# Heroes, Antiheroes, and Villains **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 4, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119 "2025-03-04T18:20:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/61 "2025-03-05T17:08:38Z")
> [@Cardigan](#): > > I included Khan on that list because this character asks the viewer to question who he’s helping and/or harming. Khan was all about helping _his_ people. Yeah, sure, but remember that the reason he had to help “his people” was because they’d just lost a genocidal war that they started, because they thought their “superior intellect” made them better than everyone else. He’s a straight-up villain who blames all of his later, “Wrath of Khan” problems on Kirk, because that’s what villains do. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/62 "2025-03-05T17:14:07Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > Yeah, sure, but remember that the reason he had to help “his people” was because they’d just lost a genocidal war that they started, because they thought their “superior intellect” made them better than everyone else. He’s a straight-up villain who blames all of his later, “Wrath of Khan” problems on Kirk, because that’s what villains do. Yeah, I remember them being the classic “villain’s henchmen”, he’s only concerned that he will have some foot soldiers in his campaign to rebuild his evil empire not showing any actual concern for their well-being. I’ve not seen any of those scenes in a lonnnng time though, so I could be wrong. ---
**Author:** ![ParallelLines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/parallellines/32/3575_2.png) [@ParallelLines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParallelLines)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/63 "2025-03-05T17:17:12Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > > [@ParallelLines](#): > > > > Professor Snape: Villain, but in the redemption arc. > > By the time of the first book, he has already redeemed himself. Harry, et al, thought he was a villain, but Dumbledore was clear the entire time that he wasn’t. Even in the first book, when Professor Quirrell was trying to throw Harry off of his broom, Snape was there trying to counteract those spells. I’ll expand a little on my POV then. Here’s the thing, in a world where one can ONLY be a Hero, Antihero, or Villain, redemption has _less_ (not zero) meaning. If you were a villain once, then, IMHO (!) you’re disqualified from being a Hero. Of course, in a _wider_ definition, you can absolute be various flavors of driven redeemer, tragic heroes, flawed heroes of many flavors and the whole cornucopia of expression. But if I lack such nuance, Snape is an antihero or a villain. As I said, I would not argue against anyone who wanted to consider him an antihero (though we have some who point out that he doesn’t qualify as a non-protagonist), but _for me_ (again the emphasis) anyone seeking _redemption_ is at some level acknowledging they are or at least _were_ a villain. And for _most_ of such characters, there’s the acknowledgement that if you _were_ a villain, your redemption arc _never_ ends - you have to keep proving you’ve changed, or keep working to offset your sins until the day you meet your ultimate judgement. It’s a _very_ blurry line between the categories, and as I said in my first post on the subject, Snape was the _hardest_ for me to put into one of the narrow categories. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/64 "2025-03-05T17:21:48Z")
I never read any of the prequels, so I don’t know what he’s like in those. But, in the original books, he’s a good guy all the way through. He’s harsh on Harry as a professor, but in terms of actions taken to combat Voldemort or whatever other bad things are going on at that ridiculously dangerous school, he’s always a good guy, and always doing the right things for the right reasons. By the time we see him as a professor at the school, he’s on Dumbledore’s side completely, having left the Death Eaters (what a dumb name) behind before the beginning of the first book. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/65 "2025-03-05T17:35:38Z")
> [@solost](#): > > I think I’d call Dexter a ‘sympathetic villain’. This is the key point in all these discussions IMO. A sympathetic villain and an antihero are _not_ the same thing. You can make a villain the protagonist and get us to root for them as they do villainous stuff (and show us their motivation for doing that villainous stuff, which may not be entirely evil), but that’s not an anti-hero. An anti-hero is someone who does heroic stuff in an unheroic way. ---
**Author:** ![ParallelLines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/parallellines/32/3575_2.png) [@ParallelLines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParallelLines)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/66 "2025-03-05T17:41:45Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > By the time we see him as a professor at the school, he’s on Dumbledore’s side completely, having left the Death Eaters (what a dumb name) behind before the beginning of the first book. The first clause in the above an interesting, if slightly different point. Do we judge a character’s role based on only the situations “on-screen” as it were? Plenty of stories begin with hugely involved backstory that grows as a series continues, or we have “simpler” characters that have a more complicated past evolve over incremental flashbacks which may or may not be serving as partial retcons! ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/67 "2025-03-05T18:23:04Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > A sympathetic villain and an antihero are _not_ the same thing. Case in point is Erik “Killmonger” Stevens in _Black Panther._ He’s basically right in what he wants to accomplish, broadly speaking (opening Wakanda to the world). He’s even right about the reasons (it’s morally indefensible for them to be a hermit kingdom, hoarding their power for themselves, given the suffering in the world). And he’s deeply sympathetic in terms of his painful background. But he’s _entirely_ villainous in what he _specifically_ wants to accomplish (imposing Wakandan values via conquest instead of representing them diplomatically) and how he goes about it (violence and wanton murder). Zero percent antihero. He’s the best villain in the MCU in what is still the best film in the MCU. Thanos comes close, for similar reasons (an understandable goal, bordering on being honorable, which is undercut by _horrifically_ villainous actions), but Killmonger edges him out in my opinion. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/68 "2025-03-05T18:29:08Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > By the time we see him as a professor at the school, he’s on Dumbledore’s side completely, having left the Death Eaters (what a dumb name) behind before the beginning of the first book. This is pretty much what I noted about him upthread. The issue is that, in the timeframe of the early books, while this is true about him, we only know this in retrospect, having read the later books/seen the later movies. In the early books, this information isn’t yet available to the reader, and certainly isn’t available to Harry & Co. His behavior towards Harry, his demeanor, his past, and his generally secretive nature, all serve to reinforce distrust in the character until the latter stages of the story arc. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/69 "2025-03-05T18:36:12Z")
I haven’t read the books in a long time, but in the first movie, he’s shown saving Harry from Quirrell (we find out later in that movie, not in later movies) and Dumbledore entrusts him with all kinds of stuff. Dumbledore wouldn’t do that if Snape were still evil. All he does are good things (outside of being tough on Harry in class), and Harry never trusts him, but that’s on Harry. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/70 "2025-03-05T18:45:20Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > This is the key point in all these discussions IMO. A sympathetic villain and an antihero are _not_ the same thing. They aren’t, but only because the role they play in their stories. A sympathetic villain is an antagonist, and an antihero is a protagonist. Write a sympathetic villain as the main character in the story, and he becomes an antihero. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/71 "2025-03-05T19:04:50Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Write a sympathetic villain as the main character in the story, and he becomes an antihero. We’ll have to disagree on this one. This is fundamentally not what an antihero is IMO ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/72 "2025-03-05T19:05:10Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Write a sympathetic villain as the main character in the story, and he becomes an antihero. How about Walter White in Breaking Bad? He’s without question the main character of the story, but I wouldn’t classify him as an antihero. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/73 "2025-03-05T19:19:14Z")
> [@solost](#): > > How about Walter White in Breaking Bad? He’s without question the main character of the story, but I wouldn’t classify him as an antihero [From the Wikipedia on antiheroes:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antihero) > [@](#): > > During the [Golden Age of Television](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Age_of_Television_(2000s%E2%80%93present)) from the 2000s and into early 2020s, antiheroes such as [Tony Soprano](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Soprano), [Gru](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gru), [Megamind](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megamind), [Jack Bauer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Bauer), [Gregory House](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregory_House), [Dexter Morgan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Morgan), [Walter White](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_White_(Breaking_Bad)), [Frank Underwood](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Underwood_(House_of_Cards)), [Don Draper](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Draper), [Neal Caffrey](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Caffrey), [Nucky Thompson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucky_Thompson), [Jax Teller](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jax_Teller), [Alicia Florrick](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alicia_Florrick), [Annalise Keating](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annalise_Keating), [Selina Meyer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selina_Meyer) and [Kendall Roy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kendall_Roy) became prominent in the most popular and critically acclaimed TV shows. Emphasis mine. ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/74 "2025-03-05T19:29:46Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > From the Wikipedia on antiheroes: OK, if that’s the accepted definition in popular culture, it’s not my place to say it’s wrong. It just doesn’t feel right to me that, despite what a character does, if they are the main character they are automatically an antihero. I’m not going to admit I’m wrong, though. Just that I’m anti-right 😉 ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/75 "2025-03-05T19:44:42Z")
