Villains a la Carte

“Up to no good, I love plottin',
'Cause I'm so good when I'm rotten.
No more Mr. Nice Guy, wait and see.

I'll become that nasty, naughty, very spiteful,
Wicked, wayward, way delightful,
Bad guy I was born to be.

Lying, loathsame, never tender,
Indiscreet repeat offender.
No more Mr. Nice Guy, that's not me.”

~Rothbart

The Swan Princess

Let's talk about bad guys.

I have written and completed four novel length stories. I use the word completed a bit loosely, but, hey, it counts as far as I'm concerned. Lately, I've been working out a new story idea in my head, and I feel really good about it. This one's going to get written and finished, too! I can feel it! But there are aspects of it that are tripping me up, and one of them is, well, the bad guy. See, I have no idea why, but from one story to the next, I can have a well-rounded bad guy that I love to write about and then have a villain who's absolutely flat. You know, the kind of bad guy that you could replace with a cardboard cutout labeled “Evil” and none of the other characters would notice anything was amiss. I really don't understand it. This new villain of mine is trying really hard to fall into the "Flat" category, even though I keep telling him not to. It's gotten me thinking lately about just what it is that makes a good bad guy. There's got to be some kind of formula out there. If I could just figure out what it is, I could use it to help out Mr. New Villain.

Well, after much thought, observation, and study, I have come up with the following.

Sarah's Recipe for Villains a la Carte

(Produces 1 serving of Main Antagonist. Results may vary.)