Identity and Individuality of Derivative Fictions -- continued

In the movie Peter Pan, Wendy will also play an important role in the rest of the story. As a final grace for the dying, Wendy asks Hook for permission to give her precious “thimble” to Peter. Wendy lies alongside to Peter on the deck and talks to him.

Peter. I’m sorry I must grow up. But this is yours.

The kiss-thimble exchange description introduced through the conversation between Wendy and Peter, at the beginning of the film, was supposed to serve as an underplot for deceiving Hook in this climactic scene. Hook arrogantly allows Wendy to give her “thimble” to Peter.

It is just a thimble.
/ How like a girl. By all means, my beauty, give Peter Pan your precious thimble.

Wendy gives Peter her “thimble”. But John and Michael know that what Wendy is trying to give Peter is really a kiss.

This belongs to you, and always will.
/ That was no thimble. / That was her hidden kiss.

Thanks to the kiss Wendy gave him, Peter is able to regain the power he had lost. The offense and defense are reversed through Peter’s wit, and the psychological battle that cleverly exploits the effects of melancholy and despair that Hook started, becomes a make-believe game that focuses on the melancholy that restrains the mind of a reflexive, self-conscious educated person ingrained in Hook himself, who introduced this tactic. And at the end of the battle, the materialization of the phenomenon by consciousness is supposed to dominate everything. It is a result of transformation trial of Hook’s self-consciousness, described in an inverted picture.

I have won! / You are old. / But I won! / Old. And alone. / Alone. No! I won! I won! I… / Done for. / Happy thoughts. Happy thoughts. Ripping! Killing! Killing! Choking! Lawyers! Dentists!

In his predicament, Hook thinks of various atrocities and struggles to come up with something that will restore his sense of pleasure. However, all that comes to his mind at this point is pain and suffering. Unlike Peter, Hook has a sober self-consciousness that demands him objectively look at himself just as he is.

Old! Alone! Done for! / Killing! Pus! Chidren’s blood! Puppy’s blood! Bunny’s Blood. Disease! / Old! Alone! Done for! / Kittens dashed on spikes! No! Spiders, cockroaches, snakes. Venom and pox. White death. Black death! Any death! A nice cup of tea!

As a rebel who seeks to resist the regime, Hook can only think of the horrible pain he inflicts on others, as something that will bring him pleasure. However, when he finally says. “A nice cup of tea!”, his raison d’être as a traitor collapses. Hook finally accepts his own destruction as an objective fact.

Old! Alone! Done for! Old! Alone! Done for! / Old. Alone. / Done for! / Done for.

In the movie Peter Pan, the children coldly shout “Done for!”, when Hook is about to meet his end and swallowed by a crocodile after suffering a miserable defeat in the battle against Peter. Wendy, who had once been enamored by Hook, joined in on this cruel proclamation, chanting in unison with the other children. However, in the original Peter and Wendy, the hostile word of curse, “Done for!” was used by the narrating author, as a merciless summary of the children of Neverland who had returned to the real world. It is a particularly striking fact that the author’s curse is not only directed at all the children, but also on Mrs. Darling, who was once the object of the author’s preference. Let’s take a look at an interesting epilogue from the original Peter and Wendy, which was omitted from the movie Peter Pan.

All the boys were grown up and done for by this time; so it is scarcely worth while saying anything more about them.  You may see the twins and Nibs and Curly any day going to an office, each carrying a little bag and an umbrella.  Michael is an engine-driver.  Slightly married a lady of title, and so he became a lord.  You see that judge in a wig coming out at the iron door?  That used to be Tootles.  The bearded man who doesn't know any story to tell his children was once John.
Wendy was married in white with a pink sash.  It is strange to think that Peter did not alight in the church and forbid the banns.
Years rolled on again, and Wendy had a daughter.  This ought not to be written in ink but in a golden splash.
She was called Jane, and always had an odd inquiring look, as if from the moment she arrived on the mainland she wanted to ask questions.  When she was old enough to ask them they were mostly about Peter Pan.  She loved to hear of Peter, and Wendy told her all she could remember in the very nursery from which the famous flight had taken place.  It was Jane's nursery now, for her father had bought it at the three per cents. from Wendy's father, who was no longer fond of stairs.  Mrs. Darling was now dead and forgotten.


In the original Peter and Wendy, the author describes the actions of all the characters, including Mrs. Darling, by feigning aloof cynicism, but the only person whom the author is sympathizing with is actually Captain Hook, a rebel who defies the regime as a martyr of aesthetics. However, in the climax of the movie Peter Pan, the villainous captain of a pirate ship is supposed to be depicted as a comical old man who has lost everything.
However, behind the children, who were relieved to be convinced of the destruction of their menace, Hook, suddenly the voice of Hook, who should have been swallowed by a crocodile earlier, echoes.

Brimstone and gall. Silence, you dogs, or I’ll cast anchor in you.

The startled children turned around and saw that the eerie voice was Peter. For Peter, there is never a moment when he should miss an opportunity for mischief. Impressed by Peter’s usual wit, Wendy exclaims.

Oh, the cleverness of you!

However, these words of admiration uttered by the girl who is the main character were also spoken in a completely different scene in the original Peter and Wendy, and it was by Peter himself. Though Peter was able to sneak into the children’s room and finally get the shadow back, when he was sitting on the floor crying because he couldn’t put the shadow on his body, Wendy helped him and sewed the shadow to Peter’s feet with a needle and thread, and Peter involuntarily screamed thinking he had done it all by himself.

Oh, the cleverness of me!

This line was spoken by the main characters both in the original Peter and Wendy and in the movie Peter Pan, and it was directed at Peter Pan.