One Hundred Fantasy Clichés That Really Need To Rest In Peace

#99: The Dark Half

This following cliché is named after a Stephen King book of the same name, which focuses on the trope which is a dark persona that shares the same body as the main character. Mostly referred to as their dark side, this trope has been extremely prevalent in the fantasy genre. The goal of this trope is simple; give the main character or an important side character a usually secret evil personality that creates potential tension in the plot. Through their chaos, the cast faces constant immanent danger by their own friends, creating internal conflict for the character trapped in this situation and a moral dilemma for their friends to face with potentially having to kill the victim in order to restore peace. Near the climax of the plot, the evil personality always takes over the character's body, making the already rough situation presented in the story even worse. The world or just the group of friends are threatened by this evil force, unable to seemingly do a thing in order to protect their friend trapped inside. However, through the power of friendship or a convenient plot device, the evil personality is destroyed forever, ending the ongoing conflict. Despite the moral dilemma faced by the main cast with the PTSD the evil personality surely left behind, the story in these cases always ends on a high note. Almost every single story with this trope does the same exact plot structure to an annoying degree. As much as the idea of this trope is tempting for causing as much chaos as you want with an evil version of one of your characters, it is extremely cliché.

Whether your character is The Malevolent One, Mephiles the Dark, kitsunes, or most famously Hyde, excluding for the famous example, these characters will almost always fall flat. Because they are just an embodiment of evil, there is no motivation towards their actions that would make them interesting to an audience. Anytime this trope is even explored, the audience is going to find themselves bored, find the plot line formulaic, and find the entire storyline to be completely predictable. In the end, the heroes will always win and there is going to be no variant to the storyline. Having an evil version of a character may be fun for the author, but the same cannot be said for audience. Whenever this storyline is attempted anywhere, it usually ends up being the author's worst reviewed book or leaves a bad taste in the mouths of their fans. No one wins from this formulaic plot line.

The only solution to beating the dark half cliché is to completely subvert the trope. You need to create a storyline in which their is not an easy solution to the problem, if there is any at all. The evil persona needs to have a motivation besides being evil for causing mass amounts of chaos and attacking the main cast. If the evil personality does take over, the act needs to have some sense of permanence so the audience will have no idea what to expect next. In the situation the evil side is beaten, make sure that by then both the audience and the cast have pretty much accepted the character trapped inside has no definitive way of coming back. In the situation in which the evil personality has erased the regular cast member completely from their own body, treat the personality as a newly introduced main character by developing their character beyond just being a source of chaos. As they start to experience the world exclusively for themselves, develop the dark personality into more of a villain through their surroundings or even redeem them in a way by seeing the errors of their ways from the beauty of the world they have just been introduced to. Through character development, the audience will start to like the evil persona, making what happens to both the author and the public to be completely unpredictable. Maybe this character will end up becoming a highlight of the story, maybe they will produce the most tense plot line ever produced by the author, or maybe they will end up in the audience's hearts forever by sacrificing themselves so the true personality can live. By subverting the trope, the once cliché plot can become legendary.

One of my favorite examples of this trope being subverted is through the witch transformations in Puella Magi Madoka Magica. In that example, magical girls after reaching an equal amount of despair to their hope fulfilling wish transform into witches based on the person they were at the time. Instead of just becoming a being with warts all over their body or sporting a darker uniform, the magical girl transforms into a unique creature fused with the things that were important to the magical girl. Additionally, they attack through the hopelessness they have experienced, believing the world to be beyond saving. One of the most memorable examples was when Sayaka Miki transformed into the witch Oktavia after having her heart broken and believing herself to be weak. As Oktavia, she takes on the form of a mermaid-like creature, representing her collected personality as well as being symbolism for Sayaka's plot line in the anime mirroring The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Anderson. The orchestra always surrounding her represents her love for classical music as well as the boy she loved who got her into the music genre, Kyosuke Kamijo. The witch's high pitched screams are an amplified version of Sayaka's voice, full of the despair she was going through before the transition. Finally, the wheel she usually attacks with represents The Wheel of Fortune (not the game) in which a person's fate is decided by where it lands. Her attacks as the witch initially are fueled by wanting to spread her heartache to others. The form is permanent and the only way out is death. This is a prime example of how to subvert this trope perfectly.