Romance between two antagonists

Discussion in 'Character Development' started by Xerclipse, Apr 2, 2016.

?

Should there be a developed romance between two antagonists who get defeated by the hero

  1. Yes, it humanizes and develops the antagonist more.

    84.2%
  2. No, the reader struggles with investing with certain characters.

    5.3%
  3. Maybe, under certain circumstances where at least one of them turns good.

    10.5%
  1. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    It's not the point that no one in the world is pure good or pure evil. The function of the villain is to generate heat from the audience. If you show the villain to be a romantic or loving person in some contexts, that pulls the villains alignment back towards moral center, making the audience conflicted and the villain more difficult to hate. More likely for the audience to want to see redemption than the irredeemable force of evil that everyone must resist. The purpose of the villain in a narrative is not so much embodying the wide range of humanity so much as it functions as a symbol of the worst of humanity within everyone. Within the hero. The villain is what the hero could become reflected back at him or her. The personal demons metaphorically made manifest.

    Hitler may have been kind to animals etc, but when placed in any kind of narrative, it's rare to see him portrayed that way because it conflicts with his narrative function. I'm sure Palpatine donated to hospitals and so on. We don't see it because that's not his purpose. It's not always about being realistic. Total realism is a slow, lumbering thing.
     
  2. BayView

    BayView Huh. Interesting. Contributor

    Joined:
    Sep 6, 2014
    Messages:
    10,462
    Likes Received:
    11,689
    I think I agree with @Phil Mitchell in that it's the role the character plays in the story that's important.

    And to some extent, I'm struggling with spending this much time on characters and still calling them antagonists. I think it's possible to write a compelling story with multiple protagonists, some of whom function as antagonists for other protagonists in the story but are not portrayed as villains. But writing a story with one clear protagonist and then spending a lot of time on a romance between two antagonists seems like a structural issue, to me.
     
  3. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

    Joined:
    Jan 21, 2016
    Messages:
    8,496
    Likes Received:
    5,120
    Location:
    Sydney, Australia
    There's no reason an antagonistic character can't feel sympathetic. They can be as sympathetic as you like. Even an awful person's life has worth morally. Portraying this, and complex morality, does not make your story confusing.
     
  4. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    Oh but there is a reason.

    Villains should be sympathetic in the sense that their motives are understandable.

    However giving a romance is giving them virtuous traits and is one of the most powerful ways to humanize a character. So much so that I didn't even give my protagonist a romance must less the antagonist. There's this underlying assumption here that as long as you have the bad seemingly outweigh the good then the audience will still see them as a villain. When that's just not true,as it's asking people to think like computers about these characters when humans are emotional creatures. Especially if the romance is good. Give Draco Malfoy a good romance and suddenly people like him more than Harry. The edgy villain with a soft heart who just needs someone to bring it out is one of the most attractive characters to alot of people. People like Edward Cullen and Christian Grey tread on villain territory overtly. But they're beloved because of their romances, which no longer merely makes them understandable, but likable to alot. Or alternatively the romance sucks, in which case it's just a pointless waste of time.

    If you try this and you treat such a lovable character as the villain YOU see them as, people might really start hating the hero. You really don't do your protagonist any favours.
     
  5. Simpson17866

    Simpson17866 Contributor Contributor

    Joined:
    Aug 23, 2013
    Messages:
    3,406
    Likes Received:
    2,931
    Maybe more writers should deconstruct that notion? Make it clear that a person who genuinely loves another, but who willingly hurts innocents for the benefit of said significant other, is still an evil person who happens to have a "don't hurt" list?

    Jeffrey Dahmer spent 99% of his life not kidnaping guys, raping them, murdering them, raping them again, and cannibalizing them, does that make him "99% not evil?" Of course not, and neither is a fictional character who genuinely loves a percentage of the world (maybe more than 50%, maybe less) but would gladly see the rest of us get hurt.
     
