Here are some 'big beat' summaries of films that are said to follow 'The Heroine's Journey'.
A great summary of 'The Heroine's Journey' can be found at heroinejourneys.com, which is a super cool website. I have used the beat explanations from here, and here is a quote about the origin of the Heroine's Journey:
As a student of Campbell’s, Murdock, came to believe that the Hero’s Journey model did not adequately address the psycho-spiritual journey of women. She developed a model of a heroine’s journey based on her work with women in therapy. When she showed it to Campbell in 1983, Campbell reportedly said, “Women don’t need to make the journey. In the whole mythological journey, the woman is there. All she has to do is realize that she’s the place that people are trying to get to.”
This is an excellent example of how even Great Men™ glamourise and simplify human women's lived experience, in my opinion, and possibly Murdock's.
I have used examples drawn from this Letterboxd page compiled by Frida. Frida says:
"The heroine brings balance to herself, then changes the world around her, the journey is about self-worth and identity."
1. HEROINE SEPARATES FROM THE FEMININE. The “feminine” is often a mother/mentor figure or a societally prescribed feminine/marginalized/outsider role.
BRAVE
Merida disobeys her mother by refusing to marry.
The separation is echoed in the moment of decision when she tears the tapestry depicting her family. Very literal.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven’s mother is dead and he’s a chaotic but happy little boy.
SILENCE OF THE LAMBS
Clarice starts off in a male-dominated field. We meet her this way. She’s already succeeding amongst the men- which might suggest a separation from the feminine, but honestly it’s Jodie Foster so. Interesting questions around stardom in this context.
Oh! Buffalo Bill’s separation from the feminine is stark!! He’s literally torturing and murdering women and wearing their skin. Fricken duh. Again, we meet him in this state.
LEGALLY BLONDE Elle’s boyfriend says she isn’t “serious”, so she sets out to prove that she is by getting into Harvard Law.
2. IDENTIFICATION WITH THE MASCULINE & GATHERING OF ALLIES. The heroine embraces a new way of life. This often involves choosing a path that is different than the heroine’s prescribed societal role, gearing up to “fight” an organization/role/group that is limiting the heroine’s life options, or entering some masculine/dominant-identity defined sphere.
BRAVE
Merida challenges her suitors for her own hand in marriage.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven learns to fight monsters using the skills of the Crystal Gems- magic women from another planet. His mothers. Lots of the allies who come in want to fight to protect various values. He also has his father who wants safety and worries about Steven but doesn’t get in the way of his training.
SILENCE OF THE LAMBS
Clarice allies-up with a literal actual psychopathic genius. And she has other male allies around. They have a singular intention.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Elle identifies and is identified by other ‘outsiders’ all trying to get good at Law in various ways. Law is inherently masculine, fight me. Don’t. I’m a girl.
3. ROAD/TRIALS AND MEETING OGRES & DRAGONS. The heroine encounters trials and meets people who try to dissuade the heroine from pursuing their chosen path, or who try to destroy the heroine.
BRAVE
The witch’s pie turns Merida’s mother into a bear resembling the one who took her father’s leg.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Oh, so many.
SILENCE OF THE LAMBS
Yep.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Yep yep yep.
4. EXPERIENCING THE BOON OF SUCCESS. The heroine overcomes the obstacles in their way. (This is typically where the hero’s journey ends.)
BRAVE
I’m confused about where this moment is in Brave- any ideas?
STEVEN UNIVERSE
The big one is Rose Quartz’ light canon. The Diamonds have been defeated.
SILENCE OF THE LAMBS
Damn, okay, no, the boon of success is the discovery about the skinsuit and the address. Then she goes in and she kills him. Badda bing badda boom. We stop here. It’s a Hero’s Journey. Go Clarice.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Elle gets the internship!
5. HEROINE AWAKENS TO FEELINGS OF SPIRITUAL ARIDITY/DEATH. The heroine’s new way of life (attempting the masculine/dominant identity) is too limited. Their success in this new way of life is either temporary, illusory, shallow, or requires a betrayal of self over time.
BRAVE
Merida discovers that she has ancestral responsibilities, and that the longer her mother remains a bear, the more she will lose her humanity.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven begins to have flashbacks to a time when he was a Diamond. (His mother, Rose Quartz, was Pink Diamond, and wanted to run away and protect Earth from the Diamonds’ colonialism, so she transformed herself. She later transformed herself into Steven. He is his own person and she is dead.) Anyway, when he has these visions, he awakens (gradually) to the ‘humanity’ of the Diamonds, and defeat is no longer satisfying.
