Writing character (protagonists) you hate

[HeyYoureThatGuy]

Have you ever written characters you just hated?

I was pretty far into what I wanted to submit for the Summer Lovin' contest, but I ditched the story because I started to really dislike the characters.

The basic plot was an enemies-to-lovers thing. Workplace rivals, attorneys, rent-a-car overheats, and they're stuck out in the desert. Things get heated, and then they get hawt.

But to make the rivalry make sense, they both had to, on some level, be assholes, and the more I wrote them, the more I just hated both of them.

I'm okay with writing dislikable antagonists and even some rather dark anti-heroes, but... I don't know. This time I kinda wanted them to die in that desert. It's a story that might be salvageable later, but not when I'm trying to make a deadline.

 

[SimonDoom]

Sort of. I've written several stories with antagonists who were bad, but I've only written one story with an arguably bad protagonist. But it was a tongue-in-cheek spoof of a Loving Wives story told like a Mickey Spillane/Mike Hammer tale, with a narrator who's an amoral detective. I found it fun and amusing because I could have him do anything without regard to people's feelings or scruples.

 

[NotWise]

Have you ever written characters you just hated?

One, sort of. It was intentional.

Juan Francisco in part three of "A Valentine's Day Mess" is a terrible person for the things he does to Ximena: kidnapping her, driving her husband off, keeping her as a servant, paying the priest to stay quiet, breaking her spirit. The scene when she runs from him, and he chases her down and makes her feel worthless was really hard to write.

Before the story is over, though, he's fallen in love with her, made her the head of his household, and given her the child she wants. Maybe he earns a little understanding and redemption.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

One of my protagonists, Boldbator Tengger, is a ferocious Mongol warlord. Different time, different era, and all that.

In some ways, you can like him- he's intelligent and even sensible. But he thinks nothing of cruelty, including rape and murder. To him the strong and the not-foolish are meant to lead.

In many senses, he's my most complex protagonist because he's so very outside the boundaries of what we consider acceptable. Is he a murdering rapist with common sense and a keen eye for the future, or is he a man of destiny burdened with the traditions of rape and murder as commonplace?

Even as he consolidates power, he may make it illegal to murder other Mongols or rape their women out of hand, but that's just a matter of convenience to him, keeping his house in order, rather than a moral imperative. Killing, pillaging, and raping in foreign lands is cool.

His wives all hate one another and fight constantly and cruelly for domination. He only forbids it eventually because he doesn't want scarred, ugly wives.

So I hope he's a very intriguing character, because he's intelligent and driven by his perceived destiny. But his personal morals are abhorrent by today's standards, and he would be reviled as a horrible person.

His only out or excuse really would be that he's a creature of his day and age.

 

[Blind_Justice]

Absolutely. A hero is only as good as his counterpart. My stories revolve around the conflict of good and evil, broadly speaking, and the villains need to be detestable. To make them really worthwhile, I try and give them understandable motivations. So, under different circumstances and without resorting to violence, coercion or other despicable means to achieve their end, they might have been sympathetic characters.

Morgan Carver, the chief antagonist in my "Mud & Magic" series, used to be a priest of Justice, trying to better the kingdoms by apprehending evildoers with his adventuring band. Fighting evil monsters was easy enough, but once the heroes began to clean up the human filth of the kingdom, many of which were nobles, he realized how futile his struggle was since the wicked always found ways to evade their due punishment. Eventually, he snapped and instead of delivering a noble who abused his servants to the authorities (who would have let him go after a stern tsk'ing), he instead hired a gang of mercenaries and had them level the noble's estate, killing the culprit and his whole family. When his friends found out, they dragged him back to the temple of Justice for atonement, but Carver had secretly made a deal with the wish-granting goddess Desire, vowing to offer his soul in exchange for the power to re-unite the kingdom under his rule, a rule, as he vowed, which would not tolerate injustice of any kind.

His goal may be noble, but his means of achieving said goal are anything but. To exert any kind of leverage over the cities of the kingdom, he gradually starves them by conquering the peasant villages supplying the cities with food. He rules his subject with an iron hand and draconian laws. His soldiers are the scum of the earth, because by allowing to indulge in their base needs, their loyalty is much easier to win than with lofty concepts such as honor and pride. So rape and pillaging are a staple of their "peacekeeping". "The ends justify the means" could be a plaque hanging in Carver's office and he still fiercely believes that with his iron-fisted rule, the kingdom would be a better place.

He's utterly detestable, but not in the overblown comic-book supervillain style so often seen in movies and TV shows. He shows glimpses of humanity. He honors his pacts and generally treats his direct underlings with dignity and respect. He is not a violent person and prefers to avoid outright bloodshed (unlike his former second in command, who reveled in it), but he is wise enough to understand when the application of force is needed. I'm pretty happy how he had turned out. Yes, he's basically the "LAWFUL EVIL" kind of fantasy villain, but these have to be written with care too.

The secret to writing well-rounded villains is asking the question "how did they get there?" It's not necessary (but useful!) to write a full biography, but outlining the reasons for why the character in question acts the way he does can inform many plot decisions and make them more interesting than someone who's full on "bwahahaha!" all the time.