  6. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    Well that's just it. You have to now go to extremes and make your book taboo to nullify the romance's effect. Romance wouldn't make such a person sympathetic. You just gave them the romance to humanize then ramped up the villany to super taboo levels to dehumanize. It cancels each other out. To use an example, I doubt audiences will believe that a child rapist pedophile murderer is genuinely capable of love. Seeing how genuine love requires EMPATHY.
     
  7. Simpson17866

    Simpson17866 Contributor Contributor

    Joined:
    Aug 23, 2013
    Messages:
    3,406
    Likes Received:
    2,931
    Maybe that's not the point of introducing romance. Maybe the point is just to show that the villain is capable of feeling empathy for some people but not others.

    Psychopaths are people who are born biologically incable of empathy for anybody, but sociopaths are people who grew up in a dog-eat-dog environment that they learned to survive in by forming emotional connections with some people but not others. 85% of serial killers for example are psychopaths, but the Mafia are an organization of sociopaths who would not tolerate the unreliability of a psychopath for very long.

    Breaking Bad (despite my still having about the last half of season 5 to catch up on) is a fantastic depiction of a man who loves his family, starts a drug business so that his cancer doesn't destroy them financially, but gradually becomes more and more sociopathic and villainous as he continues his empire long after his medical bills are taken care of.

    But no matter how accepting he becomes of ruthless bloody murder as the cost of doing business, he never stops loving his family. More importantly, never once do the writers try to portray this as making him Not A Villain.

    Is this the kind of "taboo extreme villainy" you're talking about, or is this just "villainy"?
     
    Oscar Leigh likes this.
  8. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    Neither.

    The problem with that is for the audience to want to see his downfall, they would also have to accept the cancer destroying his innocent family. If the hero were to bring him down then and there, the audience would resent that. That's how you know he's not a villain. In fact a case could be made for antihero. A villain is someone you want the hero to stop and someone you cheer the hero on for stopping.
     
  9. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2013
    Messages:
    17,674
    Likes Received:
    19,889
    Location:
    Scotland
    I wouldn't worry about humanising them too much. In fact, I would worry about doing the opposite. An antagonist is merely the force that opposes the protagonist. This antagonist (or antagonists) don't have to be 'evil.' All they have to be is in opposition to the protagonist. Trying to make them 'pure evil' is just ...well, frankly, it bores the arse off me as a reader. I like to feel the human side of every character (unless they are a camel or a piece of seaweed) regardless of how they relate to the protagonist. Making a character 'pure evil' just cheapens a story, I reckon. It makes it too easy. All you need to do is defeat 'pure evil' and you're home and dry. It just becomes an exercise in 'how.' If the antagonists have a human side to them, though, it makes it a more emotionally-charged story. If winners don't take it all, that's more like real life, and it makes a fantasy or sci-fi story have a longer lasting effect on the reader.
     
    Oscar Leigh and Lyrical like this.
  10. Mckk

    Mckk Member Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Dec 30, 2010
    Messages:
    6,541
    Likes Received:
    4,776
    It seems to me like you have a very narrow view of fiction. Genre fiction, bestsellers, commercial stuff - yes, what you said is all true for those types of fiction. What if that's not what you're writing? Actually, that's exactly not what I'm writing. My antagonist is distinctly sympathetic - it's harder to write and I do struggle with it due to a lack of experience - but for me, that takes a story from merely entertaining to something thought-provoking, something really, really good. Anyone can write a black and white character - but it takes skill to write a complex, grey character and still lead the reader to feel according to how you want them to. Also, books that allow the reader to come to their own conclusions, perhaps not even to like the protag but nonetheless to follow the story and enjoy it - again, that takes a book from a mere bestseller kinda quality to one closer to that of a classic.
     
    Oscar Leigh and Lyrical like this.
  11. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    "All you need to do is defeat 'pure evil' and you're home and dry."

    There's usually the less evil, more conficted servant who's soul is at stake as well.

    "My antagonist is distinctly sympathetic"

    Your antagonist isn't a villain. I said antagonists can support a romance. So what are you arguing against?
     
    jannert likes this.
  12. Mckk

    Mckk Member Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Dec 30, 2010
    Messages:
    6,541
    Likes Received:
    4,776
    It's true that in my head, antags and villains are often synonyms - I know technically they're not. Still, I think of them as very similar/the same sometimes.

