Do we love villains more than heroes? The internet has gone wild over the reappearance of a beloved animated baddy. Perhaps we see ourselves in nefarious evil-doers.
Evil penguin spotted in new trailer
Do we love villains more than heroes? The internet has gone wild over the reappearance of a beloved animated baddy. Perhaps we see ourselves in nefarious evil-doers.
It was the day Wallace & Gromit fans had been waiting for. The teaser for the animated duo's new feature film Vengeance Most Fowl features explosive action and talking gnomes.
But one character in particular has excited fans. The trailer reveals the return of Wallace and Gromit's greatest foeEnemy. , the evil penguin Feathers McGraw. He appears playing an organ solo while glaring at reports of his arrest.
McGraw first appeared 31 years ago in the 1993 short film The Wrong Trousers. He has since become a firm favourite with fans. One X user called him "the greatest TV/movie villain of all time".
McGraw is a nasty piece of work. Yet fans are thrilled by his return.
Despite their evil actions, villains rank among the most popular characters in fiction. In recent years, famous film and comic book baddies such as Cruella de Vil, the Joker and Loki have been given their own films and TV series.
Our love for villains stretches back centuries. Readers of John Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost (1667) often find SatanAnother name for the Devil. their favourite character. Fellow poet William Blake famously wrote that Milton was "of the Devil's party without knowing it".
Research has found that we tend to like characters that we can relate to.1 And no-one is perfect. As science writer Jocelyn Solis-Moreira says: "fictional villains can allow us to privately explore a darker version of ourselves".
Yet for all our love of villains, we still tend to cheer on the heroes - and want their enemies to lose in the end. In most films, the hero gets the biggest billing.
Heroism can be as complex and compelling as villainy. Heroes in tragedyAn event that causes a huge amount of suffering and sadness. , for example, usually have a fatal flaw that leads to doom, such as Romeo and Juliet's youthful impatience.
Do we love villains more than heroes?
Yes: Villains inspire curiosity. We want to know why they became bad and whether they can be redeemed. We know how the hero will act. But villains are unpredictable and leave us guessing about what comes next.
No: Heroes can be richly complicated and sympathetic characters too. They come in all shapes and sizes, from the blood-thirsty warriors of Greek mythology to the hard-boiled detectives of film noirA style of film-making or type of film which shows the world as a dangerous place where many people suffer, especially because of the greed or cruelty of others..
Or... Forget heroes and villains. The characters that we truly love are anti-heroes. These are neither good nor evil, but have positive and negative traits. And they reflect the broken world we live in.
Keywords
Foe - Enemy.
Satan - Another name for the Devil.
Tragedy - An event that causes a huge amount of suffering and sadness.
Film Noir - A style of film-making or type of film which shows the world as a dangerous place where many people suffer, especially because of the greed or cruelty of others.
Evil penguin spotted in new trailer
Glossary
Foe - Enemy.
Satan - Another name for the Devil.
Tragedy - An event that causes a huge amount of suffering and sadness.
Film Noir - A style of film-making or type of film which shows the world as a dangerous place where many people suffer, especially because of the greed or cruelty of others.