> [@solost](#): > > OK, if that’s the accepted definition in popular culture, it’s not my place to say it’s wrong. We can put this along side “literal just means figurative” in stuff that I will never agree with, but I guess people do 😠 Hey that would be an awesome origin story for a _sympathetic villain_! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Flightless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Flightless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flightless)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/76 "2025-03-05T20:04:06Z")
The Cowboys who cut up the prostitute (or whores as Little Bill calls them) are the bad guys. In an ideal society, the local enforcement (Little Bill) would have brought them to Justice. His rather dismissive failure to do so makes him the bad guy. William Munny is a bad man who killed women and children in his past. But his wife convinced him of the error of his ways. But she died and he has got 2 kids to raise. So he takes a job killing violent predators. They kill his friend who didn’t kill anybody. So he kills them too. Not advocating vigilante justice but he’s far from the villain of the movie. ---
**Author:** ![YamatoTwinkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/cc9497/32.png) [@YamatoTwinkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YamatoTwinkie)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/77 "2025-03-05T20:59:33Z")
Personally, I think Walter White is more of a “Villain protagonist” , where you’re often rooting for him to _fail_ during many points in the show. He often switches into the anti-hero role, though. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/78 "2025-03-05T21:04:48Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > Sherlock as depicted by Doyle is a bit different than how he is generally portrayed in popular culture. He’s more Victorian “British”, being very polite and socially reserved. He is also much more intellectual in his approach to everything that he does, and I think a bit more eccentric but also significantly less emotional. Book Holmes is tall and gaunt with a hawk-like nose. Popular culture Holmes has more of a heroic build. > > Think more “autistic but brilliant eccentric dude” rather than “dashing brilliant action hero”. Right, I have recently read _the Annotated Sherlock Holmes._ It is odd- close aka “particular” friends (and relatives) were generally the only ones who used ones first or “Christian” name. But altho Holmes and Watson are very close, they still dont- which is one reason why Doyle accidentally used two different names for Watson (there is, of course- several fanwanks for this, along with Doyle screwing up Watson’s wifes details- how many of them are are, how many times did Watson get married?). Holmes only wore that deerstalker hat once- maybe in one story where he goes to the country- even non-fashion aware Sherlock would not wear such a hat in London. Holmes is a _flawed hero._ > [@Miller](#): > > In Doyle? No, not at all. Doyle wrote him as athletic, physically quite strong, and a skilled fighter. True, but later- not so much when Holmes gets into a drug funk. As for Unforgiven- how about Little Bill Daggett? Antihero? > [@solost](#): > > How about Walter White in Breaking Bad? He’s without question the main character of the story, but I wouldn’t classify him as an antihero. Villain, who starts out with Good intentions. (incidentally, IRL the IRS is gonna come down on the wife and confiscate all that money) ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/79 "2025-03-05T21:08:01Z")
> [@Flightless](#): > > Not advocating vigilante justice but he’s far from the villain of the movie. Calling him an antihero isn’t the same as calling him the movie’s villain, or even that he’s the worst person in the film. He’s an antihero because he’s the “hero” of the story, but he lacks heroic virtues: He takes a bounty to kill a couple people who did a bad thing, but he’s not motivated by bringing them to justice, or in helping the injured woman. He’s just in it for the money, and doesn’t particularly care if the people he’s killing are factually innocent - which, IIRC, one of them is. In the film’s climax, he goes after Little Bill out of revenge, not some higher purpose, and kills a bunch of people who weren’t involved in Ned’s death. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2025, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119/80 "2025-03-05T21:27:52Z")
Robin Hood: despite being (literally!) an outlaw, he was driven to it when the law became so corrupt that rebelling against it became the lesser of two evils; and despite that maintained a moral code. Hero. Shrek: more or less drafted to be a hero over his own objections, then grew into the role. Hero with a tinge of anti-hero. Professor Snape: reformed villain with a lot of darkness still clinging to him, but did the right thing at the cost of his own life. Hero. William Munny: attempted reformed villain that was undone by events. Caught up in a [Grey-and-Gray Morality - TV Tropes](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GreyAndGrayMorality) situation, did what he had to for his children’s sake. Antihero. Joker: A disciple of what Alistair Young in his Eldraeverse terms “entropism”. **Super** villain. Draco Malfoy: classic [Heel-Face Turn](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HeelFaceTurn), and at that he previously had the excuse of a bad upbringing. Hero. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heroes-antiheroes-and-villains/1015119.md?page=5)