    So, to you, the moment someone is humanised, they're no longer a villain? What is a villain to you? I do think someone sympathetic can still be a villain. You could feel sorry for a murderer's messed up childhood while still hating him and wanting him to burn for what he did, after all. You could feel remorse at such a person's death and still feel they should be punished for what they did.

    For example, I don't remember which film this was now - there was a scene of a murderer's execution by hanging. There's no question the viewer sees him as the villain and that he deserved to die. Yet, that moment when he fell with the bag over his head, and his feet kicked and kicked in the air because his neck did not break - there's also no question that I found that disturbing and I questioned if anybody really deserved this. Distinctly a villain, yet in that moment, at least, also distinctly sympathetic.

    I just don't see that "villain" and "sympathetic" must always be mutually exclusive. Usually they are, it's true, but there are moments when that might not always be the case. Romance might be one such moment for a villain.
     
  13. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2013
    Messages:
    17,674
    Likes Received:
    19,889
    Location:
    Scotland
    It's just a personal preference of mine, but the conflicted servant is a much more interesting (and believable) character than the 'pure evil' he or she 'serves.'

    Take Lord of the Rings, for example. Who, as a character, is more interesting to work with? Sauron or Saruman? The orc leader or Boromir?

    What made Gollum an interesting character is that he was not pure evil at all. He had moments when he was truly likeable, and was truly trying to do the right thing.

    These are the stories we remember. Pure evil works fine as background, but I wouldn't try to make a character out of it. Instead, humanise your antagonists as much as you can. You can't go wrong with that approach.
     
    Last edited: May 29, 2016
    Oscar Leigh, Lyrical and Mckk like this.
  14. Lyrical

    Lyrical Frumious Bandersnatch

    Joined:
    Jul 13, 2015
    Messages:
    385
    Likes Received:
    262
    Personally, as a reader, I love characters who make me feel conflicted. I think a romance between two villains would be something that I would read the crap out of. Cheering on the hero to win and defeat/kill the villains but also rooting for the villains to get together would be wonderfully contradictory for me as a reader, and make the story richer.

    Even if, or perhaps especially if, the hero kills them in the end, the tragedy of them would be heartwrenching and make the hero's victory bittersweet. For me, that's more moving than a traditionally happy ending.
    I love when there is a cost to winning. Forum members who hate the series will forgive me for saying this, but it's one of the reasons why I appreciated the ending to the Hunger Games trilogy. The protagonist wins, the cause she's fighting for wins, but at such great personal cost that you can't help but feel a sting of sadness even amidst the relief of victory. So although we will be happy that your hero has won, we will also mourn the loss of this doomed love story in the face of their evil ways.

    I can appreciate purely evil-for-the-sake-of-evil villains, like The Joker, but more intriguing to me are the villains you really want to like, even though you really hate what they are doing.

    ETA: Whoops, didn't read @jannert's reply before writing my own. Didn't mean to say the same thing :bigtongue:
     
    Oscar Leigh, jannert and Simpson17866 like this.
  15. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    "So, to you, the moment someone is humanised, they're no longer a villain? What is a villain to you?"

    A villain is someone the audience wants to see defeated or destroyed, as opposed to redeemed, by the hero. This doesn't exclude a certain degree of humanisation, but it can't interfere with the villain's ability to generate heat from the audience, as opposed to pity.

    When you're generating pity, it's something different.

    "I do think someone sympathetic can still be a villain. You could feel sorry for a murderer's messed up childhood while still hating him and wanting him to burn for what he did, after all. You could feel remorse at such a person's death and still feel they should be punished for what they did."

    Then you're making a point that this person is mentally ill (most villains are, but to emphasize it is a different story), meaning as a writer, you shouldn't assume the reader would want to see the person burn. It makes the hero look bad, and the author look bad, when this person is treated as a villain. Example, Inheritance Cycle, Paolini makes it clear that Galbatorix suffered from dementia from a tragedy that wasn't his fault. Yet he's treated as evil and unceremoniously killed off. This caused a fan backlash.


