The perfect bad guy

[B.R.Stateham]

Suppose you're thinking about writing a series centered around one or two main characters. As the series goes along the readers get to know the good guys. But what about the bad guys?

Should . . . could . . . a series have a recurring bad guy? What would he look like in today's crime scene? How bad should he be? Should there be any good qualities about him or her?

Does having a recurring baddie hurt a series?

[John McFetridge]

Ask Tony Soprano or Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell. Or, talk to Ian Rankin about Big Ger Cafferty.

Or, I guess, you could talk to me about the bikers and mafia guys in my books.

My first novel, Dirty Sweet, has as the main character an ex-con, ex-pimp who runs porno websites. He's the hero, he's the good guy. The book is about him and a crooked real estate agent trying to blackmail mobsters.

The main character in my second book is a woman who runs a grow-up and deals drugs with her daughter. She's the "good guy." I have a book coming out later this year in which the main character is a former gang member from Detroit who joined the army so he could go to Afghanistan and buy drugs directly from the source. He teams up with a woman who robs spas and jewellry stores at gunpoint and they try and steal the five million dollars being used to buy cocaine by the bikers. None of these characters "reform" in any way.

So far no one's complained (but with the few books I've sold, I guess it's fair to say that so far no one's really noticed).

Maybe what I need is a recurring good guy?

And, I guess this seems like a lot of BSP, so I apologize.

[B.R.Stateham]

John,
I guess you definitely believe in anti-heroes, eh?

[John McFetridge]

What I like about bad guys is that they're proactive, they can drive a story. My books aren't police procedures where a crime is committed and cops or a private eye try and figure out what happened, they're about ongoing crimes. My bad guys work for a living, it's not about, "one big score," it's about the next score and the next score and so on.

(Hmmmm, I may be starting to see why I'm not selling any...)

There are cops in my books and they try and solve the crimes, but it's their job, it isn't "personal" or anything like that.

I'm really just trying to present the world as I see it.

[Jessica]

It's a good angle. Bad guys are more fun to work with anyway!

[J. F. Juzwik]

I can only speak for myself, but I love to see a 'good' bad guy get away with it and come back for more, providing he's not overtly cruel or anything, because there's 'bad' and then there's 'bad'.

But, a recurring 'bad' guy who doesn't reform and really isn't nice or anything, just charming and likable (yes, it's possible)? I believe that would work. I'd read it.

[Dana King]

Even in a more traditional setting than The Wire or The Sopranos, Ed McBain used to periodically bring back The Deaf Man. Even Hawaii Five-O had Wo Fat.

A recurring bad guy can serve as a foil, or nemesis for a good guy. He just has to be interesting, and lend something of his own to the series that makes him worth bringing back.

[B.R.Stateham]

Dana
I was thinking of The Deaf Man when I wrote the piece. And I do remember charming Wo Fat from Five-O. A delicious bad guy!

[D.R. MacMaster]

I was shocked to find out the actor who played Wo Fat wasn't even Chinese. But I digress, even though he was a great villain actor playing a great villain character. (He was so happy in the Manchurian Candidate.)

In a way a good recurring villain has to have a story arc of their own (rise-fall-revenge is always a nice one). But I think the key is knowing when to not use the recurring villain. Overuse can lead to a predictable formula where the villain always gets away to strike one more time.

I guess a good model is Blofeld in the James Bond novels. First they introduced his organization, SPECTRE, then a quick trip up the food chain to the big boss, the destruction of most of SPECTRE, then a final battle with both men emotional and psychological wrecks from their conflict. Even Blofeld's death by strangulation illustrates how intensely personal their battle became. And once he was dead, he was dead, leaving damaged lives in his wake.

[Dana King]

I think what makes The Deaf Man work so well is that McBain used him sparingly, and only when he wanted to write a more complicated story. Usually his bad guys were your basic criminals, and the cops did basic police work. The Deaf Man left them puzzles, planting misleading clues, and it made them work more like "traditional" literary detectives of the Hercule Poirot or Nero Wolfe school. It also helped that, even though he got away, his plan never quite came to fruition as he mapped it out. Both sides were frustrated at the end, which led to anticipation for the next encounter.

I hope McBain enjoys a renaissance some day. When masters are talked about, he seems to be taken for granted. Lots of other people get mentioned, then, if someone asks about him, the answer is, "Oh, yeah, of course McBain." I still read him, and every time i do I gain a greater appreciation for what he was capable of.

[John McFetridge]

I agree Dana. I recently read LEARNING TO KILL, early short stories by Ed McBain and they're terrific. He was far more influential than he gets credit for. In many of those stories he handles complicated social situations so well - they aren't about good guys and bad guys or cops solving crimes, they're people caught up in a world changing too fast around them.

Then he went on to write all those books.

[Jack Getze]

Dexter fits. A serial killer.

And I think just about everybody loves a "good" bad guy. If the antagonist isn't fearsome, someone who could defeat the protag (Star Trek Next Generation did a great episode with Moriarty and Data as Sherlock on this), where's the suspense?

[I. J. Parker]

From what I've seen of Dexter (I couldn't finish the book) this sort of character is simply not believable.
A good man may commit a crime if coerced by insurmountable circumstances or do so accidentally or while temporarily out of his mind, but it surely stretches the imagination that one can carry on the lifestyle of a serial killer while also being a humanitarian.
One wonders also why readers like their violence so much that they want it projected by a likable or admirable character. Take the Meyers vampire novels, for example.