We have a fun couple of days for the people who don't work ahead and the ones who are already done. And to be honest, you all pretty much did my job for me. If you haven't been reading posts in the forums, I suggest checking out the posts and the links connected posts here: "Antagonists"   and "Re: Antagonists"  . I mean, I could just leave that there and most of the answers probably cover everything but that is way too easy for me. So, let's look at different elements of character antagonists because the natural disasters and situational antagonists are going to be covered by the wonderful Battywyn🎶Prep! .

The Assignment: Draft a profile of the antagonist(s) you identified in the "Premise" assignment. If your antagonist is a situation rather than a person, choose another minor (but significant) character to profile.

1. The Crazy Villain that shares their whole life story at times.

Haha. Okay, this one is for the extreme but there are stories out there with them and they can be fun to write. That means, if you want a villain like we see in comic books, superhero movies and some movies that go to this extreme, this part of the post is for you. And if you don't believe me that you can't have this kind of silliness in a book, I have evidence for you in the form of a book. Check out: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/467308.How_to_Be_a_Villain

The book title says it all. How to Be a Villain: Evil Laughs, Secret Lairs, Master Plans, and More!!! It is a fun read and I can say this because I have read it, twice. I made sure the book made it through a couple of different moves between different states too. And I have an idea for a story where there is a school for villains and a school for heroes that is going to use chapters from the book. So, if your story is on the fanatical side maybe you can go there. This means costumes or particular choices in appearance, maniacal laughs and minions. This assignment might be easy for you because there are elements you can talk about for a profile, like what I just mentioned. They can also have a family that can be later brought to life in the day 11 backstory. Or they find minions in the backstory. Whatever you want to write to bring the details to life. Day 10 is the create details day. If you know things like hair color, age, bathroom schedule (or not, probably not), or if their music taste leans more towards Journey and Guns n Roses or if it's Lady Gage and Katy Perry. Do they want all black for a classic villain style or are they going to like that pop of color with red. Today is the day to find some details.

2. The somewhat regular person or how some people seem normal but can do evil things.

Okay, maybe the person isn't that crazy villain that will capture the hero and when threatening them, tell their life story and plot for taking over the world. That is okay. It's great to have a regular person type of antagonist because that is what we find in many stories. As mentioned in one of the posts that I linked above, the antagonist doesn't have to be a "villain" type. It technically don't need to be a bad person. It just needs to be someone who goes against the protagonist. The "hero" has a goal that they are trying to succeed or find and the antagonist gets in their way. However, some people can seem nice but they can do some really bad things. If you don't believe me... just watch Snapped. My mom loves that show and she will even fall asleep to it. I've seen several episodes now and some of the ones guilty of the crimes do not look like someone who would do that. I know one episode had a southern lady poison her husband or maybe it w as two different ones but it turns out when police would stop by, she would be a proper host by giving them some banana cream pie and/or sweet tea that was laced, so they might feel sick later but no one thought it was from her. Or if you consider the fact that sometimes when questioned later, the family and friends of a serial killer will often say they are the least likely person. They never suspect a thing. Which can make it scarier because it's not some crazy, obvious villain but instead it could be anyone you know.

This means you can use almost anyone, including a nice little grandma, to act as the antagonist. And what they do or how bad it is, that depends on the story. They could have good intentions but it causes problems that make it harder for the protagonist to get what they want. It's that simple.

3. The protagonist can also be the antagonist.

So, the romance novel has been used as an example in the forum discussion and for good reason. I write romance all of the time, which means that there have been years taking part in the Prep Challenge where I hadn't had a different person for the antagonist. Instead, it's either a situation, non-person antagonist. Or, it just might be the protagonist getting in their own way. What I read is m/m romance and that's what I write but I'll keep the details to topic. One of the biggest ones that I've written with traditional romance was one that I prepped and ended up writing 120,000 words. Two protagonists and in essence, both could be said to be antagonists as well. Sure, the ex-boyfriend is a problem and there is the situation with the friend, but the real thing that causes problems is the one lacking experience that also causes self-confidence issues. One of the protagonists, even with experience, has self-esteem issues and self-worth along with PTSD spurred around his coming out and family. They really have to battle the problems with themselves that affects their ability to connect or understand what they want or even put into words what they want to tell the other, all of that is the bigger problem creators than some person on the side. They have more of a tendency to cause their own problems, not some villain or other person antagonist.

This also can work in other genres. There are inner, psychological aspects to a person. And they don't need to have multiple personalities to get in their own way, but that could be a fun story too. Though one would have to question if a different personality counts as a different person for antagonist as they don't know in the main consciousness what the other identity does often times. hmmm For another time. The basics of this part is that the protagonist can also act as the antagonist.

We have options for today and the good part is that you don't need to write things out in long form or paragraphs. You can just use templates and profile creators. You could even act like they are creating a profile for a dating site. That asks for the basic information like age and visual details about the self along with the various questions like music taste, favorite date or other things that might be relevant. In fact, I suggest someone uses a dating profile as an influence and create that for your character. I think that would be a fun way to do the profile.

Get ready to have fun because up next is the story with the antagonist as the POV character.