The Hero’s Journey By Christopher Vogler

“A beginning is a very delicate time.”

-from Dune, screenplay by David Lynch, based on the novel by Frank Herbert

Stage One: The Ordinary World

1. Title: A good title can become a multi-leveled metaphor for the hero or his world.

2. Opening Image: create mood and suggest where the story is going.

3. Prologue: some stories open with a prologue, they can serve several useful functions. They can give a little bit of important backstory; cue the audience of what kind of story they are about to read, or start the story off with a “bang”. In Star Wars, the prologue shows Leia being kidnapped by Darth Vader even before you meet Luke Skywalker in his mundane world. You do not have to have a prologue, you need to determine if you story needs a prologue or not. Most stories just start with the hero in their “Ordinary World”.

4. Contrast: Make sure that you show and describe your “Ordinary World” very different from your “Special World”, so that the hero has to make a very drastic change to cross over to the “Special World”. In The Wizard of Oz, the “Ordinary World” was black and white and the “Special World” was Technicolor.

5. Foreshadowing: sometimes can help in modeling into the Special World.

6. Raising the Dramatic Question: every beginning must have the reader questioning about the fate or ability of the chosen hero. Are they going to make it? Get back home? Save the world?

7. Inner and Outer Problems: Every hero needs both, inner and outer problems to overcome.

8. Making an Entrance: this is an important part of building your character’s relationship to the reader. What is that hero doing at the beginning of the book? That first action should model the hero’s character, attitude and even he/her future problems or solutions. (Read Chapter II, The Glorious Whitewasher from Tom Sawyer. Copy at end of packet)

9. Introducing the Hero to the Audience: Whether or not your audience likes your hero, your hero stills needs to be relatable, the audience needs to be able to relate to him/her so that they have compassion or understanding of the problems that your hero is going through.

10. Identification: heroes need to have universal goals, drives, desires, or needs.

11. The Hero’s Lack: any missing element in a hero’s life with help create sympathy from the audience. Audiences will want the hero to gain this element somewhere in the story. An element can be anything

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from learning to love to gain that family that they never had. It could be never being able to say “I’m sorry” to “I love you” or learning to deal with guilt.

12. Tragic Flaws: a weakness or fault that makes your hero truly human and real. This flaw puts them at odds with their fellow men or even their destiny. It could be as simple as stubbornness, or even the inability to see at great distances or to read.

13. Wounded Heroes: this could be a deep psychic (invisible) wound, such as rejection, betrayal, abandonment or disappointment from something that happened in your hero’s life as a child, some emotional separation from their mother or father. It could also be a physical (visible) injury. This wound can also cause the hero to be extra-strong in defense of this area, or vulnerable and weak, or defensive and guarded. Your hero should heal from these wounds and be restored throughout their journey.

14. Establishing What’s at Stake: What does your hero stand to gain or lose in their adventure? What will be the consequences for the hero, society, or the world if the hero succeeds or fails? **Make sure the stakes are high—Life and death, big money, or the hero’s very soul.

15. Backstory and Exposition: “Backstory is all the relevant information about the character’s history and background—what got her to the situation at the beginning of the story. Exposition is the art of gracefully revealing the backstory and any other pertinent information about the plot: the hero’s social class, upbringing, habits, experiences, as well as the prevailing social conditions and opposing forces that may affect the hero.” (Vogler 95) Both are very hard to master. Backstory can be doled out gradually throughout the story, even by what is not said or done. Think of the story as peeling an onion, revealing a layer at a time throughout the story.

16. Theme: State your theme while in the “Ordinary World”. What single idea is your story about? Can you state your theme in a single word or phrase? Betrayal? Love? Greed? We must work together to survive, or Money is the root of all evil? “Theme, a world derived from Greek, is close in meaning to the Latin-based premise. Both words mean “something set before,” something laid out in advance that helps determine a future course.” “Knowing the theme is essential to making the final choices in dialogue, action, and set dressing that turn a story into a coherent design.” (Vogler 96)

THE WIZARD OF OZ

I refer often to The Wizard of Oz because it’s a classic movie that most people have seen, and because it’s a fairly typical hero’s journey with clearly delineated stages. It also has a surprising degree of psychological depth, and can be read not only as a fairy story of a little girl trying to get back home, but also as a metaphor of a personality trying to become complete.

As the story unfolds, the hero Dorothy has a clear outer problem. Her dog Toto has dug up Miss Gulch’s flowerbed and Dorothy is in trouble. She tries to elicit sympathy for her problem from her aunt and uncle, but they are too busy preparing for a coming storm. Like the heroes of myth and legend before her, Dorothy is restless, out of place, and doesn’t know where to light.

Dorothy also has a clear inner problem. She doesn’t fit in anymore; she doesn’t feel “at home.” Like the incomplete heroes of fairy tales, she has a big piece missing from her life—her parents are dead. She doesn’t yet know it, but she’s about to set out on a quest for completion: not through a marriage and the beginning of a new ideal family, but through meeting a series of magical forces that represent parts of a complete and perfect personality.

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To foreshadow these meetings, Dorothy encounters a small model of the Special World adventure. Bored, she tries to balance on the thin railing of a pig pen, and falls in. Three friendly farmhands rescue her from danger, predicting the roles the same actors will play in the Special World. The scene says, in the language of symbol, that Dorothy has been walking a tightrope between warring sides of her personality, and sooner or later she will need all the help she can get, from every part of her being, to survive the inevitable fall into conflict. (Vogler 96)

http://ffilms.org/the-wizard-of-oz-1939/

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. Look at a film, play, or story of your choice. What is the Ordinary World? How does the author introduce the hero? Revel character? Give exposition? Suggest the theme? Does the author use an image to foreshadow or suggest where the story is going? Fill out the sheet about the “Hero’s Journey”.

2. In your own writing, how well do you know your hero? Do a complete biographical sketch, specifying personal history, physical description, education, family background, job experiences, romances, dislikes and prejudices, preferences in food, clothes, hair, cars, etc.

3. Do a timeline, specifying what the character was doing and where he was at every stage of life. Find out what was going on in the world at these times. What ideas, events, and people have been the greatest influences on your character?

4. How is your story’s hero incomplete? Get specific about the character’s needs, desires, goals, wounds, fantasies, wishes, flaws, quirks, regrets, defenses, weaknesses, and neuroses. What single characteristic could lead to your hero’s destruction or downfall? What single characteristic could save her? Does your character have both an inner and an outer problem? Does she have a universal human need? How does she characteristically go about getting that need met?

5. Make a list of all the points of backstory and exposition that the audience needs to know to get the story started. How can those be revealed indirectly, visually, on the run, or through conflict?

6. Do different cultures need different kinds of stories? Do men and women need different kinds of stories? How are the heroic journeys of men and women different? Do juvenile readers need different kinds of stories?

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Stage Two: THE CALL TO ADVENTURE

“It’s money and adventure and fame! It’s the thrill of a lifetime!....and a long sea voyage that starts at six o’clock tomorrow!”

-- from King Kong, screen play by James Creelman and Ruth Rose

1. Get the story rolling: Incite or initiate an incident, the catalyst, or the trigger to get the story rolling. Suggestions may be in the form of a message or a messenger. A declaration of war, an arrival of a telegram, a stirring within the hero to move or change, a dream (prophetic or disturbing), maybe the hero is just fed up with their life.

2. Synchronicity: a string of accidents or coincidences.

3. Temptation: allure of an exotic travel poster or seeing a potential attractive girl or boy friend.

4. Heralds of change: the Herald may perform this function and it may be a positive, negative, or neutral invitation to the adventure.

5. Reconnaissance: a villain makes a survey of the hero’s territory and seeking information about him/her. This information-gathering alerts the audience that something is going to happen, a struggle is about to happen.

6. Disorientation and Discomfort: there can be some unsettling and disorientation to the hero, Heralds can sneak up on heroes, or change in form or personality to lure the hero into the adventure.

