: Re: How to avoid the villain being a caricature I am on draft 4 of my story now, and many things are hanging together well. As a result, lesser items are coming into sharper focus. I need to

@Barnes643

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The excerpt is quite short, but on first reading I would say his tone comes across as 'casual'. This could work for being frightening - if his actions are frightening and raising the stakes. This could be punctuating his dialogue with 'beats' i.e. actions, most likely violence to bring in the fear factor. The fear could then come from the villain's casual dialogue contrasted with his frightening actions.

Avoiding caricature is a good way to make them scary, and it's another way to make the villain frightening. How often in a TV drama has the villain said something that's blown their plan, or not killed the hero when they really should have? Making the villain avoid these pitfalls can make them more frightening immediately, because they will be smarter and more efficient than the stereotypical villain.

More important than any of this is 'why'. Why does the villain like to ask rhetorical questions? Is he trying to break the hero from the inside before killing him/her? Does he go after the hero's friends because he's trying to teach the hero a particular lesson? If violence excites him, then why is that? Is it a means of exerting power? Is it for the thrill of it? Is it a way of proving his philosophy right and the hero's is wrong? Trying to make the heroine think the ensuing violence against her friends is her fault in the excerpt suggests there are personal motivations there, or else that he's a manipulator.

Once these questions are answered, it should be easier to make sure the villain behaves consistently. After that, depending on your genre, the villain should take actions that let the hero(es) know that he is not to be trifled with, and those actions should continually raise the stakes and increase in intensity. Again, depending on genre and the ultimate outcome of the novel, the villain will probably be pursuing a goal and will eventually cut off all alternatives for the hero.

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