This is good, because real life is anything but
one-dimensional, and people are hardly ever completely good or totally evil, so
unless you want to escape into a fairy-tale world for a while, characters and/or
circumstances should also have various layers and dimensions. The classic definitions of protagonist vs
antagonist have become blurred, but rather than confuse readers by undermining
what is “good” and what is “bad”, a good story nowadays leads the reader to
come to his or her own conclusions, and this is a much more rewarding and
satisfying result.
I’ve been reminded of these points again just recently after
watching a couple of my favourite TV series again, namely Buffy, the Vampire Slayer
and Haven. In Buffy,
for example, the traditionally evil vampire called Spike goes through many
ordeals and transitions until he comes out as the hero and saviour of the world
in the final episode. Haven has the winning formula of three
characters which each brings something different into the mix according to
their own perspective. One of them is
Duke, a petty criminal but actually not such a bad guy when you get to know him
better. Like Spike, he, too, sacrifices
his life to save everyone else in the second-last episode of the show.
Without directly thinking about such shows or books with
similar storylines, I found myself also creating a “bad guy” who ends up saving
all the “good guys”. His name is Goram,
and he first appears as Beacon of the Night, his formal Atlan name, in the
first book, Rhuna, Keeper of Wisdom.
He’s already showing signs of rebelling against the Atlan way of life by
trying to grope and seduce Rhuna, but some 20 years later she meets him again
in Ancient Egypt where he has switched sides completely and is the leader of
the Black Magic followers of the Dark Master.
But by the end of book 3, Rhuna, The Star Child, however, Goram
has actually saved the Atlan people who had to flee Egypt, and at the end of
book 4, Rhuna: new Horizons, he does something even more extraordinary
to rid the ancient world of the Dark Master’s influence. Needless to say, just like Spike in Buffy and Duke in Haven, their actions didn’t come about on the spur of the moment,
but rather developed subtly over time with a series of challenging events.
So, we are seeing deeper dimensions and layers of the
antagonist who, in many cases, turns out to do a particularly good or heroic
deed. Maybe it’s much more rewarding to
see the ‘bad guy’ do good in the end out of love or some other deeper
motivations, than seeing the good guy do the predictable heroic stuff!
