My Naughty Thoughts : Is Bad Ever Good?

So a while ago I wrote a post Yummy Baddies in which I practically drooled over how hot bad guys were getting and how sad it made me to watch such fine specimen of male anatomy die. I complained about how it was getting harder to not root for the bad guy because truth be told, I am a bit (truth: really really) shallow. (What...I like eye candy). But in the end, I knew he was the villain of the story and he was never a character I could sympathize with or relate to. I mean who could sympathise with Luck Evans in No One Lives? He was a sadistic psycho, but come one, the guy is hot (I'm drooling again...sorry).

Suddenly a new breed of baddies are appearing. The ones that play on our sympathies and make us say to ourselves...I can see myself going down that dark path....or I completely understand.  

For example Regina a.k.a the Evil Queen from Once Upon A Time who, as the seasons progressed, I watched transition from a sweet young woman full of love to a vengeful and bitter evil queen. I found myself yelling at young Snow White (well the tv) to shut her trap when she blabbed to Cora about Regina's love indirectly causing his death and agreeing with Regina when she made the comment that she should have let Snow White die (is that bad). A broken heart can lead you down a dark path and I'm sure some of us can relate. (Regina's still my favourite character from Once Upon A time. I'm was so pissed at Emma at the season finale...lol).

While the writers of Once Upon A Time are having the characters make a distinction between Regina and the Evil Queen like they're two individual people (perhaps to make it easier to sympathise with Regina), Maleficient is one very bad, very vengeful fairy. Not only is this character a villain, but she's the title roll. How could I not cheer on her vengefulness after the brutal way she was betrayed by someone she considered a friend? Shouldn't I have been cheering on her friend a.k.a the king as he tried to save his daughter's life by destroying Maleficient. Of course by the end Maleficient had a restorative transformation to good like Regina did which made my struggle between good and bad a moot point.

Recently I watched the trailer for Dracula Untold (psst Luke Evans is in this one again...yum...so you know I'm going to watch it). Isn't Dracula a bad guy? The trailer is making him out as as father who'd do anything, including selling his soul to the devil, to protect his family. How can you fault a guy for that?

Or what about Walter from Breaking Bad? I've never watched that series so I don't have much I can say, but as I understand from the tidbits I've gleamed, Walter was a chemistry teacher, who after being diagnosed with cancer, turned drug dealer in the hopes of ensuring his family's financial security after his death. Another character doing something bad for the good of his family. Is that shade of grey to the Walter character what made him so popular? An upstanding citizen driven by circumstances to do things he otherwise never would have. It kind of reminds me of the Gerard Butler character in Law Abiding Citizen. I tried to have sympathy for some of his victims (not the killers) but having understood what drove Clyde to his depth of depravity it was a little hard (sorry Jamie, I was rooting for him to kill you too, you were such an insensitive jerk for a good guy).

There are also the characters who we know are good, but are just plain bad. They can be mean and surly, say vulgar and despicable things, and make you feel like smacking them. In essence there're not your stereo typical good guy. Because I watched this movie last night, I'm going to use the autobot Crosshair as an example. He advocated living the humans to fight the decepticons on their own, abandoning a seventeen year old girl and letting Bumblebee and Drift kill each other so he can take over without a fight. At times he was a jerk, but never once did he let his fellow autobots down. Through all his "jerkiness" he was a good guy.

In short, are the bad things some "villains" do ever good? And are those characters always "villains" just because they do bad things? And just how big of a douche bag can a good guy be?

These types of characters are so much more complex than the cookie cutter good guy or even bad guy. When they make you stop and think...wait...is he/she good or bad...

And that's my naughty thoughts on the bad...good...bad guy.

Later Loveys

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My Naught Thoughts : Is Strong Ever Too Strong

I got some great comments in response to my last post about leading females. I wrote about two types of heroines, the strong and the helpless. As I "penned" my thoughts on the strong heroine and used a few leather clad bad-asses as examples, it nagged at me that I might be setting up the idea that kick-ass only means physical. And then...how physically combative does she have to be before she loses her femininity.

So I included Jessica Rabbit as an example of a certain type of kick ass female. She may not be able to go toe to toe with werewolves, take on hoards of zombies, or slice a vampire's head off but weak she is not. If there is a spectrum of kick ass females, Jessica would be at one end of it. She's the type that oozes femininity and sexuality. After all, she was drawn that way. She sways her hips in an enticing rhythm, bats her sultry eyes, and puckers her pouty lips (I won't even mention what she does with those boobs). She's alot dainty, but from the first time I saw her, I thought....that chick is dangerous. Jessica is the girlie-girl bad-ass.

At the other end of the spectrum lies the alpha female bad-ass. She's so strong she comes off a little to manly. Sexy may not be the first word used to describe her. Either her body doesn't look very feminine, she doesn't dress feminine (no leather here) or her dialogue is a bit off putting...to "I need no one". I think Sandra Bullock or Melissa McCathy's characters in The Heat is my best idea of her. You have a hard time believing the love interest.

Sonja, Selene and Alice fall somewhere in between. The unobtainable bad-ass. Physically they are gorgeous women to look at, but personality wise they have their short comings. They're hard and lack any vulnerability. You wonder what they need the hero for. (Did you notice how Selene was always saving Michael?  It made him look like less of a man in my eyes).

As much as I love a leather clad fighter, I think I most relate to the girl next door bad-ass. Kind of like Buffy the Vampire Slayer (what vault did I dig that out of). She's cute and bubbly, wears the same kind of clothes I do, doesn't emasculate the hero with her strength and independence, but still needs him from time to time.

Most times when I read romance novels I forget the description of the character that the author gave (especially if there isn't a couple on the cover) and I start imagining them more from what they say and how they act (if that makes any sense). The words conjure the image in my head of either Jessica, Selene or Buffy. And as much as I enjoyed Underworld and Resident Evil, their heroines were just a little to far from the every day woman. I like when they're more like Buffy, they're a little more real to me.

And that's my naughty thoughts on strong heroines.

Later Loveys

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