What's The Worst Hero You've Seen In A Book?

I'm not talking about worst as in badly written. I'm talking about the hero you found the most sociopathic/morally dubious despite the author wanting you to root for him. Basically, the most villainous hero you've ever seen in a book.

Does a Heroic Sociopath count?

EDIT: Grammar fix.

edited 3rd Jun '11 9:44:16 PM by clockworkspider

Hm, I'm not entirely sure what's the worst I've seen, but I know that an example of this to some is Eragon from The Inheritance Cycle. The people that support this view argue that he needlessly kills and tortures and even delights at the thought of using new skills to do it more efficiently. I personally dislike him greatly for a multitude of other reasons as well.

edited 4th Jun '11 5:46:46 PM by snowfoxofdeath

I was thinking more along the lines of characters intended to be straight heroes, but I don't see why Heroic Sociopaths wouldn't count as long as the Sociopathic part is so egregious as to completely eclipse the Heroic part.

I started reading The Picture Of Dorian Gray yesterday (about halfway through it now), and good fucking god Lord Henry Wotton needs to be punched in the stomach so badly.

John Galt. He's the very incarnation of Well-Intentioned Extremist, yet you're supposed to root for him and his plan. He doesn't even work as a champion of individuality because the entirety of Atlas Shrugged has him coerce Dagny and Hank to agree with him (or at least the world bends over to his will). His Moral Event Horizon was brushing off disabled people because the strong shouldn't sacrifice to support the weak, never mind disabled people aren't that way by choice! He is my most reviled character in anything I had ever read or seen.

Humbert Humbert in Lolita, who's infamous for being a pedophile. The author himself opposes pedophilia so it's not like he's saying "root for this guy because what he's doing is okay", but still, it's not hard to catch yourself almost rooting for the despicable man's success. Books have that way of doing that to you.

Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho did the same thing—even though the motel dude killed an innocent woman, you're still deep down hoping he can hide the body without getting caught.

edited 2nd Jun '11 8:21:27 PM by annebeeche

Probably Auron from the Age Of Fire series. In addition to the fact that he uses brute force and muscle to get what he wants, even when it's completely not merited, he has an inherent belief in the superiority of his species—including beliefs that he should set them up as the rightful rulers of the world—that make him impossible to sympathize with, for me. Maybe he gets better in later books, but I was way too put off by him to continue (which is bad form in writing anyway).

Isabel Dalhousie, the star of the Sunday Philosophy Club series by Alexander McCall Smith (better known for The No 1 Ladies Detective Agency).

Not a destroyer of worlds, but she snoops in her niece's mail to find out about a boyfriend she doesn't like. She—unironically—buys out an ethics journal so she can keep herself as the editor. And she does everything with such an insufferable air of self-righteousness, apparently unaware that she might ever be wrong about anything.

I'm pretty sure you're supposed to feel that way about Henry, Wicked.

The protagonist of High Plains Drifter is pretty much one of the biggest jerk protagonists I've ever seen. Eh rapes wimmens and doesnt afraid of anything. The only thing that keeps you from hating him, I think, is that the people he's abusing are pretty bad themselves. Oh, and he looks cool doing it.

Oh nevermind, that's a movie. Forgot what subforum this is.

Well then, I'll submit Mister B Gone. It's told from the POV of a demon who, within the first half of the book, boils a girl's face off for rejecting his crush and bathes in a tub of baby blood. You don't see all of his shenanigans but presumably he'd done a lot of that sort of thing.

edited 2nd Jun '11 10:44:32 PM by melloncollie

^ I thought the whole point of High Plains Drifter was that Western hard-man protagonists are assholes and you're (that is, the audience is) stupid for worshipping them as heroes.

edited 3rd Jun '11 12:04:59 AM by FurikoMaru

In before Richard Rahl.

@Wicked 223: yes, Lord Henry Wotton is pretty much the villain of the story (insofar as Dorian himself isn't).

I'd feel remiss not to mention Thomas Covenant, but then, from what I've heard, the series is supposedly largely about his redemption after he rapes a teenage girl in the first book. Still left a bad taste in my mouth (I stopped reading it shortly afterwards). One day I'll go back to this series and see if he ends up getting better.

Kelsier from the Mistborn books is a tad bit of a sociopath

I'd say more emotionally damaged than sociopath- Kelsier is capable of empathy, he just also has a homicidal hatred for The Empire and anyone who serves it. Also, the author is well aware of this- on Sanderson's website, he remarks in one of his annotations that Kelsier scares him sometimes. He's also not really the hero of the series, but that's a whole nother can of worms.

I'm in a split between Cole Matthews from Touching Spirit Bear and the obvious Bella Swan, if we're talking about books I've read myself.

Cole Matthews is one of those obvious, contrived "Sure, I'm a gigantic, violent, abusive douche to everyone around me, but I come from a broken home! That justifies everything," sorts. Sorry, kid, but that shit don't fly when you actively resist just about any sort of help anyone offers you until the Magical Native American stereotypes save your soul. You gave a boy permanant brain damage. Because he witnessed you breaking and entering. What the fuck are you doing?

And as for Bella Swan, she's... well, Bella Swan. Not two chapters in and she's complaining about getting a free car, treating the aspect of (voluntarily) living with her reasonably nice father like a death sentence (as well as equating having to spend time with him in the past to psychological trauma. Fuck you, Bella), whining about not making friends just before whining about making friends, and generally dedicating herself to hating everything that's not a sparkly, bloodsucking popsicle. Could you be any more of a passive-aggressive asshole, Bella?

edited 3rd Jul '11 12:13:41 PM by Sparkysharps

I'll just quote what I put on Paint the Hero Black in regards to the protagonist of The Soprano Sorceress: "This mysterious sorceress murdered a rightful king and queen and proclaimed herself the regent for the young prince, but it's an open secret that she's the one really controlling the country. She uses Black Magic to Mind Control people and force them to serve her, feeling no guilt in cases when this becomes Mind Rape and even turns lethal. Those she can't control, she sets on fire — her personal body count reaches four digits by the end of the first book, and in the second she "makes an example" of an entire town, including noncombatants. She even kills her own soldiers for thinking disloyal thoughts."

(Yes, we're actually supposed to root for this character and believe that she's doing the right thing.)

^^ How in the world did I forget those two? And we might as well add Edward to the list while we're at it.

I'm going to give annebeech the prize.

@annebeeche: But when that scene happens you don't know it was him, yet. Or you weren't expected to, before everyone blabbed about the twist. Hell, Janet Leigh was billed as the star of the picture (a trick later homaged by the folks who made Scream)!

Okonkwo from Things Fall Apart. Misogynistic check, kills a boy check, egotistical douchbag double check. His only remotely redeeming quality was his soft spot for one of his daughters. Other times, hes just a controlling asshole. I know its a part of his culture, but the author feels sympathy for him and does not regard his behavior as bad in anyway, because its a part of his culture.

I like The Inheritance Cycle despite its flaws, but I still really dislike the character of Eragon. Self-explanatory, really.

I gotta echo Eragon. I didn't read Brisingr, but he left a very bad taste in my mouth in Eldest. There was that thing where he breaks down after accidentally killing some ants and flowers... and then he wantonly massacres legions of soldiers. I find something rather unsettling about that.

edited 4th Jun '11 4:52:53 PM by Pannic

Thomas Covenant maybe, except I think you're supposed to hate him.

Maybe something from S. M. Stirling.

Hows about Patrick Bateman- I can understand where he's coming from, but the thing with the rat and the tube... Ewwwww...