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[BLUE [offscreen]
Hey Red! You won't believe the morning I had!
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I just fought off an entire horde of...
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...nin..
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..jas...
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Red?
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Hey look! Someone's writing characters based on antiquated stereotypes rather than personal experience!
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Huh. Guess she's not here after all...
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Where on earth is she?
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Huh...
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What's with all these notes conspicuously scattered on the floor?
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Oh, this better not be an apocalypse log...
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Oh no, it's just trope notes.
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Huh. "The Hero's Journey."
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Well, let's give it a shot!
Can't hurt to try.
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[clears voice]
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So...
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'The Hero's Journey' as a codified concept was initially coined by Joseph Campbell in his 1949 book,
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"The Hero with A Thousand Faces"
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After examining a large number of stories and myths from various cultures around the world,
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Campbell analysed the common threads he recognised and came to the conclusion that he had identified
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the fundamental components of the archetypal
hero's journey.
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The idea is that this formula,
this 'monomyth' as he confidently calls it
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covers everything from Gilgamesh and the Buddha, all the way up to modern day
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and can be identified in a large number of stories
in-between.
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Now while, it's cool that so many different stories share common threads...
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(Which you may note, is the definition of a trope in the first place.)
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Campbell went a little overboard on trying to apply the rule to absolutely EVEYTHING in assert that it was the only way hero stories can be told.
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But, of course, no trope is omnipotent, and it's impossible to come to one formula for how all stories since forever have been written.
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For our purposes, let's take a less cavalier approach.
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'The Hero's Journey' is not a trope that all stories do or should follow as a strict formula,
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But rather the trope works best when it serves as a lens through which to view and analyse a story.
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Think of it as a more detailed version of a three-act structure.
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There's no mandate that anyone has to write that way,
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But knowing about it and understanding how it works lets you analyse the story from this perspective
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and potentially identify interesting story components you might have otherwise overlooked.
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And also, like all lenses, you need to make sure that you're not using it to view stuff that doesn't fit.
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Not all stories are hero's journeys.
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And in some cases, looking at a story through the lens of a hero's journey will obscure your view of the parts of the story that don't easily fall into its categories.
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Trope responsibly kids!
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So before the hero's journey was the thing that all the cool heroes were allegedly doing,
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the term for the general 'leave the ordinary world to have an adventure' myth was 'the Medicine Journey'.
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A concept observed in worldwide examples of shamanism
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by University of Chicago professor,
Mircea Eliade who write a few books on the subject.
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The medicine journey serves as the structural foundation of the hero's journey
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with all the other bits basically added in by Campbell for specificity later.
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The basic structure of the medicine journey is the following:
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(1) A problem exists for which there is no solution within our ordinary understanding of the world. (Like our starting culture)
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(2) So the protagonist must travel elsewhere to find the solution.
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(3) And eventually they return with the solution to the problem!
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For instance, the Journey to the West is a medicine journey where the problem is evil and suffering and the solution is Enlightenment.
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The West being the 'elsewhere' Tripiṭaka and friends have to travel to.
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So the hero's journey heavily reflects that original structure of [leave] -> [find solution] -> [come back].
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So Campbell's trope takes the three-part structure of:
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(1) Departure - where the hero leaves the familiar world.
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(2) Initiation - where the hero navigates the unfamiliar world, otherwise known as 'the world of adventure'.
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And (3) Returned - where the hero, well, returns to the familiar world.
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Usually bringing along the stuff they went to the unfamiliar world for in the first place.
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Otherwise, you'll... have a problem.
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Campbell's first major alteration to this trope was to install 'the hero' archetype as the protagonist.
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The medicine journey could have any type of protagonist whatsoever with literally zero caveats.
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It could be a group ...
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... a child ...
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... a squishy human monk with his four monster friends!
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You name it!
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By contrast, 'hero' is a much narrower characterisation
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and it comes with a decent amount of narrative baggage too.
