Villain: “You and I are very much alike, you know.”
Hero: “I realize that.”
Villain: “Doesn’t that trouble you?”
Hero: “Why would it? I share most of my genome with sewer rats.”
Villain: “But our similarities mean that, deep down, you’re a bad person. There’s nothing stopping you from being just as evil as I am!”
Hero: “Sure there is. I’m stopping me.”
Villain: “But in your heart you crave—”
Hero: “Sometimes when I’m in a crowded building I get the sudden urge to just boop a stranger right on the nose. But I don’t do it, because that would be super rude and weird. Does having that compulsion in the first place make me just as much of a weirdo as if I had acted on it? Maybe it does in your eyes, but to the would-be boopee, it makes all the difference in the world.”
Villain: “We’re not talking about booping noses, we’re talking about killing peop—”
Me: “Look, dude, I’m sure murder can be really satisfying. But I’ve decided that I don’t want to murder people, and I think that’s very sexy of me. Look at me. With a little self-restraint, you might have had what I have.”
i love this. the hero turning the “we’re not so different” speech back on the villain