***COWARDLY VILLAINS***
Villains, by their very definition, have at least some level
of cowardice when it comes to exercising their evilness upon innocent people.
Criminals run away whenever the police show up. High ranking villains use their
wealth and power to control their adversaries. Bullies target only people who
are weaker than them. If villains didn’t have any kind of power over their
intended targets, they would scurry away in fear when the heat gets too hot.
When was the last time you saw a caterpillar bully a full sized human adult? It
doesn’t happen.
And then you have the kind of cowardly villain that uses
their chicken shit ways in order to frustrate their opponents. You see this all
the time in WWE with guys like The Miz and Kevin Owens. While the frustration
tactic may be effective at times and believable more often than not, you don’t
really hear about these kinds of villains in any other medium. Jaws was a big
badass shark who devoured his victims. The giant tarantulas in Eight Legged
Freaks felt no need to run away from their prey to frustrate them.
In short, whenever I write a story, I prefer that my
villains be badasses who will gladly go toe-to-toe with their opponents and
will most likely win. Those ones are the hardest to defeat. Those are the ones
with the most power over their victims. Yes, Roger Zee from my most recent
first draft novel Demon Axe had cowardly traits, such as relying on mass
manipulation more than his own fighting skills, but hardcore fighting skills he
did have. If anything, manipulating people into believing him was little more
than an insurance policy. So you have this deadly assassin who’s unmatched in
machete swordsmanship and he’s got an army of believers behind him. Holy shit!
The reason manipulating people is considered cowardly is
because the ones doing the manipulating target impressionable youths and
already-converted adults exclusively. Do you think for one minute that the
white nationalists in Charlottesville
are capable of brainwashing hard left resisters? I don’t fucking think so. They
stick to their own base and that’s what gives them power. And then that kind of
indoctrination is passed on from generation to generation behind closed doors.
So what should an ideal villain be as far as the
cowardice-bravery spectrum goes? As I’ve illustrated with Roger Zee a few
paragraphs ago, it could very well be a middle of the road deal. If Roger
relied on his fighting skills exclusively, there’s still a small chance he’ll
get blown to bits by the military or police. But if he blackmails those same
police and military members, he becomes even more unnecessarily powerful. The
power hungry crave more power and it’s an addiction that rivals cocaine and
sugar.
For villains who don’t have the kind of power Roger Zee possessed
in Demon Axe, cowardly tactics could be perceived as intelligence in disguise.
That’s why we see assassins and hit men in movies run away from the police
rather than taking them down with a bazooka in either hand while riding a tank.
Some battles just can’t be won, but it’s the war that will determine a
permanent victor. In the case of evading police, power over the public comes
through self-preservation. The one who is the most energetic at the end of the
war will be the winner.
So now we have an axis of bravery-cowardice (X coordinates)
and wisdom-naivety (Y coordinates). I’d draw the graph myself, but I don’t have
that kind of software on my computer nor will it show up very well when I copy
and paste this blog entry online. When crafting a villain, these are the kinds
of personalities you’ll have to consider. It may not be as simple as plotting
points on the X-Y graph. There are variables to consider such as a powerful
dictator being too lazy to do the job himself or maybe some underlying sense of
entitlement due to being overpowered. I’m not saying one way is better than the
other except for when I write my own novels and short stories. I prefer
badasses who will go toe-to-toe with everyone, but that’s my opinion and
everyone is entitled to their own.
And now that I’ve mentioned this mind-blowing idea of
everyone having their own opinions, I’d like to hear some of yours, my lovely
audience. Should villains be completely cowardly or not at all? How many shades
of gray are there when determining an answer? Where does your main source of
creative fuel for villains come from? We’ve got ears, say cheers!
***AMERICAN DARKNESS 2: WE ARE THE MACHINE***
This collection of short stories is only three away from
being complete. The third to final story will not be featured at the WSS as a
contest entry, but rather as an independent piece. It’s called “Bloodstained
Paycheck” and it goes like this:
CHARACTERS:
1. Owen
Edge, Crime Scene Cleaner
2. Dennis
McKay, Porn Theater Bouncer
3. Felicia
Strom, Kidnapped Teenager
PROMPT CONFORMITY: None.
SYNOPSIS: As part of his occupation, Owen doesn’t
discriminate when it comes to clients as long as they pay his expensive fees.
