Song of Ice and Fire series? In the later books you start reading chapters from the perspective of the queen, Cersei Lannister, who is pretty much as evil as it's possible to get. She has almost no redeeming qualities, every scheme and action she takes makes you loathe her. There's such a strong feeling of moral injustice in how so many of the 'good' people lose their lives whilst she wreaks havoc upon the kingdom from the safety of the capital. You desperately want her to get her comeuppance and to meet a gruesome end. A Feast For Crows has some of its best chapters written from her perspective because you get a chance to see into the mind of this downright sadistic character.
I have an idea that involves the classic mustached villain with an evil plan and no remorse (sans mustache)...in space. Keeping that one under wraps though. It's my baby.
Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast books 1 and 2 dedicate a large portion of the narrative to the villain, a very good one at that.
Now see here. I can understand why many people root for the good guys because this world is dominated by good people. Not everybody are good, but most of us do like characters who fight for good and show their emotional intention. But I am sure there are some people who root for the villains, even if the villains never win. Some of us can get tired of heroes winning a lot. That is why villains like Leather Face, Freddy Cooper, and Jason never died. If they did, then why do they have stupid sequels? Sometimes we want to see what will happen if the world goes up in flames. Some of us want to see innocent characters die. And some of us don't care about becoming emotionally involve to the story. To us, the story is just plain entertainment to amuse us from our boring reality. If all stories are about good people winning and telling us what is right and wrong, then entertainment will be boring as hell. No matter how much drama and thrills it can have, sometimes the villain should win and get the chance to be the main character. If I write a book about a blood thirsty killer, and my readers throw it to the trash, then that is their choice. But my other stories will have good characters who my readers shall gain empathy and maybe relate to their cause. But still, a good evil anti-hero needs a good reason for his corruptness.
The thing about your examples is that they're from horror movies where the 'good' characters are usually written in such a way that we don't care if they live or die. It's usually the bland teenage archetype, they go off on a road trip to party and have sex with one another, the guys are all full of themselves and the girls are airheads; in these instances they aren't really 'good guys', and we cheer for the serial killer because we want to see what gruesome trick he's going to pull out for his next victim. We actually enjoy their deaths, it's the same in pretty much every horror movie with a clear protagonist. Now think up some examples where the good guys have qualities, they're likeable and there are reasons to cheer for them. Do the bad guys win in those worlds? It's far more rare.
What if the villain has a better choice than the hero, even if the moral sounds heartless. For example, what if the last of the human race are living on an alien planet, and they are being treated like low class citizens with mistreatment and a little slavery. The villain wants to free the human race by wiping out the alien race, even if they are innocent. However, the hero believes that both humans and the alien rulers can coexist peacefully if he can show the aliens how good most of the human race are. The aliens are tyrants, but they can understand. Should the villain commit genocide on the aliens for humanity's freedom? Or should humanity choose to coexist with the aliens without using violence to solve their problem. Who do you think have the better choice?
The concept of good and evil has been a part of the fabric of life since w/e it began. It really isn't hard to understand that many more people would prefer to read about the good winning vs. evil. I'm not saying that there can not be evil characters that we don't enjoy. I enjoyed Heath Ledger in TDK and watching a villian take Batman to the limit was exciting but ultimetly I want the good guy to win. Why? Because you are wrong about the world. It is not dominated by good people it is a collection of very BAD things. Sure evil can have its day but readers want the good guy to overcome in the end. Hence the reason reading a book where the baddy wins is so unique and sometimes welcome.
First of all, it is Freddy Krueger, not Freddy Cooper. Second, Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees and Leatherface are all horror movie characters. And in horror movies the protagonist is not the villain, but the one trying to run away from him. Now, in the scenario you describe the one you call "villain" is actually a hero, along with the other hero. Ultimately they are both champions of the human race. The villains are the alien race, since from the beginning you have set the humans as "good" and the aliens as "bad" and oppressive. It is a classic story of 2 heroes with conflicting opinions on the methods that should be used to achieve a goal.
Could suggest a couple of graphic novels the Incognito series by Ed Brubaker andSean Phillips which is based around a super-villain who has had his powers suppressed and stuck in witness protection. Needless to say he isn't too happy with the situation And Bomb Queen although this is probably for a particular taste as it does feature some nudity but it is based around a female super-villain who runs the town and somehow you always find yourself routing for her to beat the super-heroes that turn up to challenge her rule. Fun and doesn't take itself too seriously. Both of these are definitely stories that follow villains and not the heroes or anti-heroes.
