In the past year, I have watched two separate TV shows with a killer antagonist. No pun intended.....yet. Both shows portray a main character who is also the "bad guy." One character is a politician who betrays everyone around him to gain power. The other is a gangster whose family controls an entire city through cutthroat bribery. Both characters are murderers. Both characters demean women. Both characters stomp all over innocent bystanders. As I watched both shows, I began to realize something. I liked these characters.
In the midst of me mentally shaming them, I was rooting for their success. Each week I would watch these shows and make excuses for the character's behavior. Most of my excuses were made because I knew the person behind the action. Their reasoning had been explained through thoughtful script writing throughout each episode. They were no longer just evil men doing evil things.
The writers of the shows had allowed me to cozy up next to their bad guy and see the mind behind the madness.
Empathy crept up in me as one of the characters forces a former prostitute back into her old ways to save his family's gambling business. Understanding pervaded my opinion of the other character as he commits adultery to uphold his wife's desire for political control. These two men will stop at nothing to gain their selfish and psychotic dreams, yet I find myself wanting them to be the victor. Wanting them to stay alive and make it to the next season. What does this say about me?
When I allow my mind to convince me that I know the villain, I emasculate the evil in which their character possesses. When I know the heart behind the villain, I want to make excuses for their actions in an attempt to convince myself they aren't bad. They aren't all bad. They're just like me. And in many ways, they are. The evil of my heart isn't satisfied just dwelling inside me. It wants to own me. My inner grand jury thinks it can judge a soul by it's humanness instead of it's depravity. It thinks we're all naturally good. This is how I know I'm messed up inside. When I see evil and justify it.
