Back in My Day: A Generational Gap of Villainy

“Master Wyndham, sir, I’m sorry to disturb you, but the stylist team is here. I have them setting up in the east parlor.”

The butler stood at attention at the door, refinement and prestige pouring off of his shoulders.

“Thank you, Mr. Chapman, I’ll join as soon as my workout is finished. Tell them to begin with the staff.”

“Very good, sir.”

Kent Wyndham watched Chapman’s coattails swish as he exited the gym and went to collect the rest of the staff for their regular skincare regimen. 

“Two more reps and then an ice bath should do it for today,” Wyndom’s personal trainer informed him.

Kent groaned as he lifted the barbells again.

It’s for the abs. He told himself as his muscles strained. Ladies don’t swoon without abs. 

An ice bath of equal torture was good for the muscles, but it was an efficient way to prevent cramps. No one sided with a villain with cramps.

The castle hallways were chilly as he walked out of the gym. Ancient castles were always chilly, no matter how much renovation had been done over the years. It was part of their aesthetic. 

Kent shivered under his bathrobe, wishing he came from a villainous family who lived in a desert palace or private island in the tropics. Maybe the edge of a volcano? Anywhere warm.

But no. Great great grandpa Wyndham had built his fortress on a craggy peak where the sun barely shone and the winds froze your very soul. So Kent had to work with what he’d been given.

By the time he made it to the east parlor, most of the staff had completed their manicures and facials. Those that needed touch-ups with botox had been shifted to another room. Mr. Chapman, who had come from a long line of Chapmans who served the Wyndhams, was overseeing the process. 

And unfortunately…so was Kent’s grandfather.

The moment he walked in, Jako Wyndham’s wheelchair spun around and the elderly man sneered at Kent. 

“What is all this?” He demanded, same as he did every time touch-up day came around. “All these creams and injections! What kind of villain has his nails cleaned? There’s nothing scary about curving nails! You need proper smelly nails, yellow and crusty! That frightens people!”

Kent took a seat by his regular manicurist, an amiable woman with heavy hips and steely brown eyes. She could file a nail with the precision of a surgeon and he appreciated her efficiency. 

“No villain has had crusty nails in a century, Grandpa,” Kent reminded him as he stretched out his hands. “It’s bad for your health.”

“Bah! I’m still kicking, aren’t I?”

“That’s only because of Dad’s health injections. Otherwise you’d be rotting away.”

“Bah! Your dad! You know I paid his university fees so he could go on to be a proper evil scientist. And he retired early! Hardly made a dent in the chemical field!”

Dr. Basil Wyndham, Kent’s father, had actually made the closest approximation to an elixir of eternal life that anyone ever had. It just took such a massive amount of a specific endangered frog’s mucus that he was constantly being hounded by animal rights activists who blew up his chemical factories, usually while he was in them. After losing both his legs in fire, Basil had decided he’d made enough money, passed the villainy mantle on to his son, and retired to the Bahamas.

“Dad’s doing just fine,” Kent answered. “He’s a billionaire. What else could he want?”

“A little self-respect, maybe!” Jako snapped. 

So said the man who couldn’t function without Kent’s aid. Jako was just mad that he was dependent on his grandson for everything now when he used to be at the top of the villainy field.

The manicurist finished and a masseuse began working the stress out of Kent’s muscles.

“Bah!” Jako snapped. “In my day, villains didn’t do all this nonsense. You had to be proper evil, show your proper credentials by looking terrifying and monstrous. I put your dad in goggles from the time he was two because he was too pretty and they made him proper horrifying!”

“Times have changed, grandpa,” Kent said with a sigh. “Villains have to be attractive now.”

Not just attractive, but hot. Hot villains had soccer mom book clubs falling all over themselves to defend them. Ugly villains might have stoked fear, but today’s game was admiration. That was what tripped up would-be heroes and paved the way for success in villainy today. 

“Attractive! Attractive he says!” Jako practically choked on the words, spittle spraying from his mouth. Chapman surreptitiously reached over to wipe the old man’s chin. Jako fended him away and grumbled, “Your dad was always going on about ‘gray moral zones born from sympathetic motives’ and I thought that was all nonsense, but here you are going on about ‘attractive.’ Even worse! Bah, I say!”

“Motives matter in villainy, Grandpa.”

“Not in my day! In my day, evil could just be evil!”

“You always had motives, grandpa, your generation just never articulated them.”

“Articulated! Do you know what’s articulate? Swarms of bear-spider monsters! Bashing heads in with spiked mauls! Blacking out the sky with hordes of bats! That’s articulate!”

“Times have changed, Grandpa.”

“Bah!”

It was on to the facial and botox injections, very important for when he was going to have so many close-up cameras on him.

Chapman interrupted before Jako could complain about that, saying, “Master Wyndham, sir, your speech writer is here with a new draft.”

“Speech writer! You don’t even write your own villainous monologues anymore!” Jako howled. “You are a disgrace to villainy!”

“Have him set up his computer in my office. I’ll be there shortly,” Kent answered.

Once his treatment was done, he rose from his chair. His stylist stepped forward with the new evil tailoring they had for him: a svelte suit, unbuttoned dress shirt, no tie. Once dressed, Kent said farewell to his grandfather and headed up to his office to meet his speech writer.

Maybe Jako couldn’t see past the glamor of new-age villainy, but Kent had built a massive empire of social media suckers who were about to overthrow the UN and make him the emperor of the world. He just needed to deliver one last speech with a perfectly toned face and set it all in motion.

Then Kent would be the greatest villain to ever walk the earth, thanks to his mastery of aesthetics.