It's embarrassingly true.  I do like villains. The more sinister, awful, and evil, the more I clap my hands like an excited child.  Why?  Let me explain.

Having a believable hero, a sympathetic hero, a hero who makes audience cheer is necessary.  The audience should want to know more about the hero and celebrate the hero’s triumph.  Heroes have to be real, they can’t be perfect.  In other words, they must have a flaw to be overcome so the end triumph is complete.  The audience will laud the overcoming of that flaw. 

But the villain makes or breaks the hero.  Why?  Because without a villain, the hero sits around the house, unemployed, watching daytime television, and eating bon-bons.  The villain creates the situation for the hero's battle.  The villain exposes the heroic flaw.  The villain gives the hero drive, purpose, a reason for pushing him/her/it self to the limits and beyond. 

That said, what do I like most in villains?  What makes me giggle with maniacal glee?  Let's talk traits and execution, motivation and development.  I'll demonstrate.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: The queen, a woman with an obsession for being young, beautiful, and THE BEST is driven to, among other crimes, conspiracy to commit murder, performance of black magic, and assault with a deadly apple with intent to kill.  Without her drive to be the fairest in the land, that all consuming NEED, her stepdaughter, Snow White, would never have found herself in the crosshairs.  Snow White would have never found comfort among the dwarfs, and the Prince would have just been another suitor, not a hero charging in on a figurative (or not) white horse to save the day. No queen, no obsession, no story. 

In the above example, you have the following traits: physical beauty, intelligence, pride, power of position and responsibility, appearance of youth, ambition, leadership qualities, and semblance of self-confidence.  In and of themselves, these traits are harmless.  However, let's add some modifiers and a few other traits: overweening, excessive, coldhearted, conceit, jealousy, obsessive-compulsive behavior, and nebulous morality. 

NOTE: most of the traits, good or bad, are not physical.

Execution of the above traits relies heavily on the motivation and development of the villain. 

In her past, the queen was exquisitely beautiful.  That beauty gave her renown, which in turn gave her pride and ambition to marry well.  She had the intelligence to exploit her beauty, and a male's susceptibility to it.  She captured the heart of a king. Good for her. Since she is the most beautiful in the land, she can afford to be generous to those less fortunate.  She is jealous of her hard-won position.

She believes the only way to keep her position--both in the monarchy, and in everyone's regard--is by retaining her youthful beauty.  As she ages, she relies more heavily on magic (or a really good cold cream) to maintain her looks.  Time and the elements are not her friends.  As she ages further, she becomes more desperate. 

Enter Snow White, who has a mother's-dying-wish good looks, and a gentle demeanor to match.  The queen is indulgent at first, but as Snow White matures, so does her beauty.  Too soon, the queen has a challenger who has nothing but time and good breeding on her side.  Cold creams can't take up the slack. 

The queen doesn't let little things like ethics or morality stand in her way--it's only her stepdaughter after all, not a blood relative or her own daughter--and so resorts to more conventional means of taking out her competition: she orders a hit on her rival.   

When the assassin is beguiled by Snow White, the queen takes matters into her own hands and employs magic.  She's smart: she figures out ways to use Snow White’s naiveté against her, as well as defeat Snow White's other protections, the dwarfs.  The queen goes the extra mile to make sure she does it right.  Snow White's protectors are forced to take a more active role, even as each thwarted attempt drives the queen to more heinous acts of aggression.

NOTE: This descent down the path of evil is driven by the queen's obsession.  She doesn't see it.  She only sees the prize of being the fairest in the land.  As her obsession grows, her other more admirable traits are twisted or eclipsed.

Let’s get back to those traits. The queen exhibits most of the traits I like in my villains: physical beauty that hides the viper underneath. Intelligence, because a stupid villain is not appealing. Darkness of soul. Willpower. Cunning. Presence. Poise. Follow-through. Feelings of superiority. Ambition and drive to get to—or stay on— the top with little to no regard for who is hurt in the process. Depraved indifference for all but their own aims and existence. A willful and premeditated suspension of moral and ethical accountability, and the ability to justify its disregard which, in a sense, is the villain’s own sort of morality.   Integrity. 

Silence of the Lambs: the villain of the book is supposed to be the serial killer on the loose. The serial killer is interesting, but Hannibal Lector snares our attention from the moment we see him. Why? 

However aberrant it is, Lector follows his own morality, his own rules, his own code of conduct with no apologies and no excuses. Soft-spoken, Lector possesses genius-level intelligence, piercing perception, cunning, education, evident gentility (aka, poise), humor, and a ton of backstory, both spoken and non. He is also a cannibal filled with barely suppressed rage. Lector is horrifyingly, terrifyingly fascinating, and so sinister he takes residence in our nightmares. Yet, when Lector escapes, Starling trusts him not to come after her as his next meal because she believes Lector likes and respects her; Lector would consider eating her to be… well…rude. Why? Because he is true to himself, always. This is integrity.   

I am not a fan of slasher films because most of the villains are mindless evil, have no real depth, and no understandable motivation for what they do other than the one or two lines we may or may not get during the course of the movie. The only thing that makes them scary is that they don’t stop until killed, and in the case of some, not even death has a hold—witness Jason and Freddy and other multiple-sequel slasher films. The reason we jump or have nightmares about them is because those villains are usually physically intimidating combined with the Hollywood oogada-boogada factor with a side of tension-music to assist.

Slasher villains play on primal fears—powerful, but one dimensional. They might be cunning, but they aren’t truly intelligent because they really don’t have a personality other than their hunger for blood. Freddy Krueger is an exception…he has a twisted sense of humor, intelligence, and a back story, thus, Freddy has complexity, and seems more real because of those traits. In the slasher film world, however, he is an oddity.  

More real because of those traits. Think on that a moment. Think on the traits I listed above. Which do you find admirable? Which do you find scary or hateful? What would happen if you took the good traits to extremes, or twisted them and eclipsed them with those you most dislike? What is the back story of that villain? What caused them to turn into monsters? What makes them get up in the morning? What drives them over the bounds of socially acceptable? What would complete their fall from grace? What would redeem them? 

Would they take the redemption were it offered?

You can’t have a hero without a villain; they go hand in hand. The stronger and more vibrant the villain, the more the audience will desire the hero’s success. In short, the villain has to be just as multi-dimensional as your hero. Without that depth, the villain will stand lack-luster, and your audience won’t understand why the hero has to overcome anything. The villain wants to blow up the world and become a god-like super-being? So what? The God of Nothing still has nothing. Stupid villain. Why did I pick up this book? 

That said, think carefully about your characterization of your villain. The traits make the character. The development, motivation, and execution of those traits create a believable villain who will make or break your hero’s journey. Even if it is a decent into the depths of Hell, your villain also has a journey. Don’t neglect it.