A villain (also known in film and literature as the “antagonist,” “baddie”, “bad guy”, “heavy” or “black hat”) is an “evil” character in a story, whether a historical narrative or, especially, a work of fiction. The villain usually is the antagonist (though can be the protagonist), the character who tends to have a negative effect on other characters. [x]
Villain: A cruelly malicious person who is involved in or devoted to wickedness or crime; a wicked or malevolent person; the main evil character and antagonist to the hero
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- Villains Who Take Over the Novel.
- Obvious Villains.
[If you’re having trouble with this, read the novels of Agatha Christie and other famous mystery writers to learn how to fool the readers while playing fairly. For an even better learning experience, try reading an Agatha Christie novel after finding out the identity of the killer. You’ll get great tips on how to conceal information right in front of the reader’s eyes.]- Clichéd Villains.
[The conniving other woman, the evil mother-in-law, the wicked twin sister. Some villains have been used so often that they have become recognizable character types. These characters still have a lot of life left in them, but only if you flesh them out.]- Villains with Unbelievable Motivations.
[Nobody wants to read an entire novel only to find out that the villain was plotting against the hero the whole time because the hero stole away his prom date 20 years ago. If your villain is scheming and planning and committing crimes, he needs a good reason to go to all this trouble.]- Unnecessary Villains.
[Powerful main characters can create plenty of conflict on their own.]- Utterly Evil Villains.
[Some villains are simply too evil. Not only does he make life miserable for the hero and heroine, he also beats and rapes the servants, kicks the dog, and on top of that, refuses to recycle. Not only is this unrealistic, it is often trite.]- Villains Who Talk Too Much.
[This one is a classic cliché. The villain captures your main characters, but instead of getting them out of the way, he goes into a spiel about how bright he is because he outwitted them all.]- Weak Villains
[Imagine this scenario. You’ve been reading an exciting, suspenseful novel, and you’re close to the end. The hero is confronting the villain. You’re expecting a big payoff. But instead, the villain turns out to be a huge wimp who caves in quickly.]—-
Writing Tips for Creating a Complex Villain
—Choose a model for your villain: an ordinary person, a celebrity, or a notorious criminal from the news; examine that person’s flaws and weaknesses. How have they wronged others? Discard their positive traits, magnify their negative traits, and write a brief character sketch. What’s the character’s name? What does he or she look like? What is going on in the character’s head that allows him or her to treat others with disregard?
—Give your villain a shady past: what terrible things has your villain done throughout his or her life? What terrible things were done to him or her? Some villains are just trouble makers; others are deranged psychopaths. How extreme is your villain?
—Identify the source: what happened to your villain to turn him or her so evil? Was your villain born that way?
—The most interesting villains are not completely evil. They have a soft spot for puppies or they write cheesy love poems. Contrary personality traits add depth and realism to all characters. Describe your villain’s positive traits.—Put your villain in a scene: make sure you include dialogue so you can work out how the character speaks. Give your villain a distinct voice. Is your villain disguised as a benevolent character? Does he or she spend every waking minute committing evil deeds?
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Real Life Inspirations Behind Some of the Best Comic Book Villains
Creating Villains People Love to Hate
Everybody Lies
What Makes Serial Killers Tick?
The Making of a Serial Killer
The Greatest Female Villains
Female Villains: 10 Evil Women In Literature
Basic Tips To Write Better & More Despicable Villains
Seven Tips on Creating a Fantastic Fantasy Villain—-
A good villain must be ACTIVE:
Writers often complain that they have trouble making the middle of their novel exciting. A villain who acts, instead of simply sitting around thinking evil thoughts, is the best possible cure for a sagging middle-book.A good villain must be SMART.
When the author has the villain do something stupid so the hero can defeat him, it not only makes the villain look stupid, it makes the hero look weak.A good villain must be SENSIBLY MOTIVATED, AND NO WORSE THAN HE HAS TO BE TO ACHIEVE HIS GOAL.
A credible villain can be motivated by anything from simple greed to self-preservation, from patriotism to revenge, from religious fervor to ambition to romantic love. In short, anything that can motivate any normal person can also motive your villain.[x]
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A great literary villain is not any one thing; some are moustache-twirlers or evil geniuses, some are darkly complex, tortured souls, while others are amoral crazies who act wholly on impulse. There are many ways to write a literary villain, but a unique characteristic often binds the truly memorable anti-heroes together: they are at least as complex as the heroes. [x]
Tag: reference
60 Awesome Search Engines for Serious Writers
Finding the information you need as a writer shouldn’t be a chore. Luckily, there are plenty of search engines out there that are designed to help you at any stage of the process, from coming up with great ideas to finding a publisher to get your work into print. Both writers still in college and those on their way to professional success will appreciate this list of useful search applications that are great from making writing a little easier and more efficient.
Professional
Find other writers, publishers and ways to market your work through these searchable databases and search engines.
- Litscene: Use this search engine to search through thousands of writers and literary projects, and add your own as well.
- Thinkers.net: Get a boost in your creativity with some assistance from this site.
- PoeWar: Whether you need help with your career or your writing, this site is full of great searchable articles.