7. Lack or Need: the Call to Adventure may be a loss or subtraction from the hero’s Ordinary World. A house or home is destroyed, or a kidnapping of a loved one happens, or someone the hero loves dies.

8. No More Options: the Call to Adventure may be just that is the only option the hero has. Everyone is fed up with the hero, or the hero is in dire straits and this is the only option they have.

9. Warnings for Tragic Heroes: The story could start with a dire warning of doom for the hero. This captures the audience with initial questions of whether the hero will make it or not.

10. More Than One Call: Call Waiting: Maybe the Call to Adventure is not just one call, but two or more calls. Example:

THE WIZARD OF OZ

Dorothy’s vague feelings of unease crystallize when Miss Gulch arrives and spitefully takes away Toto. A conflict is set up between two sides struggling for control of Dorothy’s soul. A repressive Shadow energy is trying to bottle up the good-natured intuitive side. But the instinctive Toto escapes. Dorothy follows her instincts, which are issuing her a Call to Adventure, and runs away from home. She feels painted into a corner by a lack of sympathy from Aunt Em, her surrogate mother, who has scolded her. She sets out to respond to the Call, under a sky churning with the clouds of change. (Vogler 104)

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QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY Stage Two: Call to Adventure

1. Think of several books or movies and tell what the Call to Adventure was. Who or what delivers the Call? Write down at least three.

2. Can a story exist without some kind of Call to Adventure? Can you think of stories that don’t have a Call?

3. In your own story, would it make a difference if the Call were moved to another point in the script? How long can you delay the Call and is this desirable?

4. What is the ideal place for the Call? Can you do without it?

5. Have you found an interesting way to present the Call or twist it around so it’s not a cliché?

6. Your story may require a succession of Calls. Who is being called to what level of adventure?

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Stage Three: REFUSAL OF THE CALL

“You’re not cut out for this, Joan, and you know it.”

-- from Romancing the Stone, screenplay by Diane Thomas

1. Avoidance: ignorance, dodging it, hesitating, expresses reluctance, or just flatly refusing. This protest may continue until the hero’s Refusal is overcome by a stronger motivation which raises the stakes, and forces the hero.

2. Excuses: these are temporary roadblocks until the urgency of the quest overcomes them.

3. Persistent Refusal Leads to Tragedy

4. Conflicting Calls: the hero may get two Calls to Adventure and has to choose one. This is a difficult choice but the Refusal of the Call is the time to determine what path the hero will take.

5. Positive Refusals: “Refusal of the Call is usually a negative moment in the hero’s progress, a dangerous moment in which the adventure might go astray or never get off the ground at all. However, there are some special cases in which refusing the Call is a wise and positive move on the part of the hero. When the Call is a temptation to evil or a summons to disaster, the hero is smart to say no.” (Vogler 109)

6. Willing Heroes: some heroes are willing heroes and accept or even seek out adventures as opposed to “victimized heroes”. Even though these heroes go for the adventure, there still may be fear and doubt by them or other characters that they come across in their adventure.

7. Threshold Guardians: "Heroes who overcome their fear and commit to an adventure may still be tested by powerful figures who raise the banner of fear and doubt, questioning the hero’s very worthiness to be in the game. They are Threshold Guardians, blocking the heroes before the adventure has even begun.” (Vogler 111) This creates emotional suspense for the audience.

8. The Secret Door: these are symbols that create human curiosity, that powerful drive that makes the hero want to know the secret.

The Wizard of Oz

Dorothy runs away from home and gets as far as the carnival wagon of Professor Marvel, a Wise Old Man whose function, in this incarnation, is to block her at the threshold of a dangerous journey. At this point Dorothy is a willing hero, and it’s left for the Professor to express the danger of the road for the audience. With a bit of shamanic magic, he convinces her to return home. He has convinced her to Refuse the Call, for now.

But in effect Professor Marvel is issuing a higher Call to go home, make peace with her embattled feminine energy, reconnect with Aunt Em’s love, and deal with her feelings rather than run away from them.

Although Dorothy turns back for the time being, powerful forces have been set in motion in her life. She finds that the frightful power of the tornado, a symbol of the feelings she has stirred up, has driven her loved ones and allies underground, out of reach. No one can hear her. She is alone except for Toto, her intuition. Like many a hero she finds that once started on a journey, she

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can never go back to the way things were. Ultimately, Refusal is pointless. She has already burned some bridges behind her and must live with the consequences of taking the first step on the Road of Heroes.

Dorothy takes refuge in the empty house, the common dream symbol for all old personality structure. But the whirling forces of change, which she herself has stirred up, come sweeping towards her and no structure can protect against its awesome power. (Vogler 112-113)

Refusal of the Call comes in many ways:

Subtle moment, a word or two of hesitation between receiving and accepting Single step near the beginning of the journey Encountered every step of the way, depending on the hero As a redirect to focus the adventure

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. While watching your movie or reading a book, can you recall a time when a hero’s Refusal to the Call?

2. What are the heroes of your story afraid of? Which are false fears or paranoia? Which are real fears? How are they expressed?

3. In what ways have they refused Calls to Adventure, and what are the consequences of Refusal?

4. If the protagonists are willing heroes, are there characters or forces that make the dangers clear for the audience?

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Stage Four: MEETING WITH THE MENTOR

“Sometimes it’s not a bad idea to refuse a Call until you’ve had time to prepare for the “zone unknown” that lies ahead. In mythology and folklore that preparation might be done with the help of the wise, protective figure of the Mentor, whose many services to the hero include protecting, guiding, teaching, testing, training, and providing magical gifts. Meeting with the Mentor is the stage of the Hero’s Journey in which the hero gains the supplies, knowledge, and confidence needed to overcome fear and commence the adventure.” (Vogler 117)

1. Sources of Wisdom: usually there is an emotional bond between the hero and the Mentor. Audiences enjoy stories where the Mentor passes wisdom to the hero through one generation to another. Mentors are considered to be role models.

2. Mentors in Folklore and Myth: typically bestow gifts of magic to guide the hero on their journey.

3. Chiron: a Prototype: Greek heroes were mentored by the centaur Chiron, a prototype of all Wise Old Men and Women. Mentors in stories often show that they are connected to nature or to some other world of the spirit.

4. Mentor Himself: “The names Mentes and Mentor, along with our word “mental,” stem from the Greek word for mind, menos, a marvelously flexible word that can mean intention, force, or purpose as well as mind, spirit, or remembrance. Mentors in stories act mainly on the mind of the hero, changing her consciousness or redirecting her will. Even if physical gifts are given, Mentors also strengthen the hero’s mind to face an ordeal with confidence. Menos also means courage.

5. Avoiding Mentor Clichés: defy the archetypes like kindly fairy godmothers and white-bearded wizards in tall Merlin hats. Keep your writing fresh and surprising.

6. Misdirection: don’t be afraid to mislead your audience about the Mentor (or any character). A Mentor can lead your hero into a life of crime. Your Mentor can be a sweet, loving person at first, and then change their character to be someone else entirely.

7. Mentor-Hero Conflicts: sometimes the Mentor-Hero relationship conflicts and they fight or oppose each other. Sometimes the Mentor turns villain or betrays the hero. Sometimes the hero is ungrateful or violent towards the Mentor. Like parents, sometimes the Mentor has a hard time letting the hero go. And sometimes, Mentors can be disappointing, especially if the hero admires them too much.

8. Mentor-Driven Stories: sometimes a story can be built around a Mentor and the Mentor is actually also the hero. They may Mentor others, but they are also the hero in the story.

9. Mentor as Evolved Hero: these are the Mentors that have been down the Road of Heroes one or more times. They have acquired knowledge and skill that helps them pass onto the current hero.

10. Critical Influence: when the Mentor’s appearance is critical to the hero so that the story passes through blockades of doubt and fear. The Mentor may show up during those crucial times. An example

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of Glinda the Good Witch’s appearance three times in The Wizard of Oz: 1.) giving Dorothy the red shoes and a yellow path to follow, 2.) intervening to blanket the sleep-inducing poppies with pure white snow, and 3.) granting her wish to return home, with the help of the magic red shoes. All three times, Glinda’s function was to get the story unstuck. A Mentor will help the story keep things moving with many things such as gifts, encouragement, guidance, or wisdom.

