Characters: Antagonize me more

Again, looking at the conflict between the protagonist (main character) and the antagonist (bad guy), we can see the crux of many different types of bad guys from nature, to society, to the protagonist themself, to another character.

But getting down to the nitty gritty of conflict and antagonists is that a “bad guy” is usually not intrinsically evil outside of the world of Mordor.  The best bad guys must antagonize, bring out some of the worst things, in the protagonist.

This is the crux of antagonists. 

As proud or tough or noble as the protagonist is, we love to see conflict.  One of the best known mantras in writing is, “Only trouble is interesting.”  An antagonist must draw out the most interesting trouble we have ever seen to keep up interested.

Then, we have an antagonist that is golden.

A video blog I have enjoyed is "Writing with Jane," and here's a good episode that explains this well.