What should a character's goals be? To support the hero or heroine? Go on their own adventures?
Rawle is on point:
In summary, modern mainstream creatives prefer villains to heroes because villains have fewer constraints on their behavior, allowing them to take whatever actions they want, irrespective of whether such actions are moral. By contrast, heroes are constrained by their virtues and have to take action while maintaining virtue, for if they break those virtues, they can easily slide into self-indulgence, and ultimately, villainy. While there’s substantially more in the video, this is the most important point he makes.
But what do superheroes and supervillains have to do with romance? Everything.
Just as modern creatives shun the hero and embrace the villain because the villain is more free, they shun the devoted wife or girlfriend for similar reasons. If the female must emotionally satisfy her boyfriend, this limits her behavior; she is not free to do whatever she pleases, since like the hero and his virtue, she has her own virtue to uphold, which she values more than total freedom. Not for nothing is the female protagonist of a romance called the “heroine.”
With modern storytelling, to use Anita Blake once more, a character is looked down upon if they have ethics and morals so they get ran through the grinder and go from Urban Fantasy to Erotica, totally derailing characters and settings in the process.
The "In Love with the Freedom of the Villain" POV has diluted books. Imho. We have to fight cynicism.
Far too many people still look at the dirt and that's all they see.
If there's to be more intimate scenes I prefer a more sensual build up rather than IKEA "ON the Page" Porn. Older romances had that. You didn't have to go into tons of detail. Plus they had more characters that were monogamous then.
Do we need Superman type Aspirational Heroes? Yes, we most certainly do. It's easy to deconstruct and pull people through the mud. Take another path. Make Aspirational Great Again 2020.
I'm no Stephen King or JK Rowling but I want to leave a legacy of Aspirational Superhero Space Opera behind and that's what I'm gonna do. All I have to do is be me. I don't have to be anything else.
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