Not all stories have baddies. The protagonists may be challenged by a mindless thing, such as an animal, a fire, a disease or a natural disaster. The greatest fiction does have villains, however. Even if the main threat is otherwise, there is evil to contend with.
The significance of villains is that they are people as the problem. They are deliberately a threat. To contend with them is a clash of wills. Even if sympathetic, the villain is the will to evil personified.
Men have always been the warriors. Women are seldom combatants. The heroes and villains of action-adventure contend with each other violently, thus, the heroes and villains are traditionally male characters.
The heroine and the villainous dominatrix are not new, but they have only recently become somewhat common. The female characters of action-adventure are traditionally the damsel in distress and the seductress. The usual exceptions were the hero’s mother or the villain’s eye-candy girlfriend.
Society is more comfortable with the idea of a female character being a hero than a villain. She may slay men and all is well, since her victims are baddies. If she is harmed, it is by baddies, thus, our ideals are not subverted.
Society is uncomfortable with the idea of female villains. The very idea acknowledges that women may personify the will to evil. The sex of our mothers is vilified… and that is scary to us, who were all children. We are more comfortable with the idea that the female villain is not actually a villain, but rather the victim of the actual villain, turned to evil by him.
What if a woman is actually murderous… and not because a man drove her to it? She is a villain because she wants to do evil things, for whatever reason. Not only is she willing to kill, she delights in doing so.
Not every villain, male or female, is reprobate. The character may have a truly sensible reason for his or her villainy, even if it involves killing people. Crafting such a figment of imagination takes more effort and skill to get right, however. It is much easier to make a villain evil for the sake of evil, to suit the story as the protagonist’s foil.
Limiting female villains to always being sympathetic
marginalizes female characters in action-adventure entirely. Imaginary women must
be allowed to thrive in the full spectrum of the genre. They must be
allowed to be the best or worst people
in their stories… or else being “female” shall mean “inferior” as a figment of
imagination.
Evil sacrifices others to get what it wants. Both males and females are guilty of this. Villains are sympathetic or unsympathetic based on their motivations.
ReplyDeleteYes. Villains are indeed those willing to sacrifice others. A sympathetic villain may have a "good" reason for doing so, but the evil is what it is regardless.
DeleteIndeed a great villain must be a person, not evil because it's Tuesday. A true believer is far more endearing to an audience than a cynical thug. I would like to see more female villains, but as FEMALE villains not gender-swapped dudes. I definitely agree they should not be marginalized.
ReplyDeleteYeah, characters in the image of girls but likeness of boys are pretty boys, not female characters.
DeleteSociety doesn't know what it wants. Half the time people will complain when the villain isn't female. The confutation happens because villains are often portrayed as hedonistic rock stars. It goes from being a bad thing to being prime real estate. It sort of goes back and forth when people get the moral bug. People generally don't seem to know what they want because they are too busy listening to the wind and hearing what it tells them at that moment. The truth though is that all things under the sun are good and acceptable as long as love if put into it. People will notice and love it as well, even when others tell them they shouldn't like it.
ReplyDeleteIndeed on all points. The very idea that an idea AS AN IDEA should NEVER be considered is NARROW MINDED by definition. As a criterion for storytelling, it is UNINSPIRING, thus, kills interest rather than sparks it.
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