How To Make A Hated Character

The best way in my experience to make a hated character.. is to give them traits you yourself find hateable.. chances are.. someone hates them to... some examples: obnoxiousness, arrogance, rude, thoughtless, self-centered, narcissistic...

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one thing i noticed is that most people dont like those who are resistant to change in everything. people who just cant go with the flow sometimes are really annoying or stuck up or just plain ignorant. use that if you want.

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Inspiration comes in many shapes, sizes, forms and colors, just like the people who inspire or are inspired.

Haha, hated? JKR did an awesome job creating Umbridge in Harry Potter. I have yet to meet anyone who liked that character. She is SO hated.... And all she did was make things horribly unfair for those going against her.

~~Kat

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If Tears could Build a Stairway and Memories a Lane, I'd Walk Right up to Heaven and Bring You Home Again.

Snophlake- My pure white
Pharoah- My yellow tiger-stripe
Tomika Bakolias- AKA: Tommy Riddle- My Slytherin Partner in Crime

I Love You and I

Hate-worthy characteristics:
-Violent, . . .
-. . .while not feeling guilty . . .
-. . . while getting away with whatever he wants.
-Imposing beliefs on others like a Bible-thumping fundamentalist who chases people down the street screaming
"Your unborn child is going to grow up a Satan-loving lesbian slut, that is, if you are prevented from aborting her!"

Just think about people you dislike and model your evil character after them.

@cary: ...I actually tend to really like characters like that. Um, and I kind of like people like that too... XD

I think, actually, that most "bad" characters for me are Deliciously Evil or Charmingly Annoying so long as they possess pride and self-awareness (and some kind of intelligence--it doesn't have to be book smarts). You can be an obnoxious, pushy, abusive, foul-mouthed, self-preserving, egotistical, disloyal bastard--but if you're intelligent, and if you know what you're doing, look it in the face, sneer an evil sneer and do it anyway--I like you.

What I find most creepy and horrible are cloying characters--characters who whine their way through their nastiness, avoid responsibility for their actions (by trying to wriggle out of them or place blame on others), and who try to smarm their way into better people's good graces, like mollusks oozing around on a whale. And I really do have something of a bias against stupid people. So stupid, smarmy people are, for me, the ultimate way to go if I need to make someone hate-able.

The major antagonist of my NaNo this year is really hard to think of as the major antagonist. He's just too LITTLE to be easily thought of as the big destructive force, and it's not usually him with the weapons (he does some killing, but it's before the book opens and it's offpage)--he's that awful, underestimated slug of a character who wreaks havoc everywhere he goes by being simultaneously destructive and whingy. (I am trying not to use the term Peter Pettigrew Syndrome, but it seems apropos.)

lol to each his own i guess :D someone will always like your villian.. and someone will always hate him/her :x.. you just have to figure out where the balance is so that more people hate him/her than like them :x

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I think if you make a character priveleged and spoiled that generally leads to them being hated. Like if a character is rude to a waiter, or doesn't feel any sympathy at all. Also, (if your character is a male) you could use that go-to movie strategy of having them say something creepy to a girl. That's always a good way to inspire hatred.

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"You must have heard of Shakespeare. He's well known. Fellow who used to write plays. Only Aurelia's aunt said he didn't. She maintains that a bloke called Bacon used to write them for him."
"Dashed decent of him!" said Archibald approvingly.

-P.G. Wo

Well, I don't really ever think about it, but I know I pretty much succeeded when creating a father for a char. I've even had someone tell me they got so angry at the bastard, they wanted to kill him. Though in this situation, the girl was really sweet and innocent, and her father abused her, used her as a slave, a thing he could give to his friends for entertainment. I admit that he is a very flat character. He has no guilt, he is rather stupid, short temper, thinks that women are nothing more than tools around the house... He let his wife die because he didn't want to pay for a doctor and "she was just a woman anyway". So, maybe if you create an evil, bad guy who you want people to hate, one of the first things you should check if he is just a really flat character. He is evil, he acts like an asshole and there is little reason for him to make it up. Don't let him be all angsty or make up excuses for his acts, such as 'he grew up in a poor family' or 'his father was always drunk and beat him'. He's an asshole. No excuses.

Same is with my current 'bad guy'. He's a rich guy who lost two of his wives (most likely killed them), he deals in drugs (the bad ones), he makes tons of money, but he'll never give it to charity or anything like that. And someone wants him dead because he's such an asshole.

