Spanner in the Works (A bad thing?)

I have a Villain Protagonist. He comes up with a plan to finally defeat his arch enemies. I realized that the only real reason his plan fails is because one of his mooks turns on him (one of the people he's trying to kill is the Mook's sister) I was all set to go along with this idea, but then I remembered Ohgi from Code Geass, and how a betrayal like that for personal reasons lead to him being called the scrappy.

I was wondering if having a Spanner in the Works like that is an inherantly bad thing, because I want the mook who defects to be one of the more sympathetic characters in my story.

edited 9th Sep '11 6:08:53 AM by gingerninja666

I personally don't see too much of a problem there. I think that as long as you make an effort to present the mook's reasoning for betrayal in the proper fashion, you won't have a problem. This is kinda more of an execution-based conundrum.

I think that in Ohgi's case, it has something to do with the fact that it's the protagonist of the series whose plans he's messing up, and, well, since Lelouch is the protagonist... Plus you have to consider that he's a poorly executed Spanner in the Works as well.

That's the problem: the character who's plan is being ruined is the protagonist's

Villain Protagonist, but still.

You have to consider that Code Geass's protagonist is Lelouch. Fabulous, fangirl-bait and hamtastic.

The problem with Ohgi was he betrayed that kind of character, for not just personal but flimsy reasons.

Basically, if you want to avoid a case like Ohgi, you have to make your Spanner's motivation believable, enough for people to understand or sympathize.

So what a guy above said, it lies in the execution.