: Re: Should a villain have redeeming qualities I know it is important for main characters to have flaws to make them believable and real. But should an antagonist have redeeming or good qualities,

In real life, very few people are "pure evil". They have history that makes them the way they are and motivations for their actions. So it would definitely be more realistic to have a few redeeming qualities or at least a background explaining why they act the way they do.

A character who is evil with no explanation as to why isn't very realistic. People aren't just born evil (unless they have some sort of mental illness) and oftentimes something happened to them to make them the way they are, whether it was just how they were raised or a traumatic experience.

A few possible scenarios:

1) Your antagonist was once a good guy but someone did something to him (killed one of his family members for example) and he wants revenge.

2) Your antagonist was traumatized early in life. A lot of people who were beaten as children also beat their kids when they get older for example (obviously not always the case). Some people also want others to feel the pain they feel, which is a good motivator.

3) Your antagonist is insane. They have something wrong in the head and are literally psycho. This can make for an interesting story because the character doesn't necessarily have to have motivations for his actions. They can be completely random. (Although a little direction or purpose is always good, even if the insane character seems like his actions are random.)

So, you don't necessarily have to make the antagonist "good" or have redeeming qualities but I do think a good backstory and motivation is required to make the bad guy more realistic (unless he is psycho).

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: Different ways to say "I looked"? I find myself overusing phrases like "his eyes flickered to (object/person)" and "he shifted his gaze to (object/person)". I use the words 'eyes' and 'gaze'

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: How important is a story's introduction? I would feel like an introduction would be the first impressions and knowledge someone has of a book, along with the cover, just like a good movie.

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: Describing a Character Traveling: Too much narrative? I am new to writing and I am trying to a write a novel. In the first chapter, my main character travels from her hometown to a different

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: I think that it might work if you switched tense at a large break in the story, such as a chapter. This would especially work well if you were switching the POV character. A friend in

: Re: Should a villain have redeeming qualities I know it is important for main characters to have flaws to make them believable and real. But should an antagonist have redeeming or good qualities,

More posts by @Pope4766717

: Different ways to say "I looked"? I find myself overusing phrases like "his eyes flickered to (object/person)" and "he shifted his gaze to (object/person)". I use the words 'eyes' and 'gaze'

: How important is a story's introduction? I would feel like an introduction would be the first impressions and knowledge someone has of a book, along with the cover, just like a good movie.

: Describing a Character Traveling: Too much narrative? I am new to writing and I am trying to a write a novel. In the first chapter, my main character travels from her hometown to a different

: I think that it might work if you switched tense at a large break in the story, such as a chapter. This would especially work well if you were switching the POV character. A friend in

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