Originally Posted by
Atomic
'Villianiny' will never die in literature. It's not something that encourages cardboard characters...a well written villain goes a long way, often revealing the failings of the so called 'good' characters. One great example is Madame De Winter from the Three Musketeers who, while a savage woman through and through, manages to illuminate the chauvinisistic hypocrisy of the titular characters.
Then we have plain evil characters, commonly seen in fanatasy, who don't seem to think, do or even feel much at all. I would not term such things 'characters'.