The Anti-Hero Defined

So, the anti-hero is the star of the show, but doesn’t have the same trope-like characteristics and/or attributes that we normally identify the hero of a story with. This, in my opinion, is one of the things that makes the anti-hero so potentially appealing. As a writer, we’re always looking for ways to make characters interesting, and fresh. That’s one of the driving factors that keeps readers going. Anti-hero’s feel a little grey, in other words, and that helps add color to the people in our stories. A little shading helps things take on a three-dimensional appearance, right?

The Allure of the Anti-Hero

One of these days I’m going to write a story with an anti-hero. In fact, now that I write that, I think I’ve got one in the current book I’m writing, The Shadow’s Servant, and one that I’ve already written in The Magic Shop. The notion of a protagonist, or supporting character that blurs the line between the traditional hero and villain is curious to me, and from an author’s perspective, is super fun to write. While the idea of the anti-hero may be less common in books and other media, its noteworthy that the literary device has been around for quite some time, and is used.

In my Magic Shop series, I’ve got a few characters that might fit the notion of Anti-heroes a bit. 

Elba—The crypt keeper. She’s one of the good guys, for sure, but, well, sometimes you’re not sure. If there are two factions in this series, she’s one character that seems neutral most of the time, even though she comes to the aid of the good guys. The result it that you are left wondering how she will respond to certain situations most of the time.

Exum—Here is a character that first appears in The Shadow’s Servant. He’s a smuggler, and a bit of a rouge. He’s in it for himself, and always looking for how he can profit from a situation. That said, he’s one of the good guys…or is he? These characters are fun to write.

Examples of Anti-Heroes in Our Modern Media

Where I’ve given you a couple of examples anti-heroes from my writing, here are some examples of anti-heroes type characters in other literature and media:

• Severus Snape from the Harry Potter series
• James Bond
• Dexter Morgan of the Darkly Dreaming Dexter series
• Gollum from the Lord of the Rings
• Artemis Fowl 
• Jason Bourne 
• Hellboy
• Han Solo
• The Punisher
• Jack Bauer
• Saul Goodman from Breaking Bad
• Sherlock Holmes

…just to name a few. 

Here’s another neat TED video I found on anti-heros. Notice the awesome use of Tron as an example. What about you? Have you ever written an anti-hero? Tell me about it in the comments below.