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So we can already see how Campbell was starting to narrow it in here.
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From there, Campbell developed a highly specific and detailed model of the fundamental hero's journey.
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Adding a large number of secondary story elements he observed frequently augmenting the general medicine journey structure.
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He was also using it to try and make sweeping assessments of humanity as a whole,
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(Which is never a good sign in literacy analysis...)
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The problem is that the trope as he outlined it, was way TOO SPECIFIC
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and didn't really apply to all that many things.
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So as a result, it isn't all that useful,
even as an analytical tool.
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Unless you're willing to flagrantly abuse and squish around the text you're trying to analyze to fit it exactly.
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(Which...)
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(Please don't do that.)
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(It makes writers really sad...)
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So since then a lot of people have made their own versions of the model,
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to the point where no two sources on it will fully agree with one another.
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Stripping away a lot of the faff to make it more inclusive and more useful to understand.
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The general rule of thumb nowadays, is that a lot of stories fit Some of the components of the hero's journey.
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But it's meant to be flexible and there shouldn't be pressure to force a story to fit it.
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Again, it's not a recipe,
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It's there to help us understand story structure.
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A lot of writers have serious beef with this trope when taken as mandate because their critics tell them their story needs to fit the hero's journey.
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Which is as needlessly annoying as any,
"Oh man, you got to do this trope!" complaint.
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So we got to tread carefully.
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Okay!
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So, with the origins and several disclaimers out of the way.
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Here is the modern consensus of what approximately
a hero's journey looks like.
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Stage One is the 'Ordinary World'.
This is the hero's starting point.
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It's usually familiar to the audience and is definitely familiar to the hero.
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The purpose of the ordinary world is to give us a 'status quo' to start from.
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And to get our audience personally invested in the comfort the ordinary world provides so the impact of leaving it is strengthened later on.
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As an optional bonus, your hero can be comfortable with their life here, but really yearning for something more
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foreshadowing the inevitable onset of plot.
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Next, they get the 'Call to Adventure',
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where the hero learns that they might need to do something out of the ordinary in order to save their familiar world.
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This stage is sometimes accompanied by
a mentor character,
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your Gandalfs and Obi-Wans,
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But sometimes, they show up later to guide the hero through the unfamiliar world instead.
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This part is identifiable in the original medicine journey structure as the moment your protagonist realises there's a problem that they can't solve internally.
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The next step, 'the Refusal of the Call',
is where the hero doesn't want to go on an adventure.
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and is narratively punished for this.
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Typically their ordinary world is damaged in some way as a result of their refusal to act
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so the hero then recognises that they need to go on the journey, even if it's still semi-reluctant.
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If you have a gruff but fair father figure in your ordinary world,
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the narrative punishment is usually
this dude getting Uncle Ben'ed.
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The 'refusal' is actually semi optional even in this structure because sometimes, heroes are all about adventure and jump at the opportunity instead.
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Again, it's flexible!
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Stage four is when the hero 'Crosses the First Threshold' into the unfamiliar world.
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And the story really gets going!
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Here, the hero makes a conscious and irreversible decision to go on the adventure and crosses through some physical threshold that signifies that.
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Sometimes there are threshold Guardians
to test the hero but that's optional.
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If you're dealing with something like urban fantasy where the natural world is the world of adventure,
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the first threshold is usually the moment where the hero gains the power to see the more adventurous underside of the ordinary world.
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Or is introduced to the secret world and has the urban fantasy rules explains to them.
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In the next step, 'the Realm of Adventure',
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the hero learns how to navigate a world totally different from the ordinary world they started in.
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Sometimes, this involves nifty loot, friends and allies, convenient mentors, etc.
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This is usually a very large portion of the story because
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it's fun and that's what we're all here for!
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Also sometimes, this part of the story has the hero find or at least figure out the solution to the initial problem that they're here to solve.
