An antihero is more than just a regular hero going through a goth phase. They are complicated, conniving, and gritty reminders of how people with good intentions can ultimately be truly terrible.
Antiheroes can be just as compelling as traditional heroes or villains, but they’re not always easy to pull off. Check out our lists of different breeds of antihero, the ingredients that make them who they are, and tips for how you can craft the most deliciously complex antihero in your novel.
What is an antihero?
An antihero is a hero we didn’t expect, one that subverts our expectations of a classic hero.
Traditional heroes are bold, strong, merciful, and selfless. Antiheroes may hold some of those characteristics, but they’ll most likely lack many of those traits and suffer from their shortcomings. They are narcissists, criminals, misanthropes, loners, or bigots. Sometimes they even commit serious crimes.
Antiheroes can still be protagonists, vessels through which your audience experiences a story. Flawed though they may be, readers are meant to relate to their struggles and successes.
Different kinds of antiheroes
No two characters are the same, but we can group antiheroes into different groups. Here are some of the most common.
Misguided antiheroes
Many antiheroes stumble their way into the role of classic hero. What begins with a selfish desire—laziness, a quick buck, seclusion—ends in altruism and doing good.
- Han Solo needs money to pay off his debt to Jabba the Hutt. But by the end of Star Wars: A New Hope, he fights alongside the Rebellion against Darth Vader, despite his claims that he’s only looking out for himself.
- At the beginning of his movie, Shrek, a reclusive, fart-laden ogre, just wants to be left alone in his swamp. But after surviving a dangerous quest, making friends with an annoying talking donkey, and falling in love with a cursed princess, companionship becomes more important to him.
Antiheroes seeking redemption
Other antiheroes commit great wrongs and are under the misguided belief that they cannot redeem themselves. Chances are good that a well-constructed narrative might prove otherwise.
- Ebenezer Scrooge seems like a villain in the first few pages of A Christmas Carol, but do you remember what made him such a Dickensian tightwad? Parental abandonment, strict schoolmasters, and, as a result, an inability to love. It takes three Christmas ghosts to show him the error of his ways and give him the opportunity to change.
- The titular character from Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Fleabag is so manipulative, immoral, and cynical that we can’t help but binge-watch the hell out of this human catastrophe. But as we learn about the dark secret at the core of the show’s first season, her self-destructive actions take on new meaning: they are the struggle of a person who is barely a hero at all, but nonetheless fights to get the monkey off her back all by herself.
Antiheroes settling a score
Antiheroes might appeal to our sense of justice—or rather, our distaste for great injustice. Although their goal is to commit what, out of context, might be considered an evil act, they do so to balance the scales. The ends, they believe, justify the means.
- Robin Hood is the classic example. You know from whom he steals, and you know to whom he gives—and, in your heart of hearts, you know why.
- In Kill Bill: Vol. 1, Beatrix Kiddo loses her unborn child after her near assassination. As a result, she swears revenge on every member of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad.
Antiheroes in the right place at the right time
Maybe it’s a complete coincidence that your antihero’s goals align with what feels right. They’re simply a flat, amoral mercenary, and unlike the Han Solos of the world, they’re not going to undergo great change. They’re just here to do a job.
- Geralt of Rivia from The Witcher series is the antihero you need, not the hero you want. He lacks manners and respect for anything other than his personal code, but for a few coins, he hunts and slays whatever lurks in your wildest nightmares. Just don’t try to drag him into personal squabbles or local politics.
- Journalist Raoul Duke, the protagonist in Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, was hired to cover a motorcycle race. No great heroics there. But though the novel lacks a clear plot beyond getting as high and drunk as two men can get, Duke’s irreverence and impetuousness paints a scathing portrait of American disillusionment in the early 1970s. (Basically, his antagonists are Nixon and the Vietnam War.)
The ingredients of an antihero
Antiheroes are typically more complex than your traditional heroes. But like any good character in a novel, they need to be believable and, in some way, admirable to your reader.
If you’re working on crafting a strong antihero for your novel, here are a few key ingredients to get it right.
Realistic flaws
A part of your antihero is decidedly not heroic. Maybe it’s something from their past or a way they act right now.
But do not stop with the what. Ask yourself:
- What events and decisions made them who they are at the start of the story?
- How can you show this backstory through action and description without relying on exposition dumps? (See our article on showing vs. telling for more on this.)
- If your antihero starts the novel as a bad guy, why do they have to be bad?
Now pit that flaw against a heroic quality they do have. Would that clash make for an interesting inner conflict? Here are a few made-up examples:
- Dishonesty vs. selflessness: A renowned doctor lies to her superiors about her patient’s condition in order to prescribe him an experimental drug that she thinks will cure him. The drug kills the patient, and now an investigation into the treatment has begun.