 

[KeithD]

I write some evil characters. I always try to have some rationale for them doing what they're doing, even if it's a twisted mind.

I find them delicious to write. I'm not sure how that squares with "like."

 

[Salacious_Scribe]

Not all, but many of my characters are loosely based on people I know IRL. So I don't dislike any of them. They may do things I don't like or understand, but that's true of real people.

Although as someone who has been involved in live theater on stage and off, it's always more fun to play the villian. I'll play Quark over Odo any day.

 

[HeyYoureThatGuy]

I'll play Quark over Odo any day.

I love it that you went with a DS9 reference there.

 

[Blind_Justice]

... and who says Quark's the villain? He's just a Ferengi who wants to be loved. And rich.

 

[HeyYoureThatGuy]

... and who says Quark's the villain? He's just a Ferengi who wants to be loved. And rich.

Quark's a 'good' bad guy because when the chips are down, he'll do the right thing. (He might fit better under the heading antagonist.)

 

[Wilson Spalding]

Have you ever written characters you just hated?

I was pretty far into what I wanted to submit for the Summer Lovin' contest, but I ditched the story because I started to really dislike the characters.

The basic plot was an enemies-to-lovers thing. Workplace rivals, attorneys, rent-a-car overheats, and they're stuck out in the desert. Things get heated, and then they get hawt.

But to make the rivalry make sense, they both had to, on some level, be assholes, and the more I wrote them, the more I just hated both of them.

I'm okay with writing dislikable antagonists and even some rather dark anti-heroes, but... I don't know. This time I kinda wanted them to die in that desert. It's a story that might be salvageable later, but not when I'm trying to make a deadline.

Definitely.

I'm not the type of person who hates, and if I feel myself collecting ill will, I usually try and figure out why and what led to it. That said, I've been around plenty of personalities who have been... character studies.

I've written a buttload of bad guys, people truly worth revulsion, but not so much when writing erotica. In this category, there's enough psycho-social challenges in living out some healthy kink that I've never had the interest in sprinkling in the real-life complications of some raging asshole mucking it up.

I might be missing some dramatic opportunities but... don't care. My stories here are long enough already.

 

[SamScribble]

I've written some pretty evil characters, but I don't think I have ever 'hated' any of them. I usually try to give them a redeeming feature or two. I remember one story in which the central character was a cold-blooded Scottish psychopath - but he had excellent taste in classic cars.

 

[HeyAll]

No

I've written bad guy characters before for crime erotica and the key is to go all in. If the person is bad, make them really bad.

Then it becomes so bad it's good. Like reality tv where a villain is so bad you have to love it.

 

[Jamie_and_Lisa]

Jus' sayin'

You can always run them over with a pickup truck without legal consequences.

 

[KeithD]

You can always run them over with a pickup truck without legal consequences.

Although it's best at Literotica if they enjoy it.

 

[NotWise]

Although it's best at Literotica if they enjoy it.

If not the first time, then at least before the story is over.

 

[Salacious_Scribe]

... and who says Quark's the villain? He's just a Ferengi who wants to be loved. And rich.

Villian may be too strong a word. Criminal. Between him and Odo, Qurak is the bad guy.

 

[Salacious_Scribe]

I completely forgot about the one dickhead I wrote about. He was the antagonist in my Donny and Marie story.

B]The character was based on a guy I knew in the Navy. The only mother fucker I wanted to throw overboard some dark night in the N. Atlantic.

The real guy and my character both had similar personality traits...Bully, Rapist, thief, liar, all around scumbag. He got his in the end.

The real guy kept talkin shit about me one day in front of my friends. I punched him in hte face and I kicked his ass up one bulkhead and down the other. He ratted me out to the MAC, but the only witnesses were my friends and they said he attacked me and I defended myself. He got 30/30 and lost his crow. Revenge is sweet.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Yep. Damien in "Cathy and karate". A real smarmy little git.

Cathy-and-karate-the-beginning

I took great delight when Cathy punched him in the face, breaking his nose. He tricked her into having sex with seven guys while she was tied to a bed and blindfolded...

I had an idea of writing another story with him in it, but I really don't want to now.

 

[RetroFan]

I've written some pretty nasty characters over the years.

One recent one was Lorraine, the wife from 'Grumpy Humphrey's Easy Wife'. This floozy - who shows strong sociopath tendencies - makes a fool of her much older husband Humphrey, having affairs with other men all over town, evidenced by letters from angry wives he receives. Her cheating includes an orgy with five of Humphrey's students who give him a hard time in class, the neighbours' son and her boss at work. Even a trip to the local gas station ends with Lorraine giving the two guys there blow jobs. She tricked her husband into marrying her years earlier as a means to getting her debts for bouncing checks paid off, and her youngest brother is actually her son, something she has never told her husband. Lorraine often refuses to have sex with her husband, and when he can't rise to the occasion she is either amused or scornful and mocks and ridicules him for his impotence.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

Of course, I would have to really hate someone, man or woman, who does the kind of things I have them do. Mostly though I just write them as real assholes and let the reader determine whether they hate them or not.

Some I kill, other's just wind up being hurt badly.

Like the many bad guys in this one OFM 02 - Jack O'Hara - One for a Kill.