I was thinking the other day, "why do certain races have to always be bad in fantasy?" why is it always "ugly" races that are bad. Is this something we should change?
I think we need to break the rules of fantasy more. I know that everyone wants to make something like Middle-earth but guess what, it's already been done.
So this is an appeal to break free of cliche and try new things.
Really I'm starting to get tired of good elves, bad orc like creatures, and men that go between. We need to mix the pot more.


~Joe~

I think it's like that because it's so complicated in this world. The beauty of Middle Earth is things are as they seem and you can trust them. I agree with you to an extent though. I have good dragons and seemingly beautiful races that are evil.

That is a very good point. I think for my book (or maybe books, who knows!) I'll just make it so every race is like the humans, and can go either way. What do ya'll think of that?

I like this idea Elanhil! Because in the end no one's perfect and anyone from any race can be good and bad.

And that takes away some of the "perfectness" people hate about elves.

It always annoyed me as a kid when I'd read Redwall and none of the vermin were ever good. And in Outcast of Redwall we find out that even if they're raised with good people, they're still bad.
One of the main characters in my "epic" is a were-wolf that is not bad. He travels with a dragon, who also isn't bad. They are both victims of the notion that dragons are evil and were-wolves are evil.

I didn't mind the perfectness of the elves in Middle Earth because they seemed to be allegorical of angels. Especially since (in the movies at least) orcs were said to once be elves (fallen angels.)

If you notice though, modern fantasy has gone back to making pretty things good. I remember when vampires were evil, but they were always beautiful. Now people want beautiful (despite darkness) to be good.

I like mixing things up. I also like having antiheroes. Like my book Circle of Three, in which the main character is a grouchy werewolf girl who's killed quite a few people. She changes during the story. That's one series, focusing on the werewolves. It gets pretty dark. In my only other fantasy world, there are people, and there are the supernatural creatures. Essentially, angels and demons are physical in this alternate dimension in the form of red and black dragons. Not the big, fire-breathing dragons, but closer to winged serpents.

I've always seen different races as representing different things. This is why I've always excused good elves, bad orgs, and whatnot. Good elves are allegorical of the capacity for good inside all of us. Bad orges are allegorical of the capacity for evil inside all of us. Now, you might say the "stereotype" of certain races is because writers keep reusing others' allegories. True. You might also say we should try to break this. Not necessarily. Say you decide to use orges to represent good and elves for evil. You approach this with a "I could have done it the other way around, but I'm not because I don't want a cliche." Well, readers aren't going to go into your story so open-minded. They're going to expect the elves to be good and the orges to be bad. Finding it otherwise will skew their interpretation of your allegory.

What I'D like to see if a race that relies entirely on logic (perhaps having eliminated emotions) and is bad. It would all be so much more realistic (and if I were to explain that sentence it would derail the topic). Yes, evil Vulcans.

All my races are more human like and can lean either way, so I don't suffer from ugly always being bad and beautiful good.

Wait... Elfs are not always the good guys. I know if at least a few book/storys/movies/games that have elfs as a evil race.
In the warhammer series: Dark elfs exist
Wiki on dark elfs

Even in our norse mythology
2nd Wiki on dark elfs

Both are in some way "evil"-ish. They exist, just nothing cool ever happens to them. (By cool I mean: worthy of writing a story about)

In our world, elves and the like are usually feared in folk beliefs as much as they are fantasized, if not more so. Terry Brooks in some of his books has good trolls. I had one story/world in which goblins were the good guys and humans were the villains. I personally am adverse to white and black races, meaning one race is all good while another race is all bad. While I understand the reasons people do so I think it's a fairly simplistic and overused technique. In our world, there are no good races and bad races, their are merely races. Now that doesn't mean that certain groups of people don't look at other groups as "evil." In WWII, American citizens prayed for the soldiers that were fighting the "evil Germans". So I think it perfectly believable for people within your worlds to view a certain race as "evil," but that doesn't mean it has to be the objective truth.

