Choose the "Bad" Guy: Feminist Analysis of Love Triangles in TV/Movies [Part II]

[Disclaimer: Howdy; it's come to my attention that I need to start this way to avoid people getting the wrong idea: I'm writing about LITERARY patterns, LITERARY characters, and the places where THEY live and act. Their worlds, their circumstances. This is not a direct "Hey, go out with your life and do x" post. Literary characters are not you, and you are not them. I'm writing about how agency is portrayed and how audience is "supposed" to feel in regards to female agency/freedom/expression. Enjoy the post!]

Dealing Out Truths

The last time we met, you read about the common misconceptions people have about the “Nice Guy should get the Girl” dynamic shown in many modern stories. This time, rather than looking at misconceptions, we’ll be looking at things that are true, if somewhat obscured, in these love triangle narratives.

Nice Guy Loves Conditionally

As Nice Guys are Nice™, they’re normally very concerned about their image. They have an image of themselves they want to present to the world. Anything messing with this image is unacceptable. This is why Nice Guy is typically very strict on Girl’s actions.

• Raoul takes control of the Phantom-situation despite Christine knowing way more about the Phantom, and because of his ignorance and desire to look like a hero, puts Christine and himself into a fat pot of danger.
• Aang thwarts Katara’s decisions pretty much every time she makes them. He doesn’t want her to take the water-bending scroll from the pirates. He doesn’t want her to avenge her mother’s death (and equates his temporary losing of his pet to the death of her mother). He doesn’t want her to blood-bend. He doesn’t want her to be emotional, pretty much ever because he wants her to fit his image of himself--the passive Buddhist-monk type.
• Stefan doesn’t want Elena or Caroline to make their own-vampire choices. He doesn’t want them to bite people, even though they can both control themselves (unlike him). He doesn’t want them to be violent (even when situations call for it). He wants them to desperately want to be human again, like he does.

Nice Guy is willing to cut Girl off if she does something he doesn’t approve of, or if she refuses to do something he wants her to.

Bad Guy Loves Unconditionally

One of the “alluring” things about Bad Guy is that all he requires to keep his interest in Girl is that she….exist. As herself. Bad Guy accepts inconvenient or unpleasant aspects of Girl/his relationship to her without wavering in his affection.

• Phantom is the most obsessive of the guys on our list because in addition to be a Bad Guy, he’s also the villain of the tale. However, he accepts Christine’s personality. He offers himself/his life to her-- “Music of the Night”/”Past the Point of No Return”--but ultimately lets her go when she rejects him. He doesn’t interfere with her life again, but does leave a rose with her ring on her gravestone, showing he loved her from afar for her entire life, even when she was married to and living with Raoul.
• Zuko accepts every part of Katara. He accepts the different potential versions of her, as well. He’s just as fine with Katara-the-murderer as he is with Katara-the-merciful. He takes a lightning bolt for her even though, canonically, they’re “just friends” and she ends up with Aang.
• Klaus loves Caroline no matter who she is currently romantically entangled with or what she has done. He loves her when she sells him out again and again, using his affection against him. He loves her when her friends try to kill him. He loves her when she gets magically knocked up with another man’s kids (unlike Stefan, who can’t handle it….)
• Damon loves Elena as a human, as a vampire, and during every step in-between. When she’s violent, he loves her. When she’s broken, he loves her. When she hates him, he loves her.

Nice Guy is Closed

As we’ve hit on already (and I just want to hammer home), Nice Guy tends to keep secrets about himself, especially inconvenient or deep-dark secrets. He keeps the secrets to preserve his image or to make things easier for himself. He doesn’t reveal the truth to Girl unless he has to. Why does Nice Guy do this? Because, ultimately, Nice Guy does not trust Girl. He does not trust Girl to still like him if the truth is known. He doesn’t truth Girl to make the “right” decision. So he takes that choice away from her by keeping her in the dark and feeding her bullshit.

Because Nice Guy is so keen on keeping his own skeletons in his closet, he represses Girl’s skeleton’s, also (see above with the conditional love). If Girl is not the Perfect Princess™ Nice Guy wants her to be, then he’s done with her. This is unrealistic. This is inhumane. At worst, it’s mastubatory. Nice Guy cripples Girl to never be able to fully express herself. Instead, she always has to be on her toes, worrying about Nice Guy’s approval.

Bad Guy is Open

On the other hand, Bad Guy is almost never hiding anything (other than his soft-and-gooey center). His worst deeds are all common knowledge, and, when given the chance, Bad Guy will usually share even more of his dark past with Girl. And, paired with the aforementioned I’m-Not-So-Bad Confession™, Bad guy does everything he can to level the playing field with Girl. Yeah, he kidnaps her, but he doesn’t hurt her, and he gives her the information she needs to emotionally cripple him forever. This info-bomb serves as an apology of sorts for the kidnapping, but more importantly, it is Girl’s fail-safe. Bad Guy is saying, “Hey, if I ever step out of line, you can destroy me with the information I’ve just given you.” Why does he do this? Because he trusts her. Bad Guy knows that for her to trust him, he has to show his vulnerability first, so he does. He trusts what she’ll do with this information.