    "For example, I don't remember which film this was now - there was a scene of a murderer's execution by hanging. There's no question the viewer sees him as the villain and that he deserved to die. Yet, that moment when he fell with the bag over his head, and his feet kicked and kicked in the air because his neck did not break - there's also no question that I found that disturbing and I questioned if anybody really deserved this. Distinctly a villain, yet in that moment, at least, also distinctly sympathetic."

    Only in that moment though.

    "I just don't see that "villain" and "sympathetic" must always be mutually exclusive. Usually they are, it's true, but there are moments when that might not always be the case. Romance might be one such moment for a villain."

    You underestimate the power of romance. Even a crappy romance can make ol' Ed, someone who admitted to killing people, stalks girls, watches them sleep, threatens violence, almost killed his "girlfriend" abandoned her out of the blue ...a crap romance can turn HIM into a hero. Jacob can romantically desire a baby and people still think "amazing", cos crap romance.

    Now imagine what a good romance can do to a villain in the reader's mind.

    "Take Lord of the Rings, for example. Who, as a character, is more interesting to work with? Sauron or Saruman? The orc leader or Boromir? Who, as a character, are we more likely to remember?"


    You know they're not in competition, right? They have different function that aren't in competition. They're working together to entertain you. I don't believe in "favourites" when it comes to writing. Is one instrument better than another in an orchestra for creating a richer sound? No.[/QUOTE]
     
    jannert likes this.
  16. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

    Joined:
    Jan 21, 2016
    Messages:
    8,496
    Likes Received:
    5,120
    Location:
    Sydney, Australia
    The Joker isn't pure evil and he actually has a sense of ideology, especially if we're talking movies; the Dark Knight version.
     
  17. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2013
    Messages:
    17,674
    Likes Received:
    19,889
    Location:
    Scotland
    I guess I don't really like the concept of 'hero' any more than I like 'villain' or pure evil or pure good. I don't want a reader to be wanting to see 'evil' defeated and 'good' triumph. I want readers to be invested in the characters I create, and only react to what moves them or makes sense to them. I'm not ever going to label a character 'good' or 'evil.' I want all of my characters to be a mixture of the two.

    As in an orchestra, they all work together to make the story rich. The endings I prefer are usually the ones where nobody wins it all, decisions are difficult because no choice is ever perfect, and actions have consequences (sometimes unforseen) that arise from the actions themselves.

    Of course I'm not saying people can't write pure good versus pure evil stories. In fact, they have been writing these stories for zillions of years, both as myth and as entertainment. It's just that I don't find these black/white stories very interesting any more because I don't see life as being quite that simple. It's the gray areas that interest me the most.
     
    Mckk and Oscar Leigh like this.
  18. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

    Joined:
    Jan 21, 2016
    Messages:
    8,496
    Likes Received:
    5,120
    Location:
    Sydney, Australia
    [/QUOTE]

    Edward is "kind" and "considerate" according to personality descriptions. He is clearly just a troubled hero, an interesting hero. (Although Twillight is shit sooo) And as for Jacob that shit is twisted. Many people have complained about that.
     
    Lyrical likes this.
  19. Lyrical

    Lyrical Frumious Bandersnatch

    Joined:
    Jul 13, 2015
    Messages:
    385
    Likes Received:
    262
    I suppose he does, in his own twisted way. I think in this context, I meant that no effort is made in the Dark Night film to explain or humanize him in any way. No back story is given. The Joker himself gives two contradictory hints at how he got his scars, indicating that origin for him doesn't much matter. He is chaos incarnate. No one makes an effort to make him relatable or sympathetic, he's just villainy. So perhaps instead of evil I should have said "villainous for the sake of villainy."
     
