I would like a little bit of help with this. Normally, I'm fine with thinking of villains, but I'm just stuck here. I'm writing a sequel to this script I already wrote. A mass Alien genocide was covered up by the Galactic Security Agency. But after the events of the first story, the cover up was leaked, exposed, and spread throughout the Galaxy. A LOT of Aliens are pissed off and it created heated conflicts between Aliens and Humans. There was already some brewing hatred, but this whole situation really fanned the flames. The protagonists are a group of Space Intelligence Officers that work for said Galactic Security Agency. I was thinking of a group called 'Aliens United' to strike back against the humans and take their "rightful place" as the dominant species, but that somehow wasn't working for me. I was thinking more of these agents going from world to world trying to quell the tension, but it doesn't work and they question themselves. One of the members even temporarily quits the team. There's no villain in that version of the story. Can this work? Maybe I'm not thinking hard enough.
Yeah, you don't need a villain to make a story, you need tension, conflict and resolution. If you can do that without introducing a main antagonist character, then all the power to you.
There are three types of conflict: * Man vs. Man * Man vs. Nature * Man vs. Himself. Sounds like what you're going for is the last - following the SIO as they grapple with a potential change of their beliefs and worldview. I think it would make a good bridge to the third part, whatever it may be.
It is more realistic if each side is the other's villain using different rules of ethics. In "Gunslinger girl", it was dictator versus terrorists but both sides were trying to do good in their own twisted ways.
Yeah, I think that's more along the lines of what I was going for. You worded it better than I ever could. Thank you all for the advice. I been racking my brain over a villain, but maybe in this case, the best villain is no villain. Maybe small, minor antagonists along the way, but no central villain.
Since my story is more about discovery, there is no true villain. I tried to put one in but found the subplot stupid so I X'ed it. So yeah, you don't need villains and as some previous post mentioned, there are other types of conflict .
I would say that a story without a villain is the best kind as I find such stories to be more realistic. In life, few of us have a single person that we constantly fight against, but most all of us have an internal battle of some kind; whether that be morally (What I think you're going for), mentally or intellectually.
Your first version wasn't working for you probably because it's a little cliche, like a very typical alien invasion story, with very typical conflicts - you know, two opposing races/species against each other etc. Your second idea re having no villain sounds a lot more interesting. It might also be harder to write in terms of having a satisfying ending - I imagine such a story may have a stronger overall theme/message that you're probably trying to bring out. That kinda story may have a more ambiguous ending that allows the reader to decide whether it was a fitting end or not, and what it meant. Overall I'd imagine it'd be more message-driven. Harder to write but more satisfying if written successfully. You'll have to be careful you're not preaching, I think. By the way, all those Galactic Agent type names reminds me of when I was 11 or 12 - it has this sorta innocent and vivid thing about it that's really nice. I'm not saying it sounds childish - it doesn't - but somehow those names reminds me of the kinda books I might find in my school library.
Actually, there are FIVE types of conflict: - Man vs. Self - Man vs. Society - Man vs. Man - Man vs. Nature - Man vs. Technology or The Supernatural or Fate (not sure about fate, really, but I've seen all three of these listed to describe the last one and you can see hoe these could great a similar kind of tension) @Other Paw -- It seems like the humans might be the villains from your description of what you're working on. The Aliens have to unite and fight the humans for their place in the universe. It would seem that from the point of view of the members of Aliens Unite the humans would be viewed as the villains. Is part of the struggle you're going through making humans the villains?
While it would be a short conflict, I think playing a game of Russian Roulette would be in the Fate category. Though most traditional Fate based conflicts are usually tied to prophecy.
If you play Russian Roulette against someone, though, wouldn't you have an antagonist? If you played it against yourself, that's not really a fight against fate but more like Darwin taking his share.
Kurt Vonnegut's books never had a villain in them. When his father asked him why there were no villians in his stories, Vonnegut replied "That's one of the things I learned in the Army."
Well if they are not playing against someone with malicious intent on either side, the revolver would be the antagonist. At least it would still control the character's fate. Playing alone could be seen as either being both Fate and Darwinism.
I agree with the others. Sometimes, Circumstances Beyond One's Control is the biggest villain of all. And, OT, but @Cave Troll, there's something laugh out loud funny about a cat in scrubs talking about Russian Roulette.
I think yes and no, you don't need a single individual or group to play the villain but there should be some conflict. Most stories boil down to man v. man, man v. god, man v. nature, or man v. self. So your story definitely falls into one of those. I wouldnt think in terms of "villain" or even "antagonist" I would think of the conflict of the story and what that means for your characters; how do they respond to it? how does it change them? how does it test them?
Well, as others have stated, a story doesn't necessarily have to have a villain, but I'll wager to go further and state that it doesn't need to be about intent. Your character can have their ideals pitted against another force by sheer coincidence, and there would still be the necessary conflict to advance the story. If you want a human antagonist, that doesn't mean you need to have a villain. You could simply have two characters with similar goals but clashing ideologies, and make that a conflict. Neither of them are "evil" but they might view each other's methods as wrong or unnecessary. It's not that the two characters directly try to undermine each other, but their beliefs indirectly bring them into opposition. I think a major point to remember is that an antagonist is not always a villain, but a villain is almost always an antagonist. They aren't really synonymous. In a similar regard, a villain is almost always a human, humanoid, or something with a degree of sapience, but an antagonist can be anything from a person or idea, to an entire society or system of thought. In my story, there are five protagonists who form a group together down the line, and while there's technically a villain, the villain is long dead at the time of the story. The true conflict(s) lie within the main cast. Each of them I designed with one of the five main types of conflict in mind, but only one of them is ever at conflict with an individual person in the story.
You mean like in Frankenstein where Victor was literally the worst to maybe second worst person in the book?
I really like it when the main character is the greatest threat to themselves and others, especially when they are of the belief that they are a "good guy", or trying to do the right thing.
I was thinking that it was a little cliche when I was writing the first draft. I had the story and villain all ready, but when I started writing, I was thinking just that same thing. I needed it to be better than that. I'm not a fantastic writer, but I knew I could cook up something a little less cliche. You're right, the second idea is a little harder to write because as of now, it's them just going from world to world trying to solve problems and keep the peace. It almost feels like a long TV show. I have to find a way to make that more interesting than it sounds. I do have an idea for the ending, but it seems rather anti-climactic... and well, kinda bad. It's frustrating, but I like it. That's what writing is all about. It's making me really sit down and put my brain into Overtime and think about how I want to end this story properly, and transition into a Part 3. Thanks! I originally wanted to write a basic spy story, but I didn't want to be bound by real world limitations, so I took the spy genre and put it up in Space. Also, Space Agents just seemed like a cooler idea too. Yes, this is definitely what I'm aiming for the most. Oooh, I like that. They think they're doing the right thing, but end up making things worse and question themselves even more. Something along those lines.