- Publisher’s Catalogues: Try out this site to search through the catalogs and names of thousands of publishers.
- Edit Red: Through this site you can showcase your own work and search through work by others, as well as find helpful FAQ’s on writing.
- Writersdock: Search through this site for help with your writing, find jobs and join other writers in discussions.
- PoetrySoup: If you want to find some inspirational poetry, this site is a great resource.
- Booksie.com: Here, you can search through a wide range of self-published books.
- One Stop Write Shop: Use this tool to search through the writings of hundreds of other amateur writers.
- Writer’s Cafe: Check out this online writer’s forum to find and share creative works.
- Literary Marketplace: Need to know something about the publishing industry? Use this search tool to find the information you need now.
Writing
These helpful tools will help you along in the writing process.
- WriteSearch: This search engine focuses exclusively on sites devoted to reading and writing to deliver its results.
- The Burry Man Writers Center: Find a wealth of writing resources on this searchable site.
- Writing.com: This fully-featured site makes it possible to find information both fun and serious about the craft of writing.
- Purdue OWL: Need a little instruction on your writing? This tool from Purdue University in Lafayette, IN can help.
- Writing Forums: Search through these writing forums to find answers to your writing issues.
Research
Try out these tools to get your writing research done in a snap.
- Google Scholar: With this specialized search engine from Google, you’ll only get reliable, academic results for your searches.
- WorldCat: If you need a book from the library, try out this tool. It’ll search and find the closest location.
- Scirus: Find great scientific articles and publications through this search engine.
- OpenLibrary: If you don’t have time to run to a brick-and-mortar library, this online tool can still help you find books you can use.
- Online Journals Search Engine: Try out this search engine to find free online journal articles.
- All Academic: This search engine focuses on returning highly academic, reliable resources.
- LOC Ask a Librarian: Search through the questions on this site to find helpful answers about the holdings at the Library of Congress.
- Encylcopedia.com: This search engine can help you find basic encyclopedia articles.
- Clusty: If you’re searching for a topic to write on, this search engine with clustered results can help get your creative juices flowing.
- Intute: Here you’ll find a British search engine that delivers carefully chosen results from academia.
- AllExperts: Have a question? Ask the experts on this site or search through the existing answers.
Reference
Need to look up a quote or a fact? These search tools make it simple.
- Writer’s Web Search Engine: This search engine is a great place to find reference information on how to write well.
- Bloomsbury Magazine Research Centre: You’ll find numerous resources on publications, authors and more through this search engine.
- Merriam-Webster Dictionary and Thesaurus: Make sure you’re using words correctly and can come up with alternatives with the help of this tool.
- References.net: Find all the reference material you could ever need through this search engine.
- Quotes.net: If you need a quote, try searching for one by topic or by author on this site.
- Literary Encyclopedia: Look up any famous book or author in this search tool.
- Acronym Finder: Not sure what a particular acronym means? Look it up here.
- Bartleby: Through Bartleby, you can find a wide range of quotes from famous thinkers, writers and celebrities.
- Wikipedia.com: Just about anything and everything you could want to look up is found on this site.
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Find all the great philosophers you could want to reference in this online tool.
Niche Writers
If you’re focusing on writing in a particular niche, these tools can be a big help.
- PubGene: Those working in sci-fi or medical writing will appreciate this database of genes, biological terms and organisms.
- GoPubMd: You’ll find all kinds of science and medical search results here.
- Jayde: Looking for a business? Try out this search tool.
- Zibb: No matter what kind of business you need to find out more about, this tool will find the information.
- TechWeb: Do a little tech research using this news site and search engine.
- Google Trends: Try out this tool to find out what people are talking about.
- Godchecker: Doing a little work on ancient gods and goddesses? This tool can help you make sure you have your information straight.
- Healia: Find a wide range of health topics and information by using this site.
- Sci-Fi Search: Those working on sci-fi can search through relevant sites to make sure their ideas are original.
Books
Find your own work and inspirational tomes from others by using these search engines.
- Literature Classics: This search tool makes it easy to find the free and famous books you want to look through.
- InLibris: This search engine provides one of the largest directories of literary resources on the web.
- SHARP Web: Using this tool, you can search through the information on the history of reading and publishing.
- AllReaders: See what kind of reviews books you admire got with this search engine.
- BookFinder: No matter what book you’re looking for you’re bound to find it here.
- ReadPrint: Search through this site for access to thousands of free books.
- Google Book Search: Search through the content of thousands upon thousands of books here, some of which is free to use.
- Indie Store Finder: If you want to support the little guy, this tool makes it simple to find an independent bookseller in your neck of the woods.
Blogging
For web writing, these tools can be a big help.
- Technorati: This site makes it possible to search through millions of blogs for both larger topics and individual posts.
- Google Blog Search: Using this specialized Google search engine, you can search through the content of blogs all over the web.
- Domain Search: Looking for a place to start your own blog? This search tool will let you know what’s out there.
- OpinMind: Try out this blog search tool to find opinion focused blogs.
- IceRocket: Here you’ll find a real-time blog search engine so you’ll get the latest news and posts out there.
