Archetypes: Alice and Wonderland and "Big Fish"

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll and “Big Fish” directed by Tim Burton both focus around the idea of if the story is fantasy or reality.  In Alice in Wonderland Alice falls into another dimension while in “Big Fish”, a son, Will is trying to find out the truth of all the tall tales his father, Edward would tell. Nevertheless, both are trying to grasp on what is reality. But what enhances the meaning of each are the many archetypes found in them. Alice and Edward both embark on a journey but while Alice sees darkness and confusion around her; Will’s relationship with his father is hanging by a thread.

            In Alice in Wonderland, Alice falls into Wonderland and in the beginning she sees darkness around her while she falls and once she lands in the room. The darkness represents the unknown and also all the chaos that gets caused. Because of the darkness, Alice had to make choices that made her question the reality of things. Later when she meets the queen, Alice is surrounded by red and only red.  Red represents all the ‘sacrifices’ that happened and also shows the queen’s personality. The queen is rather an angry person and she has a violent passion for beheading people. Both archetypes question a person’s sanity as well as how Alice perceived Wonderland to be.

In “Big Fish” Will has a hard time maintaining a relationship with his father, Edward. This father-son conflict complicates the understanding of Edward’s life stories. The fish that is referred to in the story represents Edward himself and throughout the movie the lake, which the fish swims in, shows the mystery in the movie as well as the lake itself. In Will’s story about how his father dies also shows that the lake “revives” Edward. The lake intertwined with the characters’ lives.

In both works there are common archetypes as well. First, the main characters, Alice and Will go on a journey, which sends them in search for reality. Along the way Alice and Will’s father befriend different people like the outcasts of society who help them along the way. Alice meets the Mad Hatter, Cheshire the Cat and the Caterpillar; while Edward gets help from the giant and witch. Even though Will never met the giant and witch, it seems like they also help Will accept the fantasies his dad would recite. Also both Alice and Edward get lost in a forest before they reach their destination. The forest shows the darkness and fear in the characters. Alice, Edward and Will all face obstacles, but at the end they accept the truth that they discover.

All the archetypes in these works make an impact on the meaning. To me the meaning was whether their adventures were fantasy or reality and upon comparing and contrasting the archetypes in both works, the meaning changed to what people perceive as reality. People perceive in different ways; so what to one person would be unrealistic to the other would be their reality. Without the archetypes both works would just be whether their journey really happened, but with all the archetypes like their journey, darkness, father-son conflict, forests, lakes and more; it allows more depth into the meaning.


-Pavneet K.