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Making the problem, 'getting the solution back to the ordinary world'.
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Okay, so this next stage is often the most misunderstood.
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In a lot of cases, it's shoehorned in right before or even during the final fight with the Big Bad,
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which really doesn't do it justice.
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This section is usually called the 'Belly of the Whale', named after that very moment in the story of Jonah.
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It's where the hero descends into an abyss or in one way or another "goes down"
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and undergoes a psychological trial during their darkest hour.
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In the classical Greek and Roman tradition, this part of the story is known as the 'Kathabasis [κατάβασις]'.
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Literally "going down", and usually constitutes a trip to the Underworld.
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Here the physical symbolism of descent is meant
to clue the reader in to what's going on thematically
inside the hero's head.
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Anyway, here the hero has to face and overcome
their inner demons.
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And they emerge as a stronger and better person for it.
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Now to be clear, the hero doesn't need to be in
any physical danger for this portion of the story
to be effective.
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And it can even be more effective when the danger is explicitly coming from inside the hero instead.
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It's essentially the mental internal climax of the story, and it prepares the hero for the trials to come.
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Sometimes this is phrased as 'rebirth', since the hero is different when they emerge from 'the whale'.
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(But I personally find that this implies too much of a physical component which just gets confusing...)
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The key purpose of the stage is that the hero undergoes character development.
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In any case, this is a major turning point in the hero's journey.
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And usually marks the point where the hero is fully committed to the adventure and prepared for the dangers ahead.
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Stage seven is the 'Road of Trials',
the path out of the belly of the whale.
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Usually this part coincides with the appearance of a lot of tests, allies and enemies.
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This usually includes a temptation to 'leave your quest' test where the hero is tempted to abandon their journey.
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Campbell's version calls this, 'the woman as temptress' and gives it an entire section
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but since that notion is more than a little antiquated...
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most people agree that any form of temptation, be it money, power, lust or even just a good night's sleep,
will do the trick!
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The road of trials is also frequently a large part of the story because, again, it's fun!
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And it's also really cool because since the hero has escaped the abyss,
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you get to see your hero as a full hero
with their act together now!
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Stages 5 through 7 can be seen as one contiguous act.
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Since it's usually quite long and makes up most of the meat of the actual adventuring.
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Your heroes having wacky trials in Adventureland!
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What more do you need?
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The next stage is the 'Pre-Showdown Breather',
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Where you're coming up on the final confrontation against the physical or metaphorical Big Bad,
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So your hero or heroes take
a quiet moment to reminisce.
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This one is also optional because sometimes you just straight-up don't get that minute to breathe.
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Such is life.
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This gives your writer the chance to show off the humanity of the characters involved
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Which actually exposes some of the difficulties caused by the hero's journey.
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Since, ideally, you don't need a designated chapter to remind your readers that these characters are
fully developed characters.
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Usually you want that to be on full display for most of the story!
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But the hero's journey is a plot driven structure which can easily supersede the unique characterisation
of the characters involved.
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The next stage is 'The Climax' of the story and it can come in at least one of three flavors.
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The Final Showdown,
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The Apotheosis,
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And the Ultimate Boon.
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And most stories will just put two or more of these together in some capacity because
that just gives you more options.
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The most standard version of this is the Final Showdown,
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where the hero fights an overwhelmingly powerful enemy and the hero then defeats the Big Bad!
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Frequently through some form of self-sacrifice.
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In the Apotheosis [ἀποθέωσις],
which is Greek for "the elevation to godhood",
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the hero comes to view the world in a radically different way due to some revelation or received knowledge.
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Either that or they get a new power.
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Finally there's the Ultimate Boon,
where the hero attains their final reward,
which they've been seeking all along.
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Sometimes there's a final temptation to overcome first, but again, optional.
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In a lot of our media today, the climax to an adventure story almost always includes some big fight
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but there are a lot more ways to go about writing a narrative climax that get brushed aside
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because honestly, they're just more difficult and people are lazy.
