Comments | ds_workshop: round table discussion: villains!

sageness in ds_workshop

round table discussion: villains!

Nov 06, 2007 12:42

Several people seconded an off-handed mention of doing a post on writing villains -- and LOTS of us are doing either Due South Seekrit Santa and/or Yuletide this holiday season, so this is hopefully a very timely and relevant post. Feel free to pimp this far and wide because I'd love to get a good range of discussion going in the comments ( Read more... )

craft: plotty casefic, craft: character, craft

Comments 16

brigantine November 7 2007, 17:32:30 UTC

I find I tend to be more convinced by villains that are cool, calm and subtle. Unless it's a horror movie, but even then, keeping it low-key creepy is often scarier than ramping up the blood and guts. Sometimes it's the monster you can't see that's the most terrifying. I believe Etcetera_cat mentioned Keyser Sose. Yep. Kinda like that.

James Bond-type villains have never done it for me. Of course, that could in part be my own perception of the James Bond character as an asshole, so sure, go ahead and kill him, but what turns me off of the villains themselves is that they're so cartoonish. I know that's done intentionally, but I don't get the attraction. Gadgets, henchmen, villainous physical disfigurement, Big Plan To Take Over The World, lecturing, gloating, and/or ranting, and… again? Yawn. A little of that goes a long way ( ... )

buzzylittleb November 8 2007, 18:55:27 UTC

Okay, now I'm going to emulate sageness's walk through my fandom history approach ( ... )

Now with added Mounties! buzzylittleb November 8 2007, 19:08:03 UTC

Looking through my dS fic, I'm a little surprised by the lack of villains. The bulk are of the "their own worst enemy" school of plotting and are typically more involved with slash psychology than anything else.

So, that's mirrors covered (the whole self villaincy things) so what about smoke?
1) one haunted book that does things to Vecchio's life
2) completely unseen bird smuggler
3) a crate of herrings (Ray/Ray comedy deathfic, yes, quite)

All of those are "Enabling villains". They aren't important as themselves, the can't carry a plot on their own. They are excuses to dig into the character's Inner Lives.

So do I have any real villains ( ... )

Re: Now with added Mounties! buzzylittleb November 8 2007, 20:48:27 UTC

find out things about himself" and was briefly "the boys discover subtext after realising they are in a television show" (an idea better left to frankly better writers) and so ended up somehow developing plot and somewhere along the line the arc changed to "RayK sees ghosts... and this lets him inside things and understand his feelings..." (Look Ma! No Spoilers!). My bad guy didn't come fully formed, it was very organic, but now I think he was not as scary as I wanted him to be...

Is it some function of the slash that villains become secondary characters enabling the slash plot? They become "obstacles to romance" rather than fully formed characters.

And yes, on Frankie, I'm going to be using him and the lack of solid characterisation is driving me buggy. I don't know how to handle him without going all pantomime.

Re: Now with added Mounties! buzzylittleb November 8 2007, 20:50:17 UTC

On the reading side, like I said, I like the creepy type of villain to the realistic guy trying to feed his kids kind. I just don't know why. Hmm... *goes to think*

keerawa November 14 2007, 06:24:00 UTC

I've never written a Due South villian. I don't think the fandom lends itself to them, although the show has a plethora of ridiculous villains. They usually bore me, so I don't write them. due South also has the "misguided" criminals, who Fraser can convert to the Light Side of the Force.

Most of my dS stories have, as someone else mentioned, the main characters as their own worst enemy. Case fics tend to the police procedural genre, and even though there is a criminal, they aren't really a villain. The cops on a case are struggling to find clues, rather than directly battling a villain ( ... )