I think that the most influential factor is that much of fantasy involves fighting and battles and it's easier as authors and as readers to justify violent acts against an enemy if the enemy is evil. It's hard for our minds to reconcile a noble and "good" hero mercilessly killing any being that isn't totally evil or serving evil or enslaved by evil. But the truth about war is that in reality, both sides commit deplorable acts and that's simply the long and short of it. Once you get past that, I think the tendency to polarize worlds between the side of evil and the side of good might decrease a little. Not that I think all fantasy authors need to break down that polarity, but I think it has been a bit overworked. Just my thoughts on the matter.

I suppose that having an archetypal evil creature or race hasn't ever bothered me. Although they generally sound too much like orcs, most evil creatures are expressions (whether by intent or accident) of the ultimate enemy and his demonic cohorts.

I agree with Shawn that representing evil with ugly and good with beautiful (and vice versa) can have strong allegorical implications.

Cliches & tropes can be a writer's shorthand. If you're writing a short story, for instance, you can use orcs as an evil race and not need to waste precious words explaining their existence. The reader will accept them as typical orcs. You can use the cliche to your advantage.

However, I think breaking the established norms is a worthy exercise - if you have space to develop the difference. Like Droid said, if you're going to usurp, you need to explain yourself. If you don't, your story might be confusing or out-of-place.

One thing I would be careful of. Some creatures have been thoroughly established as evil through centuries of dark folk lore. Some of these creatures are so twisted that I wouldn't recommend trying to portray them as good. The moral implications could be disastrous.

I try to portray any "human" race (elves, dwarves, etc.) as equally capable of good or evil. Any beings that are entirely evil must therefore be monsters, not a race of humans. A possible exception to this might be if a Dark Lord creates a "race" that is basically evil, though it would be interesting if a few members of such a race turned out not to be evil and separated themselves from the rest.

Here's another question for Y'all. why do all the bad guys have to be ugly? Regardless of race or not. In books you can always tell the bad guys just by the description. There either ugly or mean looking.
I read "City of Ember" today and as soon as they introduced the mayor I knew he was the bad guy, which kind of annoyed me.

The fact is they're not always ugly. Sure there are usually micro expressions which can give away everything and they tend to be greater in books because you can't see them. But again, vampires have never been especially ugly. That was the point. However this is also where writers fall into another stereotype: beauty+evil=seduction. This isn't a wholly unreasonable connection but it can be overdone. I for one am not a huge fan of an orc-esque creature that is not quite an orc. My evil race is physically perfect and always has been.

I have read lots of books in which the bad guy is not ugly. For example, in the Chronicles of Narnia series, Jadis is described as the most beautiful woman ever. Maybe you should be more careful with your accusations and instead of saying 'always', you could say 'often'. Just my two bits, take it or leave it.

I think it might have to do with the mindset and feeling that seems to pervade all the fantasy I've read. It's the mindset that views fantasy as a picture of an idealistic and simpler world where things may not be perfect, but they aren't muddled and confused as life is in our world. The grass is greener, the trees taller, and the good more striking. Nearly everyone is basically good, except the villain and his minions who are evil. Everything is black and white and their outer appearance depicts what they're like on the inside. The races that are good are beautiful, possibly because people think of themselves as good and like the thought of being beautiful. People also look down on those whom they think are ugly, just think about the image of a high school, and so, to make it seem right, they make the evil races ugly.

I agree. In many cases, "bad as ugly" is an automatic mentality, a stereotype we follow without noticing it. It doesn't have to be this way, but it's not a problem if it is. Either way has different implications. Use them to your advantage.

Sauron appeared wise and good to just about everyone for thousands of years. Saruman deceived the whole White Council for a good while.

As to the races having natural tendencies toward evil or something, that can largely be a helpful shorthand. You don't have to worry about whether or not an orc named Gothmog is going to be good or bad. Fantasy isn't always about being real, it is about representing reality. The same goes for paintings. None of the subjects are real, in fact they are often surreal, but they make us feel a certain way.

Also, dragons are just about as 50/50 on evil as anything else. For me they can be good or evil, in fact they are more likely to be good. In The Door Within by Wayne T. Batson they are mute creatures that are incapable of taking sides anymore than horses. In Middle-earth they are super rare and are only evil. There is a lot of variety.