    jannert and Oscar Leigh like this.
  20. izzybot

    izzybot (unspecified) Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 3, 2015
    Messages:
    2,419
    Likes Received:
    3,884
    Location:
    SC, USA
    I think the difference there is between a romance novel/story that inadvertently painted the male lead as a creeper while devoting most of its time towards also talking about how great he was, versus a non-romance novel/story that focuses primarily on a character being 'evil' or antagonistic but also mentions that they have a love interest or some redeeming quality. Twilight's romance was supposed to be just romance and was written that way - the creep factor was inferred by the readers (not that it wasn't completely warranted, just that every other piece of Twilight was about telling the reader how romantic is was). A villain/antag purposefully written as a villain/antag, with the majority of the narrative centered around their villainous deeds, doesn't get immediate redemption just because they have one good quality. Readers aren't stupid. People were able to see that Edward was creepy despite the whole series saying "no no no it's sweet" - they're not going to be tricked or confused by one piece of a story saying "he's not all bad" when a character's role in the rest of the story is them being bad.

    Anyway, my personal take on it is that a villain who's human and relatable is by no means a bad thing. Like @jannert says, gray areas are the most interesting - we don't need to be spoonfed "this one is %100 good and this one is %100 evil" to understand who to sympathize with, and sympathetic villains and flawed heroes are much more compelling anyway, imo. A villain who does reprehensible things and then goes home, feeds her cat, and curls up to watch cartoons with her kid while eating ice cream isn't confusing, it's a human. I wouldn't worry about my characters seeming too human. Typically we worry about the opposite of that (well unless we're literally writing aliens, I suppose).

    I also don't really consider 'being involved in a romance plot' a redeeming quality, honestly. Horrible people can fall in love and have friends. Why not? Unless they're completely self-centered, they're not necessarily horrible to everyone - they only have to be horrible to the hero, or whoever the hero's getting revenge for, or whatever. A complex villain with their own life - which can include friends, family, all kinds of loved ones - apart from just looking for ways to mess with and foil the hero all day isn't something to be avoided. They can still be awful to the hero and simultaneously love their wife.
     
    jannert, Mckk, Lyrical and 1 other person like this.
  21. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2013
    Messages:
    17,674
    Likes Received:
    19,889
    Location:
    Scotland
    I wonder if I've missed an aspect of this very interesting problem. I'm wondering if writers worry that if they give their 'bad' characters any good qualities that readers will think the character's bad actions are excusable.

    I think that's a good point to consider. However, again, I welcome it. It's something people really do need to think about more often. Can we excuse bad deeds because the person who did them isn't all bad? It's not a question I can answer, but it certainly is one worth asking.

    In real life, we ask these questions in articles that show a bad person in a good light—did Hitler's dysfunctional childhood partially excuse his behaviour in later life? Or vice-versa—we find huge flaws in people we thought were as 'good' as humans can get. Look at all the negativity swirling around Mother Teresa recently—that she was self-serving, that she was a monster manipulator, bla de bla. What? The person who is often used as a symbol of 'good,' who has actually become a 'saint,' was maybe not all she appeared to be? What? What?

    I do believe that pure good and pure evil don't actually exist. They are end points on a scale we use to judge humanity's actions. But these points are never actually reached. Good always has flaws. Evil always has a reason for being. We end up somewhere in between.

    We can create these tropes in fantasy, of course. But my question is: why not challenge the reader to look at the real world THROUGH fantasy instead? Encouraging the tendency to sort people into good and evil piles makes the world a very surreal place.

    Give me the protagonist who struggles against his own dark side. Give me the antagonist who has issues about how he was treated in the past, or who secretly wishes he'd done things differently. Don't give me 'good' and 'evil.'
     
