A child named Alana talks through why characters are good or bad in stories like Harry Potter, Narnia, and Roald Dahl. She notices that good usually wins in books but not always in real life, and that villains often choose their badness or are cursed into it.
Hey Alana, how are you?
I'm good, how are you?
I'm well, I'm well. So, um, I was thinking about, um, you know, last time when we talked about your story, Abigail Williams, we towards the end we started thinking of, um, kind of the, the good versus— I think we got to good versus evil. Medusa, remember we were talking about how Medusa wanted to control things and therefore I don't know, how would you describe Medusa as a bad character?
Maybe how I would describe her— well, I don't think it's her fault that she has that stone gaze. Maybe she's just mad that she got cursed by, I think, Oh yeah, I think it was Athena. Maybe she's mad, so she wants revenge or something like that. Um, but yeah, she maybe wants to control other people so like they can be in her possession so she can use them for other things.
So it sounds like you don't want to blame her. You're saying it's not her fault. Um, and yet Abigail Williams and all of her fellow hero kids. Is it fair to call them hero kids?
Sure.
Okay, Abigail Williams and her hero kids, they're all about fighting Medusa, right?
Yeah.
So they're the good guys. Can we say they're the good guys and Medusa and her side are the bad guys?
I think so.
Okay, and I was kind of comparing it to, you know, Enrolled Doll. Usually there are kids that are good guys, and there also can be kids that are bad guys. Sometimes there are adults that are bad guys. Are there adults that are good guys in Roald Dahl?
There's Willy Wonka.
He's definitely a good guy.
There's No, um, there's Danny's dad. I don't know his name. Um, there's the Twits. Do you think the Twits are kind of evil?
You know, I don't remember them, so remind me who they are and what they're like. What do they do?
Oh, they're like nasty little humans, and Mr. Twit has this big shaggy beard that goes down to like here. Here, and then he's got hair all over his head, and he's very, very tricky. And Miss Twit has a glass eye that she can pop out and pop right in, and she— they're both just kind of weird, and they do nasty little tricks to each other to get payback from the tricks that the other person did to them. Go ahead. I think they're kind of bad, and in the end of the book they got the payback. They got payback by the monkeys and the birds.
Mm-hmm. Okay, sounds like they're bad characters.
Okay, sounds like, um, and also some bad characters are Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker.
Mm-hmm. Um, okay, that makes a lot of sense. Roald Dahl has funny characters. He's really clever about, um, his bad characters. Yeah, funny. And so Narnia— in Narnia, I forget who are the bad— there's like the White Witch or something. Who are the bad guys in Narnia?
Um, there's— sorry, you know, I for— Yeah, I know that there's different bad guys. There's Jadis, the White Witch. I'm just like, there's this whole tribe that's kind of the bad guys. I just, I forget what it's called, but in each book there's a map of Narnia, so maybe I could check.
Is, would you say the White Witch is sort of the head bad guy?
I think so, because she's the first witch She's the first bad guy, which was in the first book.
Do you think she's the most powerful bad guy?
Um, I think so. Like, she also— like, the White Witch, I think, is just Jadis, and she has all those cool icy witchy powers.
Is— and the lion What's the lion's name again? I should remember.
Aslan.
Aslan. Is Aslan fighting the White Witch directly or indirectly?
Um, I think so, but in the movie I think he kills her.
Okay, so I'm just sort of thinking of the good versus bad side of lots of things. In Harry Potter, it seems like there are a bunch of bad characters. Um, would you say there's just a bunch of characters in Harry Potter?
Um, I think Voldemort is the lead— or sorry, you know who is the lead bad guy, and all his Death Eaters are kind of bad guys, but they're being possessed by him. I think Dolores Umbridge is kind of like a bad guy.
So do you think that all of these good versus bad—
Sirius Black is not a bad guy.
Uh-huh.
Um, I definitely think that Sirius is not a bad guy.
Um, and then in Lord of the Rings, uh, do we know who are the bad guys in Lord of the Rings?
Um, I don't know. I don't think I've read or watched the movies, much of it.
Oh, okay. I thought you knew those stories, but not— have you started any of the stories, reading them?
Um, I think one time I watched a movie.
Okay, um, my internet is not very good. Can you hear me very well?
Yes, I can.
Okay, I'm moving because I'm trying to get better internet. So do any of these, um, good versus bad, uh, would you say that, um they are similar anyway, or is every good versus bad story kind of different?
Um, um, I think everyone is kind of a little different because like it all has their own like either silly or sad or bad story. Or maybe it's just serious or like, there's no like playtime in it, like in role doll, there's cut, like, for example, I'd be not Spike or Charlie. Maybe It was a little more like focused on battling the bad guys.
I turned off my video just because I really have terrible video reception, so my apologies. But before we said that, you said that pretty much all— there was only one time when you saw when the bad guys won. Would you say one thing all these stories have is that the good guys win in the end?
Yeah.
And do you think, um, you know, do you think the bad guys get what they deserve?
Um, I think so.
Do the good guys get what they deserve?
I think so, yeah.
Do you think that that happens in real life? In real life, do the good guys get what they deserve, and do the bad guys get what they deserve?
Um, it's not gonna happen. I don't think it's gonna happen every time that the bad guy— that the good guys are gonna win. Sometimes maybe the bad guys win.
Do you think in the long run the good guys win?
Um, I hope so, and maybe I think so.
Okay. Um, and do you think that, um, so do you think that some people deserve to win and other people deserve to lose?
Um, if maybe the bad guys want power control, maybe they deserve to lose. Um, but if they're just trying to If they're doing something that you maybe won't expect, maybe not. I don't know really, but sometimes it's mostly that the bad guys get what they deserve.
Okay, it sounded like maybe you're thinking of a particular example there where, um, the bad guys don't deserve bad things to happen to them. Would you say sometimes they don't deserve bad things to happen to them?
If they're doing something like really bad, maybe they do. Like maybe trying to murder someone, maybe the consequences were going to like 15 years in jail, maybe, or sent in a dangerous wild place, maybe. But I think mostly the bad guys would get what they deserve.
Okay. Well, because my internet is not very good today, these are really big issues. How do we decide what is good and bad? Who deserves what? Are stories like real life or different? So we can think about this more in the future, but today I'm gonna let you go. What are you gonna do today?
I actually don't know, but before this call, my dad and I were watching a little bit of Star Trek.
Very cool. Okay, have fun with your dad, and we'll talk next week probably. Okay, bye-bye.
Okay, bye. Thanks.
You're welcome.
