If you’ve ever seen a Star Wars movie (just say yes), you’ve probably heard George Lucas proclaim he made deliberate use of Joseph Campbell’s monomyth theory when he wrote his script. Over the past several decades, the idea that most great myths and epics follow a similar structure has grown to nauseating levels of popularity. The “hero’s journey” is now consciously followed in everything from Hollywood movies to Playstation RPGs to Harry Potter novels. You can also apply it to anime series, as I’ll do here for the excellent summer ’06 anime Ouran High School Host Club.
But what exactly is the hero’s journey? How does does it work for anime that run for hundreds of episodes? And does it make any sense at all to utilize principles of Western myth when discussing Eastern pop culture? In this post I’ll use examples from Ouran to illustrate the initial stages of the hero’s journey.
The Hero’s Journey
Campbell published his ideas in a 1949 book called The Hero with a Thousand Faces, but the concept of the “hero’s journey” didn’t really enter popular culture until Star Wars came along. The hero’s journey consists of the story steps or stages that Joseph Campbell identified as universal in most classical myths and legends and beyond — everything from the Iliad to Dante’s Inferno to Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. The hero’s journey consists of the 12 different stages that follow a hero’s journey from the Ordinary World when the story begins, to the hero’s separation from society in order to perform an important task, and her* reintegration into society.
Important: Stories do not necessarily contain every step of the hero’s journey. Steps can be performed in a different order or skipped entirely. Otherwise, every story would be the same and series like FLCL would never get made. Just because there’s a structure doesn’t mean we can or should slavishly adhere to it 100% of the time.
Campbell’s book is somewhat academic and overly specific in places, which is why other writers rushed in to popularize and smooth out the general concept. Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey is one of the more well-known books for writers about the hero’s journey, so I intend to mostly follow its outline here. (If that book sounds familiar, it’s because I also referred to it in my heroes post a couple months back.) If you’re a fiction writer, you probably own a copy of Vogler’s book already, in which case turn to page 18 and follow along.
1) Ordinary world
The ordinary world is where the hero begins her journey. It may be a home, a school, or just a state of mind. The ordinary world usually contains a flaw — some challenge or annoyance that the hero faces in her daily life, or something she’s not quite succeeding at. In a fish out of water story, we show the fish in the water first. It sets up a great contrast when we move to the “Special World” of the story later on. In Fullmetal Alchemist, the Ordinary World is the comfortable, safe cottage the brothers live in with their beloved mother. The incipient problem? Their mother is dying of an illness. In Cowboy Bebop, the Ordinary World is the spaceship in which Spike and Jet live — no kids, no women, and no strings attached. The problem? Spike and Jet are so low on money they can’t even afford beef for supper.
Ouran High School Host Club: A dowdy, grumpy, and geeky Haruhi shuffles into the third music room looking for a place to study and an escape from all those rich, frivolous students….
2) Call to adventure
The call to adventure is what grabs the hero by the collar, shakes her, and shouts, “Wake up! There’s something more out there!” It presents the hero with a “problem, challenge, or adventure” that won’t allow the hero to remain in her Ordinary World anymore. The “CTA” makes clear what’s at stake. In Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru, the Call occurs when Mizuho reads his grandmother’s last request to attend an all-girl’s high school. In D.N.Angel, the Call happens when Daisuke first shapechanges into the angelic alter-ego Dark.
Ouran High School Host Club: Haruhi breaks the vase, incurring a debt she will struggle to repay…
3) Refusal of the call
Do heroes like leaving their safe, comfortable Ordinary World? No way! The Refusal of the Call happens because most heroes want to stay home. The Special World is too dangerous, too unknown, too scary. Of course, Willing Heroes may skip this step entirely — they’re rarin’ to go. Other heroes will have to be motivated by events in the plot to accept the Call. But if the Refusal were successful, we wouldn’t have a story. In Fullmetal Alchemist, Ed doesn’t accept Roy Mustang’s offer to take the State Alchemy exam right off the bat. He has to be convinced first. In Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru, Mizuho naturally refuses at first to attend a girl’s school.
Ouran High School Host Club: “You’re going to be our dog until graduation,” Kyouya says with cool and sinister smile. Haruhi is shocked and reluctant, but she eventually agrees to join the club in order to repay her debt…
4) Mentor
It’s very common to introduce a mentor character at this point in the story. The Mentor can be a source of reassurance to the hero, offering advice, help, and sometimes even magical equipment to speed her on her way. The mentor/student relationship is “one of the most common themes in mythology”, but the mentor can only do so much. The hero must face danger alone. Stories can have multiple characters that act as a mentor, or no mentor at all. In Fullmetal Alchemist, Roy Mustang provides both the Call to Adventure and helpful advice (“Get on that train! Now!”). In Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru, Mariya provides Mizuho with makeup and wardrobe advice to better imitate a girl.
