Character Flaws - Fatal

We all know by now that character flaws are very important to maintaining an identifiable hero in any story you create.

But we don’t just have protagonists to write about in our stories. Our heroes and heroines need an arch nemesis to fight against, the antagonist of the storyline, the bad guy who reaps fiery infernos of vengeance upon the good guy.

The bad guys need flaws as well—but not just any flaw; they need flaws that will make them hateable, flaws that are absolutely unforgiveable. These bad guys must have the reader so angry at them that they identify even more with the hero or heroine. These flaws can’t be just any old flaw or your reader might be able to identify with the antagonist more than he or she does with the protagonist.

While having some identifiable characteristics for the antagonist is okay, having the reader actually feel bad for the bad guy isn’t a good idea unless the bad guy is supposed to be redeem him or herself by the end of the novel; so they require the ultimate character flaws.

These character flaws I like to call the Fatal Flaws.

Fatal flaws make a character irredeemable. For the reader, this bad guy must die at all costs, whether it is at the end of the book, or by the end of the series! Either way, this really bad guy is hated greatly by the reader. You can give as many or as little of the fatal flaws to your antagonist as you like.

Note that, if you are giving your character several of these fatal flaws, the antagonist may have a rebellion building up on his hands inside his own ranks. An antagonist can use only so much terror on a group of people before that group decides it’s better to kill the antagonist and die that way instead of living in fear under them. The antagonist may need several bodyguards at all times, depending on the severity, frequency and quantity of the fatal flaws.

Fatal Flaws

1. Mass Murderer/Genocidal Our antagonist has committed genocide against (the complete killing off of) one or more races/groups/religious factions (or perhaps he is in the process of wiping them from existence).
2. Sadistically tortured and murdered a companion The antagonist has captured one of your heroes/heroines companions. They tortured this companion and then murdered them in the slowest, most painful way possible. They may have even displayed the mutilated corpse where the protagonist would see this.
3. Goes after heroes/companions family The protagonist has been enough of a thorn in the antagonist’s side that the antagonist has decided to hit the protagonist and his/her companions close to home. The antagonist has discovered the families of the protagonists and goes on a rampage murdering the men, raping the women and female children and leaving the infants out in the streets to exposure to the elements and wildbeasts. May have gone as far as doing this to the entire village/town/city/etc. the families were staying in. The bodies are left where they fell, or possibly put up on display as a warning that rising up against the antagonist is dangerous to their health.
4. Killing the Messenger the antagonist isn’t killing just the bad-news messengers, they get an especially cruel satisfaction from killing the messenger that brings them the good news! And they do it in different ways each time. The antagonist may have promised riches to the messenger beforehand if they could bring good news to him/her, but then the antagonist goes back on his/her word.
5. Killing the Messenger’s Family The messenger brings the good news and the antagonist slays the messenger’s family just because and right in front of the messenger as well, likely saying the messenger wasn’t fast enough. May kill messenger as well to keep messenger from seeking revenge.
6. Random Killings The antagonist just kills people at random (or watches as s/he has their minions do so). They might laugh at the person (or people) as they’re dying.
7. Murders through another The antagonist forces a good guy to kill someone (there are many ways to force the protagonist to do this, but that is your plot to come up with ). This murder is committed to someone the protagonist cares about greatly.
8. Intense rage The antagonist is always getting angry about the tiniest things. S/he is always flying off the deep end, so to speak, and is hurting those around him/her to make him/herself feel better.
9. Intelligent The antagonist is always one step ahead of the protagonist. The antagonist is causing a lot of trouble for the protagonist and there is a high loss of life. No matter where the protagonist turns, the antagonist has someone in his/her pocket doing his/her will.
10. Death by a thousand cuts The antagonist is able to deal one blow after another to the protagonist’s morale. No matter how much the protagonist tries to keep on fighting, the antagonist finds new ways to keep the protagonist feeling down. Not only is it affecting the protagonist, but is affecting his/her companions as well. More and more the companions are crying out against the protagonist because the antagonist is finding ways to hurt them and turn them against each other. In the end, the antagonist hopes to defeat the protagonist through morale alone, making the protagonist that much easier to kill.