Characters Switching Sides

[Danny, Goomba face]

I am personally a big fan of the good guy falls into darkness plotline.

[[deleted user]]

Ahh, but it's so unfair when the guy you were orginally rooting for is now the guy you're booing for (that sorta rhymed:).

[[deleted user]]

I'm a real fan of characters with ambiguous morals, not something I saw much of in Conan or most of my first heroic fiction books. I like Karl Edward Wagner's Kane stories better in many ways.

I'm reading A Night in the Lonesome October again & the main character, Jack the Ripper, is described by his dog as a man who 'does bad things so worse won't happen'. When you think that scenario through, the implications are bewildering. Dogs love their master unconditionally, but even so, a psychopath like Jack the Ripper?

Ambiguity was the saving grace of Robin Hobb's Soldier's Son trilogy. I didn't care much for her writing, but the basic idea of the culture clash & the POV from both sides, the duality of the main character & how a good act on one side was evil on the other was wonderful.

L.E. Modesitt Jr. does something similar in his Recluse series. The first books are all from the order POV and, while not perfect, it's still better than chaos, which is seen as plain evil. Then he switches POV. It was great.

[Jonathan]

I've found that a good technique when executed well and a poor one when executed to an average or poor standard. I found that Warbreaker had a good twist with some characters I thought were cool turning out to be villainous.

[[deleted user]]

I love morally ambiguous characters, but if they're not done well, it can seem very forced and contrived.

[Jonathan]

I also liked them in Gardens of the Moon

[Elizabeth]

On the flip side. If characters are too morally static it also seems forced, so I feel like a lot of the time there has to be some kind of development ( unless there is a real good reason not to have any or the bad guy isn't a main character). The best stories come when the reader has to really choose their own side rather than having one forced on them.