A beautiful young artist comes to Italy to take possession of the castle she has just inherited, and her art-restorer friend joins her for the night. They agree to shelter a troupe of carnival performers, and at dinner the leader drugs them in order to have his way with them (but passes the artist off to his lookalike brother, who becomes a beast). The friend leaves the next day, and the artist starts exploring the labyrinthine castle (this being one of those GU stories that takes place entirely within a house). She begins seeing the apparition of a ghostly girl, who (it turns out) was long ago killed by a curse that is on her family, a curse which involves the performers.

The artist, Catherine, starts to fall in love with the beastly brother, still thinking he is the same person as the wicked, cruel man, when in fact he is his kinder brother. She is helped a little by her housekeeper, a mysterious old woman who mostly tells her she must figure things out for herself. Catherine must break the curse by confronting the evil brother (wearing the clothes of the ghost girl, apparently), which will also save the gentle brother from turning into a beast all the time.

Leading up to the final confrontation, Catherine goes underground within the castle, and then is temporarily tricked by a cruel fraud. Once the adversary is defeated, she decides to follow the good brother back through the portal from which he came, into his own world.

If nothing else, this movie should be watched simply for the opening scene, of fire jugglers and other performers slowly emerging in the fog from the mouth of a giant stone ogre (this and other scenes were filmed in the Park of the Monsters, a 16th century garden full of monumental sculptures in Italy).

Elissa believes she is an orphan, having been raised by an old healer, with no knowledge of her real family. She keeps a potent secret: she can talk with animals, and they are her only companions in an otherwise lonely life. One day, her father shows up and takes her away, hoping to use her in his plan to win a war. It turns out she is next in line to be royalty, a shock for the peasant girl. Elissa takes along her best friend, a donkey, who rescues her when she is captured by the enemy. Back with her father, Elissa chooses her own fate this time, electing to go to the palace of the Khan instead of back to her old life. There she makes a new friend and companion, a young slave girl named Maya.

Maya takes Elissa underground to a secret lake for a coming-of-age ritual that ends with the discovery of a small, insignificant-looking item that will prove important. Then she takes her to a wise woman, who speaks cryptically of things that hint at Elissa’s true power. The Khan is planning to wed Elissa and kill Maya, but they are rescued (and captured, and then escape into the desert and are rescued again – there is a lot of this type of action), and then Elissa is enlisted by a group of ancient healers to defeat the Khan. She uses her latent magic to destroy him, one on one.

The Last Unicorn is a classic 80′s fantasy animated film based on a novel by Peter S. Beagle (but this post just refers to the film version). One day the unicorn learns she is the last of her kind, which basically fits the “orphan” archetype. Initiated on her quest by a rambling butterfly, she sets off to find out what happened to all the other unicorns. The story is that an evil creature called the Red Bull has driven them to the edge of the world.

She is soon captured by a witch, but in captivity makes friends with her first companion, a mediocre wizard named Schmendrick.  When they escape together, they encounter bandits in the forest and acquire another companion, Molly. They travel to the castle of King Haggard, who controls the vicious Red Bull. But when the unicorn is directly threatened by the bull, Schmendrick tries to save her and instead turns her into a human – the bull leaves, but the unicorn quickly loses her magic and starts forgetting who she is.

The companions all stay for awhile in the castle. The unicorn, thinking herself a mortal woman, falls in love with the King’s adopted son, and gets distracted from her mission of finding her own kind. But after going through a magical portal, all is revealed to the prince, and the unicorn is returned to her original form. When the Red Bull kills the prince, the unicorn finds the strength to confront it, and in turn frees the other unicorns who had been trapped in the sea. The castle crumbles, the king is killed, but the unicorn revives her prince, although she can no longer make a life with him.

“You’re Ellie Spencer…and your eyes are opening.”

