5 Golden Rules Every Action Movie Should Follow

4. ...And a Villain They Love to HATE. You can all name plenty of worthy heroes in all genres of film, I'm sure. The modern action genre certainly has its fair share - but it seems like you have to go through several John McClane's to get a genuine Hans Gruber, the perfect villainous foil. There are always two sides to every conflict, and when a single character personifies the audience and their hunger for good to triumph against evil, the neatest way to balance this is to create a villain who's defeat will feel both necessary and earned, a worthy endeavor for the hero. A good antagonist needs to be the hero's equal, even the better in some key ways (more experienced, more powerful, more wealthy, etc.). They should be as well-established as the hero (ideally introduced to the audience around the same time), and while they can be despicable and evil, they should also be as compelling as the protagonist. Something about them needs to keep the viewer interested beyond just "They do bad things, they must die." Darth Vader was a masked wizard shrouded in mystery. Agent Smith was an enforcer of the Matrix struggling against his own programming. The well-received (but historically under-appreciated) Mask of Zorro stacked its deck with TWO entrancing antagonists - one a superstitious psychopath and the other an obsessed father certain he's the real hero of the piece. Basil Rathbone and Claude Rains are the first characters the audience meets in The Adventures of Robin Hood, their gleeful scheming setting the board for the entire rest of the film, and their continued conspiratorial collusion is what Robin must constantly contend with. They are the driving force of the film, a force to which Robin must react or perish. In many cases, introducing the villain first (as seen here,The Matrix, The Mask of Zorro, Star Wars, Captain America: The First Avenger) is a perfect way to immediately set the stakes. If the bad guy is this bad, the audience is going to want a hell of a protagonist to take them down. Everyone remembers the first time Darth Vader appears on-screen, because he's utterly terrifying even before he opens his mouth and James Earl Jones dares you not to sh*t yourself. That's not easy to accomplish, but it's incredibly important in this genre.

Contributor
Contributor

Brendan Agnew has held jobs as a salesman, a fraud investigator, a credit card supervisor, and a teacher, but writing is always what's kept him sane. He's a life-long film/TV and literature enthusiast, a lover of interactive entertainment (that's a pretentious way of saying video games), and a full-time nerd. The only thing he enjoys more than immersing himself in all things nerdy is the opportunity to drag someone else in to the wide world of geekdom, kicking and screaming if necessary. If you don't think your daily feed is bloated enough already, you can follow him on Twitter: @BLCAgnew