Meet the Characters - Beowulf

Now, ladies and gentlemen, I shall present to you a hero that's a bit more unconventional than the others. When you hear "hero," you tend to think of somebody good, kind, brave, and a bit physically attractive, yes? 

Well, this particular hero of mine falls more under the "Byronic" category. For those of you who don't know, a Byronic hero is more of an antihero; they have more unsavory traits, they don't always do the right thing (or they use shadier methods), and in some cases, you can't even tell if they're supposed to be "the good guy" or "the bad guy." That said, they still have a few morals, they still technically save the day, and when you get to know them better, they can be quite sympathetic and even downright tragic. 

Beowulf fits all of those categories to a tee. 

No, not the Beowulf from the Anglo-Saxon epic poem...

...though I most definitely garnered a great deal of inspiration from that. 

No, this is a different character with the same name. This Beowulf of mine is a werewolf. 

Now, I'm hardly a fan of horror. I don't read Stephen King, I avoid most vampire stories (and don't even get me started on Twilight), I don't like zombies (with the exception of Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island), I wouldn't watch anything featuring Freddy or Jason or Michael if you paid my weight in diamonds, I never had a strong stomach for bloody scenes (even in cartoons), and this is why I keep my distance from Game of Thrones. 

But I absolutely adore my Beowulf. If I may be frank, I think he's one of the best characters I've created yet. 

With him, I sort of get to flirt with "the dark side" while still keeping him (for the most part) heroic. He doesn't just skirt the line between the good guys and the bad guys; he makes it a first-class high-wire circus act.

Even if he is sort of a villain, he's most definitely the tragic type. He's only "evil" because he has to be; in his own words, "Some people are evil for evil's sake. Others are evil because the world leaves them no other option." Given how werewolves are regarded as a whole, and many of them truly live up to their grim reputation and more besides, you can't blame Beowulf at all. 

If anything, you're amazed that he's not more evil. 

Besides the Anglo-Saxon epic hero, I modeled Beowulf after Batman...

...Darth Vader...

...Edward Scissorhands...

...Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Caribbean...

...Jack Skellington from The Nightmare Before Christmas...

...the Beast from Beauty and the Beast (the 1991 cartoon version, NOT the 2017 live-action recycle)...

...Scar, Mufasa, and Kovu from The Lion King, all mixed together...

...Long John Silver from Treasure Planet...

...Zaheer from The Legend of Korra...

...but mostly after Severus Snape from Harry Potter, a much nobler and more palatable version, more like Alan Rickman's portrayal in the movies. Were Alan Rickman still living, he would have been my first choice for Beowulf's voice.

Still, I wouldn't mind anyone else with a good, strong, deep, powerful voice, like Benedict Cumberbatch, who voiced Smaug in The Hobbit. That voice is absolutely spot on: seductive and crazy terrifying!

As I said, Beowulf toes the line separating the heroes from the villains, but personally, I think he's more of a hero than anything else. 

It takes a tremendous deal of inner strength not to succumb to a mindset of evil, especially when you have every reason under the sun to do so. Anyone who's not running away screaming from Beowulf is making monumental efforts to slay him; it's only because of his wits (and a bit of sheer luck) that he's able to escape with his life. 

Anyone who doesn't fight or flee from him avoids him like the plague. He doesn't have a single friend in the world, and any "family" he once had died ages ago. 

Most of his good deeds are left unnoticed or unappreciated...and yet, he does them anyway. 

Why? 

Because he can. 

Because it's the right thing to do. 

If people are cruel and nasty because they have the power to do so, Beowulf dares to be good and helpful because he has the power to do so.

To me, true courage is when you give something your absolute all, even when you don't appear to stand a ghost of a chance, even when you have nothing to gain from it. In the words of Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird, "It's when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what."

That's not to say Beowulf isn't infallible. He still makes plenty of mistakes, he gets knocked down over and over again, and many times over, he very narrowly avoids a complete fall (or better yet, an impressive swan-dive) into that black abyss. 

But he doesn't give up, he always picks himself up again (every now and then, he gets a helping hand) and he sees a good thing or two about the world that's worth fighting for. If he must go down, he'd rather go down fighting, and he'll take as many "eviler than thou" characters with him as possible. 

That's the other thing about Beowulf: despite being a hideous creature of the night, despite being more than capable of murder, he has a deeply pious streak. 

He knows many scripture passages by heart, he has perfect respect for God and the Church, he doesn't claim to be worthy of heaven, and he has no tolerance for anyone who gives religion a bad name. He hates people who use religion to justify unspeakable acts, such as Claude Frollo, Margaret White, Melisandre, and the Bishop of Hereford. 

Just before he became a werewolf, he knew a certain man who was like Frollo: claiming to be a holy man while, in actuality, being everything under the sun that was unholy...

...and he knew yet another man who was more like the good Archdeacon, or the Bishop of Digne: a very wise, humble, down-to-earth, extraordinarily kind man who always thought of others more than himself. 

So, take a wild guess as to which man Beowulf looked up to the most and tried to emulate the most, even after becoming a "monster." 

Another interesting thing about Beowulf is that he lives long enough to meet Varian, Terence, and Reid face to face. He's one of those threads that tie all the books together, and he has a remarkable influence on all three protagonists. Not that they're any less noble in their own way, but the impact Beowulf leaves on them is much greater than even he could have imagined.  

When he's very old, even by werewolf standards, he finally gets what he always wanted but never expected to have: a friend. Out of everybody he meets, Reid Darryl Lactantius is the one to wholeheartedly embrace him, in spite of what he is and what he's done. 

Reid loves Beowulf, pure and simple, while Beowulf learns to love the boy as if he were his own.

This is Beowulf's greatest trait, this is what makes him a hero in the grand scheme of things, and this is why I deem him one of my greatest characters. 

He has the capacity to love. 

He always had it; he only needed a chance to show it.