From ‘Breaking Bad’ to ‘Taxi Driver’: exploring the existential male antihero archetype
Throughout the history of film, television and literature, there have been plenty of male protagonists penned by men who embody the existentialist male antihero archetype. In fact, our media is overrun with this kind of character, and they’re typically at the centre of some of the most acclaimed pieces of work from the past decades.
Take, for example, Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye, who struggles to find meaning in the world, choosing to rebel against what is expected of him from wider society. Then there’s Meursault from Albert Camus’ The Stranger, Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver, Alex DeLarge from A Clockwork Orange, Walter White from Breaking Bad, and Naked’s Johnny Fletcher. These are all examples of classic male antiheroes who typically experience some form of existential or nihilistic thinking. They struggle to create a meaningful life for themselves or create meaning in unusual and antisocial ways.
Most of these characters commit acts such as murder, financial crime, and other forms of violence, yet we’re typically meant to empathise with them on some level—or at least remain invested in their stories. How can it be that mass audiences become so invested in the lives of characters who commit heinous acts or have a general disdain for their fellow humans? The popular archetype challenges viewers while also giving these characters enough of a complex backstory for us to root for them in some way, even when we know we shouldn’t.
An excellent example of this is presented in Breaking Bad. Despite Walter White turning into a cold-blooded murderer, viewers continuously find themselves rooting for the protagonist, who ended up in this situation due to a terminal cancer diagnosis and a desire to leave his family financially stable. Even if we don’t find ourselves necessarily rooting for a character, they often carry enough of a compelling presence to maintain our attention, such as Johnny in Naked. As a result, films and shows featuring these archetypes, no matter how flawed they are (even if they are outright criminals), often receive significant acclaim for their well-written characters.
Yet, how is it that most existentialist antiheroes are white, able-bodied, straight men? Despite being an extremely privileged group, most of our media’s most troubled protagonists who think life isn’t worth living or choose to live it in a selfish and violent manner fall into this category. Would the same kinds of characters become as popular or be taken as seriously if they didn’t? When we think of female anti-heroes, the list is considerably slimmer, and, on closer inspection, many of them can’t really be placed on the same level.
Many people consider Fleabag from the show of the same name an anti-hero. She is flawed, messy, difficult, and struggles to find true happiness and fulfilment. However, the character only commits one ‘bad’ act (before the show even begins) of sleeping with her best friend’s boyfriend, inadvertently leading her friend to accidentally kill herself. While this is, of course, terrible, it’s not exactly on the same level as murder, smuggling drugs across borders, or raping women. Fleabag is deeply regretful of the act and spends two seasons struggling with grief and guilt. She is not exactly an antihero as much as she is a troubled and complex young woman.
Still, in instances where a female character is very much an ‘antihero’, such as Amy Dunne in Gone Girl, who frames her husband for her own murder and kills a man, audience reactions tend to differ between genders. It seems as though women are more likely to justify female antiheroes’ actions, as evidenced by the popularity of the phrase ‘good for her’ to describe films with ‘deranged’ female protagonists. Meanwhile, specific male viewers often find these kinds of flawed characters annoying, over-dramatic, and hard to sympathise with because they don’t adhere to a stereotypical idea of femininity – these women often challenge it.
There is a consistent use of double standards within the media when it comes to classifying men versus women. You only have to look at the perception of certain male rock stars to see that the drug-addled, alcoholic rockstars of the 1960s and ‘70s are still revered as troubled artists, whereas female artists like Amy Winehouse were routinely ridiculed for substance abuse issues, relationships, and body image. It is often the case that male artists are seen as ‘opinionated’ while their female counterparts are ‘gobby’ and ‘annoying’. And as we know, art imitates life, which imitates art, and so on.
Since men have populated the entertainment industry’s writing, directing and production jobs for years, the perspectives of white men have come to dominate, and anyone who doesn’t fall into this category will typically learn to enjoy and relate (where possible) to media that centre men. For example, countless women have enjoyed Taxi Driver and Breaking Bad because they’re great pieces of media with interesting character studies at their core, even if the perspectives of women within these are slim.
Sadly, when the roles are reversed, it’s so common to hear men assume that a piece of media ‘isn’t for them’ because it revolves around a woman and excludes a male perspective. We need more female antiheroes who counteract patriarchal stereotypes and help to diversify the archetype. The existential antihero is an incredibly fun archetype in which viewers can lose themselves, even if the actions committed by these characters seem outrageous and shocking. Yet, it’s one that prioritises a specific kind of man, and it’s time for this to change.