So... keep him a flat character. Don't develop him too much. And I agree on the giving him traits you find hateful. I'm sure if you do that, you'll be fine. ;)

I tend to hate characters that are perfect...Usually I end up hating the MC unless they're violent with a sarcastic mouth. And come to think of it, I usually end up really liking the villain. I don't think I'll be much help to you o_o

I figure my character is a pretty hated character, considering he takes advantage of a 17 year old paralyzed girl, as well as killed a rather innocent character. Even worse, he gets away. In all, I think people will hate him. I really wanted to know more of what other people do to create characters they want hated. Looks like I'm not the only one who wants to make characters for people to want to kill.

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The voices aren't that bad once they're scared of you.

My villain is awful. I hate him. TT.TT

One of my characters comes from a rich family. So he kidnapped her and is making her parents pay the ransom, because he wants the money. His cousin was his partner in crime, until she decided she was on the FMC's side. Then he killed her so she wouldn't blab that he did it and tell where the kidnapped girl was held. He also kidnapped my MMC and is blackmailing his sister. Real nice guy. XD

I'm thinking of having his cousin kill him or something as revenge. I guess it's a little extreme for her, but I want her to do SOMETHING!!

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If you use the phrase "Way Past Cool" near me, I will be forced to kill you. :)

Well, considering I am writing fanfiction, I had an advantage. I just had to go from what he had in the game, and turn it up a notch. From the reviews I got in the first book, I did a very good job. He's more hated than he was before.

All I did was make him more manipulative overall pretty much. He forced my MCs to do something neither of them would ever do. And considering one of them almost died, yeah that was enough to earn hatred from my readers who love the MCs dearly.

My main antagonist is a very charming leader of a group of bandits. As the story goes on, we learn that he is in a very disturbing relationship with one of the FCs. He degrades her and uses her. He has killed one of the more innocent of my characters, just because she got wind of his plans. He manipulates everyone, does nothing to prevent his oldest friend from being kidnapped by slavers because it will give him more control over another character.

The creepiest thing I've had him do so far is to kill the woman he had been in the degrading relationship with by slitting her throat while telling her that it was basically for her own good and that he loved her. The scary part is that I really think he loved her...in his own sick twisted way.

I've got a lot more planned for him. No one is safe.

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First you're an unknown, then you write one book and you move up to obscurity. Martin Myers
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2007 NaNo: Leap Year

If I wanted to make MYSELF hate a character, I would copy and paste the entirety of Wuthering Heights into my novel and then write, "Lindsay was quite exactly like Kathy."

Seriously I never hated a character as much as I hate frigging Kathy. Seriously. Frigging. Geez.

(I wouldn't actually do that, but I would definitely model a character after her)

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Cathy Earnshaw or Catherine Linton? I felt sorry for Catherine Linton-her mother hated her father and loved an evil antihero, he didn't have much of a chance to be nice, and she DOES reform after all. But I agree about Cathy Earnshaw-one of my most hated characters of all time.

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Sanity: Code Turquoise
Dead Plots: Two
Title: Cherished
Tea: Earl Grey, and holding

Whoa skunk, I did not know that your story was like this. Do you have it posted anywhere?

Unfortunately not. I haven't ever made an LJ account and I don't know where else I'd put it. As of right now the story isn't even on the computer. It's just a stack of typewritten pages in my desk drawer. My plan is to get the whole of the novel completed before I transfer it to the computer and start editing.

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First you're an unknown, then you write one book and you move up to obscurity. Martin Myers
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2007 NaNo: Leap Year

Usually what I try to do is give him/her a personality that makes them begrudgingly acceptable to the reader - that is, messily good, good by the letter of the law but not the spirit. II try to set them up as a loveable but undependable dope, someone who does the right things for the wrong reasons for most of the book, until the turning point when their twisted motivations eventually get the better of them and the reader/MC sees them for their reasoning and not their actions, for who they really are. NOBODY likes it when they feel betrayed.

I base my hated characters on people I actually hate in real life.

Heh, I did the same. Specifically family members that set my teeth on edge every time we visit them or they visit us. So it's not so much hatred as general annoyance. With a bunch of anger too though...

Communism is just the other side of the same coin. Socialism's the edge.

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Communism is just the other side of the same coin. Socialism's the edge.

For me, characters I hate are the ones without any insight.

Have any of you read the Liveship trilogy, by Robin Hobb? She's great at writing despicable characters overall, but in terms of that, her crowning glory for me was Kyle freakin' Haven. I hated that man to the point it gave me energy! He was cruel, yes, and very selfish, but the thing that drove me insane was that he was incapable of learning and understanding the people around him. He saw no value in his wife, he saw no potential in his son, he saw no strength in his sister-in-law, and he always thought he knew best.