Ouran High School Host Club: The Hosts prepare Haruhi for her new role with gifts of a new uniform, haircut, and contact lenses. Tamaki offers advice on comportment….
5) First threshold
The hero commits to the adventure. Crossing the threshold occurs when the hero agrees to enter the Special World. This step is very often an actual journey, but it could be as simple as the hero agreeing to confront the problem raised in the Call to Adventure. This concludes Act I of the story. In Fullmetal Alchemist, the brothers Ed and Al take a train to Central in order to take the State Alchemy exam. In Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru, Mizuho travels to the all-girl’s school and meets with the headmistress to enroll.
Ouran High School Host Club: Haruhi commits to being a Host and dons her new seifuku for the first time…
6) Tests, allies, and enemies
Now past the threshold and firmly in Act II of the story, the hero begins to learn the rules of the Special World. She meets a number of new characters, both allies and enemies, and faces new challenges that test her abilities, reveal her personality, and illustrate the rules of the Special World. Vogler points out that scenes in a bar, cantina or other “watering-hole” are very common at this stage, as they’re natural mixing places where it’s common to encounter new people from all walks of life. The hero may be on a journey, as in Fullmetal Alchemist where the Elric brothers travel throughout Amestris, alternately solving problems and raising a ruckus wherever they go. Because anime series are episodic, the Tests, Allies and Enemies stage usually occupies most of the episodes.
Tests: Haruhi appears in the third music room in her new role. Will she succeed at charming her first customers?
An enemy will spice things up
With allies like these, the Special World doesn’t seem so bad…
Next time
As you probably noticed, I’ve only covered 6 of the 12 steps of the hero’s journey. Next time I’ll cover the second half using a different anime, from the Approach to the Inmost Cave to the Return with the Elixir. I’ll also discuss whether it makes sense to apply a Western concept like Campbell’s monomyth to Eastern pop culture, and some alternate ways of analyzing stories.
* Note on language
I will occasionally use the feminine pronoun (she/her/hers) for convenience, but a hero can be a man or a woman. In case you did not know that.
Further reading
Vogel, Christopher (1992). The writer’s journey: Mythic structure for storytelling & screenwriters. Michael Wiese Productions: Studio City, CA.
13 Comments
* Note on language
I will occasionally use the feminine pronoun (she/her/hers) for convenience, but a hero can be a man or a woman. In case you did not know that.
I have to disagree. A hero is by definition, male. The female equivalent is a heroine.
That is all.
(waits to be corrected and publicly humiliated)
I’m not sure whether this would be considered a spoiler, since it IS about a book that’s been out for over half a century, but wasn’t one of the major points about the Mentor figure in the monomyth that they had to step aside (or be put aside) in order for the Hero protagonist character to shine?
I’m not sure how far Campbell’s book dealt with the various methods for the removal of the Mentor from the spotlight, ranging from being killed off (as in Star Wars or Lord of the Rings, even though it was technically only temporary) to simply ignoring them for the rest of the story. It’ll be interesting to see the monomyth theory applied to various anime, and the variations they bring to the table.
@Lupus: I use the word “hero” for clarity and conciseness. The “Hero’s Journey” is a specific literary term; there is no such thing as a Campellian “Heroine’s Journey”. Other writers have identified a monomyth theory for specifically female protagonists (“Containment”, “Transformation”, “Emergence”), but the important thing is the gender of the hero does not matter for any of them. I used the masculine pronoun for my heroes post and no one minded that I included some female characters in that list…
@DKellis: You make a good point about mentors. I may have to cover them in more detail in a future post. The unfortunate fate of mentors tends to be that they drop dead at some point in the story. It’s good drama and lets the hero demonstrate some growth. However, characters can take on various guises and roles throughout a story, which is good news for Tamaki in Ouran. He’s only a mentor for a short time
I’d definitely feel nervous if I was a grey-haired octogenarian guiding a young lad on an epic quest to defeat evil, though.
Mentors don’t HAVE to drop dead – they just have to be removed, somehow. In OtoBoku, Mariya is removed as a mentor by the introduction of Shion (who in turn gives Mizuho some advice before being shuffled off into a background role by the writers) and Mariya’s own feelings for Mizuho. With Ouran, the mentor is revealed as a real idiot (Tamaki) and then she just refuses to take advice from any of them… not that she really NEEDS to; as they note in the first episode, she’s naturally charming and is able to keep girls’ attention just by being herself.
