Is there anything wrong with evil villains?

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ninjacricket911

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I know some people complain about there sometimes being a lack of sympathetic villains in cartoons, but is there anything wrong with evil villains?

There have been lots of live action movies where the villain is a nasty piece of work and is not sympathetic at all, but the movie are often good. In real life, there are many people who don't have noble intentions.

Plus its hard to make certain sympathetic, if you ever had Red Skull in a cartoon, I wouldn't want him to be sympathetic, he works best as a monster.

Plus there have been some compelling evil villains through out the last two decades (BTAS Joker, 2003 Shredder, Ozai, etc). Sometimes you need an evil villain to contrast a sympathetic one. Even in anime, there are plenty of pretty evil villains, like Freiza. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Monster/AnimeAndManga

I think the problem is there is a difference between silly evil and real evil, an silly evil character works best in comedy, a real evil character is harder to pull of in a kids, but not impossible. A truly evil character can raise the stakes the way a sympathetic one cannot.
 
Sure I get that, but there are cases where it is debatable whether a character is one dimensional or not.

I mean look at Michael Myers from the original Halloween, is he one dimensional? Perhaps, but still an effective villain I think, perhaps the best slasher ever, at least in the first film. Certainly better then Jason Voorhees. Myers was more of cypher then a character I suppose, but he worked well in that role, he was a physical representation of evil and a fear of the unknown, literally a bogey man that can come up kill you out of no where. There was given no reason why he was evil and that make him even more scary, sometimes evil cannot be understood.

Now in the recent Halloween remakes, they gave him a back story, about growing up in a abusive red neck family and it didn't work, it made him less scary. He was scarier when you didn't know much about him.

There is nothing even remotely likable about Michael Myers, but still an interesting villain from a thematic point of view.
 
I think it all depends on the genre and how the character is utilized. Michael Myers works with his unknown background (sans his insanity), how he appears, when he does, the fact that one cannot understand his reasoning, cannot get inside of his head.

However, Myers is almost animalistic. In an adventure epic, a deeper character with some motivation is necessary. Someone completely insane to the point of barely being sentient who doesn't talk much and possessed no obvious leadership skills wouldn't make much. Insane leaders need to be insane in a different sense, where they have misplaced morals and dreams, yet can command well and have a convincing way of portraying their goal positively.

Then, there are characters like Myers and the Joker who sort of show up and do evil things for the heck of it. Some people in real life enjoy hurting others for no apparent reason and I'm fine with the characters if they are handled correctly and not made out to be more than they are. Because back story can detract, give them a flavorful personality that catches attention. Also, as you stated with Myers, it's best not to introduce them as insane characters, build them up to be that, have people enjoy them because of their ways, and suddenly tear that apart by trying to make them sympathetic.

I think it becomes a problem when creators make an evil character...and that's it. They try to use it as an excuse for the character's every action. "So, why is he attacking that kid periodically over 5 years?" "Because he's evil and hates him." It just doesn't work well. Even if they aren't an intelligent-insane character, they'll still need more than that.
 
While I prefer a villain with one than one dimension to them and can make me stop and say 'Would I do any different in their situation?' , I don't mind a pure evil villain as long as they're interesting and done right. The problem for me is that it's extremely hard to do in Western animation because censorship is so restricting that it comes off really sloppy and forced most of the time. Most of the examples are ones who say their evil, but don't really do anything bad. They say how evil, monstrous, and unforgiving they are, but then you realize they never really do anything that fits the bill because the censors won't allow it. I love Medusa from Soul Eater and Envy from Full Metal Alchemist; they're both psychotic and completely evil and have done terrible things to the characters, but characters like Azula or Shredder just seem silly when they try to act tough because their feats at most amount to 'delayed the heroes for a few episodes'. In the west, sympathetic villains are more likely to be successful because they don't rely on cruel acts that the censors wouldn't allow.
 
