How do I write a compelling villain-all-along twist?
I have in mind a character who is the protagonist's trusted ally throughout the story, but it is revealed at the end that he was the primary antagonist for most of it. This kind of thing has, of course, been done many times in the past, most recently in:
Spider-Man: Far From Home with the character Quentin Beck, a.k.a. Mysterio.
I want this to be foreshadowed but still surprising, the "How did I not see this coming?" sort of twist. But once it's clear that someone else is pulling strings in the story, this character is probably an obvious first suspect to readers, given the prevalence of this trope. What are some strategies to lead readers off the trail and make the twist compelling?
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/46699. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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The actual answer depends largely on the genre. In some genres a villain is simply an active impediment between the hero and his goals, e.g. conservative father vs. daydreaming son. In other genres the rivalry assumes larger proportions, with the villain commanding armies of minions, and the hero having the face them, e.g. a large number of superhero plots.
In any event,
Make your villain more heroic than the hero.
If you want the reader to believe that the villain is on the side of the hero, give them a moral stature that is far superior to the hero himself. Throughout the story the villain could:
- stop the hero and impose a stricter moral code to their actions;
- scold the hero for not following a higher moral standard;
- be regarded as an inspiration by the hero for their higher moral stature.
This is strongest when the villain truly has such moral qualities, instead of just pretending. To show it, you may need either minor villains with lower moral standards, or very long dialogues between the hero and the sidekick villain.
An Example
You mentioned Spiderman. Take Batman, who abides by the moral code of not killing: his villain sidekick will abide by a stricter moral code of not even physically harming anyone. For instance, he could defeat the minor villains with psychological means, or by checkmating them in a long strategic game, or simply reverting/nullifying the negative part of their deeds.
True or Fake? The decision is yours
It is up to you whether the sidekick villain truly has a higher moral code compared to the hero, while their ultimate goals are not in line with what we consider good (paperclip villain). On the other hand, it could all be just a ruse of the sidekick villain to toy with the mind of the hero, make them believe that there truly is a higher moral code, and render them impotent when faced with a real threat (Truman Show villain).
A word against evil-doing sidekick villains
Finally, I'd argue against making your sidekick villain look like a rough-but-good sidekick. First, it is difficult not to alert the reader with every odd action by the sidekick. Second, it has a negative impact on the hero during the reveal: a good and intelligent hero would unlikely accept such a company and would not once suspect that the misbehaving companion could be a villain all along. Third, it has a negative impact on the re-reading value of the story, when all the evil actions of the sidekick lose the benefit of the doubt, and just become vulgar criminal acts, which simply go unpunished for a good part of the story, with good grief for the fans of your now shortsighted hero.
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You have to make the character into a real person who the audience believe certain things about. In particular that the sidekick is loyal to the protagonist not the or some set of ideals but the person they're fighting alongside and yet determine to eventually betray, creating a strong bond between those characters will give the audience pause if/when they suspect the outcome of the situation. They won't/won't want to believe that "Sid the psychic sidekick" is going to betray his friend and fearless leader this lets you hide their intentions as long as possible, the less your audience suspects the better the reveal becomes.
The trick is that in order to avoid whiplashing your audience you need to point out what your villain is without the audience realising that's what you've done. One of the better ways of doing this is an apparent redemption narrative wherein your villain starts out disagreeable and seems to "turns their life around" while with the protagonist they still have shadey dealings with people from their "previous life" as they "wrap up loose ends" and "pay off understanding obligations" etc... All the time they're actually setting up the big fall of the protagonist.
One thing to note is that no matter how you dress it or hide it there are always going to be readers who make an early intuitive jump, like my father watching The Village for the first time and realising what was going on during the first town council meeting and spending the rest of the film being disappointed. Sometimes the ones who make that jump are your beta-readers so it pays to get several opinions on these kinds of stories to see if you're actually to transparent or just have a savvy first reader on your hands.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/46707. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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One such strategy is to have your villain, on more than one occasion, actual act against his own best interest and defeat his own plot, kill his own men, etc, in order to convince the hero (and the audience) that he is truly on the side of the hero.
He can do this when he perceives the hero is going to prevail anyway, but (for example) instead of letting his men escape a compound, takes action to blow the whole thing up and kill them all.
A trait of many villains is sociopathy, a complete disregard for human life or suffering. It doesn't give them pause for a moment to kill people, including their own loyal minions, if this serves to advance their agenda.
If you like, you can also let such a killing be a cover-up, a way for the villain to ensure there are no survivors that might tell anything important to the hero.
But the important thing is, he deceives the audience by doing things, taking risks, helping the hero in ways that seem loyal, so we just wouldn't expect the villain to be doing them. The tricky part is giving him an ulterior motive to do this, but that can be because it isn't possible to achieve his primary goals yet, and his secondary goal is to be trusted by the hero, no matter what the cost.
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There is a distinction between what the audience can logically deduce and what the audience is emotionally rooting for. The latter can make them blind to the former.
A recent example is (Game of Thrones, TV final season -- SPOILER!):
Daenerys Targaryen. She has committed many brutal murders and is becoming more and more unhinged, fixated on the iron throne, and self-important when judging those who stand in her way. If we were to pause and think analytically, we might very well predict the sacking of King's Landing. However, we are rooting for her to be a hero, and when she commits one of the foulest deeds of the story (even by GoT standards), it is a shock. Surprising yet inevitable.
So, you can start giving weak logical hints that your character is the villain, while you give what appears to be stronger actual evidence that (s)he is a hero. But you are not hiding these two possibilities from your audience, rather, you try to make them care. If you are able to develop the character to the point where the audience is emotionally invested and rooting for the character to be a hero, now they will be willing to ignore much stronger evidence to the contrary. (And so, when the reveal comes, it is surprising yet inevitable.)
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