The Two Critical Components Of A Well Crafted Villain

Good Stories Need a Good Bad Guy

Photo by Artur Tumasjan on Unsplash

Every one of us has encountered a truly terrifying villain in film, TV, or books. A well-written and complex antagonist will stick with us throughout our lives, formulating our perception of good and evil. The problem I’ve seen is that villains often miss two key components, which makes them weak.

What I am talking about is relatable motivations and unnerving calmness.

Relatable Motivations

We do not have to agree with the motivations behind their heinous scheme, but we should at least understand and relate to them. Too often, I see the antagonist in a story with either ridiculous or weakly conceived motivations.

A great example of this is many of the villains in the Bond movie franchise:

Elliot Carver (Tomorrow Never Dies, 1997) is a media mogul who wants to start a war between China and the UK to increase TV ratings and acquire broadcast rights in China. I don’t believe that anyone would ever relate to someone starting a war to get better ratings, especially when they are already running a massively successful media empire.

Dominic Greene (Quantum of Solace, 2008) is an eco-terrorist and businessman who wants to monopolize Bolivia's water supply by helping a military general stage a coup. I had to look up who the villain in Quantum of Solace was; that’s how weak a Bond villain he is. I also couldn’t remember the plot despite watching the film at least three times.

Stromberg (The Spy Who Loved Me, 1977) wants to create an underwater civilization after destroying the surface world with nuclear war. The ‘destroy the world’ trope only works when we understand that the villain’s motivation is rooted in a desire to rebuild a better world from the ashes. Creating an underwater civilization borders on cartoonish villainry rather than realistic.

We also see examples in other modern films:

Richmond Valentine (Kingsman: The Secret Service, 2014) is a tech billionaire who wants to combat climate change by killing most of the human population with a signal that causes violence, believing this is the only way to save the planet. If his goal is to save the earth, a billionaire can affect change in far more productive and effective ways than wiping out billions of people.

Enchantress (Suicide Squad, 2016) is an ancient sorceress who wants to take over the world by creating a machine that will destroy modern technology. This is another movie that I watched several times, and I never understood what the machine she was making was, why she wanted to do it, and why it was taking so damned long to build.

Now that I’ve shown you some bad villains, let’s talk about some who have relatable motivations:

Thanos (Avengers: Infinity War, 2018) believes that the universe’s overpopulation is unsustainable and that wiping out half of all life will prevent suffering and resource depletion. I refuse to see Thanos as a true villain. His motivation is born out of watching the downfall of his homeworld, and while wiping out half of all life in the universe is extreme, the argument can be made that it would achieve what Thanos is setting out to do.

General Hummel (The Rock, 1997) is a highly decorated U.S. Marine who feels betrayed by the government after witnessing the deaths of fellow soldiers in covert operations, only for their sacrifices to be ignored and left unrecognized. He demands that the government pay $100 million in reparations to the families of soldiers who died in black ops missions, using a threat of chemical warfare (VX gas rockets) as leverage. General Hummel is another character I refuse to see as a villain because his motivations are so relatable. He never intended to go through with his plot and hoped the US government wouldn’t call his bluff.

Colonel Hans Landa (Inglourious Basterds, 2009) is a Nazi officer who is more interested in his survival and advancement than ideological loyalty, making deals to ensure his comfort and power. He doesn’t care about anything but saving his skin and ensuring that he is on the winning side of the conflict. We can relate to him because, at the end of the day, most of us are not bound by ideology but by a desire to live the best life we can, and we will wheel and deal to ensure that.

Ozymandias (Watchmen, 2009) is a former hero who orchestrates a catastrophic event that kills millions to unite the world and prevent nuclear war. He genuinely believes that sacrificing millions will save billions, and his motivations stem from a desire to avert global catastrophe. His logic is cold but rooted in a belief that the ends justify the means. The thing that makes his motivations so relatable and grounded in reality is that he’s right, and just like the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, sometimes innocent lives are sacrificed for the greater good.