The Wizard of Oz

Dorothy, like many heroes, encounters a series of Mentors of varying shades. She learns something from almost everyone she meets, and all the characters from whom she learns are in a sense Mentors.

Professor Marvel is the mentor who reminds her that she is loved, and sends her on her quest for “home,” a term that means far more than a Kansas farmhouse. Dorothy has to learn to feel at home in her own soul, and going back to face her problems is a step in that direction.

But the tornado flings her to Oz, where Dorothy encounters Glinda, the good witch, a new Mentor for a new land. Glinda acquaints her with the unfamiliar rules of Oz, gives her the magic gift of the ruby slippers, and points her on the way of the Yellow Brick Road, the golden Road of Heroes. She gives Dorothy a positive feminine role model to balance the negativity of the Wicked Witch.

The three magical figures that Dorothy meets along the way, a man of straw, a man of tin, and a talking lion, are allies and Mentors who teach her lessons about brains, heart, and courage. They are different models of masculine energy that she must incorporate in building her own personality.

The Wizard himself is a Mentor, giving her a new Call to Adventure, the impossible mission of fetching the witch’s broomstick. He challenges Dorothy to face her greatest fear – the hostile feminine energy of the Witch.

The little dog Toto is a Mentor, too, in a way. Acting entirely on instinct, he is her intuition, guiding her deeper into the adventure and back out again. (Vogler 123-4)

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. Who or what is the Mentor in your book or movie?

2. Is there a character in your story who is a full-blown Mentor? Do other characters wear the mask of the Mentor at some point?

3. What Mentor functions can be found or developed in your story? Does your hero need a Mentor?

4. Does your hero have some inner code of ethics or model of behavior? Does your hero have a conscience and how does it manifest itself?

5. Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom portray a hero who has no apparent Mentor. He learns things from people along the way, but there is no special character set aside for that task. The third film in the series, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, introduces the character of Indy’s father, played by Sean Connery. Is he a Mentor? Are all parents Mentors? Are yours? In your stories, what is the attitude of your hero to the Mentor energy? (Hint: the energy of the Mentor usually gets the hero past fear and sends them to the brink of adventure.)

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Stage Five: CROSSING THE FIRST THRESHOLD

“Just follow the Yellow Brick Road.”

-- from The Wizard of Oz, screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf.

Now the hero stands at the very threshold of the world of adventure, the Special World of Act Two. Crossing the First Threshold is an act of the will in which the hero commits wholeheartedly to the adventure. (Vogler 127)

1. Approaching the Threshold: there may be external events that occur to force the hero to continue through this threshold, there may be inner choices that the hero wants to occur that drives him/her. They may even be a combination of both external events and inner choices that boost the story into the second act.

2. Threshold Guardians: As your hero approaches the threshold, they may encounter other beings that try to block his way, and stop him from entering. These beings are called Threshold Guardians; they are very powerful but useful archetype. They may serve many purposes, they may be friendly and are part of the training for the hero, they may be drawn into the drama reluctantly, but they have information that the hero needs, they may be a foreshadow of the enemy. Many times they just need to be recognized, a bit like tipping a doorman so that they will let you into the building.

3. The Crossing: this is the border between the two worlds (Ordinary World and Special World). The border can be a change of color, physical barriers such as doors, gates, arches, bridges, deserts, canyons, walls, cliffs, oceans, or rivers. It could be an airplane ride to another country. It just needs to be a noticeable shift in energy. The Crossing takes courage from the hero called the leap of faith.

4. Rough Landing: crash landings into other worlds can be figurative or literally. It can be exhausting, frustrating, or disorienting.

THE WIZARD OF OZ

A tremendous natural force rises up to hurl Dorothy over the First Threshold. She is trying to get home but the tornado sends her on a detour to a Special World where she will learn what “home” really means. Dorothy’s last name, Gale, is wordplay that links her to the storm. In symbolic language, it’s her own stirred-up emotions that have generated this twister. Her old idea of home, the house, is wrenched up by the tornado and carried to a far-off land where a new personality structure can be built.

As she passes through the transition zone, Dorothy sees familiar sights but in unfamiliar circumstances. Cows fly through the air, men row a boat through the storm, and Miss Gulch on her bicycle turns into the Wicked Witch. Dorothy has nothing she can count on now but Toto—her instincts.

The house comes down with a crash. Dorothy emerges to find a world startlingly different from Kansas, populated by the Little Men and Women of fairy tales. A Mentor appears magically when Glinda floats onto the scene in a transparent bubble. She begins to teach Dorothy about the strange ways of the new land, and points out that the crash of Dorothy’s house has killed a bad witch. Dorothy’s old personality has been shattered by the uprooting of her old notion of home.

Glinda give a mentor’s gifts, the ruby slippers, and new direction for the quest. To get home, Dorothy must first see the Wizard, that is, get in touch with her own higher Self. Glinda gives a specific path, the Yellow Brick Road, and sends her over another

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threshold, knowing she will have to make friends, confront foes, and be tested before she can reach her ultimate goal. (Vogler 131)

The First Threshold ends Act One and begins Act Two.

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is the First Threshold of the movie or book you are watching or reading? How does the audience know we’ve gone from one world to another? How does the energy of the story feel different?

2. Is your hero willing to enter the adventure or not? How does this affect the Threshold Crossing?

3. Are there guardian forces at the Threshold and how do they make the hero’s leap of faith more difficult?

4. How does the hero deal with Threshold Guardians? What does the hero learn by Crossing the Threshold?

5. What have been the Thresholds in your own life? How did you experience them? Were you even aware you were crossing a threshold into a Special World at the time?

6. By Crossing a Threshold, what options is a hero giving up? Will these unexplored options come back to haunt the hero later?

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Stage Six: TESTS, ALLIES, ENEMIES

“See, you got three or four good pals, why then you got yourself a tribe—there ain’t nothin’stonger than that.”

--from Young Guns, screenplay by John Fusco

Now the hero fully enters the mysterious, exciting Special World which Joseph Campbell called “a dream landscape of curiously fluid, ambiguous forms, where he must survive a succession of trials.” (Vogler 135) It is new, exciting, and frightening all at once.

1. Contrast: the Special World must physically be a sharp contrast from the Ordinary World.

2. Testing: The Tests at the beginning of Act Two are often difficult obstacles, but they don’t have the maximum life-and-death quality of later events. If the adventure were a college learning experience, Act One would be a series of entrance exams, and the Test stage of Act Two would be a series of pop quizzes, meant to sharpen the hero’s skill in specific areas and prepare her for the more rigorous midterm and final exams coming up. The Test could be the continuation of the Mentor’s training (Vogler 136) preparing the hero for the adventure yet to come. The Test should be built into the landscape of the Special World and can even be close to the villain or Shadow. How the hero deals with any obstacles or barricades that the Shadow presents to him, will also be part of how he handles the tests yet to come.

3. Allies and Enemies: during this stage, the hero will make Allies and Enemies. A natural part of this stage is the hero figuring out who they can trust and who they can’t. The hero learning to judge character is also a type of Test.

4. Allies: a hero may be walking into the Test stage looking for information because they are focused on that, but they walk out with new friends.

5. Sidekicks: Western movies call an ally a Sidekick when there is a pairing of a hero with a supporter of the hero’s adventure. Lone Ranger had Tonto, Zorro had Bernardo, Sherlock Holmes had Dr. Watson, and so on. Comical Sidekicks aid to the story by providing humor, and sometimes comically goofing up or causing mischief or more problems to be tested, Hans Solo was often a Comical Sidekick of Luke Skywalker. Ron was a Comical Sidekick of Harry Potter.

6. Teams: teams may be formed or recruited during the Testing stage. Sometimes the hero may have to struggle against rivals for control of a group, other times he/she may have to gain the respect of the group before they will follow him.

