The Hero’s Journey
created by Travis Peterson, Travis HS
The Hero’s Journey
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The Stages:
The Humble Beginnings
The Call to Adventure
Refusing the Call
Threshold Crossing
Departure
The Journey / Challenges
The Final Confrontation
The Return
The Archetypes:
The Mentor
The Gift
The Allies
The Hero
Arch Nemesis
The Hero’s Journey
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The Hero’s Journey is an idea developed by Joseph
Campbell, which explores the theory that many
movies, books, stories and etc. all share a
fundamental structure, which Campbell called the
monomyth.
In a well-known quote from Campbell’s book “The
Hero with a Thousand Faces”, Campbell
summarized the monomyth like this:
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A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region
of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered
and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this
mysterious adventure with the power to bestow great joy on his
fellow man.
The Stages
Humble Beginnings
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The Hero is often an
ordinary person
The Hero shows no
signs of extraordinary
powers
The Hero is often not
popular
The young Hero is not
taken seriously
The Call to Adventure
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In this stage the hero is
offered an opportunity
to face the unknown
and to do something
great and adventurous.
The hero has the
chance to gain
something physically or
spiritually
Refusing the Call
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In this stage the hero is initially reluctant to accept
the call to adventure
The hero is uncertain about their ability to complete
his or her mission
Threshold Crossing
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This is the Big Decision
part
In this stage the hero
chooses adventure
Often times but not always
a mentor helps the hero
make the decision
Departure
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After choosing adventure and opportunity the hero leaves his
normal average world
The Hero is no longer comfortable, and faces many difficulties
but he / she cannot turn back to the normal world
The new life is unknown and dangerous
The Journey / The Challenges
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Main part of the story
Many obstacles are faced and overcome here
The Hero meets the enemy, his mentor, his allies,
and he receives his gift.
Final Confrontation
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In this stage the hero battles his arch nemesis
This is the climax of the hero’s journey
Following this stage the hero begins the journey
home
The Return
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Hero returns to his home/origins
The hero is a different person from the last time he
was home
The hero helps change and improve home
The Archetypes
The Mentor
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Though the Hero has friends, they know little of the journey
The Mentor is the person who will guide the Hero with wisdom
and knowledge
The Mentor is usually experienced in the quest, but cannot
complete it himself.
The Allies
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In the journey the
hero meets friends
that help in the quest
The friends are
usually normal
people
The hero knows he
cannot complete the
quest on his own
Gift
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In the journey the hero
is given a gift to use
along the way
Sometimes the allies
are also given gifts, but
the most significant gift
is reserved for the Hero
The gift isn’t always a
physical object, often it
is knowledge or a craft
The Hero
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The hero is the main
character.
The whole story is
about their growth and
development as a
person.
In the Hero’s Journey
the good guy always
wins
Arch Nemesis
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The Arch-Nemesis is the
primary antagonist in the
story.
Often times the Nemesis is
depicted as a “fallen angel”
type character.
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This means at one time the
Nemesis was a good and
favored character, but now
he or she has fallen to a
state of disrepair.