SILENCE OF THE LAMBS
We do have the suggestion of this, as Lecter’s phonecall from the Bahamas is riddled with ‘misery never ends’ vibes. But Clarice is left hanging over the precipice of this crisis, trapped forever in a torturous masculine paradigm. I haven’t seen the sequel.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Some fucker with Law power tries to rape her.
6. INITIATION & DESCENT TO THE GODDESS. The heroine faces a crisis of some sort in which the new way of life is insufficient, and the heroine falls into despair. All of the masculine/dominant-group strategies have failed them.
BRAVE
There’s a moment in the wild when she’s catching fish with bear-Elinor and we think maybe they can be happy in this new state. This is broken when Elinor goes batshit. Merida realises she can’t run away (individuality), and has to heal the separation wound.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven spends a long time in Diamond jail, experiencing life as Pink Diamond would have, and just feeling really empty. The Crystal Gems are powerless to rescue him.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Elle’s DNOS after quitting, through which she regains interest in the emergent goal, from a perspective that comes directly from her ‘silly’ feminine outlook.
7. HEROINE URGENTLY YEARNS TO RECONNECT WITH THE FEMININE. The heroine wants to, but is unable to return to their initial limited state/position.
BRAVE
Merida sneaks Elinor through the castle. There’s a moment where we think they’ve fully healed, but they haven’t.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven tries to get an audience with White Diamond. He tries to talk Blue Diamond around, but it doesn’t work because of her loyalty to White Diamond. He also desperately wants to go back to Earth. Simultaneously, his father is trapped in a Human Zoo that’s kind of like a Garden of Eden where everyone’s understanding of life and love is bizarrely limited.
8. HEROINE HEALS THE MOTHER/DAUGHTER SPLIT. The heroine reclaims some of their initial values, skills, or attributes (or those of others like them) but now views these traits from a new perspective.
BRAVE
Merida faces her father after a heart-to-heart with her mother.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven speaks with White Diamond, who is adamant that he is Pink Diamond. With Connie, and other help, he explains the full picture of who he is, and White Diamond… I can’t remember how but eventually she comes around.
LEGALLY BLONDE
I feel like this might be the passion Elle has for the beauty stuff? The yearning is towards the defendant’s truth, and they’re connected on it via the specificity of beauty stuff.
9. HEROINE HEALS THE WOUNDED MASCULINE WITHIN. The heroine makes peace with the “masculine” approach to the world as it applies to them.
BRAVE
Merida makes the speech about clans. She has become a leader.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
Steven has this shield and that’s a representation of his integrated masc/femme power. He’s been gaining strength in his use of it throughout the series, and I’m sure there’s some kind of final show of how powerfully protective it is. There’s also a final battle where everyone shows off their magic lady powers which have masc magic interwoven with femme (swords and skirts). The vibe of Steven Universe is kind of this integration from start to finish, ngl.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Elle argues in court.
10. HEROINE INTEGRATES THE MASCULINE & FEMININE. In order to face the world/future with a new understanding of themselves and the world/life, the heroine integrates the “masculine” and “feminine” qualities/perspectives. This permits the heroine to see through binaries and to interact with a complex world that includes the heroine but is also larger than their personal lifetime or their geographical/cultural milieu.
BRAVE
Yep.
STEVEN UNIVERSE
The skills all the characters gained in war come in handy (and comically useless) for rebuilding a Gem home (paradise) on Earth. Steven is a figurehead of this society.
LEGALLY BLONDE
Elle is pretty AND a lawyer.
I hope this was useful, and appreciate and enjoy engagement.
References
The Heroine Journeys Project- Exploring and Documenting Life-Affirming Alternatives to the Hero’s Journey (they have a lot of articles about a lot of structures that are different from The Hero’s Journey.)
Maureen Murdock’s Heroine’s Journey Arc
Another list of films which are said to follow The Heroine's Journey:
A Letterboxd list by Frida:
I used the IMDB plot summaries of all the films, but not Steven Universe. Also, I have treated Steven Universe as one feature film, including events from the feature film which formed the finale of the series.
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