Because You Love to Hate Me: 13 Tales of Villainy

by Ameriie

We love villains because they turn their aches into action, their bruises into battering rams. They push through niceties and against societal restraints to propel the story forward. Unlike our lovable protagonists, villains—for better or worse—stop at literally nothing to achieve their goals. It’s why we secretly root for them, why we find ourselves hoping they make their grand escape, and it’s why our shoulders sag with equal parts relief and disappointment when they are caught. After all, how can you not give it up to someone who works that damned hard for what they want?

Villains aren’t created in a vacuum; they’ve likely suffered devastations and made the best choices available, never mind that their decisions might differ from our own. They’ve also had their share of oft-forgotten moments of truth and honor (Jaime Lannister, anyone?). Villains take the risks our heroes can’t afford to take and make the choices our heroes are too afraid to make.

Look into a villain’s eyes long enough and we might find our shadow selves, our uncut what-ifs and unchecked ambitions, a blurry line if ever there was one.

Villains, the deliciously wicked. We love to hate them and they hate to be loved, if only because being hated frees them from having to be good.

“Most people don’t steal or kill or sell drugs because they want to, Holmes, or because they love being ‘bad guys’ so much. They do it because they’re born to a life with no exits. No chances.

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains must be the truth.

I’ve always been the protagonist of my own story, but it’s interesting to think I could be a villain in somebody else’s. Somebody out there has tried to attain or achieve something, and I have stood in their way. To an extent, we’re each an encapsulation of both protagonist and antagonist, hero and villain.

I couldn’t help but feel that this story is a reflection of modern views of rape: blaming the victim instead of prosecuting the villain.

And sometimes the princess needs to get off her ass, pick up a sword, and slay the dragon herself.

A life is a series of past moments, all of them leading you to the present one.