Sunday 27 September 2020

Hero's Journey - Episode III: The Return

Once the Hero has gone through his initiation, found his treasure or defeated the villain, he still has to return.

Just like Bilbo had a challenge of dragging the dragon Smaug's treasure back home. It wasn't a simple task and the worst challenges, such as The Battle of Five Armies, were still ahead.

The Return from Hero's Journey can be as tough for the audience as to the Hero. It's not a coincidence that third parts of movie trilogies are usually concidered the worst.

The story must come to a conclusion as the Hero must return from his Journey. Though the Hero is now a master of his trade, so are his opponents. He still must overcome them, to return triumphant.

So no rest for the wicked. It's time to Return

1: Refusal of the Return

Just like with call to Adventure, the Hero, who has now grown to his full potential, has a hard time getting out of his comfort zone.

The Dark Knight Rises showed us a broken man, who used to be Batman. Now he was neither Batman or Bruce Wayne. Though a new threat lurked Gotham City, he refused to return before Bane showed himself by attacking Wall Street (or whatever it's called In this version of Gotham).

2: The Magic Flight

As said, the Hero has now all his powers. But so does the Villain. The Hero has to flee or fight.

There are many literally example, like Frodo's Rescue from Mount Doom, as well as Bastian's flight on the back of Falkor. Both of these examples are In the next phase.

Harry Potter also got out of Gringotts, the most secure bank of The Wizarding World, on the back of the dragon that was guarding its vaults.

3: Rescue from Without

Once again, the Hero needs to outside help, when all the odds are against him.

Like Frodo, who after successfully destroyed The Ring In Mount Doom, needed to be saved by the Eagles.

The movie Neverending Story showed an interesting version of the Hero's Journey, where The actual Journey was taken by the warrior Atreyu, but the actual Hero was a boy reading his quest.

As Atreyu failed his Mission of stopping the Nothingness wiping his world from existing, it was this boy, Bastian, who had To save the world of Fantasia. This was literally Rescue from Without. 

4: The Crossing of the Return Treshold

As he had To begin his Journey by Crossing the first Treshold into unknown, the Hero now has to cross the final one into the old world, where he left from.

The challenge is to fit his wisdom and powers to the normal world.

It was fitting that Luke Skywalker returned to his home planet of Tatooine as a fully skilled Jedi Knight, to save his friend Han Solo, whose Hero's Journey now needed resquing from Without.

In Lord of The Rings book, Frodo and his Hobbits friends returned to The Shire very changed, only to see that the old Shire was changed beyond recognition by Saruman.

5: Master of the two worlds

As The Hero has finally overcome all his obstacles and has reached balance with his powers and the normal world.

Luke Skywalker is once more the best example, as he was fully powered Jedi Knight In the end, but also shared the world with his friends.

Katniss Everdeen had To live with her pain after surviving Hunger Games and killing president Coin, before she became a full tyrant.

Life of The Mocking Jay wasn’t easy, but neither was motherhood. All it took was survival. And that's what Katniss was master of. Balance of these two were what brought Katniss to the next, and final phase.

6: Freedom to Live

Now The Hero has reached balance and learned to live In the now. The Journey has reached its end

Just as Katniss had learned to live with her traumas and provide a better world to her children, Luke had To burn Darth Vader's armor to fully free his father Anakin Skywalker.

Sam Gamgee earned perfectly his freedom, after saying farewell to Frodo, who continued to the Gray Havens. Sam on the other hand returned home, living happily ever after with his family. There he edited Frodo's memoir of their Journey, called Lord of The Rings.

In Conclusion...

Now that this three-part Journey has come to an end, I really hope you've enjoyed reading it. There are countless more examples, as Hero's Journey has been around for thousands of years and will be around for thousands more.

Stories and Heroes either become legends or fade into oblivion, as times change, but their Journey remains the same. It's the perfect story. The stuff myths are made of.

If you enjoyed this, please share. Also, whatever examples you have In mind, Please comment below.

Thanks for reading!

-Alex

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