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Showing posts from 2013

Good Guy/Bad Guy: What's the Difference?

"You learn eventually that, while there are no villains, there are no heroes either. And until you make the final discovery that there are only human beings, who are therefore all the more fascinating, you are liable to miss something."   - Paul Gallico When I was little, I used to watch the villains like Cruella de Vil from 101 Dalmatians or Ursula from The Little Mermaid. I would cringe as they bested the hero and then cheer when they were finally defeated and killed at the end. I was under the impression, as all children are, that villains are bad and the heroes are good. There was never any question; it was black and white. Right was right and wrong was wrong. If you were to ask any writer what the fundamentals of storytelling are, they would most likely say that you have to have two things. You need someone who wants something and you need someone else standing in the way of that person's goals. Basically, you need a villain. That's a simple enough concept.