7. Enemies: during the Testing stage, heroes can make bitter enemies. They quickly will become a threat to the enemy.

8. The Rival: another enemy that the hero has to deal with may be a rival, someone who is not out to kill the hero, but they are competing with the hero for love, sports, business, or some other enterprise.

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9. New Rules: there must be new rules to the Special World, and the hero plus the audience must learn them quickly. How your hero finds out about these New Rules can be in many ways. Star Wars used a cantina very similar to Western saloons as a place where people gathered to meet, challenge, find allies, and learn about the new rules.

10. Watering Holes: in any Ordinary World, the place that hunters go when they are hunting for game is the watering hole. It is a natural congregation place and a good place to observe and gather information.

THE WIZARD OF OZ

Of course not all heroes go to bars at this stage of the journey. Dorothy encounters her Tests, Allies, and Enemies on the Yellow Brick Road. Like Psyche or the heroes of many fairy tales she is wise enough to know that requests for aid on the road should be honored with an open heart. She earns the loyalty of the Scarecrow by getting him unhooked from his post and by helping him learn to walk. Meanwhile she learns that her Enemy, the Wicked Witch, shadows her at every turn and waits for the chance to strike. The Witch influences some grumpy apple trees to become Enemies to Dorothy and the Scarecrow. The Scarecrow proves his worthiness to be on the team by outwitting the trees. He taunts them into throwing apples, which he and Dorothy pick up to eat.

Dorothy wins the affection of another Ally, the Tin Woodsman, by oiling his joints and listening sympathetically to his sad story of having no heart. The Witch appears again, showing her enmity for Dorothy and her Allies by hurling a fireball at them.

To protect her dog Toto, Dorothy stands up to the blustering of the Cowardly Lion, a potential Enemy or Threshold Guardian, and ends up making him an Ally.

The battlelines are clearly drawn. Dorothy has learned the rules of the Special World and has passed many Tests. Protected by Allies and on guard against declared Enemies, she is ready to approach the central source of power in the land of Oz. (Vogler 140-141)

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is the Testing phase in your movie or book?

2. How does your story’s Special World differ from the Ordinary Worlds? How can you increase the contrast?

3. In what ways is your hero Tested, and when does she make Allies or Enemies? Keep in mind there is not “right” way. The needs of the story may dictate when alliances are made.

4. Are there loner heroes who have no Allies?

5. Is your hero a single character or a group?

6. How does your hero react to the Special World with its strange rules and unfamiliar people?

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Stage Seven: Approach to the Inmost Cave

COWARDLY LION: There’s only one thing more I’d like you fellows to do.TIN WOODSMAN, SCARECROW: What’s that?COWARDLY LION: Talk me out of it! -from The Wizard of Oz

1. Functions of Approach: this becomes the time when the hero takes time to make plans, review the enemy, reorganize or thin out the group, fortify and arm themselves, or have the last laugh before they go into no-man’s-land.

2. Courtship: this is the time in the story where they may be a bonding of the hero and another person. There may be love in the air, or a realization that love may be possible.

3. The Bold Approach: some heroes will boldly demand to be let into the enemy’s lair, some are confident, some heroes are ignorant of what might happen, and get beaten down because of it. Some heroes succeed in the bold approach.

4. The Wizard of Oz’s well-developed Approach: As Dorothy and friends leave the woods on the border of Oz, they are overjoyed at the sight of the Emerald City. As they approach the city, they encounter a series of OBSTACLES and CHALLENGES that bond them, yet test them.

a. Beware of Illusions: 1st put to sleep by field of poppies, Glinda the Good blankets area with snow.

b. Threshold Guardians: Reach the City, but a rude Threshold Guardian (who looks suspiciously like Professor Marvel from Act One) enforces stupid and pointless rules and Dorothy identifies herself as the person who dropped the house on the Wicked Witch of the East. Sentry lets them in. Message: Past experience may be the hero’s passport to new lands, or buildings. The stupid and pointless rules help the reader realize that heroes are not exempt from rules; they still have to prove their worth, even in Special Worlds.

c. Another Special World: You have entered another Special World with other rules and values. There can be many different obstacles in this world as well. There can be mazes, confusion, intimidating sights, people who look all alike, etc. Dorothy’s life in Oz reminds us that she is, ultimately, in a dream world rules by forces of comparison, association, and transformation. Professor Marvel is a single powerful mind, a male energy. Dorothy’s own father is dead or absent and all other male figures she knows, her uncle and the farmhands are weak, she sees much paternal energy in Professor Marvel as an authority figure. Good Witch Glinda is seen as a surrogate mother or maternal figure that rescues her or comforts her.

d. Be Prepared: Dorothy and her friends are prepared for their visit to the Wizard. Message: they must be clean and combed to make them ready. Just like they are warriors, they must be polished and have sharpened their weapons. Or just like students preparing for a final exam, they must be knowledgeable and prepared.

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e. Warning: Everyone is feeling very happy, until, the Witch screeches over the City and skywrites with her broom, “Surrender Dorothy!” Terror is felt. Message: It is good for the Hero to go into the main event confident and balance, but it doesn’t hurt to create that feeling of being on guard and humbled.

f. Another Threshold: Another rude Sentry. His orders are “Not nobody, not nohow” do they get to see the Wizard. Only again the information “the Witch’s Dorothy” convinces him. Message: the Threshold message can be repeated in series. In Fairy Tales, the magic number is three (3) times.

g. Emotional Appeal to a Guardian: The Sentry returns and reports to Dorothy, “Go Away.” Everyone falls apart with emotion. Tears cause the Sentry to repeal. Message: Sometimes when you can’t muscle your way into a situation, try emotion to break down the Threshold Guardians. It creates a bond of human feelings.

h. An Impossible Test: They see Oz, a gigantic head of an angry old man, surrounded by flames and thunder. He agrees to grant your wish if you agree to do something for him. The task seems impossible; Dorothy and her friends are to fetch the broom of the Wicked Witch. Message: Nothing is easy; you have to work for everything good. Dorothy is faced with the negative male energy of the Wizard, the dark side of Dorothy’s idea of a father. She is confused with this feeling, and has to find a way to deal with this anger so that she can proceed. The test remains a test of earning approval from this parent figure to gain love and acceptance.

i. Shamanic Territory: As the heroes get closer to the area surrounding the Wicked Witch’s castle, they encounter more Threshold Guardians in the witch’s creepy servants, the flying monkeys. Lots happen, Dorothy gets kidnapped by the monkeys, the Scarecrow gets dismembered, the Woodsman dented, beaten and scattered. Message: as heroes Approach the Inmost Cave, they should know it can be a life or death situation.

j. Complications: Discouraged and confused after the monkey attack, the Scarecrow, Tin Woodsman, and Cowardly Lion reassemble themselves to proceed onto the course and find Dorothy. This is called dramatic complications.

k. Higher Stakes: Dorothy is trapped in the Witch’s castle, and the Witch mirrors Miss Gulch as she threatens to harm Toto if Dorothy doesn’t hand over the Ruby Slippers. Dorothy agrees to give the Witch the slippers, but Glinda’s protective spell on the slippers zaps the Witch. The Witch realizes that she will not own the Ruby Slippers as long as Dorothy is alive, so she decides to set an hourglass of red sand like dried blood in front of Dorothy, as the sand runs out, so does Dorothy’s life. Message: the stakes raised higher causes the team to rededicate themselves to their mission and becomes more urgent. Toto (being the intuitive side of Dorothy) is stifled but keeps popping up, as encouragement. The Ruby Slippers are a deep dream symbol, a mentor’s gift which separates Dorothy from being ordinary to unique.

l. Reorganization: Toto escapes as he did in Act One, and runs to find the Scarecrow, Tin Man and Lion. He leads them to the castle to helpless Dorothy. Now, they must become the heroes.

