Fairytales

There's something I find interesting about people's connection to fantasy stories, whether in books, movies, or some other format. We love them. They're riddled with clichés, usually fairly predictable, but we love them. We love every time the hero conquers the seemingly unbeatable odds or wins a great romance.

The other day, I was watching Disney's Tangled, and I thought about how utterly unrealistic everything was. Not just the magic healing spells or the ridiculous length of Rapunzel's hair or the fact that no matter how far Maximus jumps, he always lands perfectly. I thought about how a daughter, an only child, isolated from the world, would hold up under the emotional manipulation that Mother Gothel put her through. Or how Rapunzel felt the amazing connection to the lanterns and was able to remember the day she was born. Or how the first guy that came into her life happened to be the right one, and how wonderful Flynn's transformation was.

In stories like these, there isn't just the obvious magic that the fairies or wizards or drops of sunlight provide. There is some kind of deeper magic, the force of good, that prevails throughout any fairytale. This is the magic that brings together all the right people at the right time. This is the magic that makes sure things don't stay cursed and miserable for too long. It guarantees that good will triumph in the end.

But this magic isn't confined to fairytales. Many, many works of fiction have that thread, that underlying surety that the story will fit together exactly the way it should. That the ending will be the right ending. That the author knows what he or she is doing.

I think that's what draws people to fairytales, and any kind of story. We want to believe that good will triumph in the end, that our lives will be patched up in all the right ways, that we, just like fictional characters, will meet all the right people at the right times.

All things working together for good. That's the story people love.