Not all psychopaths are violent monsters, I have heard people suggest that Paris Hilton is a psychopath, there are different shades of unlikable people.

I would say Shredder's feats are far worse then that, considering it was said he killed billions of beings across the galaxy before being captured, killed Master Yoshi, was willing to kill millions people in Beijing just to gain some alien technology and tried to destroy the multi verse for very petty reasons. Azula also came up with the genocidal plan in the series finale.

Yeah Shredder and Azula didn't succeed in their all evil plans, but the fact they would attempt such things does make them menacing, IMO.

Its all about attitude, you can the villain act in a very malicious or just uncaring, it can create menace. A malicious intention can speak volumes about a character.

Like with Shredder and Beijing, he didn't want to kill the people in Beijing, he just wanted the alien anti gravity generator that was keeping the city afloat. He simply didn't care that everyone in the city would die as a result, so it wasn't objective to kill them, but his attitude was so dismissive, it makes him really unlikable.
 
The Joker works without the sympathetic background because of his morbid sense of humor.

David Xanatos is interesting because he manages to pull some victorys and has a cool calm personality.
 
I don't so much have a problem with "evil" villains as I do, as one person pointed out, with 1D cardboard cut out villains. This would be the reason why I'm so hostile to Dark Danny from "Danny Phantom"; beyond his "BWA HA HA!"ing, there's no character development or depth. He's evil merely because the plot calls for it.

Villains are a tricky character to develop. Too evil, and they become very boring or prone to mocking very quickly. If they're not evil enough, the threat they supposedly carry isn't there. The happy medium is tough to find, but if you manage to do it you can create some very memorable characters (like the aforementioned Xanatos).
 
But some villains do work best as pure evil.

How could you have a sympathetic version of Darkseid? The character concept is that of an evil god, making him sympathetic misses the point and makes him less threatening. I don't think he's one dimensional, I think he's very compelling.

If you have a wizard who studies dark magic and worships demons, its hard to make him sympathetic. Some character types just aren't sympathetic.
 
Well, it just depends...

Having someone evil just to be evil, well, it's all right but it's usually is done in a cartoony way. If anything one can pull it off, it's Slade from Teen Titans. :ack:
 
Haven't we had this debate like fifteen times already? Anyway as I've said before it all depends entirely on what kind of story you're trying to tell and how you execute it. Mike Myers works well for what he's designed for, slasher movies are all about evoking visceral terror in an audience, something a soulless engine of destruction is well suited for. On the other hand, Myers would make a god awful villain for a story focusing on political intrigue in the Venetian court.

It also matters whether you intend the character to be a one-shot or a recurring villain. A one-shot character will probably never need as much development as a recurring antagonist or the Big Bad. That bounty hunter from episode 3564 might not need much motivation beyond "money good", at least for his first couple of appearances. If on the other hand you plan on making him a major recurring villain then it's probably a good idea to flesh him out more.

Whether an Antivillian or Complete Monster I think it's important to clearly define what your villains goals and motivations are. Nobody does anything for no reason, it might not be a good reason or even a rational one but there's always a reason. Even serial killers have motives, completely antithetical to sane human beings they may be.

Lets look at Darkseid and the Joker for example. Both are pretty much irredeemably evil yet they have drastically different goals. Darkseid is obsessed with imposing his will upon all life in existence, to "bring order to this aimless universe". His every action is directed towards one overriding purpose; the complete and total annihilation of free will itself. Everything for Darkseid, nothing against Darkseid, nothing beyond Darkseid.

On the other side of the coin you have the Joker, where Darkseid seeks too stamp out chaos, Joker revels in it. Joker's not interested in power and money except as tools towards spreading more mayhem. Yet Joker's not about racking up a body count. The Joker is ultimately a showman, he treats every crime as a performance piece or comedy sketch. Sure Joker could just shoot Batman but where's the fun in that? Especially when you can tie him to a giant exploding whoopee cushion and broadcast it on live TV.

Complete Monster does not equal one dimensional.
 
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