Some great stuff here! The point of this tread was just to wake you all up a bit and remind us that we don't have to follow the pattern all the time. I like this quote it can be applied to fantasy writing as well as screenplays.

Interesting quote, Joe! Thanks for starting this topic.

Let's not let this die! Can anyone name me any books that breaks the bad=ugly rule? I can't think of any?

There were a few comments in Lord of the Rings about how Strider wasn't much to look at. Also The Magician's Nephew with Empress Jadis.

The Silmarillion portrays the elves as flawed beings. The majority of elves I find in there are jealous, sometimes selfish, and generally suffering from issues. (Think Feanor)

And in Narnia, Lewis describes the dwarves sometimes as ugly or homely, but the majority of them are good and stouthearted. Dwarves are pretty awesome

As for me, I thought it would be interesting to see if a Uruk-Hai from Middle Earth were to convert to the good side, maybe even try to embrace his human/elf origins before he (or his ancestors) were corrupted. That would be some neat character growth.

I don't believe there is anything like that said in LOTR but I could (possibly) be wrong.
Jadis is a good example.

But the elves are still beautiful and the majority are good.

The dwarves are "homely" quite different from ugly.

I thought of one that is similar is the inheritance cycle with the Urgals. That was well done.

C.S. Lewis used ugly to describe some of his dwarves, I believe. I could be wrong. But yes, homely and ugly are quite different, and neither are beautiful.

And as for the elves, beauty of the face is different than beauty of the heart. Feanor, Celegorm, Curufin, and Eol are the major examples of selfish and flawed elves; and there are many others which I've read about.
But anyway, you make an excellent point. Most of them are good and beautiful. Despite popular opinion, however, they aren't flawless.

I don't think this discussion was ever about interior but exterior.

Put a dwarf beside an orc and then see who's handsome
(And good story will have flawed characters otherwise it would be really boring.)

Frodo said of Strider something like this (not verbatim, but close from memory), "I think one of the enemy would look fairer and feel fouler."
To this, Strider responds, "So you mean to say that I look foul but feel fair?"
Also, Sauron the Dark Lord himself took on the disguise of Annatar, Lord of Gifts, which appeared to all as "wise and fair," such that only Elrond and Cirdan of all the Elves would guess that he wasn't to be trusted.

When I was younger I read a book called 'Samuel Blink and the Forbidden Forest' and it's in the sequel I think where there is a village of trolls and the bad guy is considered 'handsome'. To human eyes, though, he's nothing much to look at.

In my underdeveloped story, the MC girl is very pretty, but the MC man is kind of weather-beaten and average looking. I haven't worked on the bad guys much. However, looks are very important in my story, as racial tension is a big part of the plot. And I am trying to depict both races as being both good and bad, both wrong and right. In fact, now that I think about it, the story portrays the evils of making racial stereotypes. I didn't realize that until just now.

My natural inclination is to make the main evil characters ugly, I discovered, while reading this thread. Oops! I doubt that that will remain the case for long!

That's perfectly fine. In fact, I think it's better to have races that can go either way, instead of the entire race being either good or bad. That's the way I try to go.

Uglier villains are also more visually terrifying.

If anyone's read 'Pathfinder' by Orson Scott Card, the villains were all good looking, and relatively young, memory serves. (Sadly can't recommend any of Card's writing, though. Not clean, always.)

- Terra

Now that is interesting - and that's gotten me interested in the book now. =)

I think it's good to work, as someone else said, on a case-by-case basis, rather than as a generic profiling: "this race, B, is bad, but race A is good."

eruheran

And remember Tolkien had all of those. Elves were always good, with the possible exception of Feanor, but he was corrupted by Melkor. Orcs were always bad. And there were both evil and good men.

Thank you. And by the way, my world is a bit better developed now.
How it's starting to work:
One race/culture has some immoral elements about it (many don't have much of a problem with polygamy), making them appear to be more evil than the other. But then the other race defies them for this evil...and proves themselves to be savage and murderous at heart. Each culture has some things wrong about it, and some things right about it. But the rights and wrongs don't line up.
Like in real life.

I like it, Aemi! I think that portrays the good verses evil perspective well.

Thank you.