6 Steps to Creating A Memorable Villain for Your Story

Of all the types of characters to create, one of my favorites has always been the villain.

Dracula. Iago. The White Witch. The kid from the Giving Tree – all of them were classic and memorable villains. Although we root for our heroes, there is something to be said about having a compelling foil to the protagonist. 

When you have a gripping villain, it helps to drive the story forward and offers additional conflict to the hero, making the story more interesting and dynamic. However, creating a good villain is a balancing act. You want them diabolically interesting but not so over the top they are not believable.

Here’s what to consider when creating a villainous character:

THINK OF REAL-LIFE VILLAINS

Before you create your own villain, it does help to think of a real-life model.

What antagonists can you think of from history?

For instance, you may think of a ruthless dictator or an infamous serial killer. You might even think of a villain that you once heard about from someone else. When I go to a local city, for example, I often ask about any mythos, such as a local bogeyman legend. 

Think of villains in your own life, whether past or present.

You might ask yourself questions such as:

• Did you have a bully growing up in school?

• If so, what reasons did they give for teasing and humiliating you?

• What do you think their true internal or external motivations were?

• What about a current boss who seems to live to make your working life hell?

• Why are they so cruel to their employees? 

While the goal is not directly to model your character after these real-life people, it helps you better frame your creation. 

WHAT IS THEIR BACKSTORY? 

Once you have a general idea of the type of villain you want to create (for example, say your villain is a superhero turned rouge) you need to create their backstory. I suggest doing this before you begin to plot out your story because it will help frame your story later. 

For instance, where did your villain grow up?

What traumatic experiences shaped their life?

Every person has a history that is filled with highs and lows, likewise, for your villain.

Your character may have had a penchant for setting fires when they were younger, but they may have also loved to go to their grandparents’ house and eat freshly baked cookies. Your backstory should be layered because this makes the story more interesting. For instance, in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the monster is not written to be a one-dimensional character. In the actual novel, “the creature” has whole soliloquies where he laments about being created into a world he does not understand.

Although one may not realize it, he does have a moral compass, but it is not as well defined as everyone else’s because there has been no structure (such as school or church) that is there to shape him. Additionally, he is ostracized from society from the very beginning.

When he does go on and kills, because of the way he has been treated, he makes a justification for it.

Here’s a direct quote:

“There was none among the myriads of men who existed who would pity or assist me; and should I feel kindness towards my enemies? No: from that moment I declared everlasting war against the species, and, more than all, against him who had formed me, and sent me forth to this insupportable misery.”

— FRANKENSTEIN, MARY SHELLEY

In short, the creature asks himself why he should take pity on humankind when they have so clearly not treated him with the same respect. His action (murder) can be directly tied to his backstory (his experiences with the townspeople). Every good villain, or good character for that matter, needs to have a clear and defined reason to take every action. This may not be immediately obvious to the reader and may be something that comes up later in the story.

This is one of the reasons well-written villains still engage the audience. We understand their motivations and desires because they match our own. We may not engage in the same poor choices they do, but we can still understand the intention.

To further illustrate the point, think of some of the villain retellings that have become extremely popular. 

• Circe by Madeline Miller tells the story of a woman who became powerful despite being in a sea of ruthless men.

• Wicked by Gregory Maguire casts a sympathetic look at the Wicked Witch of the West, or Elphaba, trying to make sense of a discriminatory and unfair world.

These tales are popular because backstory matters. What was lacking before gives readers a new sense of wonder in these familiar worlds.  

WHAT IS THEIR MOTIVATION?

Once you have the backstory pinned down, as mentioned, you need to find out what this character’s motivations and goals are. The villain’s backstory should offer a framework for these reasons. For instance, suppose your antagonist is a mad scientist set on destroying 2/3rds of the world’s population with a giant ray gun. You could leave the story here, and some readers may still find it interesting, but what happens if you dig deeper?

Suppose that this scientist grew up in extreme poverty and would occasionally have to steal to put food in their belly and often saw friends, even family members, die of starvation. When they became older and had the means to create a giant ray gun, the financial disparity has grown, and greed is running rampant; their motivation now makes sense. In fact, a similar backstory can be found in the Thanos character from the Marvel franchise. His reasoning for space dusting the population was because humanity simply cannot survive at a high population rate.

