It is much like asking why evil itself intrigues us, and the field of psychology has come up with answers.
Hearing Meghan Markle drop the line, ‘They really seem to want a narrative of a hero and a villain’ while watching the recent controversial interview she did with Oprah Winfrey, had me thinking to myself, “You bet they did, but especially villains who hit the audience with a relatable character, reference and emotion.”
Of course, we all know Markle was referencing her experience with the UK press and the royal family, which is nothing like my perspective of villains when writing a novel or story. But come to think of it, maybe the American author Jessamyn West has been right all along for saying fiction reveals truth that reality obscures.
Personally, I think it is more complex than just liking villains but before I share my opinion, let’s take a look at this matter from a scientific perspective.
According to a April 2020 research published in the journal Psychological Science (Rebecca J Krause et al.), people may take to liking fictional villains when they share similarities with the viewer or reader. Using a large-scale proprietary data set from the website CharaTour that had approximately 232,000 registered users at the time of analysis, the results of the study demonstrated that people have a preference for villains who are similar to themselves. This suggests that people are attracted to such comparisons in everyday life.
According to Krause, as quoted in the science journal, “Our research suggests that stories and fictional worlds can offer a ‘safe haven’ for comparison to a villainous character that reminds us of ourselves. When people feel protected by the veil of fiction, they may show greater interest in learning about dark and sinister characters who resemble them.”
She added that naturally, finding similarities between oneself and a bad person can feel uncomfortable. Only when one has overcome this discomfort can he find some allure about having similarities with a villain.
The Darth Vader in all of us
If we adhere to Sigmund Freud’s view that human nature is inherently bad, or as he explains it: Homo Homini Lupus (man is a wolf to man), our love for supervillains would be all about wish fulfillment. Freud held the idea that we are born to be bad, only held back by society. Sure, the psyche can fully develop its ego (source of self-control) and superego (conscience) but Freudians believe the id (the personality component made up of unconscious psychic energy that works to satisfy basic urges, needs, and desires) remains alive deep down inside and continues to wish for selfish things.
The “shadow self” is a concept first coined by Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung who stated it to be the unknown dark side of the personality. People often choose to regret and repress their shadow selves, either because they don’t like these aspects of the personality or that they think society will not like them. When people learn to actively confront something they don’t like, they can unearth inner strengths. Jung calls it “shadow work,” the process of making the unconscious conscious.
From my standpoint, I think we like experiencing a wake-up call. We like having our eyes opened, our hearts moved. We like feeling emotions. We like thinking. These villains we love, they have probably opened our emotions in some way. Whether it’s the brutal truth or a shift from the way we look at things, your favorite fictional antagonist may have simply given you lessons you take with great appreciation.
Also, no one is stranger from those feelings of jealousy and anger, feelings for revenge. Haven’t we all been there at some point in our life? We can be heroes in our own right, but certainly, we can carry villainous traits too. Imagine how boring the world would be if we were all ‘perfect people’. It’s fun to be bad sometimes.
A well-written and complex antagonist tale can surely make villains way cooler than the good guys. Take Star Wars’ Darth Vader, for example. He has risen to be the most iconic villain in pop culture history. In 2005, after Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith came out, creator George Lucas had some interesting words to say in Rolling Stone magazine about his archetypal villain:
“I had to make Darth Vader scary without the audience without the audience ever seeing his face. Basically, it’s just a black mask. I said, ‘How do I make that evil and scary?’…His character’s got to go beyond that. That’s how we get his impersonal way of dealing with things. He’s done a lot of horrible things in his life that he isn’t particularly proud of. Ultimately, he is just a pathetic guy who has had a very sad life.”
Darth Vader is somebody we can all relate to in some ways. He is our childhood friend. He is that annoying distant cousin we’ve been trying to avoid. He is our father with whom we’ve shared very little of our life. But most of all, Darth Vader is each and everyone of us, and we just have to love the dark mirror he holds up in front of us. Beyond the death of dreams and hope, we can become Vader.
So going back to the question, “Why do we like supervillains,” I think it is more complex than just liking them. We are drawn to them because they mirror who we are when no one is looking, simple as that. We see in villains our true selves or someone we know up close and personal.
Also, villains present us with the harsh realities that exist in the world. You see, one of those harsh realities is that most humans tend to bend their moral values to benefit themselves over others. Like it or not, this is the most relatable part of being human. And heroes, because they present themselves as morally correct most of the time, are ambiguous since they do not leap at some opportunity that would be considered morally invalid.
Besides, villains are just broken heroes. Again, there is Darth Vader and there is also the Joker. Pre-Joker, he was just like any other human being. There are many backstories about him, but the 2019 Hollywood film starring Joaquin Phoenix presented a common man who was forced by society to become the supervillain as we know him today. His mom abused him, friends betrayed him, and society abandoned him. As one fan wrote in an online forum, the Joker is the result of his own circumstances.