I watched Moana 2 with my family the other night, and honestly, it was a disappointment. I came into the movie hopeful, since the premise seemed more promising than 90% of Disney’s works, but when the credits rolled I was left in a state of confusion and “why did I spend my time watching that when I could have watched 2 NCIS episodes?”
(What can I say, I like NCIS!)
And maybe I wouldn’t have even realized why I didn’t like the movie, had it not been for my also author-in-training sister leaning over and whispering, “Tell me what archetype you think this is at the end.” I had recently convinced her to go through the KM Weiland podcast series on archetypes and we had been eagerly discussing their use in stories.
Thanks to that comment, at the end of the movie, setting aside the weak songwriting, worldbuilding holes, and plot gaps aside, I knew exactly why Moana 2 is so underwhelming compared to the rich storytelling found in the first Moana movie.
Namely? The complete lack of a change archetype.
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What Are Archetypes?
In a sense, archetypes are the basic story structure types found universally in stories. I will mostly refer to the ones found in K.M. Weiland’s archetype series, which I will provide links to at the end of the article. There are six main change arcs: Maiden, Hero, Queen, King, Crone, and Mage. I will mainly be focusing on the first 3 in this article.
In most movies aimed at younger people, we either find a Maiden or a Hero arc. Maiden arcs are about individuating from society and overcoming fear to embrace love, while Hero arcs are about sacrificing power for love. Moana is very clearly a maiden arc, with Moana individuating from society to face the ingrained societal fear of the ocean to keep her people from starving to death. Part of what made Moana so powerful was this beautiful contrast of forging ahead to honor and restore traditions while defying “normal”, toxic societal fears. In other words, breaking generational curses! I’m all for that in stories. Thus we end the story with this lovely Maiden arc, meaning that Moana 2 would either have to be a flat arc (namely, Lover, which it most definitely is NOT), or the next change arc, Hero.
But… Moana 2 was NOT a Hero arc. Moana didn’t have any arc. We were given all the pieces for a very deep and powerful story without the exposition to make it happen, and thus, while on a monetary scale Moana 2 made more money than its predecessor, I believe it was more for the fact that it was a sequel than for its storytelling ability.
What might the story looked like if we had a Hero arc? The possibilities are infinite, but from what I saw, the pieces could have definitely correlated to a decent pride before the fall/asking for help arc. Moana is the hero of her people and has all she wants. She’s cocky and confident, and somehow, all of this honor and power never goes to her head even a little bit? We had so many moments where we could have given Moana a Hero arc where she learns that while yes, being friends with the sentient ocean and using her talents is great, she cannot ultimately always save the world and be the legend on her own. Someone on Youtube suggested in the comments of one video of there being a reverse The Odyssey situation where in the process of trying to find the island, she ends up connecting with many different traveling people also searching for other lands (kind of like the coconut creatures!). How cool would it have been if the character Moni was a seafarer traveling the world to collect stories instead of just another cringey comic relief male side character? He could still be a historian nerd without the cheesiness. Every character Moana had on that boat could have been another element in helping enforce such a character arc, but instead we got a wacky, pointless cast with no real reason to be there.
And the song with Matangi, “Get Lost” (the only good song in that movie if you ask me)? That could have been a PERFECT snare for Moana. After all, she’s the Wayfinder, isn’t she? She has the ocean on her side! Of course she can find her own way!
Until she leads them into a trap. Suddenly, the ocean is not on her side, she has led these innocent people into certain death (thank you, Disney, for actually making Moni a little traumatized from almost dying, that was actually a saving point of the story), and Maui’s pep talk shouldn’t have been about “believing in yourself”, but how she had shown him that one cannot do it all alone. That even with power, we still need others to sharpen us and make us better.