Pictured: Bad Guy appeasing Girl

Bad Guy’s vulnerability and sharing of his mistakes allows for something else--reciprocity. Girl can be human with Bad Guy. She can make mistakes. She can flawed--angry, lonely, sad, vengeful. Bad Guy will not judge her for these impulses or try to control them. Bad Guy knows what it’s like. Having accepted the flaws within himself, Bad Guy is also in a unique position to help Girl navigate this process.

Klaus: “Let’s get you a drink”

Nice Guy Encourages Stagnation

Because Nice Guy is so invested in how Girl makes him look, Nice Guy is very afraid of change. Nice Guy isn’t usually up for debating with girl when they disagree; he just wants girl to do what he says. He takes an “all or nothing” approach to it. If Girl doesn’t do what he wants, he cuts her off and/or guilts her until she comes around. It’s very rare for Nice Guy to change for Girl, because Nice Guy is already perfect, right?

Mmmm. Yummy.

This is especially harmful because of the way Girl is usually played. Girl is usually sweet, kind, innocent, forgiving, compassionate, blah blah blah. (Just insert “Fairy Princess). The things is, sweetness and kindness usually rely on at least some level of naivety, and Literary Worlds are never kind to the naive. However, Nice Guy wants to keep Girl in this state forever. He always wants her to be a sweet, innocent little girl who looks up to him for guidance and never argues. This is sexist in many ways, and when Nice Guy is portrayed as the “natural choice” for Girl to make, it reinforces that women should be subject to their romantic partners and always maintain a naive innocence, staying a “girl” forever.

Bad Guy Encourages Change-Growth

One of the key aspects at the beginning of the Girl-Bad Guy relationship is challenge. Bad Guy challenges Girl by pushing her boundaries, trying her assumptions and ideals, and allowing/encouraging her to explore her darker (less innocent) impulses. [Is it any wonder the body language of Girl and Bad Guy tends to be so sexual?] Exploration, education, and experience lead to change; they just do. Bad Guy knows womanhood is not about sweetness, innocence, and light. Womanhood is about blood, pain, and passion. Bad Guy being open to Girl trying new things allows her to change, to be human and fallible like everyone is anyway.

Ah, refreshing!

Unlike with Nice Guy, the challenge of the Girl-Bad Guy relationship is not one-sided. While Bad Guy is challenging Girl, Girl always gives as good as she gets. It’s typically set up something like this--Bad Guy is in seat of power, showing off, when Girl bravely speaks up about some idiot thing he’s said, hypocritical thing he’s done, whatever. Bad Guy tries to deflect or deny, but he ultimately realizes she’s right. Bad Guy already sees the flaws within himself, so when Girl points them out, he typically does something about it.

Normally, this behavior continues, with Girl telling Bad Guy truths no one else dares utter until he listens and shapes up.

This dynamic is also used to show how willing Bad Guy is to play whatever game Girl wants to play. It’s Bad Guy’s seduction in reverse; Girl crosses his boundaries. Ultimately, he wants her in the driver’s seat. It’s intimacy-building. It’s trust. And it’s beautiful.

See the difference choice makes?

Conclusion

In the typical love-triangle dynamics of modern movies/shows/literature, it’s far too often that the “Nice Guy” is seen as really the only choice for Girl to make. Nice Guy puts Girl onto a pedestal of his own making and refuses to accept any attempts Girl makes to escape this fate. If she tries too hard, he cuts her off. Another aspect of the “cut off” is because Nice Guy typically “protects” Girl from negative experiences, she doesn’t grow while with him, so when he cuts her off, she’s more or less helpless.

Bad Guy, conversely, loves Girl for who she actually is, and his love follows her through the turmoil of the plot and the changes she goes through, helping and defending her on her path.

About Girl

Now, we’ve been talking in terms of what the guys do, so let’s spin our focus to Girl. Girl is most free, most supported, most protected, most cherished, and most herself if she goes with Bad Guy. Because Bad Guy lets Girl have her experiences, if she leaves him, she’s more savvy, more skilled, and more able to look out for herself.

Now, Girl is often the protagonist of whatever story she’s in, and one of the traits of a protagonist is that they are changed by the plot. They learn and grow. Plot is all about the journey of the protagonist. When Girl is involved with Nice Guy, the plot moves sluggishly, and it typically becomes more about Nice Guy’s travails in staying “good” (ie: static) than Girl’s growth. When Girl is involved with Bad Guy, the plot speeds up, and because Bad Guy is all about Girl, the plot follows suit. The focus is kept on her growth, and it’s easier for her to be a dynamic character. She’s allowed to be more of a full person, experiencing a larger variety of emotions, exploring her sexuality, and weighing her options for herself.

In older and much-beloved stories, such as Pride and Prejudice, North and South, Jane Eyre, (and the even older myth of Hades and Persephone and poem “Wulf and Eadwacer”...),  the story revolves around the choice of the female protagonist, and she chooses the Bad Guy of the tale. These stories were considered ‘daring’ at the time. They were written by feminist women about living life as a woman with agency, personality, and passion. I don’t know exactly when our narratives started to veer away from this, but I’m hoping for a swing back. It’s past due.