New answers tagged planning
1
People with some form of psychopatchic / sociopathic disorder tend to find something to justify / reason-away their actions. People think Megalomaniacs just hoard power for no reason. But, even if they do, they still find ways to justify it (either to others, if they care about others, or just to themselves, if they're also narccisstic and only think of ...
1
Plot twist 1: It is revealed (in line with your idea) that the antagonist came across ancient records of an ancient seal enacted to seal out a great and terrible power, and saw someone involved that had so many similarities to himself that he concluded he must go back in time otherwise that ancient seal could not have been enacted.
Plot twist 2: The ...
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Some of the best writing advice I ever got was summed up thusly:
To the reader, the most important character is the protagonist. To the writer, it is the antagonist.
This has kind of ruined me when I look upon works of fiction because I look for what the antagonist brings to the table and how that forces the protagonist to react. And do not confuse ...
6
I have a slightly different take on Sciborg's excellent answer.
Yes, by all means give your antagonist a reason to do whatever it is he is doing. In fact, he should believe himself to be right. In the words of someone wise (but I forgot who): Nobody is the villain in their own life story. So in the story told from the antagonists perspective, he is the good ...
26
This is a great idea, but keep one important thing in mind.
First of all, there's absolutely nothing wrong with making an antagonist sympathetic, reasonable and likable. If anything, it's good writing! The best villains in literature, video games and movies are the ones with some personality, charm, charisma, or some other likable and relatable qualities - ...
2
Bond movies, Jack Ryan stories, Jason Bourne stories and similar get around this by doing what is more interesting an authentic anyway. They don’t pin misdeeds on entire countries but on specific people within those countries. They introduce ambitious generals or intelligence officers or politicians with plausible motivations and career objectives and blame ...
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