Due to the prevalence of GU themes in the genre, and my own inclinations, I tend to read a lot of urban fantasy, and especially a lot of fairy-related stories. Honestly, it can get kind of repetitive. While some books stand out, most just follow a basic recipe with little variation. Guardian of the Dead by Karen Healey, however, was original and compelling enough to stick with me. While some of the themes are certainly familiar (it wouldn’t be a Girls Underground book if that wasn’t true!), the siting in New Zealand and immersion in Maori mythology gives the story a distinct personality, complemented by characters that are interesting, complex and diverse (and finally, a love story that just gets more complicated and mature as it develops, rather than the typical facile supernatural romance found in YA fiction).

Ellie, 17, is spending her last year of school away from home at a boarding school while her parents travel around the world. She is awkward – a little tall, a little heavy – but strong and capable, excelling in martial arts and her studies. Her only friend is Kevin, who has just revealed to her his big secret: he is asexual. During a brief encounter one day with Mark, the boy she has a crush on, her hair gets caught in his charm bracelet, and he gives her a cryptic warning… things start to get strange after that. It seems that he has the power to make her forget things.

Meanwhile, Ellie is helping with the local university’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which is being altered to include Maori symbolism (a nod to the concept of the book itself). A stunning but unpleasant woman named Reka joins the cast as Titania, and immediately turns her attention to Ellie’s best friend, trying to seduce him (though of course, unsuccessfully, although she manages to hold him in her thrall in general).

<spoilers> As Ellie becomes more suspicious of Reka, Mark becomes more secretive, until Ellie finally discovers the truth for herself – Reka is a patupaiarehe, a kind of fairy creature from Maori folklore. She is after Kevin for breeding purposes. And Mark is deeply involved, although it’s hard to tell at first who’s side he’s on. It seems that Reka is the Adversary, who must be defeated in order to rescue Kevin. And in fact, Ellie does just that, holding onto Kevin Tam Lin-style when Reka comes for him, enduring pain to shield him from her claws. But that is only the beginning.

The real threat is the other patupaiarehe, who have been killing magical humans to steal their power, and – in their quest for immortality – are planning a mass murder of millions of people. Ellie, who is just discovering that she herself has a latent talent for magic, must go with Mark to try to stop them. Travelling back to the North Island, they stay in her empty house (fulfilling the “brief return to familiar home” theme) and gather their forces.

But after some heartbreaking defeats and a possible betrayal, Ellie is suddenly on her own, tasked with going to the Underworld (underground, of course) to meet with the goddess of death and stop the patupaiarehe‘s plans. And there is one more rescue-of-a-companion to make, from death itself. </end spoilers>

I have to also note that from a pagan perspective, this book is fascinating. Instead of the more common Celtic-based and modernized fairy lore behind most such books these days, this story is steeped in authentic and complex Maori mythology – not just nature-based spirits, but gods, and monsters, and ritual customs. When Ellie’s inherent magic is woken up, she suddenly sees the truth of the myths – the night sky is a god with a cloak of stars, the island is a legendary fish, etc. But interestingly, she can also see other truths layered over these, from other traditions (such as the Maori and ancient Greek myths regarding the moon), and all are shown to be real simultaneously. There’s some thoughtful theology tucked in there that’s worth pondering.

“She hated this place. Nothing made sense. Nothing worked as it was supposed to. She was supposed to be learning things as she went along, gaining strength for her final battle. All she was doing was losing things, one thing at a time.”

This one should probably go under Honorable Mentions too, but it deserves its own post just because it was such an excellently-written book. Breadcrumbs by Anna Ursu takes its inspiration from the Snow Queen fairytale written by Hans Christian Anderson, but truly stands out as its own story.

Hazel, 11, has been best friends with next door neighbor Jack since she was six; no one else understands her. But one day, Jack suddenly pulls away from her for no apparent reason . Hazel has been raised on fantasy books and wants to believe there is some exotic cause for Jack’s behavior, but fears he has just become one more person who rejects her. Ursu takes a long time (about half the book) building up your empathy for Hazel and her situation, before the adventure part of the story begins. Her attention to detail, making the “real” world so real, makes it that much more exciting and strange when things suddenly become otherworldly.