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But their rarity makes reading a good non-fight climax, more rewarding!
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What kind of climax your story ultimately has depends in large part on what kind of story you're tying to tell
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and what you want the reader to see as valuable!
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Whether that's a heightened knowledge of the world.
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Victory over the forces of evil.
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Or some gift that will make the ordinary world a better place, is all up to you.
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After the climax, we get Stages 10 through 12,
which all happen in fairly quick succession.
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The first of which is 'The Return',
where the heroes all done with the adventure and
needs to start heading home.
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This can be a high-octane chase or a slow sedate and contemplative journey back.
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Next the hero 'Crosses the Return Threshold' and makes it back into the ordinary world.
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Lastly, there's the 'Final Reward',
the hero's happy ending.
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Here, the hero is back in the ordinary world!
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And not only is the hero, a better and stronger person for their journey
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but the world itself has usually been improved in some way as well.
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This sometimes gets coded as the hero returning with an elixir which is of course taken directly
from the medicine journey.
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Where this is the part where the protagonists return to the world with the solution to the problem that sent them on the journey in the first place.
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So that's pretty much the Hero's Journey.
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And while I doubt there are too many stories that tick all the check-boxes,
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I'm sure you recognised a few of these stages from at least a handful of stories.
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It's not a one-size-fits-all guide to how to write the perfect story
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because if you wrote a story that exactly follows this, it would feel ridiculously generic.
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But there are a lot of useful components to be found here, if we look at the stages in isolation.
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For example, the Ordinary World is super useful because it establishes a comfortable status quo that your audience and hero will want to return to.
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When that world is threatened, you can discuss the visceral discomfort of a disrupted status quo
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and a story that takes place in that zone of discomfort will be by necessity, uncomfortable for your audience
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who will be waiting with bated breath for things to be fixed!
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Also because you establish it as comfortable and familiar for your hero,
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your audience will potentially empathise with this and feel similarly driven to protect it when it comes under fire.
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The Refusal of the Call is useful because it addresses the fact that most adventures [are] dangerous and scary!
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See, most real-life endeavours or adventures like activism, public performance or just anything where it feels like there's stuff to lose
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are frequently undesirable until and unless they become highly personal to the active party.
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So the feeling of being pulled between the desire to do the right thing and the fear of the possible consequences is relatable for most of your audience.
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Overall, the Stages establishes that your character isn't
just a vehicle for the plot and isn't necessarily
a willing participant in your story.
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But note that the Stages aren't always necessary and can sometimes feel like a disingenuous token protest.
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And "Oh, I couldn't possibly" from the hero before the plot really gets going
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The Realm of Adventure has one major thing
going for it.
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It's different!
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That's a very useful starting point!
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And because you establish that your hero starts in a familiar Ordinary World,
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you can show off this new, fancy world to your audience as much as you like.
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Since they'll be just as clueless about it as your heroes will be.
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You can display your world building for all to see,
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Which is convenient if you're a specially enthusiastic world builder.
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This works as a contrast with the ordinary world and can't function without it.
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Since without the Ordinary World, the Realm of Adventure is just...a world.
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Establishing its difference from the norm lets you explore it fully without this feeling
like a contrived info dump.
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The 'Belly of the Whale' is interesting because challenging your heroes is good.
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Doing that physically is fine but challenging them mentally is frequently more interesting.
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Usually because it has a more uncertain outcome.
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From a meta perspective, most heroes can't really afford to lose a physical fight, if death's a possible outcome.
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But your heroes can absolutely fail a mental trial.
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The only consequence is their
mental health and well-being!
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That means angst, angst, ANGST!
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As well as tons of opportunities for
character development.
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Your hero emerges from the Belly of the Whale when they finally succeeded in their mental tasks.
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But this doesn't necessarily have to be easy or quick
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and they can even have adventures while still super messed up.