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Message: Reorganizing of group, sort out wounded or dead, assign special missions, and clowns or sidekicks change into heroes to rescue the heroine Dorothy, who is now a Victim.

m. Heavy Defenses: Scarecrow, Lion and Tin Woodsman creep up to check out the threshold of the Inmost Cave. It is heavily guarded by an army wearing bearskin hats and gloves and growling. Message: The villain’s headquarters is expected to be defended by animal-like aggressiveness, giving the feeling to the audience that there is no hope of the hero surviving it.

n. Who is the Hero at this Point? The Scarecrow has a plan which involves the Lion looking ferocious, but the Lion is cowardly. Message: The Approach is a time a recalibrate and encourage. There may be arguments, discussions, and even comic relief during this time. The Cowardly Lion’s act to escape responsibility is comic, and really the last chance to laugh before the story gets deadly serious.

o. Get into Your Opponent’s Mind: As the heroes approach the gate to the Witch’s Castle, they have a plan. Three sentries attack them and as a struggle occurs, costumes fly through the air, and the heroes emerge wearing the sentries clothing. Message: Heroes can get “into the skin” of their Threshold Guardians to be like them so that they can get farther into the Inmost Cave to accomplish their mission. They disguise themselves.

p. Breakthrough: The three heroes discard their disguises and make their way to Dorothy. The Tin Woodsman uses his axe to chop through the door. Message: Sometimes you have to let you hero use force to get through resistances.

q. No Exit: Everyone is together, but how do they escape? Message: No matter what happens, at some point all of the exits are blocked, and the party is trapped. With this entrapment, the Approach to the Inmost Cave is complete. This brings the heroes to the next part of the story, the final test and obstacles of the Supreme Ordeal.

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. Campbell says that in myths, the crossing of the First Threshold is often followed by the hero passing through “the belly of the whale.” Can you identify this portion of your book or movie?

2. In your own story, what happens between entering the Special World and reaching a central crisis in that world? What special preparations lead up to the crisis?

3. Does conflict build, and do the obstacles get more difficult or interesting?

4. Do your heroes want to turn back at this stage, or are they fully committed to the adventure now?

5. In what ways is the hero, in facing external challenges, also encountering inner demons and defenses?

6. Is there a physical Inmost Cave or headquarters of the villain which the heroes Approach? Or is there some emotional equivalent?

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Stage Eight: THE ORDEALJAMES BOND: What do you expect me to do, Goldfinger?

GOLDFINGER: Why Mr. Bond, I expect you to die.

- From Goldfinger, a screenplay by Richard Maibaum and Paul Dehn

1. Death and Rebirth: “The simple secret of the Ordeal is this: Heroes must die so that they can be reborn. The dramatic movement that audiences enjoy more than any other is death and rebirth. In some way in every story, heroes face death or something like it: their greatest fears, the failure of an enterprise, the end of a relationship, the death of an old personality.” (Vogler 155-6) Magically, they survive the death and are literally or symbolically reborn; this becomes the passing of the test to becoming a hero.

2. Change: Heroes don’t just visit death and return; they change, transform.

3. The Crisis, not the Climax: This section should NOT be confused with the Climax of the story. This is just another nerve-ending crisis on the way to the climax. The Ordeal is usually the center of the story, or the main event of the Act Two. The climax comes in the Act Three, and becomes the crowning event of the whole story. Webster defines crisis as “the point in a story or drama at which hostile forces are in the tensest state of opposition.” It is like an illness where the fever spikes before the patient gets better. The Message: Sometimes things have to get worse before they can get better. Sometimes this is the only way a hero can recover or become victorious.

4. Placement of the Ordeal: A central crisis could occur in the center of the story or at the beginning of Act Two to allow plenty of time to return from the consequences of the ordeal. A delayed crisis comes near the end of Act Two or two-thirds to three-quarters of the way into the story.

5. Points of Tension: This is the halfway point; everything in the story is leading up to this point. The words crisis, critic, and critical come from a Greek word that means “to separate.”

6. Witness to Sacrifice: Sometimes the point of view may change and another character becomes witness to the death and rebirth of the hero. In Star Wars, R2D2 and C3PO both were witnesses via an intercom while they listened to their heroes being possibly squashed by the giant trashmasher deep in the Inmost Cave of the Death Star. Miraculously and at the last moment, the robots are able to disenable the trashmasher and their heroes are saved. It can be a sudden close call by car or plane, an accident, a near drowning, a fall off a building, etc. that cause that nearness to death make the hero’s life more real.

7. The Elasticity of Emotion: Good structure works alternately lowering and raising the hero’s fortune and thus the audience’s emotion. With that emotion, it is important to think and relay that your hero is growing and changing, getting wiser, stronger, and that every step they are becoming more and more confident.

8. Hero Appears to Die: He/she defies death, only to resurface again.

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9. Hero Witnesses Death or Hero Causes Death: Sometimes the hero may witness the death of someone near to him/her. Maybe it is their mentor and they plunge into a depression of the loss, or they blame themselves for that loss. Maybe it is a friend. But as the hero emerges, they become one with that person, drawing on their memories and teaching as if that person became a part of them. “Trust the Force, Luke.”

10. Facing the Shadow: The hero’s deadly enemy villain, antagonist, opponent, or even a force of nature or even the hero himself. This conflict can be negative or positive manifestations of the Shadow. Sometimes the Shadow can drive the hero to succeed. Sometimes the hero is very much like the Shadow or it could be what the hero doesn’t like about himself, a unexpressed, ignored part of himself.

11. Demonization: This form of projection are all the things that we don’t like about ourselves, those rejected qualities, fears that we sometimes project onto others. This is where our greatest fears are magnified.

12. Death of a Villain: Sometimes the villain dies in Act Two, but there are other forces, or Shadows to deal with before the adventure is over. Dorothy kills the Wicked Witch in Act Two, but faces an ordeal of the spirit: the death of her hopes of getting home in Act Three.

13. The Villain Escapes: The hero may wound the villain, and even hurt, injure or kill the villain’s underling, but the villain himself escapes only to confront him/her again in Act Three.

14. Villains are Heroes of Their Own Stories: You should know your characters well enough now that you can walk in every character’s shoes and feel what they feel. Every character thinks they are heroes in their own story, they think they are right, or just to do what they are doing. They want what they want, and they will do anything to get it, whether your audience views them as being good or bad.

15. How Heroes Cheat Death: Here the hero survives death or harm when others before him/her do not. Here is where the hero could use help from his/her mentor, or a gift that helps them survive, a magic mirror, red shoes, a specific sword, a special form of medicine, etc.

16. Ariadne’s Thread: this is the magic of love, that power that could be telepathic that connects two people together. It could be between lovers, or between parents and their child. The thread is imaginary and invisible but a powerful connection.

17. Crisis of the Heart: The Ordeal can be a crisis of the heart. In a romance, the moment of greatest intimacy creating that desire or even fear. It could also be the hero’s defensiveness, vulnerability. The hero may experience betrayal of the heart or death of a relationship.

18. Sacred Marriage and Balance: The fear and death aspect of walking up to the altar and marrying. Will it work out? Men may seek a feminine nurturing side and women a more masculine, in control side. They work to balance themselves.

19. The Love That Kills: This Ordeal takes the hero to a place of betrayal, abandonment, or disappointment. It’s a crisis of faith in the arena of love. It could come as a shape shifting person

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suddenly shows another side, leaving the hero feeling bitterly betrayed and dead to the thought of love. This could just be a twist in the story. It could be that the lover is protecting the hero by this behavior.

20. Facing the Greatest Fear: For most people this could be death, but for the hero this could be facing their greatest fear: a phobia (snakes, bugs, closed in space, etc.), challenging a rival, or roughing out a storm or a political crisis.

21. Standing up to a Parent: The hero may need to stand up to a parent or adult that is abusive or wrong.

22. Youth versus Age: In Fairy Tales, “struggles with wolves and witches may be ways of expressing conflicts with parents. The witches are the dark aspect of the mother; the wolves, ogres, or giants the dark aspect of the father. Dragons and other monsters can be the Shadow side of a parent or a generation that has held on too long.” (Vogler 171)

23. Death of the Ego: The hero is dead to the old self, and alive to the new self, which is more confident and powerful.

THE WIZARD OF OZ

Dorothy and friends, trapped by the Wicked Witch and her Threshold Guardian army, now face their Supreme Ordeal. The Witch is enraged at them for having penetrated her Inmost Cave and stolen her greatest treasure, the Ruby Slippers. She descends on the foursome and threatens to kill them one by one, saving Dorothy until last.

