Fantasy Motif Metaphors: Magical Powers as Exceptionality in Disney’s The Incredibles and Zizou Corder’s Lion Boy trilogy

While works of the fantasy genre convey literal stories which make sense according to the laws of their fictional worlds, the very impossibilities of these narratives invite further readings of their ‘secondary or tertiary levels of meaning’ (Bleiler 1983, p.vii; also see McGillis 1996a, p.72; Walsh 1981, p.38). Such readings have been generated through the analytical lenses of allegory, parable, fable, symbol and metaphor. A specific focus upon the operation of metaphor in recurrent fantasy motifs enables a precise analysis of fantasy’s secondary levels of meaning. Such a methodology scrutinises fantasy’s engagement with cultural assumptions and ideas, highlighting the ideological implications of fantasy and thus verifying fantasy’s inherent relevance to reality. This article aims to illustrate the value of this methodology by analysing the motif of magical powers as exceptionality in Disney’s The Incredibles (2003) and Zizou Corder’s Lion Boy trilogy (2003-2005).