Yes, I meant Freddy Krueger. Cooper sound like Krueger to me. And it is kind of twisted for the serial killers to act like heros killing kids who are the villains. How are the teenagers the villains? In Chrtistian, a novel by Stephen King, the nerd who brought the car is harassed by bullies, and his evil car kills them for him. The bullies in that book and movie sound like villains more than the other teens in the horror movies. That scenario is from a story I finished, but it has to be revised and hard edited. The second hero is a terrorist, who murdered innocent alien people. When the other hero try to stop him, the second hero tries to kill him. In the end, the main character defeats the hero, and the aliens decide to treat the humans with respect after they almost died out. What do you think?
Read again what I wrote. Where do I say that the teenagers are the villains? The villain in the Stephen King case you mentioned is the car, not the bullies or the nerd. As for the scenario, your setting seems quite flawed. At the beginning you brand the human side as "good" and the alien side as "evil", implying that the conflict is between them. Then from what i gather both sides of the conflict in your plot belong to the human side, with the aliens being there just as props. Also the whole alien race's behavior is not believable. On one hand they oppress the humans and treat them as slaves but on the other hand they decide to treat them with respect even after they revolt and threaten them? Highly unlikely. A society that accepts slavery is a society that has decided that if any of said slaves decides to revolt against their master, the master will usually punish them severely to inspire fear to the rest of the slaves, and not reward them for it.
The aliens are suppose to symbolize a government allowing immigrants to live in their county, however the aliens place the humans in low class labors as payment for their living,which seems like slavery. I also forgot to mention that there is an alien princess who got capture by the anti-hero who wants to use her for ransom, but secretly infected her with a virus which will spread across the planet, killing all the aliens. The hero thought it is mess up to capture the innocent princess, so he decides to bring the princess back to her tyrant father to end the conflict between the humans and aliens. Although the anti-hero kills her father, the princess had seen how mistreated the humans were, and decided to free them when she becomes the new leader.
From the information that I've read about your alien story I wouldn't say that the second hero is any less a hero than the first. He is perhaps more extreme and final in his judgement but he is doing it for the right reasons and if these aliens are holding an entire civilization as slaves they deserve what they get and I think there would be others that agree with that. I am someone that cheers for the bad guy more often than not from the sith in star wars to heels in wrestling to Magneto in Marvel. The bad guys are usually more interesting to me and their motives are often have more emotional reasoning behind them that when explained are deep and make me wonder if I would do the same thing if I was in their shoes. To me this thread is exactly the same as your "To Believe or not to believe" thread since that is what it comes down to for me when it comes to villains. If I can believe the reason they are doing what they are doing then it is entirely plausible for them to be victorious and have people like it, or at least not feel like they have wasted their time on it.
Read King of Thorns (should probably go for Prince of Thorns before that, though; got the second book first >.>) The main character isn't a 'good guy' by any means, but I found myself wanting to find out about him and what happened by the end of the book. The author made it so that I was interested in seeing what became of the MC despite - or maybe because - of his ways. I think KoT shows him a little more sympathetically; people that have read PoT seem to love or hate it, due to the way its written. I believe it was the authors first book, so while its really good the character still needed some extra work. Most of the time the problems seem to arise from the fact the MC is a psychotic 14 year old (in the second book he is 18) Its better than it sounds, I assure you.
I am sure that most stories that focus on evil characters show their past and explain how and why became evil to make sense.
American Psycho? The book not the movie. The narrator is a true monster and is completely unsympathetic. Fascinating and deeply unsettling story.
Cool. Not all evil fictional people have to be sympathetic. They just need an understanding of their evil. If the aliens in my story are good people who treat the humans like equals, then what would be the reason why my anti-hero will become a terrorist? What would be the logic of his evil actions?
Again, horror is a special case where the focus character's purpose is to inspire fear (hence the term horror) without any other aim.
id just like to point out. Hitler, Osama, Kony all monsters.... from our point of view. but to some they are the heros. and all of them purely evil believed with conviction that what they had done was for a greater good.
