Last week, I wasn’t feeling so well, so I pulled up Netflix
and decided to try “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2.” I’m not always a fan of sequels, and I went
in not expecting it to be as great as the first one.
I thought it was actually pretty creative, though there was
one thing that really bothered me. The
villain came in the first few minutes of the movie and announced to the
audience that he was indeed the villain. Then he went on to become the main character’s
mentor, though everything he did was clouded by the fact that I already knew
that he was up to no good.
As I was watching, I started wondering why it was so
important for the audience to know that he was evil to begin with. Would the story have been different? Probably not.
The young, enthusiastic inventor would have still learned from the
older, wiser inventor. He would have
been sent out to save the island and ultimately saved the ‘animals’ living
there.
The difference would have been that I wouldn’t be waiting
for the other shoe to drop. And I kept
wondering how the main character couldn’t see it. I mean, after all, he’s been so obvious in
his evil intent that I told the audience within a few minutes. How couldn’t he see it too? I think I would have enjoyed the movie more
if I had been with the main character, wondering if he was doing the right
thing, instead of knowing he was making a mistake.
Which, in turn, made me wonder what kind of villains I’m
creating. Are they all so evil that
there’s no chance of redemption? Does
the main character know who they really are or do they have an angel face
hiding what they’re really up to?
Personally, I’m starting to really enjoy creating angel
faces.
How about you? What
kind of villains do you like to read?
This is something to think about. My current WIP is written from two perspectives. One character knows the villain is the villain from the start (and therefore the reader knows too), and the other doesn't. I think it works for the the story, but I'll have to see if that gets flagged by any of my readers.
ReplyDeleteI've written WIPs where the villain is obvious from the start, and others where it takes the MC a while to figure it out. I feel like if your MC (or one of your MCs) is still trying to figure it out, maybe the reader shouldn't know. But if one of your MCs does know, I'm sure that it wouldn't seem as odd to announce it to the reader.
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