So your villain has just made a heel-face turn and is now one of the good guys. Yay!



…not so fast!

The moment where an antagonist turns on their own side and joins that of the protagonists is extremely powerful. But unless it is part of the overall story's climax and finale sequence, there has to come an ‘after’.

What happens after the villain becomes good?

Are they immediately the picture of morality and humble yet impeccable behaviors, standing for what's good, right and the *insert patriotic adjective here* way?

That doesn't sound very realistic.

We are all defined in our day-to-day behaviors and interactions by what we have learned. We all have learning histories where we developed our usual patterns of behavior in response to or in anticipation to certain stimuli.



For example, if a kid realises that throwing a temper tantrum will get them what they want after being told no, chances are that they will keep throwing temper tantrums every time they aren't immediately given what they want.



…right up to adulthood.



If a person learns from their experience that calling the manager or making fuss in a business will get them what they want, perks, or discounts, then guess what they will keep on doing?



happens across the board

These behaviors can be conscious but they can also be so well ingrained in someone's patterns that they do it even without thinking. Lashing out, laughing at something hard to handle, responding with ‘get over it’ when they don't want to be accountable for something, avoiding conflict at all costs, being unable to say no, all of these things are so well practiced by a person throughout their childhood and puberty that it's almost impossible for them to notice without help from others.

And yes, that's how abused people tend to gravitate to abusers, because that's the behavior they have learned is normal interaction, normal ‘love’, and so on.

In the same vein, a villain's learning history has taught them certain behaviors. These will be fraught with elements such as aggression, a tendency to impose or force their opinion, dominance (in a toxic way), inability to manifest compassion without feeling vulnerable (or weak, or foolish, etc), inability to be polite or considerate, a toughness that overlaps with abusive behaviors, and so on.

It's going to be a learning curve for them to modify these behaviors to be compatible with the new side they are now on. Sometimes it will be easy (depending on what type of villain they were) and sometimes it will be very hard. Sometimes it will be easy on the surface but fracture the moment they are angry (for example, easily going on a rampage and overkill when -now righteously- angry) and overtly offer to do the ‘dirty work’ their new allies are ‘too good/ don’t have the guts' do.

These people may also be really ill equipped to interact with people in any way except a competitive/antagonistic dynamic, and when shown they don't have to compete for dominance, they may not know what to do, simply because that is a behavior they haven't learned an appropriate/working response to.

A heel-face turn is the triumphant conclusion of a villain realizing they should quit being a villain- a character arc in and of itself. But it is also the beginning of the next (the new) character arc ahead: making amends, and learning to be someone else, someone better, someone that belongs to the good side, however imperfect.

How have your villains fared after doing their heel-face turn?

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