And so then, from a source of love for her people and working together with her crew, Moana could have restored Motufetu, and honestly we could have really sealed the thematic and plot elements movie if in the process Maui helping had ended up sacrificing his demigod powers for the cause (like I thought he would before they just gave him his hook back and he was fine). Like Maui, learning to live a human life? How many spinoffs could Disney make with that? But nooo, we have to keep him a demigod, and make Moana a demigod too, like she isn’t powerful and perfect enough.
That was a ramble, but I hope you can see my point. If Disney had chosen to give Moana actual flaws and a Hero archetype, we could have had a very powerful and satisfying sequel that people show up to because it’s actually a good movie, not because it’s a sequel. And they wouldn’t have had to change many of the plot points either! And yet so many movies and books fall into this same sequel slump.
So… what does a good sequel look like?
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How To Train Your Dragon: The Maiden, The Hero, The Queen (Or in Hiccup’s Case, The Initiate, The Hero, The Chief)
The How to Train Your Dragon movie franchise is one of the few I have seen that actually go through the first three life arcs. While HTTYD 2 was definitely the weakest of the lot, HTTYD and HTTYD: Hidden World were masters of the Maiden and Queen archetypes.
In the first HTTYD, we see Hiccup individuating from his society to encourage his elders and peers to put aside the toxic ideal of fighting dragons and learn how to use them as companions and assets to the community. In HTTYD 2, while not as clear, we see the quest story and Hiccup learning to both wield his power with dragons wisely and stepping into his role in adult society. In HTTYD: Hidden World, (a Queen arc, uncommon in movies of such age ranges) we see Hiccup trying to protect the dragons while at the same time struggling with the fact that in order for him to fully become the leader he needs to be, he needs to let Toothless go off on his own. By the end of the series, these change arcs are so potent and visual that we see Hiccup as a full chief, think about the little boy he once was, and sigh in blissful content because we were there, with him, watching how far he’s come.
THAT IS HOW YOU MAKE A SEQUEL, PEOPLE! Sequels are all about watching the character grow up, building on what they’ve learned in previous books. We want our readers to be sniffling at the end, remarking at how big our sweet little characters are now. In the very least, if your character isn’t going to change, they need to influence others to change, like a mentor.
And archetypes provide an easy framework to help authors learn where their characters are at now, and how they can grow next.
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How to Use Archetypes To Create Epic Sequels
So, how can you use the archetypes to create epic sequels?
Well, first you need to start with identifying what sort of arc your first book had. For instance, in my dystopian fantasy series Protectors, I knew that the main characters had Maiden and Hero arcs respective to each POV character. Thus, unless I was going to give them a next-stage flat arc (Lover and Parent), I would have to graduate them to the next change arc in the sequel (Hero and Queen). Or you could even skip some years and give them a later-stage change arc, although this might be a bit abrupt for the readers.
Your character doesn’t necessarily have to go through one life arc in one book, however. For instance, in Christopher Paolini’s The Inheritance Cycle, I don’t believe that Eragon goes through a life arc in every book. Eragon lines up with a Hero arc, and Inheritance could be a King arc (feel free to correct me on any of this), but I don’t recall a particularly strong Queen arc.
Archetypes also aren’t just used for speculative fiction, although finding non-speculative examples can be harder since they are usually more subtle. I honestly didn’t have archetypes in mind when I wrote The Color of a Horse’s Song (although I think Colton could probably be a Maiden arc) and it’s okay if you don’t use every specific detail of the archetypes in a novel. Archetypes are just a framework to help you figure out what on earth your characters are going to do next.
Read up on Archetypes, and as you learn about them, consider what story elements align with your characters. Maybe your character has already completed his Hero’s quest. Where could he go in the Queen arc? Or maybe you want to give them a flat arc and just have them change the world around them. Again, you don’t have to follow every element to the letter, but I find the archetypes are a brilliant tool in deciphering story problems that I couldn’t fix before.
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I hoped you enjoyed this article! Tell me: have you written a sequel before? Did you use archetypes? And how do you think Moana 2 should have turned out?
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