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Sometimes the Belly of the Whale is more of a state of mind than it is a physical location.
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The Pre-Showdown banter lets your heroes chill a bit,
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which is good because we always have to remember that these characters are human.
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Again, it's easy to get caught up in the story you want to tell on the adventure you want to write.
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But if it's nonstop action, your characters and your audience will get exhausted.
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Pacing is super important!
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Let your heroes take a minute to recuperate.
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Let your audience hit the bathrooms
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Or take a nap, or something!
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All emphasis is no emphasis.
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The high octane adventurer loses its impact if
you never have the slow subtle stages.
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It also doesn't really have to happen
right before the big showdown.
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Breathers can honestly happen anywhere!
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This whole thing is more of a structural reminder
that pacing really matters.
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For the Return/Final Reward, your adventure ends eventually and while not all stories end back where they started
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there's a melancholic victory in doing it that way.
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Your hero's home, but is it home anymore?
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Consider the ending of Lord of the Rings.
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They return to the Shire but they can never go back to who they were before the adventure.
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For Merry and Pippin, this is good. They're stronger, taller, more bad-ass!
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For Sam, he's braver and can probably get his reward of raising a family,
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But for Frodo, the Shire can never be his home again.
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He can only get the rest he deserves by leaving Middle-earth entirely.
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Because... you can't always go home again.
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It's a good way to give the story a bittersweet ending as well as explore what an ending should be like.
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Also does their story even NEED to end?
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Maybe this is only the first of many adventures!
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Maybe even though they've finished the adventure,
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they now know that they can't just sit idly by
when stuff goes wrong.
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Maybe when they return, the adventure continues!
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'The End' doesn't have to be the end.
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And for something extra to think about,
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the 'hero' is a vague archetype but it still has fairly rigid components.
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When really the hero of the story can be almost anyone.
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Campbell implies a strict hero character,
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but really the only trait that the hero needs in the structure is that they're usually naive when it comes to the unfamiliar world.
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Which is reasonable.
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Look no further than Red's other Trope Talks to see much, much more about how you can really play with
the hero character!
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So, there's really nothing wrong with this trope intrinsically as it helps us understand a multitude of excellent stories from all over the world,
00:18:01
but it shouldn't GUIDE your writing on its own.
00:18:04
It's similar to the Rule of Three in that it's more of a recurring concepts than a trope people deliberately invoke.
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But in another similar vein to the Rule of Three, people tend to think it's more structurally vital than it really needs to be.
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You can write an excellent hero story without needing to use the hero's journey model.
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Just look at Captain America, which has exactly ZERO elements of the classic hero's journey!
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Tellingly, most modern versions of this model explicitly state that any number of component parts can and usually are excluded from the final product.
00:18:35
Which is great because with this generator that we hooked up to Campbell's grave,
00:18:38
we can power the entire Eastern Seaboard with how fast he's spinning!
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Ultimately, it's good to be aware of it.
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And there's a lot of useful stuff included in it.
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Plus, once you know how to look for it,
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Much like the Rule of Three,
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It is everywhere!
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But it doesn't dictate how you HAVE to write and it's nowhere near universal.
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So don't do anything for the sake of just doing it.
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Do it if it helps you tell YOUR story.
00:19:01
[RED]
AHH!
00:19:02
[BLUE]
Woah!
00:19:02
[RED]
Dude, you would not believe the afternoon I just had!
00:19:05
[BLUE]
Where have you been?! I just did a whole--
00:19:08
[BLUE]
Never mind!
00:19:09
[BLUE]
What is that?
00:19:10
[RED]
An elixir, I think...
00:19:11
[RED]
It seemed important that I return with it.
00:19:14
[BLUE]
Huh.
00:19:15
[RED]
Also, did you know this bookcase has been a foot
away from the wall the whole time!?
00:19:18
[RED]
So yeah...
00:19:22
(and we never get that ninja story)