The threat of death makes the stakes of the scene clear. The audience now knows it’s going to be a battle between forces of life and death.

The Witch begins with the Scarecrow. She lights her broomstick and uses it as a torch to set him on fire. His straw blazes up and it looks like all is lost. Every child in the audience believes the Scarecrow is doomed and feels the horror of death with him.

Dorothy operates on instinct and does the only thing she can think of to save her friend: She grabs up a bucket of water and splashes it all over the Scarecrow. It puts out the fire, but it also wets down the Witch. Dorothy had no intention of killing the Witch, didn’t even realize water would make her melt, but has killed her just the same. Death was in the room, and Dorothy merely deflected it onto another victim.

But the Witch does not just go “poof” and disappears. Her death is protracted, agonizing, and pathetic. “Oh, my beautiful wickedness! What a world, what a world!” By the time it’s over you feel sorry for the Witch, and have had a real taste of death.

(Vogler 172)

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is the Ordeal in your movie, or story?

2. What is the Ordeal in your story? Does your story truly have a villain? Or is there simply an antagonist?

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3. In what way is the villain or antagonist the hero’s Shadow?

4. Is the villain’s power channeled through partners or underlings? What special functions do these parts perform?

5. Can the villain also be a Shapeshifter or Trickster? What other archetypes might a villain manifest?

6. In what way does your hero face death in the Ordeal? What is your hero’s greatest fear?

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Stage Nine: REWARD“We came, we saw, we kicked its (butt).”

- From Ghostbuster, screenplay by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis

With the Ordeal behind us, the hero savors in the pleasure of achievement. It is time to regroup, refresh, and get ready for the celebration and the final Act.

1. Celebration: Eat, drink, celebrate success, and refuel.

2. Campfire Scenes: Gather around with friends, talk about the crisis and your narrow escapes, joke, boast, exaggerate, reminiscence, connect with your audience in a slower pace and with more emotion, tears of joy and happiness, unbelief of feats that were survived.

3. Love Scenes: Heroes don’t really deserve to be loved until they prove that they can sacrifice themselves for the good of others. Now, they may have that first kiss, or dance that makes them appear more lovable.

4. Taking Possession or Seizing the Sword: In this scene the hero gets to take possession of something of value that they run across during the crisis scene. It could be gold, self-control, a secret rune or map, a magic sword, etc.

5. Elixir Theft: the hero may steal a magic elixir that heals every ill, a magical substance that restores life. It is valuable to keep and store away for another day.

6. Initiations: a special invitation into a new group of people or beings. This comes after the hero proves themselves and now they are given newfound information or privileges because they have graduated into a new and higher level of being.

7. New Perceptions and Seeing Through Deception or Clairvoyance: These are new powers that the hero has acquired any deception or disguises. The hero may even acquire the ability to see into the future, become clairvoyant or telepathic. Clairvoyant means “seeing clearly.” All of a sudden, the hero is able to figure out puzzles and put pieces of the puzzle together.

8. Self-realization: The hero sees who they are and how they fit into the scheme of things, they see the times when they were foolish or stubborn. They are now filled with clarity and truth.

9. Epiphany: Epiphany means an abrupt realization of divinity. Others may see the change in the hero, they see that he/she is different – more mature, self-confident, and serious, and worthy of a little more respect. In Percy Jackson, Percy experienced Epiphany when he realized that he was half God/half human.

10. Distortions: In other stories, conquering death may lead the hero to have some distortions, not clarity. They may be suffering with an inflation of ego, a euphoric feeling of being a god, and indestructible.

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THE WIZARD OF OZ

The immediate aftermath of the Ordeal in The Wizard of Oz is an act of Seizing. Instead of a sword, it’s the burnt broomstick of the Wicked Witch that Dorothy takes possession of. Actually she’s much too well-mannered to just grab it; she politely asks for it from the fearsome guards who have now fallen to their knees to show their loyalty to her. Dorothy had good reason to fear they would turn on her after the Witch’s death. But in fact the guards are glad the Witch is dead, for now they are free of her awful slavery. Another Reward of surviving death is that Threshold Guardians may be completely won over to the hero’s side. The guards give her the broomstick gladly.

Dorothy and companions return swiftly to the Wizard’s throne room where she lays the broom before the ferocious floating Head. She has fulfilled her bargain with the Wizard, and completed the seemingly impossible task. Now she and her friends claim their heroes’ Reward.

But to their surprise, the Wizard balks at paying up. He gets furious and argumentative. He is like an old personality structure or a parent that knows it must yield to a maturing offspring but is reluctant to let go, putting up one last fight.

It’s then that the little dog Toto fulfills his purpose in the story. His animal intuition and curiosity got Dorothy in trouble in the first place, when he dug in Miss Gulch’s flower bed. Now they are the instrument of salvation. As Toto noses around behind the throne, he discovers a meek little old man behind a curtain, controlling the monstrous illusion of Oz, the great and powerful. This man, not the bellowing head, is the real Wizard of Oz.

This is a typical post-ordeal realization or moment of insight. The heroes see, through the eyes fo the intuitive, curious Toto, that behind the illusions of the mightiest organization is a human being with emotions that can be reached. (This scene has always seemed to me a metaphor for Hollywood, which tries very hard to be scary and awesome, but which is made up of ordinary people with fears and flaws.)

At first the Wizard professes to be unable to help them, but with encouragement he provides Elixirs for Dorothy’s helpers: a diploma for the Scarecrow, a medal of valor for the Lion, and a windup heart for the Tin Woodsman. There is a tone of satire about this scene. It seems to be saying: These Elixirs are placebos, meaningless symbols that men give each other. Many people with degrees, medals, or testimonials have done nothing to earn them. Those who have not survived death can take the Elixir all day long but it still won’t help them.

The true all-healing Elixir is the achievement of inner change, but the scene acknowledges that it’s important to get outward recognition as well. As a surrogate parent for the lot of them, the Wizard is granting them the ultimate boon of a father’s approval, a Reward that few people get. Heart, brains, and courage are inside them and always were, but the physical objects serve as a reminder.

Now the Wizard turns to Dorothy and says sadly there is nothing he can do for her. He was blown to Oz in a balloon from the Nebraska state fair, and has no idea how to get back home himself. He’s right—only Dorothy can grant herself the self-acceptance to “get home,” that is, be happy inside herself wherever she is. But he agrees to try and orders a big hot-air balloon to be built by the citizens of Oz. the heroes have seized everything except the elusive prize of Home, which must be sought in Act Three. (Vogler 183-4)

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QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is the modern equivalent of a campfire scene in the move or book you are watched or read?

2. What do the heroes of your stories learn by observing death? By causing death? By experiencing death?

3. What do your heroes take possession of after facing death or their greatest fear? Have your heroes absorbed any negative qualities from the Shadow or villain?

4. Does the story change direction? Is a new goal or agenda revealed in the Reward phase?

5. Do your heroes realize they have changed? Is there self-examination or realization of wider consciousness? Have they learned to deal with their inner flaws?

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Stage Ten: THE ROAD BACK“Easy is the descent to the Lower World; but, to retrace your steps and to escape to the upper air – this is the task, this the toil.”

-The Sibyl to Aeneas in the Aeneid

“Once the lessons and Rewards of the great Ordeal have been celebrated and absorbed, heroes face a choice: whether to remain in the Special World or begin the journey home to the Ordinary world.” (Vogler 187)

1. Motivation: Here the hero rededicates him/herself to the adventure. They reached a plateau of comfort in the Reward, but now either by their own inner resolve or by an external force, they must move. Inner resolve may be by motivation of tired troops or pulling together a family after a death or tragedy. An external force might be an alarm going off, a clock ticking, or a renewed threat from the villain. The Road Back causes the Third Act. A new crisis occurs, a fear of retaliation or pursuit because you stole the elixir and they may be dangerous repercussions.

