I know. You probably just thought of a dashing hero or a horrific villain. But those aren't the dangerous characters I mean. Nope. The dangerous characters I'm referring to are those about whom we could care less.
Characters who drag us through their stories without inspiring any engagement with their personalities, their dilemmas, their quirks, or anything else about them are the most dangerous characters we can create because they can kill readers' attention like nothing else. If one or two of these characters pop up within the story, okay, but if we make our protagonist(s) someone who doesn't incur our emotional investment, we've defeated our purpose in centering our attention on him or her.
The reason I mention this is because I've had to force feed myself a couple of novels in recent times with main characters who I don't like. Not even a little. Of course some people might like them, but I'm a fairly forgiving reader. I give authors a wide berth with their novels. However, if I can't muster even a minor interest in their protagonist, why do I care what happens to them, around them, or with them? I don't.
One of my film favorites is illustrated above.
Can you identify what makes you not care about a character?
Father, you care about all of us characters. Hard to imagine, but you do. Thank you for that. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.