His latest assignment comes when Dennis hires him to clean up a bloodstained
nudy booth after the bulky bouncer got too rough with a client and committed
manslaughter. Owen’s neutrality is put to the test when he catches Felicia
trying to sneak free from captivity. She spills the gory details of how she was
being forced to perform sex acts on the other side of the glass for men’s
entertainment at the threat of being murdered or raped by Dennis. Owen must now
make a decision to stay true to his profession or pull the gun from his pocket
and put one between Dennis’s eyes.
***POISON TONGUE TALES 2: THE RIGHT TO REMAIN PSYCHOTIC***
This story, on the other hand, will definitely be a part of
the WSS contests. The prompt for this week comes from a list of lyrics CJ (the
admin) laid out for us and the ones I chose came from “Bad Reputation” by Joan
Jett. This story is called “Wolf’s Cannonball” and will bear resemblance to
last year’s “Tiger Bullet Kick”. Here’s how the story goes:
CHARACTERS:
- Big
Bad Wolf, Martial Arts Genius
- Little
Red Sniper, Assassin
- Hacksaw,
Lumberjack
PROMPT CONFORMITY: Big Bad Wolf doesn’t give a damn about
his bad reputation (judging by how he treats his bounty hunters).
SYNOPSIS: The unfortunately labeled Big Bad Wolf has been
wrongly accused of stealing children from various villages and now has a price
on his head that Little Red Sniper and Hacksaw plan to collect. Instead of
trying to explain his innocence, Big Bad Wolf has taken on all comers with no
absence of malice. He has a move in his arsenal known as the Wolf’s Cannonball,
a rolling attack so powerful that it could be dangerous to his health.
***NOVEL IDEA EXPANSION***
American Darkness 2 and Poison Tongue Tales 2 are both well
on their way to being completed and ready for Marie Krepps’ critiques. While
there will definitely be a third installment in both series, my main goal after
completing those anthologies will be to write another novel. As of now, I have
more novel ideas than I do complete scene-by-scene blueprints for them. I’ve
made it my mission to write those blueprints for all of my novels so that I’ll
have something to fall back on when one novel idea is written out. I did it
with a synopsis called “69 Bullets” and I plan on doing it with “Backwoods
Barbarian”, the next in the alphabetical order. While I won’t give away
spoilers for 69 Bullets, you can have a short synopsis:
HEROES:
- Daniel
Jameson a.k.a. Chakko, Teenaged Porn Addict
- Leon
De Taj, Electromancer
- Tina
Ryan, Heavy Metal Guitarist
VILLAINS:
- Dominick
Zola, Vampire Mob Boss
- Markus
Bathory, Red Knight
- Bailey
Krause, Mercenary
SYNOPSIS: Daniel Jameson is a high school student with a 3.7
grade point average and the admiration of his female classmates. Chakko, on the
other hand, is the online alias he uses whenever he surfs the web for porn,
both to use and to distribute to other teenagers. Chakko’s main crush is Tina
Ryan, the super attractive heavy metal guitarist from an all-girl band called
The Angry Amazons. The band is coming to his home town of Seattle, but Chakko may not get a chance to
see them. During his internet moonlighting, he downloaded nude pictures of
Bailey Krause, a member of Dominick Zola’s criminal empire. Dominick is not
happy and wants to burn Chakko alive.
***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***
I’ve been pumping out drawings like crazy and the next one
on the chopping block will be Hacksaw, the orcish lumberjack from my eventual
WSS contest entry “Wolf’s Cannonball”. He figures since he cuts down trees for
a living, hacking the Big Bad Wolf to pieces won’t be any more of a struggle.
The only difference is, trees aren’t capable of perfecting martial arts
techniques. Be careful what you wish for, Hacksaw, because you just might get
it.
***COMEDIC QUOTE OF THE DAY***
“Human beings are
nothing more than ordinary jungle beasts. Savages. No different from the
Cro-Magnon men who lived 25,000 years ago in the plasticine forests eating
grubs off of rotten logs. No different. Our DNA hasn’t changed substantially in
100,000 years. We’re still operating out of the lower brain. The reptilian
brain. Fight of flight, kill or be killed. We like to think we’ve evolved and
advanced, because we can build a computer, fly an airplane, travel underwater,
paint a painting, write a poem, and compose an opera. But you know what? We’re
barely out of the fucking jungle. We’re really just semi-civilized beasts with baseball
caps and automatic weapons.”
-George Carlin-
