Jaws: The Line Between Monsters And Villains

There is an unspoken rule for almost every epic story that if there is a hero, there must be either a monster or a villain. Nonetheless, there is also an unspoken line that exists in the literary world between monsters and villains. Over time, the line seemed to fade or get thicker in different periods. Some people often stereotype the monsters to be the villains or the villains to be the monsters, while others claim that they are nothing the same. This leads to the ultimate question: what is the difference between a monster and a villain?

A villain is mostly a human-like figure that often has its own goals and motivations which are either morally wrong or the opposite of the aims of the hero. A villain also has the personality that is related to the dark sides of humanity. Additionally, a villain makes conscious decisions to his benefit and others’ detriment. As a typical example, Lord Voldemort, the main villain character and archenemy of Harry Potter, is so obsessed with blood purity that he aims at conquering both the Muggle (non-magical) world and the wizarding world to achieve pure-blood dominance, which is a racist action. Moreover, his soul is linked with Harry Potter’s soul, who is the hero in the novel. This implies that Lord Voldemort represents the dark side of the hero.

On the other hand, a monster is often a beast-like figure with a terrifying appearance. A monster usually can’t make actions based on rational choices. It just obeys its nature or driven by its desire to do what it has to do. Also, readers cannot relate themselves to the monster because it interacts with the characters like a tornado that recklessly destroys everything in its path. However, monster isn’t a fixed definition, it has a sliding scale. On one side, the classic example is Jaws which is a pure monster in the ocean. Just like any other predator, it eats sea creatures and people only because this is its nature. On the other side, the classic example is Dr. Frankenstein’s monster with a terrifying appearance, which has the ability to think and make few rational choices. Although it has human characteristics, it eventually destroys everything in its path driven by its anger towards humans.

All in all, the difference between a monster and a villain in the literary world is that a monster is mostly a beast-like figure and it is driven by its nature or its desire, while a villain is mostly a human-like figure that can make rational choices and complicated plans to achieve evil goals.

Jaws, written by Peter Benchley, tells the story of a particular great white shark suddenly preys upon a seaside resort town and being hunted and killed by three men. Jaws is one of the most classic monster figures. It has all the basic elements that usually make a monster. First of all, it has the element of the beast-like appearance.

No more than ten feet off the stern, slightly to the starboard, was the flat, conical snout of the fish. It stuck out of the water perhaps two feet. The top of the head was a sooty gray, pocked with two black eyes. At each side of the end of the snout, where the gray turned to cream white, were the nostrils-deep slashes in the armored hide. The mouth was open not quite halfway, a dim, dark cavern guarded by huge, triangular teeth. (Peter Benchley, Chapter 12)

Jaws is a nature-based monster which is based on “‘great white’(Carcharodon carcharias), a species known throughout the world for its voraciousness and aggressiveness”( Peter Benchley, Chapter 4).

Secondly, it has the elements of obedience to its nature and unable to make rational decisions. In the novel, the sharks were mentioned to be not very bright and “they exist on instinct and impulse” (Peter Benchley, Chapter 5). In an incident, Jaws attacked a thirty-foot long boat because to him it wasn’t a boat. It was just a large creature that might be food. Its hunter nature dominated its actions which made him look more like an actor than a thinker. It could be told by another incident which involved a little boy playing in the sea. Jaws immediately attacked the little boy without even a single try to recognize if the thing moving above it was food or not. In its knowledge, “if what it swallowed was digestible, that was food; if not, it would later be regurgitated” (Peter Benchley, Chapter 4). And that was its golden rule to almost everything.

Thirdly, it has the element of interacting with the characters violently. Since Jaws has a “small, primitive brain” (Peter Benchley, Chapter 1) and it makes actions based on its instinct or predator nature, the interactions between him and the other characters are not going to involve any friendly conversations or touching each other. In fact, the interactions would only be violently because its whole life is about two things, eat and move.

However, there are monsters that are not as typical as Jaws. They have both the human-like traits and the monster traits, which makes it hard to identify whether they are monsters or not. One of the representative monster figures in that debatable category is Frankenstein’s monster.

Frankenstein, written by Mary Shelley, tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a brilliant young scientist who is obsessed with bring the dying back to life, creates a horrible monster in a scientific experiment. For its monster traits, it also has a terrifying beast-like appearance. Though the monster was made of human bodies, his appearance had nothing to do with normal human appearances.

