I think about this a lot. The conclusion I circle around is that fictional villains exist to entertain empathetic good people. I worry that those of us raised by fiction (hey) grew up expecting more from our bad guys, and honestly giving way too many chances to jerks because surely there’s a reason. - ThreadSky

mikebithell.bsky.social • 3 days ago

I think about this a lot. The conclusion I circle around is that fictional villains exist to entertain empathetic good people. I worry that those of us raised by fiction (hey) grew up expecting more from our bad guys, and honestly giving way too many chances to jerks because surely there’s a reason.

Reposted from Charlie Jane "Lessons in Magic and Disaster" Anders 🏳️‍⚧

Fictional villains: my motivation involves a complex backstory around lost love and a deep yearning to be understood

Real life villains: being cruel makes me feel like a big strong man

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majdotdev.bsky.social•8 hours ago

Yeah, seems real. I think whenever genres get established, writers start referencing other hits for inspiration, so they get further and further detached from reality. At least with superhero movies, it's pretty clear that it's all fiction. Less clear with John Wick, silly as that seems to adults.

lasercannon.bsky.social•3 days ago

You know, I bet many real-life villains have a complex backstory and a yearning to be understood…

it’s just that if they were as self-aware of it as Disney villains are they’d be in therapy instead

sophies.games•3 days ago

There's always a reason, and everyone contains multitudes, but IRL people are usually much more resistant to change, especially changing themselves.

gamongames.bsky.social•2 days ago

it's probably hard for most people to accept humans are still apes, we're still just animals, and social animals at that

status and validation are the motivation for 90% of all humans do, even the bad humans

bspp43.bsky.social•3 days ago

in fantasy novel deiscussions I'm seeing more people bringing up how they are tried of always seeing flawed heroes, empathetic villains and everyone being morally grey.

I could see good guys being good for the sake of being good and villains be villains because of plain ole greed having a moment.

gamongames.bsky.social•2 days ago

tbh thats what I feel about humanity everytime I watch the news

greedy people being greedy, just fucking other people over for resources or influence, thats extremely understandable. thats almost a given that most people would act like that

gamongames.bsky.social•2 days ago

its when people do shit that straight up hurt them in a material way because of a warped worldview that I get baffled

gamongames.bsky.social•2 days ago

like, recently we're seeing a lot of people in power acting directly against their own financial benefit because they end up believing their own bigotry

just burning through their money and connections to pursue a culture war that was barely real before they started infusing it on everything

gamongames.bsky.social•2 days ago

like, it must be true that they start going down this road with full knowledge that theyre lying and manipulating to "attack the other side", you can see the cheekiness in their act when they first start

then at some point they just get caught up in the act? they forget it was absurd on purpose?

gamongames.bsky.social•2 days ago

or maybe they were already the kind of people that'd feel validated by bigotry from the start and just fooled themselves into thinking parroting about DEI and woke was just a marketing ploy, just to build a follower base etc

maybe it was always about their ego and beliefs

zeboydgames.bsky.social•3 days ago

I'm guessing a lot of history's "heroes" are actually closer to fictional villains if you knew the full story.

mikebithell.bsky.social•3 days ago

For sure. Boringly bad.

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