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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/36079
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/36079
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

> their own distinct personalities and motives for villainy. Would this be a good way to write a Complete Monster?

It's a start. But there are only a few motives that really apply to a CM. Power, greed, pleasure in torture, killing and causing death. Perhaps misplaced vengeance.

To me, the way to make a **plausible** CM is to remove the insanity and build a simple genius psychopath, a person without a conscience or empathy and incapable of love that truly cares only for themselves, not even their own children or family, parents or spouses. To them everybody else is disposable worker ants to be used and discarded, including infants and children. Nobody else matters, except for their utility in accomplishing a goal.

To me, although "enjoying killing" is not a problem for the plausibility of a CM, irrational behavior ruins the plausibility. I don't think an irrational villain can rise to the level of being a worthy foe, irrationality makes them too easy to catch/stop and carries a high danger of resolving the plot by deus ex machina: "Oh, villain did something stupid." I find that to be disappointing even if the author telegraphs the ending by having the villain do the stupid irrational thing several times; if it is a habit it would have done him in long before the hero comes on the scene.

I would keep them rational and ruthless and quick to kill, and of course with a plan and goal to achieve it that must be stopped.

Original score: 7