2. Retaliation: Finish your opponent is a valuable lesson taught in Martial Arts. When a Shadow or villain isn’t completely finished, the hero knows that they can come back to get him and be even stronger than they were before. It could be that your hero thought he had killed or taken care of the villain only to find out it was an underling in the Ordeal. An avenging force may hurt the hero, retake back the fortune, or even kidnap a friend or family for ransom which leads the hero to the rescue or chase, or both.

3. Chase Scenes: This is the part in the book where you need to cause some excitement to wake up your reader. Heroes may leave the Special World only because they are being chased and they are running for their lives. The chase becomes the favorite part of the book. Transformation is often an important aspect of chases and escapes. Often heroes may simply disguise themselves to escape a tight situation. He may have to change his behavior or undergo inner transformation (confront a fear) to escape psychological drama.

4. Magic Flight: This type of chase is often found in Fairy Tales. The hero avenges forces by any way possible, by throwing down “protective interpretations, principles, symbols, rationalizations, anything [to] delay and absorb” their power. (Vogler quoting Joseph Campbell 191) Whatever the hero throws down may represent a gift, a sacrifice, a memento, anything of value to the hero.

5. Chase Variations: Pursuit by Admirers This is when the hero is being pursued by an admirer, rather than a hero fleeing a villain. It may be a child or a dog that wants to be with the hero, and so follows them into danger.

6. Villain Escape: Another chase scene may be that the villain has escaped when the hero thought he/she was contained. The villain may escape with the treasure or elixir as well. This leads the hero into a rescue or recovery mode.

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7. Setbacks: This is a twist in the plot. There may be a sudden setback for the hero that makes the whole adventure seem to be doomed. It could be a moment when, after great risk, effort, and sacrifice, all is lost. This moment in the story, the climax of Act Two, may be the Delayed Crisis where there is great tension and feelings of lost hope.

THE WIZARD OF OZ

The Wizard has prepared a hot-air balloon with which he hopes to take Dorothy on The Road Back to Kansas. The people of Oz gather to see them off with a brass band. However, it’s seldom that easy. Toto, seeing a cat in the arms of a woman in the crowd, runs after it, and Dorothy runs after Toto. In the confusion, the balloon wobbles off with the Wizard aboard and Dorothy is left behind, apparently stuck in the Special World. Many heroes have tried to return using familiar means – old crutches and dependencies. But they find the old ways as artificial and difficult to control as the Wizard’s hot-air balloon. Dorothy, guided by her instincts (the dog) knows deep down that this is not the way for her. Yet she is ready to take The Road Back, and keeps looking for the proper branching of the path. (Vogler 193)

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is The Road Back in the story or movie you are watching or reading? These turning points occur in Act Two/Act Three, are they single moments or extended sequences?

2. What have you learned or gained from confronting death, defeat, or danger? Did you feel heroic? How can you apply your feelings to your writing to the reactions of your characters?

3. How do our heroes rededicate themselves to the quest?

4. What is The Road Back in your story? Is it returning to your starting place? Setting a new destination? Adjusting to a new life in the Special World?

5. From the writer’s point of view, what are the advantages and disadvantages of heroes being ejected or chased from the Special World? Of leaving voluntarily?

6. Is there an element of pursuit or acceleration in these sections? In The Road Back section of your own story?

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Stage Eleven: THE RESURRECTION

”What can I do, old man? I’m dead, aren’t I?”

-from The Third Man by Graham Greene

“This may be the trickiest and most challenging passage to write. This is the CLIMAX (not the crisis), the last and most dangerous meeting with death. Heroes have to undergo a final purging and purification before reentering the Ordinary World. Once more they must change… writers must find ways to demonstrate that their heroes have been through a RESURRECTION.” (Vogler 197)

1. A New Personality: a new self must be created for a new world.

2. Cleansing: In Resurrection, the hero must be cleansed of the smell of death, yet they must retain the lessons of the Ordeal.

3. Two Great Ordeals: “The college semester metaphor suggests the reason. The central crisis or Supreme Ordeal, is like a midterm exam; the Resurrection is the final exam. Heroes must be tested one last time to see if they retained the learning from the Supreme Ordeal of Act Two. To learn something in a Special World is one thing; to bring the knowledge home as applied wisdom is quite another.” (Vogler 199)

4. Physical Ordeal: The Resurrection may just be a hero facing death one more time by another ordeal, battle, or showdown. It is often a confrontation with the villain or Shadow. The difference between this battle and the Ordeal is that this threat is not just against the hero but again the whole world. The stakes become a lot higher.

5. The Active Hero: Heroes should be the one fighting; however, they can be assisted by a surprise assistance. But the hero needs to be the one to give the final blow, to be active, rather than passive.

6. Showdowns: A showdown is an act of life or death between villain and hero. A showdown must have its own distinct rules and conventions and must be in a dramatic form.

7. Death and Rebirth of Tragic Heroes: Heroes survive this brush with death and are Resurrected, typically. They can be injured. However, there are occasions when the hero is tragically doomed, but still lives on (Resurrected, in a sense) in others via by memory or even through the hero’s children or child.

8. Choice: Through this Resurrection, the hero is faced with a choice that tests his/her values, or even lessons that they had learned prior to this point.

9. Romantic Choice: A mother’s love, a child, a boy or girlfriend, wife or husband, a parent, a hero must make that Romantic Choice of how to rescue or help them.

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10. Climax: A Greek word meaning “a ladder”. It is an explosive moment, the highest peak of energy or even the last big event in a work.

11. The Quiet Climax: Is a gentle wave of emotion, where there is a sense of conflicts which were resolved harmoniously and tensions were converted to peace and pleasure.

12. Rolling Climaxes: These climaxes may be experienced on different levels of awareness such as mind, body, and emotion. “A hero might go through a climax of mental change or decision which triggers a physical climax or showdown in the material world. This could be followed by an emotional or spiritual climax as the hero’s behavior and feelings change.” (Vogler 202)

13. Catharsis: A climax should give your reader the feeling of catharsis. Catharsis is Greek meaning “Vomiting up” or “purging,” but in English it has come to mean purifying emotional release, or an emotional breakthrough. The climax should create a sudden expansion of awareness, a peak of higher consciousness. It works best where there is a physical expression of emotions such as laughter or crying.

14. Character Arc: A catharsis is the logical climax of a hero’s character arc. Be careful not to build your character suddenly, he/she should be create gradually from bigotry to tolerance, from cowardice to courage, from hate to love. (See attached graph of a typical character arc.)

15. Last Chance: “The Resurrection is the hero’s final attempt to make major change in attitude or behavior. A hero may backslide at this point, making those around think he’s let them down. Hope for that character is temporarily dead, but can be resurrected if he changes his mind. The selfish loner Han Solo is Star Wars turns his back on the final attempt to crack the Death Star, but shows up at the last minute, showing that he has finally changed and is now willing to risk his life for a good cause.

16. Watch Your Step: This may occur as a stumble, a misstep, emotional or physical, but it just adds to the suspense of the Resurrection.

17. The False Claimant: As the hero is claiming his prize, a False Claimant (could be a Shadow) steps in and demands proof of ownership, or credentials, which may seem impossible for the hero to produce.

18. Sacrifice: A Latin word meaning “making holy.” Heroes are often asked to give up something of value, or make a sacrifice of himself. Luke Skywalker gave up some of his comrades as they battled, his Mentor when he was killed, part of his personality: his dependence on machines (Obi Wan’s teaching him to “Trust the Force”) and ultimately part of his body when he loses his hand.