    Last edited: May 30, 2016
  22. Domino355

    Domino355 Senior Member

    Joined:
    May 11, 2014
    Messages:
    754
    Likes Received:
    186
    @Phil Mitchell You're forgetting one of the most tropy types of villains, the sympathetic, sob-story villain. The Professor Dufenshmirtz type (minus the hilarity), with the poor sobstory that made hom a villain. They are still hated, and the audience wish badly to see them taken down, but still sympathize with them. So I don't see why the same can't be done with a romantic villain, truly in love, but still dispised by the readers.
    Another example just popped in my head. If I remember correctly Thanos from Marvel Universe (or maybe it was Darkseid from DC?) wants to destroy all life in the universe in order to impress Lady Death, who he loves. And there you have it, a romantic villain, who's no less villainy than any other
     
  23. jannert

    jannert Retired Mod Supporter Contributor

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2013
    Messages:
    17,674
    Likes Received:
    19,889
    Location:
    Scotland
    The thing that made Heath Ledger's joker so memorable was that Heath's portrayal made us understand that underneath that badly cracked mask of makeup, there was actually a real person. A real person who had probably had enough of life, and enough of trying to function in society, and was now in the process of destroying everything in his path—including Batman, whom he saw as a real Mary Stu. The Joker no longer cared whether he lived or died himself. I think the Joker had a nihilistic philosophy, but occasionally his sadness came through in Heath's portrayal of him. I got the impression he was disillusioned with the world—possibly for good reason—not 'evil.' Obviously he had to be defeated, but that didn't make him 'evil.'

    It just boiled down to who survives best in the real world. The Joker was just pushing the 'dog eat dog' envelope as far as he could, in defiance of conventional laws and lofty precepts. It's a dog eat dog world out there, no matter how it gets dressed up. Heath's Joker seemed to be fed up with the hypocrisy that pretends it's not. And in a way, Batman understood this.
     
    Last edited: May 30, 2016
    Lyrical, Mckk and Oscar Leigh like this.
  24. Oscar Leigh

    Oscar Leigh Contributor Contributor

    Joined:
    Jan 21, 2016
    Messages:
    8,496
    Likes Received:
    5,120
    Location:
    Sydney, Australia
    Well said!:superagree::superagree::superagree:
     
  25. Phil Mitchell

    Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

    Joined:
    Jun 14, 2015
    Messages:
    590
    Likes Received:
    247
    Actions count and if Jacob can largely retain his fanbase after the baby thing just because it's portrayed romantically, that clearly shows that people are willing to make the most taboo of immorality slide for the sake of "love".

    I don't care if you don't like the hero/villain dynamic. It isn't a story where we don't know who to root for. People choose to include a villain to have the audience root for the hero to beat them. If people see the dynamic and want the hero to lose instead, you have FAILED to tell a hero/villain story. You've told something different.

    The hero isn't who you say the hero is as a writer. It is whoever the audience roots for.

    And the audience will root for someone who does seemingly evil deeds but deep down has a heart of gold, over a person who fits the more standard hero mold. Especially if they don't have a romance that makes people emotional. As good romances should. Bad deeds in fiction are dime a dozen and people are desensitized to most of them. Emotionally resonant romance though, people will protect that and want to see it succeed. So when big hero comes along and ruins it, guess who's getting hated?

    That's opposite to what the hero/villain dynamic is supposed to do. That's rather a deconstructed, reversal of the theme.

    A good villain makes the audience so angry, their eyes bulge and they shake with outrage. That is a villain who's doing his job. The idea that the morally ambiguous antagonist who conflicts everybody is inherently better than that is nonsense. It's just a different experience. A different tool.

    "they only have to be horrible to the hero, or whoever the hero's getting revenge for, or whatever. A complex villain with their own life - which can include friends, family, all kinds of loved ones - apart from just looking for ways to mess with and foil the hero all day isn't something to be avoided. They can still be awful to the hero and simultaneously love their wife."

    And to add to that you give the "villain" and understandable reason to hate the "hero" in order to not undo the sympathy you built up and have the villain hate the hero for no good reason. The hero then pushes back and defeats the "villain" because the villain is horrible to them. Depriving the innocent family of their loved one. Or "redeeming" the villain (yeah how dare you not like me or treat me well)- This is just two people having a squabble. It's not a hero/villain dynamic.
     
    jannert likes this.

Share This Page

  1. This site uses cookies to help personalise content, tailor your experience and to keep you logged in if you register.
    By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies.
    Dismiss Notice