How to Write an Unlikable Character That Readers Still Root For by Nick Bailey

Today we welcome a new guest writer to Writer’s Fun Zone, Nick Bailey who is stopping by to chat with us about “How to Write an Unlikable Character That Readers Still Root For.” Enjoy!

***

If you’ve spent any amount of time in online fan communities over the past few years, you may have heard the term “problematic fave,” which refers to a character we know we ought to condemn, and root for anyway.

They’re easy to love and difficult to write. 

Make your character too hard to stomach, and readers will never make it past chapter three.

Lean too hard in the other direction, and you risk sanding off their irksome edges, which sort of defeats the point.

Fortunately, likability isn’t a fixed trait your character either has or hasn’t, like intelligence or bravery. It’s manufactured based on what you show the reader.

In this post, I’ll run through a few ways to manufacture it, so you can pen an off-putting (but compelling) protagonist of your own.

Give them one redeeming act early

One of the simplest ways to make an unlikable character endearing is to give them a brief moment of altruism in your story’s opening chapters.

If it’s made clear that your reprobate can be kind, readers will hold out hope for a redemption arc throughout the rest of the story.

In the pilot episode of The Sopranos, we meet Tony, the cold-hearted head of a New Jersey crime family.

Extortion, adultery, murder — nothing is off the table for Don Antonio.

But no matter how depraved Tony acts, viewers cling to the possibility that he can change, thanks in large part to a singular redeeming scene in the opening.

In between all the backstabbing and bloodshed, Tony finds time to feed a family of ducks that have taken up residence in his backyard.

Watching the little ones fly for the first time is enough to knock him out cold at a family barbecue.

In a later scene, Tony is brought to tears when recalling the incident to his psychiatrist.

None of this makes Tony a good person.

And indeed, you’d be hard-pressed to find a Sopranos fan who would describe Tony as likable.

But that brief moment of vulnerability is enough to convince viewers that there’s a man beneath the mobster worth rooting for, and his therapy sessions in subsequent episodes help keep that hope alive.

Explain their actions (without excusing them)

Where an early redeeming act lets readers know that a character is capable of compassion, this next technique goes one step further, planting a relatable motivation at the heart of everything they do.

You’d be surprised how much readers are willing to let slide, provided they understand why a character is behaving badly.

Perhaps the most iconic example of this in action is Walter White, the chemistry teacher turned methamphetamine manufacturer from Breaking Bad.

The impetus for his late-stage career change is undeniably sympathetic: following a terminal cancer diagnosis, Walt wants to make sure his family is financially secure long after his passing.

Much like Tony Soprano before him, Walt isn’t damned by his criminality alone.

It’s the way he manipulates and belittles his supposedly precious family that really makes him hard to stomach.

Still, the altruistic motive allegedly lurking behind his every move keeps viewers in his corner regardless.

While the spoiler-free Breaking Bad viewer meets Mr. White with no idea what he’ll become, readers of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes have no such luxury.

They are already well acquainted with Coriolanus Snow, President of Panem and butcher of children.

But the Snow they meet in The Hunger Games prequel is a far cry from the monster of the original trilogy.

Here, he’s hungry, destitute, and desperate — by the time Coriolanus does anything inhumane, readers have already spent a hundred pages willing him out of poverty.

Even though they know Snow will grow into a detestable tyrant, they can’t help but hope he succeeds.

Play up their talents, play down their crimes

The first two techniques I’ve covered both ask something of your character. One requires a flicker of compassion, the other a reason we can empathize with.

But a character doesn’t necessarily need to be good for a reader to root for them.

They just need a writer who knows what to dwell on.

Take Tom Ripley, the covetous con artist at the center of Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley.

Tom is unquestionably immoral: he swindles struggling artists out of their savings, and kills his friends the moment they become inconvenient.

But unlike our previous examples, Tom has no noble justification for his transgressions, nor does he stop to feed the ducks every now and then to keep readers on his side.

Instead, Highsmith pays great attention to Tom’s many talents: he’s a gifted mimic, a fluent forger, and a superb improviser under pressure.

His crimes, meanwhile, are understated — the focus remains squarely on how Tom’s actions affect him.

When he murders someone, all we are told is that the victim’s cry is loud, and that it frightens Tom.

The subsequent body disposal reads more like a chore than a crime-scene cleanup.

The result is a reader who finds themselves admiring a murderer, and hoping he gets away with it.

The Conclusion

These three techniques all rest on the same idea: your readers can only judge a character by what you choose to put in front of them.

So don’t be afraid to let your protagonist be truly awful — just make sure you’ve given readers a reason to stay.

***

About the Author

Nick Bailey writes about anything and everything in the realm of writing and self-publishing for Reedsy, an online marketplace that connects authors with editors, designers, and marketers to help them publish a book.

Aside from reading, Nick enjoys hiking, electronic music, and filling up his personal cookbook with new recipes.