Professor Moriarty, Medusa, Voldemort, Big Brother, The Dust Witch, Uriah Heep, Bryce Walker, Montresor, Randall Flagg, U. N. Owen. Different characters, different genres, yet they have one thing in common. Villainy. 

Villains. In books, the characters you love to hate. Sometimes the antagonist, sometimes the protagonist. Some bent on world domination while others on revenge against one person. We turn each page hating the villain for their evil genius, their Machievellian scheming, their one-step-ahead planning, or potentially their frustration at the hero if they’re the main character.

Many writer blogs detail how to create intricate and engaging villains. They explain why it’s important to give the villain some redeeming qualities, how to make them real, and how they must relate to your hero. This blog assumes you’ve read those foundational tips. I would rather detail how to view your villains from a different perspective. This may give your villain an edge that makes them stand out. Following are four unusual tips to consider when writing your villains. And to illustrate my point, I’m going to use the characters from Dudley-Do-Right. In particular, the mustache-twirling, sneering, Snidely Whiplash as an example for each.

In case you’ve never seen a Dudley Do-Right cartoon or if it’s been a while since you’ve seen one, here’s a recap. Dudley Do-Right is a Candian mountie who is always inadvertently foiling Snidely Whiplash’s schemes. He desires the love of the fair Nell, but she only has eyes for his horse (Horse). The unusual triangle of horse, mountie, and girl is that extra element that made this cartoon special and a worthy segment of the Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons.

First tip. When considering the main evil trait of a villain, other blogs may advise you to emphasize one main characteristic. Is your villain power-hungry, steeped in wrath for your hero, or ambivalent to all tender emotions? This tip suggests you take a look at the seven deadly sins. Religious or not, the list is a good reference for writers in building characters. The sins are comprised of anger, pride, lust, sloth, envy, greed, and gluttony. Often, writers choose greed, pride, and wrath as the main element to build their character’s personalities around. Instead choose one not often used. How about sloth, lust or gluttony? For sloth, how is an inert villain a force to reckon with? Say you’re writing an office drama and you have a ladder climber who is notoriously lazy. Let your villain, a slothful antagonist, thwart your main character who is energetic and full of innovative ideas.

Let’s use sloth again with our foursome. What if Snidely Whiplash, despite all of his efforts, was rejected from the Royal Canadian Mounties because he was deemed “lazy.” “Lazy, am I?” says Whiplash. In his latest scheme, he decides to use the simplest of traps in the world, a covered hole, to trap Dudley, and it works! All of his other schemes are too complex, require too much effort, if only he relied on his sloth, he would have been the victor years ago.  

Another interesting approach to your villain is to upset all his/her/their carefully-laid plans. Why only frustrate your hero? Throw some chaos at both of them. The villain putting his fingertips together and saying “everything is going perfectly according to plan” is a cliche. Introduce a random element, a third party which complicates both of their actions, and watch them try to recover. Your heroes shouldn’t have to be the only ones who suffer, you know!

So a common plot of Dudley-Do Right is he kidnaps and ties Nell to train tracks. Let’s say this time he also kidnaps Horse so Dudley can’t possibly get their in time. But this time, Nell, furious that Horse was kidnapped, frees herself and punches him, storming away. Whiplash, sits up from the ground, eyeing his captive, with newfound admiration.

Still a little stale? Have you tried making your villain a hero instead to spice things up? I don’t mean you should write your story from the villain’s perspective, gaining sympathy from your reader. The villain does not become the main character in the same story. No, the villain stands in the hero’s situation at the start of the story and the plot unfolds from there. The evil queen, in all her malignant glory, is the persecuted stepdaughter to a legitimately kind Queen Snow White. Professor Moriarity, evil genius that he is, decides to become a master detective. In this case, the hero may not even be in the story.

Back to Do-Right. The scheming Whiplash has just entered the Canadian Royal Mounties and has been assigned Horse. Inducted with a clueless Dudley, he plans to climb the ladder. Is his horse on his side or not? And why does Dudley keep getting the breaks?

And if all else fails, give a thought to switching your villain for a different one. Perhaps you have one that didn’t work for a different story, or one you’ve been saving for a future novel. This is extreme but even if you write a chapter of your current story with a different villain and throw it away, it may inspire you to think twice about your current archenemy. The movie, the Avengers, does a great job pairing Loki (Thor’s villain) with Iron Man in one conversation. It’s a fresh approach to both characters.

In our continuing example, Dudley Do-Right was part of the Bullwinkle and Rocky show. What if Boris and Natasha, enemies of Bullwinkle and Rocky, became Dudley’s nemesis instead of Whiplash. Instead of “stupid moose and squirrel” you get “stupid mountie and horse.” Imagine one of Boris and Natasha’s bizarro schemes with Dudley as the hero.

Upping your game on your villain will result in better characters all around. Do you have any thoughts of how you could make your evildoers any better? If so, get to work!