From Superhero to Anti-Hero

I just realized it's been a year since I became a full-fledged Troper. Guess I'd better celebrate...

So I've got this story in mind — one that's very heavy on the comedy, mind. The gist of it: Ollie Vance, mild- mannered teen living in a 90s-era pastiche of a city, finds himself harnessing the power of the ocelot after a freak zoo accident. Naturally, he becomes a superhero, and hilarity (and occasionally, heroism) ensues.

And so it goes...until Ollie — now "Ocelot V" — comes face to face with a brooding, grim, gun-toting bruiser of a hero who routinely beats him into a fine powder. This new rival, "Lygerr" is looking to impose an iron-clad reign over the city, as well as completely smash the will (and bones) of OV.

And as it turns out, they're the same person. OV is forced to fight his twenty-years-later self, while the time-travelling Lygerr is looking to correct the mistakes of the past with little more than brute force (and a mean scowl).

Question is, what do you suppose could make an energetic, proud, harebrained hero like OV turn into the '90s Anti-Hero Lygerr? I had a few ideas at first, but with this being a heavily comedic story I'm starting to think that it's time to reconsider. (Or should I reconsider at all...?) Likewise, I wonder if there are ways to use comic tropes to my advantage here, since, you know, freakin' superheroes.

Well then, any suggestions? I can provide more info as needed, so don't be afraid to ask. For now, I'll leave it in your hands, my troper comrades; transform my hot-blooded wildcat into a grimdark vigilante!

And just so there's no confusion, let me say this: thanks to all you Tropers for welcoming me onto this site. The chance to help other writers, and be helped in return...that's what it's all about!

For a tried and true method, have someone he was protecting be killed, thereby fueling his transformation into a man who believes that he must be far harsher to crush crime and protect everyone. A Well-Intentioned Extremist, if you will.

Is it Ocelot 'Vee' or Ocelot 5?

And you could always just have him be a cranky middle aged man. Maybe the kids were just on his lawn in the future, and he wants to stop society from ever going that direction.

Depending on how silly you might want to make it in the end, you could also say that one too many supervillains cut ahead in line for the last icecream cone. There are rules!

Well, the city's prison isn't exactly made for supervillains...

Oh right, I always forget to explain that. It's V as in the letter V, although in-universe a lot of people people call him Ocelot 5. Similarly, lots of people don't even know what an ocelot is.

That was exactly what I was thinking of from the get-go. In Lygerr's timeline, one of OV's friends — and a fan girl, no less — dies in an accident that Ocelot V should have been able to prevent, but screwed up because he decided to stop at the big pancake festival instead. That helped trigger OV's Start of Darkness and thus Lygerr was born. Or something akin to that.

I'm also thinking about having OV's pride be both a strength and a weakness — something that feeds into his transformation into an anti-hero. Any thoughts?

At any rate, I've got a feeling this thread's gonna garner lots of laughs...let's keep it going, shall we?

edited 16th Jul '11 10:13:02 PM by Voltech44

Fan girl dying seems just a little dark for a comedy thing...

It's your story, so if you disagree, by all means, take it your own direction. But if you wanted pride to feed into it, the fan girl could switch her attentions to a different hero, and Ocelot gets driven insane by this.

That's actually a pretty good idea. Glad I thought of it!

Kidding, of course. But at any rate, my fan girl death from earlier was a remnant of an earlier version of the story. Whether or not it'll have a place in the final product is up for debate...but seriously, that's a really good idea. There ARE other (better) superheroes in the story, so it'd make sense for the fan girl to potentially lock on to others.

Glad you liked it.

... Liger?

All I've got to say is that you should make sure the hero has, in lesser form, some of the traits that define the antihero. Pride's a good start, but that alone isn't enough. (I'm thinking of a book where an arrogant, selfish protagonist turned out to be the same as a villain who proclaimed A God Am I.)

edited 16th Jul '11 11:12:14 PM by feotakahari

"They're pretty much my favorite animal." But yeah, it is supposed to be liger; I just thought I'd try my hand at invoking the Dark Age of Supernames.

Yeah, I was thinking that too; I'm just wondering how I can pull it off. I guess at a base level, OV thinks that whatever he does is right, which he could one day take Up To Eleven and see himself as justice personified, and anything that isn't up to his standards has to be eliminated. Just spitballing here.

Although now that I think about it, maybe the change from OV to Lygerr could be a parallel to the city's transformation from a 90s pastiche to a Bad Future. Played for laughs, maybe; OV might time travel to Lygerr's world, and be repulsed not by a gritty metropolis or rampant crime, but by the fact that his favorite shows have gone off-air and his favorite hangouts have gone out of business. Again, just spitballing.

edited 17th Jul '11 12:08:06 PM by Voltech44