You can agree or disagree with his means to “fix” the problem, but you still understand why he has taken up his cause.

Think of this formula:

Backstory + Motive = Action 

This works for your antagonist, but it should also work for every character in your novel. The protagonist, the secondary characters, and even the minor characters that show up only in one or two lines.

How the characters grew up, and their motivation will frame every action they take, whether big or small.  

SHOW THAT THEIR MORAL COMPASS MAKES SENSE (TO THEM)

Now that your reader understands your villain’s backstory and why their main motivation is, you need to give them a moral compass. A writer will often claim that their character is evil, has no moral compass, and then call it a day. This is lazy writing, and you will lose reader interest if your character is “evil” and nothing more.

Think of your own moral compass.  

Spend some time answering the questions below:

• Are your morals shaped by religion?

• By specific law and order?

• By the consequences alone? (i.e., “I don’t commit a crime because I’m scared of going to jail.”)

• Do you consider stealing wrong?

• What about if you needed to steal to afford life-saving medication?

• What if this medication was for a friend?

• Family member?

• The person you hold most dear?  

We all have boundaries that we are unwilling to cross and cross if we feel we have no other option. The same is true for your character. Would they ever kill anyone?

What they harm an animal, but not a child?

Do they believe that the ends justify the means, or are there some laws that they will not break?

Make their moral compass clear. 

As shown in the above section, this is also why each character’s point of view matters; we need to understand everyone’s backstory, motivations, and ethics.

These all make your story realistic.

UNDERSTAND WHERE THEIR POWER LIES 

Now comes some of the fun stuff. While this applies to villains primarily, you can ask any of your characters specific questions, such as:

How powerful is your character, and where does that power come from?

If they have supernatural or magical abilities, is this something they are born with but developed into fruition later?

Did they come into power?

If so, how?

For example, suppose your character is not born with magical abilities but then finds an ancient spell book. After years of study, they finally feel powerful enough to enact revenge on the person who harmed them when they were younger. 

Another example would be Carrie White, from Stephen King’s Carrie.

The book mentions that these were innate powers, but that Carrie would not develop telekinetic and telepathic abilities until her first menstrual cycle. Not only does King give a specific reason where her powers come from, but he draws from lore that appears in many cultures - the idea of a menstrual cycle signifying womanhood and untapped potential. King is a great example of finding realistic villains based on specific fears we humans grapple with. He is also a good source of general writing advice as well.

If they do not have supernatural or magical abilities, then where does their core strength come from?

Did they spend their youth on a farm, developing muscles, or do they work out at the gym six days a week?

Give them a reason to be strong or magically powerful. While you do not have to spell it out for your reader in great detail (and this could actually become a tad boring) you must always be thinking of the connection between what your character does and the reason they have for who they are and what they do. Knowing motivation can also help you build conflict and tension in your story, especially if you want to use a tension and time graph to do so.

AVOID STEREOTYPES AND OVERUSED TROPES 

A cliché is an overused phrase or saying, while a trope is a literary device that is used repeatedly. You should try to use both sparingly, if at all. For instance, how often have we seen a villain throw their head back and laugh maniacally or shout, “I would have gotten away with it if not for X.” Both are examples of clichés.  

An example of a trope would be a villain that wants to personally kill the hero, instead of letting anyone else do it, thus, buying the protagonist ample time to escape.

Another example is a villain that seems to wear only black or has traditionally negative features, such as a wart on their nose or acne scars. 

While it is okay to have some of these elements, the last thing you should do when crafting your villain is to strive to make them unique and identifiable. Try to determine any clichés or tropes that might exist, and then work to eliminate them. A great resource is tvtropes.org and although this website started for Television trope, it has ample resources on books, film, games, etc. Avoiding cliche is also one of the best ways to introduce fight scenes, if your villain is the physical combat type.

Look at the various tropes you can find and determine where your story fits in. Also think of what phrases, expressions, motivations, actions, etc. your character takes and what kind of similarities there might be from media you love. Again, this does not mean you cannot have these in your novel entirely, but more so the goal is to get you thinking about why your characters look and act the way they do.

The more you think about your characters the more likely you are to understand them.

And, when you get to the point where you can answer any question about your character (From what they had for breakfast to what life experience shaped them when they were five) then you are on your way to write a fan favorite character.

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