Because Jack hasn’t just changed his mind about Hazel. In fact, the cause is a tiny shard of demon-made mirror that has fallen into his eye and turned his heart cold. Going out sledding, he meets a white witch and quickly agrees to go off with her. Hazel discovers the truth of his disappearance from one of the boys who always taunts her, but who is terrified by what he secretly witnessed and knows only Hazel will believe him. She decides to go off and rescue Jack, even though he’s turned against her, because that’s what friends do. She crosses the threshold of the woods where Jack was last seen, and immediately enters a different world.

There are wolf sentries and magical swanskins and unhelpful Fates and dangerous denizens in this wood. There are markets where you can buy potions of forgetfulness, and adults who seem helpful and kind but will trap you forever. What’s interesting is that Hazel, so familiar with fantasy stories, recognizes the storyline she’s a part of, the mythical journey she’s on. She often refers to books like Narnia and Wrinkle in Time and Coraline. In fact, she even notices that unlike most girls on such an adventure, she doesn’t have any friendly companions to help her.

The lack of companions, and the lack of much interaction with the adversary (or even a final showdown, since it turns out that the witch wants nothing, and will not fight her, and she needs to get through to Jack’s heart if she wants to save him), means this isn’t quite a Girls Underground story. But her quest to rescue her friend, her entry into the otherworld, and her keen awareness of her own archetype makes up for it.

“Hazel had read enough books to know that a line like this one is the line down which your life breaks in two. And you have to think very carefully about whether you want to cross it, because once you do it’s very hard to get back to the world you left behind. And sometimes you break a barrier that no one knew existed, and then everything you knew before crossing the line is gone. But sometimes you have a friend to rescue. And so you take a deep breath and then step over the line and into the darkness ahead.”

Riddle of the Wren by Charles de Lint

Minda, 17, lives a mundane life, her mother dead, her father no comfort. But she is haunted in her dreams by an evil creature named Ildran. One night, in the dreamworld, she meets Jan, who both initiates her into this new life by giving her special tools and protective talismans, and asks for her help.

Minda sets out on her journey and immediately loses her way, ending up in a different world. She finds companions, including an animal, and fights the minions of the adversary. Going from world to world, she does battle, manages to rescue Jan, and learns she is More than she knew. She faces the adversary alone, and reveals the fraud behind his power.

Under the Green Hill by Laura L. Sullivan

Meg, a teenager, is sent with her siblings to live with old relatives in England when an illness sweeps through her own country. Strange rules are in set down for them immediately, which they mostly ignore. But the danger is real, for faeries are abroad and it is time for a battle in which humans must fight.

Guided by a boy named Gul, the children meet the Seelie Queen and quickly become entangled in faerie business. Meg’s brother volunteers to fight in the battle, and she must rescue him from this fate. But the situation is complicated, and there is no single clear adversary. Still, in the end, Meg understands she is More than she thought, and finds a courage she never expected.

Runemarks by Joanne Harris

Maddy, 14, lives in a world where magic is feared and reviled, but she has had certain abilities since she can remember. Her only companion and confidante is a traveller named One-Eye who comes to her village every year and teaches her to use her powers. One day he asks her to retrieve a special item for him in the world below, and opens a door for her to go underground, past the realm of goblins (where she temporarily receives some assistance from a reluctant goblin). She finds the object but cannot get it yet, and in the meantime befriends a man named Lucky who turns out to be more than he appears to be.

Maddy ends up on an epic journey, meeting gods and goblins and men, all in an attempt to save her friend One-Eye from a prophesied doom. Her adversary is unclear at first, but is eventually revealed to be the Nameless, a god who wants to destroy all the worlds. She must go to Hel to fight him – but she doesn’t really end up defeating him personally. She does, however, discover she is More than she ever imagined.

The Nutcracker probably only qualifies as an Honorable Mention as a Girls Underground story, but there are some definite elements present. Clara is initiated into the otherworld via a toy given to her by her strange godfather. When the toy is broken by her brother, she cares for it. That night, another world grows up around her, and in the midst of a battle between gingerbread men and mice soldiers, her beloved Nutcracker (now life size) is threatened by the adversary, the Mouse King. Clara intervenes and saves the Nutcracker, who becomes a handsome prince. She eventually becomes the Queen of a fabulous kingdom of sweets.

