Hero’s Journey

• Departure: the Hero leaves the familiar world behind.
• Initiation: the Hero learns to navigate the unfamiliar world of adventure.
• Return: the Hero returns to the familiar world.

• Miraculous or unusual circumstances around the Hero's conception or birth. Bonus points if there was a prophecy. Less common in modern stories, which tend to emphasize that anyone could be The Chosen One. It appears in Harry Potter and The Dresden Files, though.
• Begins in the ordinary world of the Hero's hometown, often in one of two flavours:
  • Peaceful Kingdom; for a story in which the Hero must save the world from impending doom, and
  • The Wasteland, for a story in which the Hero must restore his world.
  • Suburbia can be either, depending on where the story falls on the Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism.
• The Hero may be dissatisfied with the ordinary and express a desire for adventure. In musicals this can be expressed through an "I Want" Song.
• The Herald brings a Call to Adventure. The Hero learns that s/he must leave the known world behind and travel into the land of adventure.
• The Hero must then decide how to answer the Call:
  • Refusal of the Call: More common in classic stories. The Call will often try again because The Call Knows Where You Live. Can't Stay Normal andResigned To The Call are special cases of call refusal.
  • Jumped at the Call, sometimes even in the face of Adventure Rebuff: More common in modern stories. The modern subversion of this is when the hero isResigned To The Call. He accepts it, but only because he feels it would be pointless to resist, and not because he's particularly happy about the thought of adventure. If the hero finds himself abducted by destiny before even knowing what the Call is or even that he was addressed, then he may be a Cosmic Plaything. Resigning one's self to fate becomes easier in these situations. Just like its enthusiastic counterpart, this version of the narrative is more common in modern tales than classic ones.
• Frequently, the first step on the Journey is receiving some kind of magical tchotchke or other Supernatural Aid
• Crossing the First Threshold: The Hero must make a conscious, willing decision to embark on the adventure and leave the known world behind. This isthe First Threshold. The Hero may have to defeat Threshold Guardians, who are not necessarily adversarial but do test the Hero's resolve. Down the Rabbit Hole is a special case for young heroines embarking on supernatural adventures.
• The Land of Adventure: the Hero enters a strange, dreamlike realm, where logic is topsy-turvy and the "rules" are markedly different from the ordinary world. Carl Jung identified the Ordinary Realm with the conscious mind, and the Realm of Adventure with the subconscious mind.
• The Belly of the Whale represents a symbolic death for the Hero: the Hero is defeated and killed, his flesh scattered, ready to be reborn and emerge as a new person. If you think the symbolic death ought to come later, don't worry: The Writer's Journey omits this step altogether in favor of a Resurrection step just before the end.
• Road of Trials: the path out of the Belly of the Whale. Usually the meat of the story; The Writer's Journey calls it Tests, Allies, Enemies, while Booker goes into detail on different types of tests (deadly terrain, monsters, temptations, deadly opposites, and a journey to the underworld). Stops along the way might include:
  • The Shapeshifter: someone you don't trust but nonetheless need for his or her help/information
  • The Goddess
  • The Temptress
  • Atonement With the Father: George Lucas loved this step. Oedipus probably didn't.
  • A Leave Your Quest Test, usually after meeting the Goddess or Temptress
• Night Sea Voyage: the Hero must sneak into the Big Bad's Elaborate Underground Base and retrieve something or someone. Campbell noted that theseStealth Runs were usually at night and often involved water; hence the name.
  • Link's initial attempt at rescuing Aryll from the Forsaken Fortress in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker is a near-perfect example of one of these.
  • Perhaps the best known example is the infiltration of the Death Star by Luke Skywalker to rescue Princess Leia.
• Time out just before the big battle: the Heroes gather around a campfire and prepare for the battle, tell stories, confess their feelings, etc. It reminds them of what's at stake, and serves as a breather after all the action of the Road of Trials.
• Apotheosis / Fight against the Big Bad / Ultimate Boon (These are typically very closely related, often intertwined.)
  • Apotheosis: The Hero comes to view the world in a new and radically different way, either because of a critical breakthrough he's made or some crucial information he's uncovered. If it is something to do with himself then this is a good time for an I Am Who?.
  • The Hero confronts the Big Bad in a typical David Versus Goliath fashion: He is usually called upon to sacrifice himself or something/someone important to him. Friend or Idol Decision is a common scenario. Note that asked is the key word here—it's usually enough that the Hero be willing to sacrifice something without actually having to do it. Someone else will sacrifice himself in the Hero's stead, or the Hero will prove to have outwitted the Big Bad somehow (so that the apparent sacrifice isn't really a sacrifice), or it was all a Secret Test of Character, or...
  • Ultimate Boon: getting the reward the hero's been chasing all this time, often but not always a MacGuffin.
• Refusal of the Return: At this point in the story, the Hero has mastered the strange world he was thrust into. He probably has earned a permanent place here, if he wants it. He may even want to stay, but usually there are forces at work that propel him home.
• The Return: Also called the Magic Flight; the Hero now has the boon and high-tails it away, with the villain or his forces in hot pursuit; while they engage in a battle of wits and magic (especially shapeshifting) during the chase. (See the Celtic story of Taliesin's escape from Cerridwen for a textbook example of this.) The Hero's escape may not require actual magic, but will require all of the new skills he's learned and new allies he's made. Or alternately he could realize the Awful Truth that he can't return home because sometimes Failure Is the Only Option...
• Crossing the Return Threshold. Sometimes a fight against the forces of the Muggle world, which the Hero wins thanks to help from his Muggle allies.
• Freedom to Live: The Hero grants the boon to his people.