Why does the villain always win right before the hero defeats him?
One common setup for a story goes like this:
- We have the heroes on one side
- We have the villains on the other side
- The bad guy has an evil plot that will cause some undesirable result
- The heroes know about the plot and are trying to stop it
Very frequently in such stories--in almost all of them, in fact--the villain either actually succeeds in accomplishing their goal or comes within a hair's breadth of it, with the heroes utterly defeated, before some thing happens and the good guys are finally able to improbably snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. A few examples:
Star Wars: The Death Star is literally seconds away from blowing up the rebels' base when Luke scores the decisive shot.
Thor: The Destroyer rampages throughout the town, defeats all of Thor's companions, and blasts Thor almost to death before he suddenly regains his worthiness and manages to turn things around.
Aladdin: The only way to stop Jafar is to literally let him win and become an all-powerful GENIEEEE!!!
Harry Potter: It's only possible to defeat Voldemort after Voldemort kills Harry and the Death Eaters overrun both the Wizarding government and (most of) Hogwarts.
The Order of the Stick: Not finished yet, but the story is clearly approaching the end, and there are currently two different major villains, each with their own distinct plan to effectively ruin the world as we know it. Both are currently only one step away from total victory.
I could go on (and on and on...) but you get the point.
At first glance you'd imagine the purpose of this device is to build tension, but that only works until you've seen it enough times to be able to predict that this is exactly what's going to happen, again. So, I have to ask:
Is there any other reason to use this device in a narrative, beyond "to build tension"? And what good alternatives are there to it (that don't involve the bad guy actually emerging victorious)?
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/21774. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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It's a matter of how high you want the drama to go.
Author Aaron Michael Ritchie has offered this example (and I like to use it):
Let's compare a typical episode of Star Trek: the Next Generation to one from the reboot of Battlestar Galactica.
In both episodes there is the Unthinkable Occurrence that must be avoided because it's awful.
In STNG, we follow the crew as they struggle to avoid the UO, and just barely succeed.
In BG, we follow the cast as they struggle to avoid the UO, and just barely fail. The UO happens, and things get even worse. The cast struggles and just barely succeeds at coping with the new circumstances, drawing on the best of who they are.
Which is the more interesting story? That's a matter of preference. Which is the more exciting story? I think Battlestar Galactica wins, because it uses a story arc that is almost unavoidably more exciting.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/21800. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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Is there any other reason to use this device in a narrative, beyond "to build tension"?
Yes. In Story Robert McKee describes the structure of a story as a series of attempts at a goal met by increasingly dire setbacks until the protagonist is forced to the limits of human experience and must make a final decision, a final change of values, that alters the course of their life forever.
Having the villain's foot on the hero's throat is one way to script this moment. But this is the pivotal moral crisis of the whole story. The whole structure and satisfactory resolution of the story depends on it. But there are also many other ways to bring the protagonist to this point other than the villain's boot on their throat. The hero does not have to be at the villain's mercy. But they do have to reach the crisis of values.
Bringing them to this point will, of course, produce tension, but it is not a "device to create tension". It is the essence of the story structure.
For that matter, you should not need devices to create tension at all. Tensions should arise out of the moral force of the story itself -- the great question that the protagonist must face in order to achieve the object of their desire. This is why a good story is just as good the second time around even when you know exactly what is going to happen.
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