- Weakness vs. determination: A scrawny young man is mugged. He begins taking steroids and training so no one will take advantage of him like that again. What is he willing to do to the people who love him in order to get his next fix?
- Injustice vs. morality: An up-and-coming lawyer must defend a man she knows is guilty of a heinous crime. She secretly spoon feeds the prosecution strong arguments against her own case in the hopes that her client will pay for what he did.
A set of clear goals
Every protagonist needs both short-term and long-term goals. Antiheroes are no different. How they differ is in the nature of the goals and the challenges that separate them from their goals.
Say your antihero has to steal a diamond from a jeweler to pay back a mob boss who’s holding his son hostage. The mob boss demands that the antihero leave no loose ends. The protagonist breaks into the jewelry store and nearly escapes with the loot when the elderly owner catches him red-handed. The owner reaches for the alarm. Does the antihero kill the old man before he can alert the police? Or does he make a break for it, thus jeopardizing the mission and his chances of saving his son?
What does your antihero want? What do they think they will achieve once they have it? What are they willing to do to complete their quest?
A fundamental misbelief
Your antihero’s backstory and flaw inform a misbelief about the world. It could be simple: “No matter what, no one will ever love me because of what I did.” It could be more complex: “Betting on racehorses is the only way out of this two-bit town.”
The arc of the story could end with the protagonist uncovering and reacting to a truth that runs contrary to their original misbelief. “In order for people to love me, I have to love myself.”
Or, for a tragic ending more befitting your brooding antihero, they may discover that they were right all along. “I bet everything to make a life for myself, and my luck has finally run out.”
To develop a well-rounded misbelief for your antihero, consider the following:
- How does the antihero present himself to the world?
- How does the antihero see himself honestly?
- How do the people closest to him see him?
- How does society see him?
- How might this misbelief impact the choices he makes throughout the story?
A worthy antagonist
Do antiheroes have antivillains? They might! All heroes, anti- or otherwise, need an antagonizing force that stands in the way of achieving their goals. It could be a single figure (a dogged police chief) or an organization (a corrupt government). The flaws, misbeliefs, and motivations of these antagonists, however, should be as clear as the protagonist’s.
Tips for writing an antihero
Your antihero will be completely unique, so these tips won’t apply to every type of antihero. But if you’re struggling to flesh out your antihero, consider some of these tactics:
Bury their heroism in plain sight
Most antiheroes do have heroic qualities, but they’re often eclipsed by their dark sides. That’s perfectly fine, but remember to give the reader glimpses at their inner light.
An assassin who turns down a job from her assassins’ guild to kill a child tells us that she has a personal moral code. Though she may do a dirty job, she is apart from the soulless institution that dictates her life. That’s a hint to the reader that she’s more hero than they might think.
Heck, the very fact that Chewbacca sits shotgun on the Millennium Falcon tells us that Han Solo might talk a big game about not needing friends, but deep down he craves companionship, even if he doesn’t know how to show it with kind words. Their Odd Couple camaraderie is all the evidence you need.
Look for real-life examples of antiheroes
Have you ever quietly cheered while reading a news article about someone who broke the law but did it for a good reason? Then you, in a very small way, rooted for an antihero.
If you’re struggling to write a compelling antiheroic protagonist, consider researching real antiheroes and their motives, as well as the mores, rules, or laws they broke. How did they get caught? Some people will laud their actions. Others will disapprove. What are the pros and cons of either line of thinking?
Give them an opportunity to cut and run
For antiheroes who deny a higher calling, there should come a moment where they’ve achieved everything they’ve set out to achieve. Han Solo eventually got his payment. Why does he have to stick around?
He doesn’t, and that’s the point. He chooses to turn his ship around and fight for the Rebellion not because they’re going to pay him, but because his newfound family needs him, and deep down he knows it is the right thing to do.
Make us sympathize with them
Sure, you’ve probably never stolen cars, lied to congress, or saved a city with your personal brand of vigilantism, but that doesn’t mean you can’t understand why someone would do those things for the right reasons.
Antiheroes allow us to indulge in dark fantasies of being a leather-clad badasses, but they are an exercise in seeing life through the eyes of good people who made bad decisions, suffered greatly, or were dealt bad hands by the universe. There’s catharsis in that. We can all think of times where we acted unheroically. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a little hero hiding underneath our bullshit.
Editing the antihero in your novel
Is there something off about your antihero? (You know, beside the ego, profanity, or ancient blood curse?
A developmental editor can shape your antihero into a strong and compelling protagonist that will carry your novel to its delightfully bitter end. They can also help you craft a plot that forces them (and your readers) to question their beliefs and see things from another point of view.
Need some help crafting your antihero? That’s what we’re here for! Submit a sample of your manuscript and receive a free edit of 5,000 words from one of our editors.