For a more thorough investigation of The Nutcracker as an archetypal katabasis story, and Clara’s relation to several other GU heroines from Alice and Dorothy all the way back to Persephone and Inanna, see Catherynne Valente’s essay “Follow the Yellow Brick Road: Katabasis and the Female Hero in Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, and The Nutcracker Ballet” [Word doc from her website].

Wildwood – the first book, apparently, of a forthcoming series – is a product of the creative mind of Colin Meloy, lead singer of the indie rock band The Decemberists, along with delightful and expressive illustrations from his wife, Carson Ellis. The book is set in Portland, Oregon, where the couple resides, and which happens to be the large city just north of my own, giving it an extra appeal for me. The “otherworld” entered by the protagonist, called the Impassible Wilderness in our world, is based on Forest Park, the largest city park in the country.

(On a related tangent, another novel set in Forest Park, but this one based on true events, is the powerful My Abandonment by Peter Rock. It is told by a 13-year old girl who lives deep in the park with her father, hidden away from society. But one small mistake of hers leads to their discovery, and a journey – often alone – through the “real world” which is as strange to her as any otherworld. It is not fully a GU book, but has elements of such.)

Prue, 12 years old, lives a normal life with her parents and baby brother. One day she is taking her brother out for a stroll when he is abducted by a flock of crows, who carry him across the river and into a murky, off-limits area called the Impassable Wilderness. Astonished and terrified, Prue hides the kidnapping from her parents and sets out the next day to reclaim her brother, accompanied by a school friend named Curtis who insists on coming along despite her protestations. However, very soon upon entering the magical forest, Curtis is captured by coyotes dressed as soldiers, and begins his own separate adventures (while they are reunited in the end, he is thus barely a companion to Prue).

SPOILERS AHEAD  It is slowly revealed that a witch called the Dowager Governess sent the crows to steal the baby, to use him most terribly in her mad war of revenge against the rest of the land. The coyote soldiers form her army (i.e., the adversary’s minions). Curtis initially helps them (which touches on the common theme of “betrayal by companion”) because he does not know of the Governess’ involvement in the kidnapping. Meanwhile, Prue makes a succession of alliances with various human and animal denizens of this world in the quest to find her brother, although her involvement often gets them in trouble. She criss-crosses the various lands (the Wildwood is but one part) in search of him.

Eventually, just when it seems like things are going well, Prue is captured by the Dowager Governess (and brought underground, to her lair in the coyote warren), and manipulated into returning home. (The brief return home in the middle of the journey is also a common GU element.) Once she tells her parents her outlandish but true story, they relate to her an even more unbelievable one, which reveals her seemingly normal existence to be anything but – and hints at why it is that she can enter the Wood without resistance, despite the heavy spell of protection laid on the boundaries. She resolves to go back and finish her quest, eventually assembling almost all the other folk of the Wood in a rag-tag army to confront the Governess and her soldiers.

The final showdown with the adversary is unfortunately not one-on-one, and the Governess is actually defeated by one of Prue’s allies, although it is Prue’s own hidden power that ends up saving her brother. Even though a part of her belongs there, Prue does leave the otherworld and return home permanently, with her brother, to the delight of her parents. But in a unique twist, her original companion Curtis (who appears to have his own connection to the Wood) decides to stay there.

Chihiro: “I can’t believe I forgot my name. She almost took it from me.”
Haku: “If you completely forget it, you’ll never find your way home.”

Spirited Away is not the first Studio Ghibli and/or Hiyao Miyazaki film to be included on this blog (The Cat Returns, Howl’s Moving Castle, Kiki’s Delivery Service), but it probably should have been. It’s one of the most thorough examples of the archetype, and it’s also a personal favorite. I’d just been waiting to watch it again before profiling it here, so it was fresh in my mind. Though I’m only going to give the salient points here from a GU perspective, since the film is too long and detailed to fully describe.

