For some people, yes. For other people, maybe not. Reader opinion is fickle and what can work for one person, doesn’t for another.
However, there are some ways you can get the majority of readers to see your murderous character as ‘redeemable’. Here are a few tips and pointers:
Don’t Make Them Completely Evil
Even ‘evil’ people have good sides. If we look to notoriously evil people in our own history, although it is hard to clear them of the atrocities they have committed, they are still human at the end of it all. Even Hitler, who’s time in power saw to the systematic murder of 11 million people, still had a human side, a side to him that some people would have seen as favourable and ‘nice’.
Bearing this in mind, there is a spectrum of ‘evil villain’, in which the likes of Hitler and Stalin would probably be at the very top end, whilst someone consistently stealing things from a store would be at the very bottom.
You need to decide what things your character does that are morally outrageous, and then the parts of their character that others would see as somewhat reputable.
If you haven’t read Lauren Beuke’s The Shining Girls, I would definitely recommend it as a point of research. In this book, I was surprised to – at some points – feel empathetic towards the murderer, who did unspeakable, disgusting things. However, he wasn’t intrinsically evil in every way.
Of course, one decent thing doesn’t absolve him of all the other negative things, but it puts the negative things into perspective and gives the reader a chance to understand and relate to the character more.
Give your character limits – they should never be willing to do every single ‘evil’ thing out there.
Consider Their Background
Most people aren’t born to be absolutely horrible in every way. Every person has parents who raised them from being a child, either loving and nurturing them and not expecting they’ll turn out to do the things they end up doing, or through not raising them in a safe, structured environment, inadvertently (in some cases) warp them to take a crueler, more unforgiving path.
You need to think about the kind of background your character has and whether it will be enough to make the reader understand what they do and why they do it. If they’re just evil for the sake of it and appear to have no background influence or force, then think about how they are in the present and using the tip above, present both sides of their character: the bad and the good.
Consider the Circumstances of Their ‘Evil’ Acts
What makes them do the things they do? If the answer is ‘they enjoy it’ and you don’t employ any of the other tips above and below, then you’ll have a hard time making the reader like this character.
There are many unforgivable acts, such as rape, murder, child abuse, animal abuse, etc. that people find hard to understand. In some cases, people do these unspeakable things because they are just generally awful people who do derive some sick entertainment out of it, but a redeemable character should at the very least have underlying reasons for it, even if it doesn’t erase any guilt associated with what they’ve done.
There Should Be A Visible Change
If you want to redeem a character, then essentially they have to leave the bad parts of themselves behind. There should be an overall change in perspective, motivation or circumstance.
Perspective/Motivation
This kind of change shows the once-evil villain deciding that they should join the ‘good’/other team or view life differently to how they used to view it.
It’s usually a gradual change which comes with some reluctance and the character generally won’t lose all parts of their character that can be associated with the way they used to be.
If you look at characters like Vegeta from the Dragon Ball Z series, he starts out as a main antagonist until he is forced to review his behaviour and actions. He soon finds a new life on the planet he originally sought to terrorize, softening up a little, but not losing his arrogance or short temper.
Then you get characters like Gaara from NARUTO who have a total turnaround in life, even going as far as to switch their motivations and beliefs. Gaara is at first a ruthless murderer who thinks he has to kill people in order to affirm his own existence. Then he comes to understand that things don’t have to be that way, and he goes from mindless, unstable killer, to badass leader of the Sand village. The people who once feared him now respect him, but he is still coldly strategic and brutal.
Understandably, not all people are able to trust him either, which is essential if you’re to make the transition believable. Nobody goes from devil to saint overnight, which is why you should also retain some of their more ‘darker’ traits and behaviours, even if you’re going to instead show them in a more positive light.
Circumstance
This is usually what makes a person feel sympathy for the ‘evil’ character, because they have fallen lower than ever before and have to cooperate with the people they once hated/condemned in order to survive.
The same happens to Loki, who we see disheveled and locked up after the first Avengers movie, and it is also a frequent thing in the Transformers universes; the likes of Starscream or Megatron are oft at the mercy of the Autobots, only to ‘redeem’ themselves to unite against a common foe, albeit temporarily.
Still, a lot of it derives from sympathy and the audience/reader feeling sorry for the once-villain. If you can make them fall hard, then it opens up a new side to the character that the reader might not have seen before.
They Should Show Remorse
It’s not good enough for a character to change then show absolutely no understanding for what they might have done wrong before that point. Even if a thousand apologies will never be enough for those who have fallen victim to their schemes or malice, the reader will feel something for a villainous character who is apologetic and now has to walk the long, hard road to redemption.
These are just very basic tips – please read around to get the best understanding of how to pull this off! I’ll put some resources below, but as always, keep an eye out for follower interactions via replies and reblogs.
Resources
I hope this helps…!
– enlee
Inspiration Haven 