ARGH! Just thinking about him makes me angry! Thank god he's fictional, but I shudder to think that likely someone out there very much like him exists.

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2005: What Music They Make (crashed and burned)
2006: Kaimana (flaked away to nothingness)
2007: Easy Bruises (WON)

Control freaks. Bosses/commanding officers who are always breathing down their employees'/subordinates' necks, watching everything they do because they /know/ it's going to be done wrong. double-nasty if they get their employees/subordinates reporting on each other's behavior. Triple-nasty if they are preternaturally energetic and never seem to need sleep or a day off--they're always there. Quadruple-nasty if they say they're taking a day off and then show up in the middle of you making a "mistake."

My hated character is one of the popular girls. She's not really EVIL, she's just immensely irritating. She's really full of herself, calls everyone honey, and is really nosy and pushy. I unknowingly made her exactly like these two girls I met. I honestly didn't mean to, but it just happened.
I also end up liking the villains most of the time. I did a fractured Little Red Riding Hood. Guess who shortly became the main character.
Good, you got it. He didn't start out that way, though. He's not the narrator, just the MC now. Like in Moby Dick.

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Huzzah!
By making this my signature, I hereby deify all my posts!
Huzzah!

When I create a character intended to be hated, I first give that character a name that stands out from the other character's names/titles. For example, in a short story of mine, the protagonists were called Cara, Jeanne, and Joe and the antagonist was called Armany.

I made Armany have the following traits: Flawless speech, a tendency to appear in certain key moments, manipulative of protagonists and other people surrounding him, and wit that could potentially destroy him, but never does.

All of the readers hated him, that I know of, and he had potential to go far as a character. I think those are some of the things that make a character hated, but it depends on how you want to create your characters.

I think the main thing that makes a good hated character is that they control what the main character can do.

In Ella Enchanted (terrible book, but good example) Ella is the victim of a curse which makes her obedient. It is physically impossible for her not to follow a command. Even if you told her to hop up and down on her left leg for 2 days she would have to do it. There is a character named Hattie who takes full advantage of it and makes her into a slave. She won't even allow Ella to be friends with a nice girl she meets at boarding school. In this way, she controls her.

Another example is Umbridge, who was mentioned earlier. She puts severe restrictions on Harry, not allowing him to speak about the return of Voldemort and banning him from Quidditch. These are two things he cares very deeply about.

That's just my oppinion.

Double, lo siento.

For me, what makes a hateable character is that s/he has weaknesses, just like the MC, but whereas the MC fights to overcome them (not necessarily heroically), the villan turns a deaf ear to those trying to help them.

Also, creating empathy toward the MC, and then having the villan's actions harm the MC, make for a very hateable character. It's one thing to be told people in a universe hate someone. It's another thing to pull the reader into the universe and subject them to the villan's hurtful actions.

A good way to get people to hate a character (in a good way) is, in addition to having them be a colossal prick, have them take away something the reader has come to know and love in the story. This would probably be something the protagonist would know and love, though not always. People fear loss, it saddens and frightens us. So naturally we come to dislike the things that take those things away from us.

Be warned though, sometimes no matter how unlikeable a character is fans will still love them.

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Official Deadpan Snarker since 1988.

Go against society morals. If society is generally opposed to something... then your audience will be too. For example, if a society is opposed to starvation and often are seen in an attempt to raise money for such a cause the following scenario would anger them:

Then your main character could be a self-centred photographer, focused on gaining the shot that will win him a prestigious award. In our story he journeys to the African wilderness and finds himself on a scene; a child thin, close to death, is seen crawling, resting, crawling, in an attempt to reach shelter. A vulture with hungry eager eyes looks on. The man, recognizing the puissant moment as a brilliant photo opportunity, takes some pictures and sits down to watch, eating his lunch. Then as the child collaspses once more he loses interest and goes on his way.

You can expand this story adding insult to injury, for example he is horrifically obese and carries food with him always. In contrast your likeable character is thin and diabetic, the only food he carries is a chocolate bar that may save his life. Yet he takes pity on the boy gives him the food (and because he was there by chance (kidnapping you name it - he didn't plan it)) sitting down to wait for transport to arrive. The main character comes past, sneers and insults the man, ignores his pleas for help, and drives off.

He wins his award - this makes the reader bitter with defeat because it seems the morals of their society have been destroyed amongst ecstatic applause. Then comes his downfall.

Therefore, by building your character up falsely on the poles of society morals then breaking the poles one by one, the society gains back thier moral status at the end (as the character is destroyed - I reccomend suicide or prison :D) All ends happily, and a bitter hatred for your character remains. Beautiful, pure poetry. :D

Broken_toy