Today I give you a teenager who was evil since birth, the worst enemy of his own family and school, Kevin Khatchadourian.
What Is The Work?[]
Kevin appears in Lionel Shriver's novel and cinematic adaptation "We Need to Talk About Kevin", serving as the titular main antagonist. The version i'll talk about here is the cinematic version.
Who Is The Villain?[]
Kevin is the eldest son of Eva Khatchadourian and Franklin Plaskett. He hated his mother ever since he was born, and felt nothing but contempt toward his father for most of his life.
What Does He Do?[]
He was a highly difficult child from day one, constantly antagonizing Eva in every way he could, from breaking her stuff to resist any attempt to educate him or winning his affection. However, the first really evil thing he did was provoking Eva to break his arm because he enjoyed the angry, sad and guilt-ridden look on her face. He kept using this incident to guilt-trip his mother into doing things for him and turning the other way when he act like a savage. In addition to his manipulations and abuse, he pretended to be sweet and confused around other people in order to paint his mother as a lunatic.
When he became a teenager, he began showing interest in archery, and asked his father to teach him. Unknown to his father, Kevin used the archery lessons both for his own joy and for faking bond with his father. His manipulations worked so well that his father never did truly know him. Eva saw right through it, but even she didn't understand Kevin's ultimate plan - he wanted to set his parents apart, even if it will lead to divorce, just for torturing Eva.
The birth of his younger sister Celia didn't get things better. He hated her because she was born. One of the highlight moments of hatred was when he killed Celia's pet shrew and poured a caustic drain cleaner into her eye, burning Celia's eye and scarring her face for good. Even then, Franklin kept insisting that his son is just misguided.
Franklin's complete lack of understanding of the situation costed him dearly when Kevin killed him and Celia with the very bow and arrow which he himself taught Kevin how to use. After killing his own father and sister, Kevin carried on to massacre his classmates.
He wanted his mother to visit him in prison, but not out of love. He just wanted her to experience her worst nightmare again and again, and also translate her motherly guilt for having a child in prison into feeling guilty for hating him.
Resources[]
As a teenager, he have less resources than the average adult. All he had was bow and arrows, but it was all he needed to kill his own father, sister and at least 10 of his classmates.
Redeeming Qualities[]
Maybe he had some in the novel, but he had none in the movie. Everything he did was out of pure sadism at best, and out of petty vendettas toward his own family at worst. He isn't tragic, because what he did is beyond any tragedy. Not remorseful either. When he said he doesn't remember why he killed all those people, it wasn't out of remorse. It was because of a motive decay. To put it simply, most of his victims were butchered without any cause, or at least it wasn't important to him enough to remember. No comedic quality applies (not incompetent, mischievous, comic relief), because there's nothing funny about a man who kill at least 12 people, two of them are family, and keep his mother alive only because he's amused from her suffering. He knew exactly what he was doing (neither amoral nor brainwashed or villain by proxy), never had a positive goal (not protective, anti-villain, vigilante, extremist), stayed evil even in jail (not on &off), his actions are too heinous to be considered a scapegoat, and as mentioned before, he only played nice when it suited for his manipulations.
Freudian Exuse[]
A weak one. He claim his mother loved his sister better and never made a serious effort to raise him, as well as being upset that his father doesn't know him at all. Except it doesn't justify his actions, let alone he's the sole responsible for his parents' shortcomings. Eva struggled to love him despite everything, and opened her mouth only when she could no longer look the other way. Franklin never knew the real Kevin because Kevin did everything in his power to prevent it for happening.
Heinous Standard[]
The only villain in the setting. He lead the standard. Here's a short summary of what he did:
1. He killed his sister, which he hate because she was born, in a rather grewsome way. Long before killing her, he kept abusing her, with blinding her in one eye is only one example.
2. The reason he killed his father, who had complete faith in him, is because he had complete faith in him. He manipulated his old man for most of his life, and then came to contempt and hate him for believing him.
3. Killing at least 10 of his classmates. His reasons to do so are a matter of speculations. His motive decay makes it even worse.
4. The worst thing he did to his mother, even worse than killing her husband and daughter (again, his own father and sister), was to make her feeling guilty for hating him. People have the basic right to hate people who hurt them. But Kevin want Eva to feel guilty for hating the man who killed her family, which was also his own.
Verdict[]
I would say he's pure evil. He's vile even for a mass murderer.