His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shriveled complexion and straight black lips (Mary Shelley, pg.91).

Another important and particular trait of him is that he has not been given any actual names because Victor Frankenstein doesn’t want to relate the monster he created as human.

On the other hand, it is also not deniable that Frankenstein’s monster is one of the most human-like monsters. He had secretly lived with a farmer family for a long time, and during that period, he has helped the family to make their livings and he had learned how to speak and read. Once, he even talked to the blind old man about his doubts (Mary Shelley, pg.187-238). And the blind old man didn’t sense that he was talking to a monster, which shows that in certain cases, regardless of its looking, Frankenstein’s monster is no different from other humans. He is capable of rational thinking and sympathy.

Although he was more of a man living inside a monster, the one thing that truly determined him as a monster was how he reacted after people treated him as a monster because of its appearance.

This was then the reward of my benevolence! I had saved a human being from destruction, and as a recompense I now writhed under the miserable pain of a wound which shattered the flesh and bone. The feelings of kindness and gentleness which I had entertained but a few moments before gave place to hellish rage and gnashing of teeth. Inflamed by pain, I vowed eternal hatred and vengeance to all mankind (Mary Shelley, pg.251).

Similar to Jaws following its own nature, He turned into a monster which was driven by the hate and anger towards human beings that he murdered a little boy in cold blood and then framed another woman (Mary Shelley, pg.253-257). Except for his own creator, the monster started to interact with the other characters violently and destroy everything in his path.

Beast-like or terrifying appearance is one important trait of monsters, but it is not a decisive factor. In the novel The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, the main character Quasimodo also had a monster-like appearance.

A huge head, bristling with red hair; between his shoulders an enormous hump, a counterpart perceptible in front; a system of thighs and legs so strangely astray that they could touch each other only at the knees, and, viewed from the front, resembled the crescents of two scythes joined by the handles; large feet, monstrous hands (Victor Hugo, Volume I, Book First, Chapter V).

However, he had a kind heart and reacted the opposite of what Frankenstein’s monster did when other people treated him unfairly. There were some differences between the situation Quasimodo encountered and Frankenstein’s monster encountered, but they were all treated as abnormal creatures. Quasimodo’s kindness freed him from the impression of a monster, while Frankenstein’s monster’s hateful actions driven by its anger towards humans made him a true monster. Therefore, it is what inside character that is the decisive factor to determine if the character is a monster or not.

When it comes to the villain, Lord Voldemort is a typical example. He is a main character in J. K. Rowling’s series of Harry Potter novels, and he is obsessed with blood purity that he aims at conquering both the Muggle (non-magical) world and the wizarding world to “cut away the canker that infects us until only those of the true blood remain” (J. K. Rowling, Book VII, pg. 9). Lord Voldemort has most of the critical elements that make a villain. First of all, he has the element of being a human or human-like figure. He was a human, and before he became the dark lord, he used to be called as Tom Riddle.

Secondly, he has the element of being talented. When Lord Voldemort was a little boy, “he had already discovered that he had some measure of control over them, and begun to use them consciously” (J. K. Rowling, Book VI, pg. 230).

Thirdly, he has the element of being able to make complicated plans to achieve evil goals. He had built an army of dark wizards and witches to do things for him. In book VI Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Voldemort ordered Draco Malfoy to assassinate Dumbledore, who was the headmaster of Hogwarts, to get the elder wand. Therefore, he could strengthen his power to be well prepared for the final plan, which was to conquer both of the two worlds. Also, before he carried out his final plan, he knew he needed to kill Harry Potter and destroy Hogwarts. On the surface, he had a step-by-step plan. Additionally, he secretly had another back-up plan in case he lost which was planned many years ahead when he was a student in Hogwarts. Voldemort learned a forbidden dark magic from professor Slughorn, which was how to split his soul into several pieces and stored them in different containers so that one day he could be resurrected through them (J. K. Rowling, Book VI, pg.412-414).

Last but not least, he has the element of the ability of rational thinking. Lord Voldemort had an evil goal and desire, but he was not driven by them. On the contrast, he could control his own desire and not made reckless decisions because of it.