Who do you consider an Anti-Hero in fiction?

[Seonaid]

Back on topic, it's interesting to ask whether House on House M.D. is an antihero or not.

Based on the wikipedia definition, I'd say he is!

 

[Jeff Wilder]

Vic Mackey from The Shield. Jack Bauer from 24.

I disagree about the crew of Serenity. Mal and the others complain bitterly and drag their heels and aim to misbehave, but they always, always, always do the right thing. Voluntarily. Eventually. They're outlaw heroes, not anti-heroes.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Vic Mackey from The Shield. Jack Bauer from 24.

I disagree about the crew of Serenity. Mal and the others complain bitterly and drag their heels and aim to misbehave, but they always, always, always do the right thing. Voluntarily. Eventually. They're outlaw heroes, not anti-heroes.

I wholeheartedly agree.

Vic Mackey is probably the greatest antihero in television today. He does things because he wants to. Sometimes it's to protect others, other times, it's to fund his eventual retirement. He's committed murder, intimidated witnesses, planted drugs, destroyed evidence and more. He's a violent thug and arguably a sociopath.

Despite that, we find ourselves rooting for me, just as we do with Tony Soprano.

Both great, great characters.

 

[Thurbane]

Blast ye, ye scallywag! No more grog for you, it's addled yer wits. Angus Thermopyle was nuthin' but a black-hearted murderin', rapin' bastard of a villain if'n ever there was one. Arrgh!

I can see where you might be thinkin' ole Black Angus might not be a villain thru-n-thru, but ye'd be settin' the bar pretty low for t'other anti-heroes.

Azgulor

It all depends on your defninition of anti-hero, though.

Nick Succorso (sp?) would also qualify.

Both ruthless self-serving men who only perform good deeds when it suits them, or when forced to.

I agree that Angus is stretching the limit of being any sort of hero, anti or otherwise, but he does perform deeds which can be considered heroic, although not of his own volition.

If a villain is the main protagonist and focal point of a story, does that make him an anti-hero...?

 

[Michael Dean]

I finished rereading Dress Her In Indigo (for about the sixth time) just last night. If you tell me you like Donald E. Westlake's Dortmunder series, we officially have the same taste in literature.

No, but based on the fact that you like John D. McDonald and the fact that Westlake wrote the book for "Payback", one of my favorite Mel Gibson movies, I am going to check it out.

Also back on topic, Mel Gibson's Porter from "Payback" fits the anti-hero mold I think. The movie's tagline was "get ready to root for the bad guy."

 

[xmanii]

The Punisher.

 

[jinx crossbow]

my favored Anti-Hero is
James Cole (Bruce Willis) in Twelfe Monkeys
He does anything right, but in the end he dies.

Jinx Crossbow

 

[Cor Azer]

Back on topic, it's interesting to ask whether House on House M.D. is an antihero or not. He's certainly flawed and disagreeable.

I'd say so - he does the heroic (save lives) in an unheroic (and often inethical) fashion, for unheroic reasons (curiosity/can he do it? rather than altruism).

 

[mhensley]

Thraxas from the Thraxas novels by Martin Scott is a pretty good anti-hero. He's fat, overeats, smokes weed, drinks far too much, and has a gambling problem. He also quite often breaks the law to solve whatever case he is working on.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thraxas

 

[Aaron L]

I think I can sum up why I'd view Batman as an anti-hero. He is Batman and pretends to be Bruce Wayne. Bruce Wayne isn't who he is. He doesn't have normal human concerns. He doesn't want a normal life. He wants to catch the criminal.

For me he is like the prestige class in Heroes of Horror, the Corrupt Avenger (pg 88.)

How does that, in any way, make him an anti-hero? He's less herioc because his only concern is catching bad guys and making sure no other little boy has to lose thier parents?


Your logic escapes me, here.



But I'll completely agree, in his very first appearances he was a complete gun carrying vigilante. But that went the way of the dinosaur a long time ago, and for the last 60 years a central aspect of his character has been that he will not kill, and especially will not use a gun.