On Understanding Villainy...

There are many reasons film discourse sucks. I’ve covered some before, most-recently the reactions to DreamWorks’s opening cinematic, but one that’s referenced occasionally is antagonists. Particularly, the sympathetic nature of some antagonists. There’s a tendency to cite them as “misunderstood heroes” that are “only villainous because the movie says so”. I see this somewhat, but it misunderstands film literacy.

Let me explain.

(By the way, spoilers.)

I recently saw a Tweet showing four villains that were only evil because the writers were “spineless libs”. Ignoring how loaded that statement actually is, especially those last two words, the choices were baffling. Two of them, Amon from Avatar: The Legend of Korra and Killmonger from Black Panther, made me question if the poster was paying attention. Then again, it’s Twitter. Should I be surprised?

I’ll start with Amon. Amon’s purpose is providing an argument for why benders have too much influence in general. He wants to rid Republic City of all benders, including Avatar Korra. Over Season 1’s 12 episodes, we see Amon go up against powerful benders and take away their bending. Even Tarrlok’s use of Bloodbending, which allows someone to manipulate a person’s body, can’t stop Amon, only slow him down. Basically, who is Amon, and why’s he so powerful?

The answer’s simple: he’s a former Waterbender who can remove another person’s bending with Energybending, a skill Aang learned in the previous series, mixed with Bloodbending. He’s also Tarrlok’s older brother. The Guy Fawkes mask he wears over his “disfigured face”, something he claims was caused by a Firebender, ends up as a ruse when Korra unlocks Airbending and knocks Amon into some water. Amon’s a grifter, his whole manifesto was a charade. And he dies anticlimactically on a motorboat.

It'd seem like this’d be an easy win; after all, not only does Amon expose the privileges benders have, even forcing non-benders into a curfew, he also causes the oligarchy of Republic City to dismantle. Amon won! Here’s a hero…right? Not really. It all sounds good until you start poking holes in his story.

For one, Amon’s a liar. He claims to be in favour of equality, but it’s for selfish reasons. He wants no competition with other benders. That he robs them of their bending in public is proof enough. Because that’s what tyrants do: eliminate threats. That’s the hallmark of all authoritarian leaders. It doesn’t matter if he “has a point”, Amon’s a villain.

And two, the curfew’s secondary. True, it was unjust and discriminatory. And true, it probably wouldn’t have been considered by the other benders in power if Amon hadn’t been running amuck. But guess what? Tarrlok instituted this curfew, not Amon. Tarrlok’s an egocentric opportunist. Correlation and causation don’t necessarily align.

I’ve gone on enough about Amon, so I’ll switch to Killmonger. Killmonger’s ordeal is that his radicalized father was murdered when he was a child, and he wants revenge. Using Ulysses Klaue as leverage, because Klaue’s a wanted terrorist, he returns to his homeland and challenges T’Challa, the current heir, to a battle to the death. He wins, tosses T’Challa off a cliff, burns down the chamber that gives Wakandans their strength and starts an invasion on American soil. He’s defeated in a rematch with T'Challa in the climax.

There’s plenty of really interesting and sympathetic material with Killmonger. Not only is his backstory tragic, but he makes a valid point. Black people have been oppressed for centuries, and Wakanda’s refusal to help them is bad. Wakanda can’t and shouldn’t remain isolationist, and his presence causes change on Wakanda’s part. If Killmonger’s “right”, why’s he a villain?

Well, it’s a twofold answer. The first is that the movie needed an antagonist, and Killmonger’s philosophy made him a good choice. The second is harder to swallow, but needs emphasis: his actions make him a villain. He shows up unannounced to Wakanda, challenges their leader, breaks the rules of combat by pursuing T’Challa’s death after someone intervened and proceeds to expand Wakanda through war. He might’ve been “fighting for black liberation”, but how does murdering and subjugating the world do that?

Even in What If…?, where Killmonger gets what he wants, it was never about black liberation, but rather power. Killmonger, someone who marks kills on his chest, only cares about himself. He makes that clear by playing both sides of the American-Wakandan conflict. Killmonger, like Amon, is opportunistic. His father might’ve had a point, but he twisted it…sympathetic or not.

I now refer to Anne Lamott’s novel Bird by Bird. It’s a wonderful guide for anyone wanting to write a novel, but there’s one line that sticks out most: “Even your villain has a heart.” A villain can be vile, but never forget their humanity. They might not always be relatable, but they should be sympathetic to an extent. This doesn’t, however, make them a hero.

This is what I think that Tweet misses. Villains like Amon and Killmonger have a point (to some extent), but that doesn’t make them right. Their purpose is challenging the hero, be it Korra or T’Challa, to do better. That’s good character writing. And no, it doesn’t make someone a “spineless lib”. Life can’t be distilled that way.

As a final note, I’ll address one of the Replies: citing Magneto as another example. Ignoring the above, the romanticization of Magneto needs to stop. He’s sympathetic because of his experiences in Auschwitz, but he’s no hero. His goal, essentially, is to be a mutant supremacist. He’s also a deadbeat father, and an opportunist. By romanticizing his past, you frame his Jewishness as being associated with trauma. Jews deserve better.

It’s something to think about…