However, parts of the Journey don’t apply to Ouran, just because it never really ends in the course of the anime series… and Bisco Hatori herself has stated they’re ignoring things like grade advances, so as to simplify the plotwhich in turn suggests there’ll be no easy resolution to the tale.
At the same time, her allies here can at times be her enemies or tests as well – witness Ep 16 with the Hikaru/Haruhi date, or Ep 8 with the beach incident…
I’m just fascinated you’re putting a whole other analysis onto the usual anime blog entries. I bet not that many anime blog readers have read Campbell at all.
@Haesslich – I was being humorous about mentors. They don’t always die, especially in light comedies/romances like Ouran, but their shelf-life isn’t all that great either
You’re right that parts of the Journey don’t really apply to Ouran. That’s why I stopped midway through the hero’s journey in this post. The Ouran anime does have a concluding arc I could have used, but I didn’t think it made the best illustration for the remaining steps.
The role of Hikaru/Kaoru is a little more complicated. I wouldn’t call them allies. They’re “jester” characters who delight in stirring up trouble for their own amusement, but they’re not especially antagonistic. I’d count them more as rivals, using the word “rival” in a looser, storytelling sense. A rival is a character who doesn’t outright oppose the hero’s goal but introduces all sorts of irritances, challenges, and delays. Hikaru/Kaoru are troublemakers, but they’re not as antagonistic as an actual enemy would be. In the beach episode, I’d argue the true antagonist is Tamaki, who opposes Haruhi’s desire to be recognized without regard for her gender — the plot seems to boil down to this conflict. Kaoru and Hikaru’s competition to find out Haruhi’s secret fear is more of a humourous sideshow irritant.
I’d argue that most of the cast ends up being rivals or enemies to Haruhi at one point or another, with the sole exceptions of Mori/Hunny (I tend to pair them up, since they almost always appear as a unit), and MAYBE Kyouya. We don’t see any signs of Haruhi returning from that Special World, or returning her gift to others, as Campbell’s monomyth suggests happens in most cases, due to Hatori’s desire to avoid resolving the issues at all… and the fact that Haruhi herself cannot bring everyone into the Special World with her, due to the nature of it – rich versus common folk is a situation she cannot rememdy; at most she can return herself to a normal life, or at least an upper-class life unless she marries into the ‘nobility’ as represented by Ouran.
That makes a lot of sense, and was pretty interesting, too. *goes to try it on random other things for fun*
Haesslich – I agree with you about the Special World, which is the world of rank, wealth and privilege Haruhi finds herself surrounded by after joining the Host Club. Her deadpan common sense and irritation with waste and frippery make a great contrast with the silliness of the other hosts. Keep in mind that heroes don’t necessarily have to return to the Ordinary World — see my heroes post for some examples — but they do need to make a conscious choice to stay in the Special World, and hopefully gain some wisdom by it, too.
As for the ‘elixir’ or knowledge that Haruhi will bring back with her to the Ordinary World… I get the feeling, which is supported by a couple of scenes in the manga, that during her stay in the Special World Haruhi is gaining insight into not just the privileges but also the burdens of having money. Her goal is to become a successful lawyer like her mother, and enrolling in a school like Ouran means she’s aiming to enter the elite ranks. Haruhi has made a few comments about the difficulty of preserving your own self-worth and self-sufficiency when others have such a great ability to put you in their debt.
“As for the ‘elixir’ or knowledge that Haruhi will bring back with her to the Ordinary World… I get the feeling, which is supported by a couple of scenes in the manga, that during her stay in the Special World Haruhi is gaining insight into not just the privileges but also the burdens of having money. ”
Perhaps the elixir is merely the ability to realize that she’s not alone, and that she doesn’t have to do everything alone. It’s also the realization of the knowledge that she has friends and even a potential love interest.
(I refer to the anime. I have no idea how the manga ends…
)
Great post btw, something different very very thoughtful and interesting reading. While I’ve never read Campbell’s book, there has been some literature about that focus on the subject of archetype (I think the person who raised this idea is Jung). The Hero is an archetype, and the whole Hero’s Journey is some kind of story prototype: ie, something that recurs across genres, cultures, worlds, countries and languages. Certainly the anime genre has lots of Hero’s Journey stories. Probably the only prototype more popular is the bash-bash got-whacked grow-stronger bash-bash got-whacked grow stronger prototype.
I’m not really knowledgeable about these things, but the post and comments certainly make interesting reading!
Briar – I think you could be right about Haruhi learning she isn’t always alone. I totally forgot about that, but it’s probably her biggest area of potential character growth. Great insight.
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