“Good versus Evil” is the classic hero’s conflict, and the traits that define both sides are clear. Heroes like Robin Hood are self-sacrificing and fight for the greater good! Villains like the Sheriff of Nottingham are cruel and self-serving! We all universally revere and aspire towards heroism…but somehow we still end up at odds with each other. Is this because everyone else is wrong (yes, obviously), or is it possible we’re oblivious to our own villainy?
In my historical epic Nottingham I’ve chosen to break those traditional black-and-white roles and follow perspectives on both sides. But how do you believably write from an evil mindset? Many stories have been told “from the villain’s perspective,” but these overwhelmingly rely upon a series of sympathetic events that drive a character to become the villain (think the Star Wars prequel trilogy) rather than truly seeing things from their point of view. After all, does anyone really consider themselves “the bad guy”?
WHAT EXACTLY IS A BAD GUY?
It’s easy to pinpoint “bad guys” in movies: they’re usually dressed nearly identically, and you often can’t even see their faces. Whether they’re medieval guards, post-apocalyptic scavengers, or Imperial Stormtroopers, there’s always an army of infinitely-killable minions battling our hero. This generally works fine for baddies such as aliens, robots, zombies, Nazis, and orcs; they’re so inarguably evil and non-human that we literally place zero value on their lives. We don’t flinch when heroes have to dispatch them by the dozen.
Wait, go back. “Non-human”? “Zero value on their lives?” That’s right, the key to labeling people as evil is to dehumanize them, so we don’t have to fuss with those messy emotions we’d feel if we had to care about them. Identity-stifling costumes is an easy trick for the movies, but in real life we have to dehumanize them emotionally. So how do we draw that line?
US VERSUS THEM
Here’s a simple exercise: Take every person and thing you care about and draw a circle around them. That’s Us. Everything outside that circle is Them. Voila! With one simple scribble, you’ve created your own personally-tailored line between good guys and bad guys. And if something outside that circle threatens something inside the circle, you know what to do. Especially if there’s a sword within reach.
If you’re Robin Hood, you probably drew a circle around “the people.” And you probably think the Sheriff drew a circle just barely big enough to fit himself and his comically unwieldy bags of money. Seems pretty simple—so string up your bow, it’s time to do hero stuff!
But while impossibly cruel villains work great in sci-fi/fantasy genres (it’s how we get Negans, Voldemorts, and Saurons), they don’t usually ring as realistic. The Sheriff of Nottingham, on the other hand, was a real person. We like to think our enemies are selfish because it makes them easier to hate, when in reality we’re simply not inside their circle of Us. Which means that, from their perspective, we’re the bad guy.
So are we really the bad guy, or have we just been unfairly dehumanized? In order to bolster your Us against your Them, you have to make Them a threat. We repeat generalizations about Them. They want to destroy Our way of life. They are all criminals. They want to take what’s Ours.
Is this starting to sound like politics? It should. We see this every day, especially in partisan bickering that paints the opposing side with broad brushstrokes. If you’ve ever instinctively dismissed someone because of their political party, generational identity, or geography, then you (or more likely, somebody who is manipulating you) have indeed just become the bad guy.
WHAT? HOW DID I BECOME THE BAD GUY?
Look back at our defining characteristics of heroes and villains. Heroes have a very large circle of Us, which is why they’re willing to make personal sacrifices to benefit their larger community. Whereas a villain has a tiny circle of Us, which is why they’re cruel to anyone who doesn’t serve their personal needs.
Anything that shrinks your radius of Us moves you closer to being the bad guy.
Does this apply to the Sheriff of Nottingham? For centuries we’ve been told he’s greedy and evil, and that his hordes of minions are heartless killers. But rather than accept this villainy at face value, let’s undo the dehumanization. Instead of an endless army of faceless guards, let’s take the helmets off and learn their names. In NOTTINGHAM I strove to make the members of the Sheriff’s Guard as varied and personable as the Merry Men. In Star Wars, we’ve seen exactly one Imperial Stormtrooper take his helmet off, and he instantly became one of the heroes of the movie. Because it’s impossible not to empathize with someone once you sit down with them and discover they’re (gasp!) an actual human.
IS YOUR ENEMY REALLY ALL THAT BAD?
What happens when you acknowledge heroism in your enemies? Why can’t the Sheriff of Nottingham be a noble leader, trying desperately to defend his good citizens from the wanton criminals surrounding his city? What actions might he take—at the sacrifice of his own reputation—to protect Nottingham from domestic terrorism?
He’s so often depicted as a greedy hoarder who raises taxes for his own Scrooge McDuck-level treasury, but history tells us these taxes went to the “Saladin tithe”, a ten-percent tax increase to fund King Richard’s Crusade. The Sheriff did not maliciously create this, he simply had to enforce it. Consider the real-life ramifications of Robin Hood’s actions: by stealing from the rich, Robin Hood takes both the tax money that supports the military as well as the regular funds that ought to benefit the city (if we discard the presupposition of a corrupt Sheriff). Meanwhile, his armed band of mercenaries preys on the vulnerability of the poorest citizens, promising them an easier life by flooding money into their communities. Buying loyalties, turning them against the government … doesn’t this sound like political radicalization to you? With new wealth in the villages, where would merchant trade go? As the Nottingham Guardsmen’s resources are stretched farther, the people turn instead to the outlaws for protection. And while a medieval Sheriff doesn’t exactly have to worry about winning elections, he would certainly worry about being replaced by his superiors if they see how ineffectively he’s managing his city. So even if he wanted to fight back against these new taxes, the threat of a new Sheriff (who might be exactly as cruel as our infamous caricature) would force the current Sheriff to comply. Thus he lets his reputation be destroyed, taking all the blame that should be going to King Richard, in the hopes of helping his city.
So for the greater good, of course the Sheriff has to draw that line between Us and Them. They are a menace. They are attacking your way of life. They are a bunch of violent murderers who don’t care about you. These aren’t the ramblings of a power-hungry despot, this is a very necessary (and heroic) strategy to draw a circle around the city. To protect the very large Us that is Nottingham.
WE’RE ALL THE GOOD GUYS. WE’RE ALL THE BAD GUYS.
Every one of us is guilty of this. We do this in our politics, we do this in our communities, and we’re all somebody else’s Them, whether you believe it or not. We believe that being a “good guy” means you’re willing to dramatically defend your Us, but I would argue differently. Instead, apply the reverse definition of a “bad guy” and expand your radius of Us … to include Them.
What would happen if you decide your enemy is part of your circle? If you can’t fight a problem, you’re forced to deal with it. We all do this on a small scale: we forgive a worser trait in a family member that we would hate in a stranger, because they’re inside our circle of Us. If your circle had a larger radius … if you had to absorb your enemy as something to love and protect rather than hate…then you’ve finally become the good guy.
Neither Robin Hood nor the Sheriff does this. They’ve both drawn their battle lines and labeled the other an enemy. Neither of them has the moral high ground. For me, this was the key to writing both sides. Not only is neither side evil, but neither side is actually very good either. That’s the grey area in the middle where the majority of us pesky humans land.
As for writing good and evil characters…just expand or constrict the size of your character’s Us—even just a little—and see where it leads them.
