Slave Masters: Wallace Breen and the Illusive Man

Two of my favorite villains are Dr. Breen of Half Life 2 and the Illusive Man of Mass Effect 2-3. Both are video game characters but this is incidental. Breen and the Illusive Man are mortal and only human. They believe they are doing evil for humanity’s greater good. Both men are puppets being used by inhuman entities from elsewhere.

Breen and the Illusive Man are highly intelligent, darkly idealistic and eloquent. They are dangerous but not as individual combatants. Their wits and authority are what make them formidable. They muster and command powerful forces.

Saruman of The Lord of the Rings is a character very similar to Breen and the Illusive Man. Like them, he turned evil believing good was hopelessly outmatched. He is intelligent and eloquent. He musters and commands powerful forces. He is the puppet of a mysterious and inhuman intelligence from elsewhere.

What is different about Saruman from Breen and the Illusive Man makes all the difference. Saruman is not actually human. His ambitions are unabashedly selfish, with no interest in a “greater good” whatsoever. He mindfully strives to bring humanity down.

I am a storyteller and a game designer. My games are with stories in mind. I create villains to make the stories and games interesting.

Like Tarkin in Star Wars, Breen and the Illusive Man are masterminds as henchmen. They are bosses in their own right but in the shadow of greater and supernatural authority.

As a creature humans are weak, slow and witless. Fecundity and technology empower the species but even empowered the mortal and only human remain weak, slow and witless.

My fairies, monsters and aliens are typically stronger, smarter, faster and tougher than human beings. Ordinary people are hopelessly outmatched by them. Only the extraordinary stand a chance against them.

In my stories, humans provide evil with cheap labor and cannon-fodder whether the evil is human or otherwise. Our species is a slave race whether the masters or not.

Breen and the Illusive Man are slaves as masters. Though mortal and only human, their excellence makes them powerful. Things inhuman put this to use.

In our real world, things inhuman from elsewhere use humans as cheap labor and cannon-fodder. The excellent humans are used as management. Breen and the Illusive Man are managers. They “serve” humanity by actually serving inhuman entities.

Truth is indeed stranger than fiction. Fantasy is reality from a strange point of view. Breen and the Illusive Man are wonderful characters because they are personalities as villains. They express themselves as if real human beings. We understand them whether we agree with them or not. Their perspectives make sense, thus, we sympathize with their will to evil. We cannot hate them because they are people but we resent them for betraying their own humanity.

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