Chihiro is a 10-year old girl who is moving to a new town and is very unhappy about it. Her parents are sick of her complaining, and urge her to think of the move as an adventure – but a much bigger adventure awaits. Her father makes a wrong turn and they end up at the end of a dirt road facing a strange dark tunnel. Her parents goad Chihiro into going through to explore (in the beginning, she doesn’t have much volition of her own), and they end up in an abandoned theme park. Despite her many protestations, her parents sit down at the one booth that seems active (although empty of any proprietor) and start eating the food there – however, this is actually food for the spirits, and because of this her parents are turned into pigs. Chihiro is frantic as night falls and strange apparitions begin to appear around her. The theme park becomes a large bathhouse catering to otherworldly clientele (almost all of her experiences after this take place in the bathhouse, making this one of those examples which mostly take place within a single building).

She immediately finds a companion in Haku, a boy who tries to help her escape, and when that fails, gives her food from the spiritworld to keep her solid, and instructs her on how to enter the bathhouse and be allowed to stay there long enough to save her parents (and hopefully get home again). She meets several more folks who become, if not proper companions, at least helpful acquaintances along her journey. Then she must face Yubaba, the witch proprietress, who is her adversary… although not a wholly evil one, as Miyazaki gives his characters depth and complexity. (As a side note, she also encounters a talking doorknob – animate doors, doorknobs, and door knockers are an odd little recurring theme in Girls Underground stories, though I’m not entirely sure why. See Labyrinth, the Disney Alice, The Hollow Kingdom, and many more.)

Chihiro gets a job at the bathhouse, but must give Yubaba her real name in exchange. Fortunately, Haku helps her remember and keep hold of her name, as losing it would trap her there forever (Alice forgets her name too, and most Girls Underground forget themselves for a period of time). In quick succession, Chihiro begins to have an effect on this spirit world – she heals a polluted River Spirit, a perilous and lonely creature named No Face, and eventually Haku himself (caring for his physical wounds and helping him recall his own name). Empowered again, Haku intercedes on her behalf with Yubaba, and convinces her to let Chihiro go, after one final test – identifying her parents in a row of pigs – which she passes by recognizing that none are her parents (the classic “exposing a fraud” confrontation with the adversary). There is a frequent theme here of remembering – who she is, who her parents are, who Haku is – that is very important to the archetype.

In the end, Chihiro gets her parents back (still oblivious, in their way) and returns to her own world, now stronger and more prepared for the uncertainties ahead.

(For an exploration of the fascinating Shinto influences evident in Spirited Away, see this article in the Journal of Religion & Film.)

“It will protect you. It’s made from the threads your friends wove together.”

Found a great article on the movie Labyrinth (the inspiration, originally, for this whole Girls Underground concept, for those who don’t know) over at Tor.com: “Suburban Fantasy, Gender Politics, plus a Goblin Prom: Why Labyrinth is a Classic” by Bridget McGovern (thanks to the Fuck Yeah, Labyrinth Tumblr blog for directing me there).

“But the reason I love it most is that it features a headstrong young female protagonist taking on the world in jeans and sensible shoes. If that doesn’t sound like much to you, then take into account the fact that the movie revolves around Sarah’s refusal to be treated as a princess (a word never once used in the script). One of the things that this movie does brilliantly is systematically reject the usual “princess” trope — Sarah’s happy ending isn’t going to be found on the arm of some fantasy heartthrob; her adventures in the labyrinth force her to abandon any such princess-y delusions. Her identity is her own, and she isn’t about to be swayed by any bedazzled, leather-loving, tight-panted gigolo with a castle, even if he is some sort of king. It’s an incredibly subversive approach to the usual fantasy heroine that seems to go unnoticed in the midst of all the muppetry and cleverness and stunning visuals, but to a kid raised on Disney and mediocre sitcoms, it was simply revolutionary….”

Yup, that’s a Girl Underground – not the usual fantasy heroine. Though, considering the number of examples of this archetype I’ve found (I’ve profiled almost 100 here so far, and I’m far from finished), predominantly in fantasy literature, perhaps she’s a growing favorite. Still, certainly not the usual Disney-type heroine.