19. Incorporation: “Resurrection is an opportunity for a hero to show he has absorbed, or incorporated, every lesson from every character. Incorporation literally means he has made the lessons of the road part of his body. An ideal climax would test everything he’s learned, and allow him to show that he has absorbed the Mentor, Shapeshifter, Shadow, Guardians, and Allies along the way.” (Vogler 209-10)

20. Change: The importance is to make sure that the change in your story is very visible. It’s not enough to have people around the hero notice the change or talk about it. The audience must be able to see it in the heroes dress, behavior, attitude, and actions. The hero must visibly walk and talk differently.

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In the film Romancing the Stone, the heroine, Joan Wilder goes on an adventure with Jack Colton to defeat villains, rescue her sister, and reclaim the treasure. Joan returns to write a book about the adventure, which clearly became her best book due to the fact that the Ordeals of the Special World made her a better writer. But she looks better also, through the journey she learned to love herself regardless of whether or not some man loves her, and she gained self-confidence that she lacked before.

THE WIZARD OF OZ

The Wizard of Oz, the Resurrection is not as visual as Romancing the Stone in its depiction of how the hero has changed, and yet there is rebirth and learning, expressed in words. The Resurrection of Dorothy is recovering from the apparent death of her hopes when the Wizard accidentally floated off in the balloon. Just when it looks as though Dorothy will never achieve her goal of returning home, there is another appearance by the Good Witch, representing the positive anima that connects us to home and family. She tells Dorothy she had the power to return home all along. She didn’t tell Dorothy because “She wouldn’t have believed me. She had to learn it for herself.”

The Tin woodsman asks bluntly, “What have you learned, Dorothy?” She replies that she’s learned to look for her “heart’s desire” in her “own back yard.” Dorothy has learned that happiness and completion are within her, but this verbal expression of change is not as effective as the visual and behavioral changes you see on the screen in the Resurrection scene of Romancing the Stone. Nevertheless, Dorothy has learned something and can now step up to the last threshold of all. (Vogler 211)

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is the Resurrection in your book or movie?

2. What negative characteristics has your hero picked up along the way? What flaws were there from the beginning that still needs to be corrected? What flaws do you want to preserve, uncorrected? Which are necessary parts of your hero’s nature?

3. What final ordeal of death and rebirth does your hero go through? What aspect of your hero is Resurrected?

4. Is there a need for a physical showdown in your story? Is your hero active at the critical moment?

5. Examine the character arc of your hero. Is it a realistic growth of gradual changes? Is the final change in your character visible in her actions or appearance?

6. Who learns anything in a tragedy where the hero dies, or didn’t learn his lessons?

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Stage Twelve: RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR

“No, Aunt Em, this was a real truly live place. And I remember some of it wasn’t very nice. But most of it was beautiful. But just the same all I kept saying to everybody was ‘I want to go home.’”

- From The Wizard of Oz

The hero has survived, lived through death and now he returns home, or continues his journey. True heroes return from the Special World to the Ordinary World with the Elixir; bring home something for everyone to share, or something to heal a wounded land.

1. Denouement: A French word meaning “untying” or “unknotting” (noue means knot). A story in a denouement may mean “tying up the loose ends”. To end with a denouement, you must tie up old questions, but it is okay to ask new questions; sometimes that is even desirable.

2. Two Story Forms: Circular & Open-ended.

a. Circular: most popular in the Western culture where the story ends with a sense of closure. It can be visual or metaphoric with a replay of a beginning image or a repetition of a dialogue or line in the book.

b. Open-ended: more popular in Asia, Australia, and Europe movies. There is a sense of unanswered questions, ambiguities, and unresolved conflicts. “The open-ended point of view, the storytelling goes on after the story is over; it continues in the minds and heart so the audience, in the conversations and even arguments people have in coffee shops after seeing a movie or reading a book.” (Vogler 218)

3. Achievement of Perfection: Several ways= “they lived happily ever after”, weddings, or striking up a new relationship with another person.

4. Surprise: “A return can fall flat if everything is resolved TOO neatly or just as expected. A good Return should untie the plot threads but with a certain amount of surprise. It should be done with a little taste of the unexpected, a sudden revelation.” “The return may have a twist to it. This is another case of misdirection: You lead the audience to believe one thing, and then reveal at the last moment a quite different reality.” (Vogler 219)

5. Reward and Punishment: Villains should get their punishment that they earn, and heroes should get what is coming to them as well.

6. The Elixir: It needs to be special and have enough power to restore life in the Ordinary World. a. It can be a literal treasure, a substance like medicine, or a special mixture that gives heat to a

frozen world. b. It can be figurative: money, fame, wealth, power, love, peace, happiness, success, health,

knowledge, or having a good story to tell. c. It can be emotional like love, where the hero does not receive it until after the final sacrifice.

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d. Wisdom may be another force that is an Elixir, and the world changes because of it.e. Tragedy where heroes die, or are defeated, brought down by their flaws and the audience talks about the consequences of the errors they made. The audience learns what to avoid, thus they become wiser.

7. Sadder but Wiser vs. Sadder but Not Wiser: Hero acknowledges he is a fool and he learns from this lesson vs. Hero doesn’t learn from his mistakes and he is doomed to repeat them until he does learn.

8. Epilogue: An Epilogue or postscript can be used on rare occasions to complete the story when you need to complete the story by projecting into the future to actually show how the characters turned out.

9. Too Many Endings: KISS system: Keep It Simple, Stupid. Many stories fail because they have too many endings.

10. Focus: Sometimes writers don’t realize it but they can lose track of their theme. Keep the story focused on the theme. It will not seem focused unless your close your story by Returning to the original theme.

11. Punctuation: The final function of Return is to conclude with the proper punctuation. There are four ways: with a period, an exclamation point, a question mark, or an ellipsis (the three or four little dots that indicate your thoughts have just trailed off vaguely.)

a. Period: “Life goes on.” “Love conquers all.” “There’s no place like home.”b. Exclamation point: “We are not alone!” “Something must be done!”c. Question mark: “Will the hero return with the Elixir?” “Will they be forgotten?”d. Ellipsis: “Life goes on… and on… and on…” “She proved she’s not a killer, but….”

THE WIZARD OF OZ

Dorothy’s Return begins with saying goodbye to her Allies and acknowledging the Elixirs of love, courage, and common sense she has gained from them. Then, tapping her heels and chanting “There’s no place like home,” she wishes herself back to Kansas where she started.

Back home in the Ordinary World, back to black and white, Dorothy wakes up in bed with a compress on her head. The Return is ambiguous: Was the trip to Oz “real,” or was it the dream of a girl with a concussion? In story terms, however, it doesn’t matter; the journey was real to Dorothy.

She recognizes the people around her as characters from Oz. But her perceptions of them have changed as a result of her experience in the Special World. She remembers that some of it was horrible, some beautiful, but she focuses on what she’s learned –there’s no place like home.

Dorothy’s declaration that she will never leave home again is not meant to be taken literally. It’s not this little frame house in Kansas to which she refers, but her own soul. She is a fully integrated person in possession of her best qualities, in control of the worst, and in touch with the positive forms of masculine and feminine energy within her. She has incorporated every lesson she has learned from every being along the road. She is finally happy in her

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own skin and will feel at home no matter where she is. The Elixir she brings back is this new idea of home, a new concept of her Self. (Vogler 226-7)

QUESTIONING THE JOURNEY

1. What is the Elixir in the movie your watched or the story your read?

2. What is the Elixir your hero brings back from the experience is your story? Is it kept to herself or is it shared?

3. Does your story go on too long after the main event or climax is over? What would be the effect of simply cutting it off after the climax? How much denouements do your need to satisfy the audience?

4. In what ways has the hero gradually taken more responsibility in the course of the story? Is the Return a point of taking greatest responsibility?

5. Who is the hero of the story now? Has your story changed heroes, or have characters risen to be heroes? Who turned out to be a disappointment? Are there any surprises in the final outcome?

6. Is your story worth telling? Has enough been learned to make the effort worthwhile?

7. Where are you in your own Hero’s Journey? What is the Elixir you hope to bring back?

Vogler, Christopher. The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. Studio City, CA: Michael Wiese

Productions, 2007. Print

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