 According to Joseph Campbell in Hero with a Thousand Faces, about a gazillion stories have been written with the same basic plots, characters, and objects, and events.  This pattern is simply called “the classic hero tale”  Rather than being wearied by seeing the same old thing over and over again, listeners, readers, and movie goers seem to love each new incarnation of The Hero.

 Hero comes from a lowly background; often an orphan

 At some point, a person or event calls the Hero out of his mundane, lowly existence into a whole new (often magical) world.

 The Hero reaches a point of no return; he must complete the quest or die trying. This is a place away from any old authority, where he must now make his own decisions and live with them.

 The Hero never has to make the whole journey alone. He has friends to help him face trials. In the end, however, he alone can complete the quest. They can’t do it for him!

 The Hero faces a series of difficulties that try his strength, force him to learn sometimes difficult lessons, tempt him to abandon the quest, and ultimately make him strong enough to face the last trial.

 The Hero has a Mentor who offers guidance, knowledge, and advice, but who cannot do the job for him. Often the Mentor dies somewhere along the line before the quest is over.

 Sometimes the Hero receives helpful tools with special qualities to combat the bad guy or face trials (The Gifts).  Also, the Hero has something within himself that makes him special—Magic, the Force, or simply a strength of will or character or deep and abiding love or loyalty.

 The Hero’s quest is to gain something— treasure, peace, safety, independence from an evil force, etc.

 The Hero does not follow the quest simply for his own gain. Whatever he does, he does for the good of the greater community, for his friends, neighbors, or countrymen.

 Though it takes a little of the suspense away, in a classic Hero Tale, the Hero must return at some point to where he started. He comes full circle.

 When the Hero returns to his starting point, he finds that he does not fit in there anymore. He has been too far, seen too much, experienced too much loss, pain, or growth, to be able to really belong there anymore. Either he can’t deal with the provincial attitudes now that he has seen more of the world, or the people there are no longer comfortable with him because they sense the changes he has undergone. Or both. The Hero often winds up living in emotional isolation away from all but the companions who accompanied him, or leaves again to wander on new quests or to seek a new home.

 The purpose of the Hero Tale is not just to entertain.  It’s more than just a good story—it’s part of a moral education for many cultures.  The Hero Tale is meant to inspire its hearers/readers/watchers to accept sacrifice, to face difficult circumstances with courage, and to believe in their own capacity for greatness for the good of others.  Ultimately, the Hero Tale is a call to serve.

“It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end, because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was, when so much bad had happened? “But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you, that meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. “But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something... that there's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for.“ - The Two Towers, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens

 Original Star Wars  Harry Potter  The Hobbit/The Lord of the Rings  Eragon  Narnia  Batman/Spiderman/Superman  King Arthur  The hero does NOT have to be magical or have superpowers—for instance, The Mummy fits the pattern fairly well, as do many Louis L’Amour novels.

 The Hero Tale is meant to inspire, and even though we don’t battle dragons or evil overlords, we still relate to the Hero’s struggles. Why???? Because ultimately, the Hero is us.  “Fairy tales don’t tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that the dragons can be killed.” --G.K. Chesterton