The best villains are ones that you actually kinda like.

When Thanos was defeated, I felt a little bit bad for him. I understood why he wanted to wipe out half of life in the universe, and even though I disagreed with his methods, I couldn’t help but feel bad for the guy.

The same goes for General Hummel. He was a good guy who cared about his troops and cooked up a plan to get their families the compensation from the government they deserved. His motivations were noble, but his execution was not. In his case, his character had a redemption arc that fit the film quite nicely.

When the motivations are not relatable, or at the very least understandable, we can not connect with the villain. Characters we don’t connect with and form a bond to feel one-dimensional and weak. When the hero faces off against the villain in the final showdown, if we don’t feel an investment in the villain, the stakes of the final battle evaporate, and I’ll bet good money that if you’re watching such a showdown in a film or TV show, you’ll be scrolling through your phone rather than watching.

At the end of the day, we should be able to put ourselves in the shoes of the villains and at least empathize with them.

Unnerving Calmness

Think about some of the best villains in TV and movies. I’ll wager that they all move through the story with a calm, stoic demeanor that sends a chill down our spine.

These are only a few examples of villains who remain calm in spite of the situation.

Darth Vader (Star Wars) - Never cracks his calm demeanor, regardless of the situation. The most emotion we ever see from him is when he demands:

Commander, tear this ship apart until you find those plans! And bring me all passengers, I want them ALIVE!

Even when challenged later in the film, he responds not with anger but instead force chokes the Imperial officer who dares challenge him. Throughout the films we find him in, Vader moves through each scene, never allowing emotion to break through.

Gustavo "Gus" Fring (Breaking Bad) is a central villain in the Breaking Bad universe. Throughout the series, he rarely displays emotion and couples his cool exterior with unwavering politeness. Even when he murders someone in cold blood, he does not waver. 

Seriously, the man emerged from a room where a bomb went off, missing half his face, and remained totally devoid of emotion.

Thanos (Avengers Infinity War and End Game) - No matter what the odds are against him or the situation, Thanos is stoic. Even when the odds are against him and victory is no longer certain, we see him face these challenges with the same unwavering calmness. When the final battle is done, and he is about to be turned to dust, Thanos is cool, calm, and collected as he reflects on his failed scene.

He even is stoic and calm after Thor drives Stormbreaker into his chest!

Anton Chigurh (No Country for Old Men) - Anytime I think of a villain whose unnerving calmness has stuck with me long after the credits rolled, Anton tops the list. The tone and cadence of his voice, combined with the blank, emotionless expression, tell us all we need to know about how cold and calculating this psychopath is.

These villains are strengthened by their calmness, but when a villain is written to be emotional and erratic, they cease to be intimating. The opposite becomes true.

Kylo Ren (Star Wars) - This is probably the best example I can think of, especially when we compare him to Darth Vader. Kylo Ren is emotional and throws multiple tantrums, which weaken his impact as the antagonist. It’s hard to take him seriously when he is reacting to bad news by lashing out on the walls with his lightsaber.

Biff Tannen (Back to the Future) - Biff is supposed to be the antagonist of these films, but his emotional outbursts, impulsive decision-making, and shallow motivations make him a classic high school bully but hardly a villain. The only thing he has going for him is his physical size, which Marty McFly overcomes with his resourcefulness on several occasions.

The Joker (Suicide Squad): Jared Leto’s portrayal of the Joker is probably the worst example of this character in film, especially when compared to Heath Ledger’s masterful take on the iconic Batman villain. Leto gives us a Joker who is erratic, emotional, and unnecessarily chaotic, which makes this version of the Joker weak and unintimidating.

When a villain maintains a cool and calm demeanor throughout the story, even when faced with a certain death, it sends chills through the viewer. We are emotional beings, which means that those among us who do not express these emotions come off as the antithesis of what it means to be human.

When our antagonist embodies relatable motivation and stoic resolve, we get a villain who will endure and stay with us forever.