If The Villains of Narnia Have Realistic Morality

DarkKomet

DarkKomet

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Well the villains are all just going either card-carrying villains or just usurping for selfishness without proper motive

Villains can feel more real if they have levels of either self righteous villainy believing their own evil actions to be good(And holy) or an Anti-Villain who is just law enforcement following orders or just a villain of sympathetic motivation with a reason for evil

Examples of villains to go in a realistic direction if someone were to add such characterizations to the story with examples like:

Jadis being changed to a more self righteous tyrant who believed her own tyranny to be holy and "good" but is just bad and that can make her worst than original Jadis, especially with moral hypocrisy

Maugrim being a Noble Enforcer who is obliviously on the side of evil and even has people her cared about and can have a redemption arch in contrast to his book counterpart

Miraz while a usurping villains could also be self righteous as the above or just more of a well intended villain who could be close to a good king to his people but hostile to the narnia people

Lady of The Green Kirtle could be evil by loosing a loved one and seeking revenge on the Telmarines

Tash could have a backstory of being the son who worked hard only to be rejected and hates Aslen for taking what he sees as his rightful place, which can go to the sympathetic motivation of evil


Though How would you have the villains act if they have realistic morality in some form of adaptation
 
I know that a villains movie or backstory has been popular in the Hollywood industry lately. Though I can't see any of the Narnia villains getting their own movies. Though you could think of their backstories just for the sake of speculation.

Here's a random thought-
Rishda turning to his atheistic views even as he is serving in the Temple of Tash in Tashbaan.

Not likely to be made into the movie (the Estate may not approve anyhow), but there are some things to speculate.
 
There are too many other opportunities for people who want 50 Shades of Bray to find that everyone is actually all the same. We have to remember that Narnia is an unfallen world. Things happen a little different there. They don't close shops on Memorial Day but they do take National Potato Week very seriously.
 
Jadis was a self-righteous tyrant and believed her cause to be the right one. She also saw her as the victim of her sister's actions, blaming her for not allowing Jadis to be queen and then using magic first. As a result, she committed omnicide of all life on her planet save her.

I have no problem with Maugrim just being the enforcer who merely has chosen to work for Jadis as she is the ruler of Narnia. However, I can't see any redemption for him as long as he still attacks Peter, Susan, and Lucy.

Miraz likely was a good ruler so long as he stayed as such. He killed to get into the role and would have stayed there until he had a son and wanted to get Caspian out of the way to make room for his progeny. Note that he did a good job of raising Caspian apart from denying the teachings of the real history of Narnia.
 
Maugrim can easily be just depicted as some Cop who just saw humans as an evil race by falling for propaganda and gets spared by the adaptation (Like a certain character in Prince Caspian)

The Self-righteous levels can just have Jadis being a sort of dictator who just thinks that she is doing some holy crusade for the name of the Maker (Similar to Judge Frollo), But the crusades are not as holy as she thinks or claims

Mostly on the change of character personality
 
Has anyone here been around a narcissist? I have. For sure, they WANT to believe that whatever they do is justified, but this involves willful self-delusion. There is no innocent matter of opinion here; they KNOW that they are choosing to justify themselves at the expense of truth.

If you read "That Hideous Strength," you'll find Mister Lewis carefully dissecting the process of not-at-all-innocent self-deception. As his villains get what they deserve one after another, the reader is allowed to follow their fully-intentional rejection of the very truth which could have saved them.

While I'm thinking of it, many feminist readers choose to resent the fact that the character Jane Studdock has to admit BEING WRONG for having regarded her husband with scorn and contempt. Well, if you look at the body count in the novel's climax, you'll see that FAR MORE MEN than women are gruesomely depicted "on stage" as dying horribly. Jane merely has to admit fault and amend her way of life.
 
DarkKomet said:
The Self-righteous levels can just have Jadis being a sort of dictator who just thinks that she is doing some holy crusade for the name of the Maker (Similar to Judge Frollo), But the crusades are not as holy as she thinks or claims
Click to expand...
Frollo was actually a priest in the original Victor Hugo novel. Disney changed his position to judge for a couple of reasons:
1. They want to give him more power in the city of Paris, passing judgment on gypsies and such.
2. They didn't want to offend the religious by having one of their most evil villains belonging to the church.

As far as villains goes, I think Rishda would have more similiarties to Frollo: claiming to do things in the name of Tash, but not really believing in him. Not to much constantly doing horrible things.
 
I really think the title of this thread should be More Nuanced Characters rather than "Realistic Morality," which implies the world view that nobody is ever truly bad or good. One thing I've discovered in my travels is the difference between "Normal" which is often misused, and "Normative" which is what most people mean by Normal. It comes down, I guess, to what the purpose of sea turtle hatchlings truly is...to be eaten by sea gulls before they can reach the waves (Normative) or to grow into the next generation of sea turtles (Normative). Admittedly few turtles make it down the beach to the waves...but their purpose is not defined by what usually happens to them, the way a Stradivarius is defined by everyone that plays it, regardless of skill level. It is only in the hands of a master (relatively rare) that the Stradivarius stands out from the WalMart special.
 
Copper, I agree that Jadis is a narcissist of the most dangerous level. I was merely describing her history as the book portrayed. But DarkKomet, note that Jadis was never the true ruler of Charn. She either tried to usurp her sister or there was a dispute between her and her sister which resulted in a civil war. Jadis lost but was so petty that she killed all life on Charn rather than accept defeat. She is irredeemable.

The problem with sparing Maugrim is that takes away Peter's first battle win that made him Sir Peter Wolfsbane.
 
Maybe an alternate story where Jadis is not related to Charn and just invades the city out of prejudice and charn being depicted as a peaceful city that gets attacked and destroyed

Can actually work as an external retcon similar to the Beowulf movie like going all the true story the writer gets wrong type of plot
 
DarkKomet, what I don't understand is if you want something radically off-canon, why not write out your own vision with your own characters? That way you will experience true artistic freedom. I could, if I wanted, write a crossover story with Pinocchio and Babylon 5, but the idea that Pinocchio was brought to life by nanobots who converted his wood to biomimetic resin would not really please Babylon 5 fans, and it might actually offend Pinocchio fans who say, "Are you saying the Blue Fairy was an alien scientist?"
 
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