- PubSub: This search tool scours sites like Twitter and Friendfeed to find the topics people are talking about most every day.
How to finish that last minute assignment
P
I can not count the number of times this trick has saved my ass.
And people say Tumblr doesn’t teach you life skills…
this will come in handy one day
ATTENTION GRADUATING CLASS OF 2013: COLLEGE SURVIVAL 101
Reblogging for future reference..
Fighting Words
Active verbs to use in a fight scene or an otherwise violent encounter, color-coded by severity (with red as most intense and purple as most mild), and categorized by type of fight.
ONE OF THE MOST DANGEROUS PICTURES TAKEN
The above picture you see is off the elephant’s foot, a radioactive mass. It’s from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
These are the effects:
After just 30 seconds of exposure, dizziness and fatigue will find you a week later. Two minutes of exposure and your cells will begin to hemorrhage (ruptured blood vessels); four minutes: vomiting, diarrhea, and fever. 300 seconds and you have two days to live.
The coolest thing about this photo is definitely the radiation damage. Look at the bright squiggles, and the way the man seems to be in two places at once. This is because even as the photo is being taken, the radiation is causing severe damage to the camera.
According to another source, the man in the photograph and the cameraman are now dead. Apparently, the radiation would have been too high for them to live more than a few years after this, even if they had just run in, snapped the photo, and ran out again. If they spent more than a few seconds here, it’s possible they could have died even quicker.
STOP SCROLLING
straighten your back, mate
NOW GO ON
woah thanks i really needed that today
tumblr user demeaniac doing little favors for tumblr one post at a time
FUCK THIS POST HAS SHOWED UP LIKE 10 TIMES TODAY AND I HAVE BEEN HUNCHED OVER EVERY FUCKING TIME
PLEASE KEEP THIS GOING it is the best reminder for me ever and I always need it omg
NO NO NO NO DONT SIT UP STRAIGHT THATS ACTUALLY REALLY BAD FOR YOU
I MEAN ITS BETTER THAN HUNCHING FORWARD AND THROWING THE DISCS BETWEEN YOUR SPINE VERTEBRAE OUT OF WHACK BUT SITTING UP STRAIGHT CRUSHES THE LOWER DISCS OF YOUR BACK AND HAS BEEN SHOWN TO BE REALLY REALLY DAMAGING IN AS LITTLE AS TEN MINUTES.
YOU GOTTA TILT YOUR SEAT FORWARD SO YOUR KNEES ARE SLOPED TO ABOUT 4-6 INCHES BELOW YOUR HIPS (and then also keep your upper back straight because thats pretty important too)
And if you can’t tilt your seat forward, try reclining at about 130 degrees. This isn’t in the source article but i’ve heard it helps relive pressure on your back as a whole.
As you’re writing stories about myths and legends, please consider these neglected beasties from cultures around the world.
But first read this post on cultural appropriation, as many of the creatures or gods are important to other cultures.
concernedresidentofbakerstreet:
driving-an-impala-in-isengard:
A tip from your favorite nurse
(that’d be me)
Always have eggs in your fridge
You just never know when someone will split their head open
Or cut their finger while cooking
And so on
See that membrane there?
While the blood is gushing – hold pressure and crack open an egg
Peel that there membrane off and put it on the wound (continue holding pressure)
The membrane will harden and keep the wound closed until you can get to the ER for stitches
If you even need them that is
Nature: 1, Band aids: 0
You’re welcome.
I did some research on this (because I do that now, fucking science get out) and it seems that this was done in the early 1900s somewhat frequently. It was used as a way to treat just about any kind of skin wound, from burn to cut to in at least one case an ulcer. It actually helps the wound heal not by preventing blood loss but by replacing part of the skin tissue and helping it grow.
It also helps in healing scars and reducing their visibility.
Whoah science.
Neato.
Supercool.
Also, if you have a splinter, smack one of these things on there and it will draw it out of your skin. No more shitting around with pliers.
it will also suck the poison stuff out of mosquito bites and stop them from being itchy
woaaah i didnt know!! awesome stuff 😀
Did not know the mosquito bite or splinter thing! EGGS—IS THERE ANYTHING THEY CAN’T DO?
They cant fix the economy
Do you have any advice on writing the loss of an eye? Like: short term and long term consequences?
Here are some resources to look through.
Short term:
- Medical care after removal of the eye, but before a prosthetic
- Dealing with strong emotions re: eye loss
- Mind map: Adjusting to eye loss
- Adapting to loss of an eye
Long term:
- Prosthetic eye FAQ
- Prosthetic eyes
- Adapting to monocular vision
- 5 things I learned from losing an eye
- Implications of acquired monocular vision
- Eye loss and sports
- Eye loss and driving
- Experiences of monocular vision in Australia
-Headless
Please tell me if any of the links aren’t working
Faces:Hair:Bodies:A Guide to Drawing the Human Body
Clothes and Accessories:Creatures:Dragon Hands and Feet Tutorial
Animals/insects:Objects:Nature/Food:How to Create Stars (With Photoshop)
Colours:Other:Glitch Effect (with Photoshop)
lav3nderwolftumblr 
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