Return to Neverland Is Better Before It Actually Returns to Neverland

That Mother’s Day post got me in the mood to blog about Peter Pan adaptations, ones I haven’t really covered here in detail before. Technically, the movie I’ll be discussing in this post is a sequel to Peter Pan (1953), but it does take a number of things from the original source material by J. M. Barrie so it kind of counts as an adaptation.

Return to Neverland was released in 2002 by DisneyToon, Disney’s subsidiary studio that mostly made spinoffs and sequels to their main animation studio’s films. Return to Neverland was one of their few projects to get a theatrical release as opposed to going straight to television or video.^[1]Most of the others to receive that honor were Winnie the Pooh movies. Was it because the company thought it was so good or that its visuals were so impressive that they had to be seen on the big screen? Or did they just think it might make more money that way for some reason?^[2]The credits include the names of Kevin Lima and Roger Allers, both of whom worked on some of Disney’s A-list animated movies. That might indicate the company wanted this one to be special. The movie’s opening is pretty cool. Tinker Bell flies through the night sky over London illuminating the shapes of characters and objects from the 1953 Peter Pan in the clouds, giving us a recap of sorts. I love how the musical theme for each character or item is heard on the soundtrack when it appears.

As I mentioned, the filmmakers clearly read the original book for inspiration. The sequel’s premise is that, as in Barrie, the adult Wendy (voiced by Kath Soucie)^[3]Kathryn Beaumont, the original voice of Wendy was originally going to reprise her role and even recorded all her dialogue but for whatever reasons, none of her performance was used, which is a really … Continue reading has a little girl named Jane (Harriet Owen) who also goes to Neverland and has adventures with Peter Pan (Blayne Weaver, probably the voice actor who sounds the least like the 1953 character.) The twist is that this Jane is no Pan fangirl. She used to love listening to her mother’s stories about him, just as her little brother Danny (Andrew McDonough) still does, but by the time the sequel’s story really gets underway, she’s come to consider them “childish nonsense.” Becoming a responsible adult has become Jane’s main goal in life, understandably so since both her parents and possibly her brother or herself could die at any moment. Her beloved father (Richard Rees who starred in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s epic production of Nicholas Nickleby!) is off fighting in World War II, London is being bombed, and she and Danny are about to be evacuated, leaving their mother behind. The movie’s beginning is a lot darker and more dramatic than anything in the 1953 film and, honestly, I’m down for it.

The night before Jane and Danny are set to leave, Wendy begs her daughter to tell Peter Pan stories to her little brother since they comfort him or, at least, distract him from his bad situation. But Jane angrily refuses and even shouts at Danny that Peter Pan isn’t real. The ensuing scene of Jane by herself in her room, the same room Wendy slept in as a child, is pretty great. You may recall that the young Wendy asked her mother to keep the nursery window open at night for Peter Pan. Not only is that same window now shut but it has taped X’s on it to protect it from shock waves, a nice visual symbol for lost innocence. I love how Jane smiles nostalgically up at the famous second star to the right through that window and then that smile fades as her gaze travels down to the smoked-out city below. I don’t love the pop song, I’ll Try, that accompanies this scene, but I appreciate how its lyrics emphasize that Jane really wishes she could believe what her mother and brother do but feels like she can’t. I can see how, say, a young adult struggling to believe in the religion their parents taught them as children would really relate to this scene. It’s pretty powerful stuff.

After Jane cries herself to sleep, a flying pirate ship appears over her house. Captain Hook (Corey Burton, the voice actor who sounds the most like his 1953 counterpart) and his crew descend, stuff Jane in a sack, mistaking her for Wendy, and fly with her across London and back to Neverland.^[4]How did they get their ship back after Peter and the Lost Boys took it over at the end of the original movie? And would the pixie dust that made it fly really still be effective after all these … Continue reading This scene is probably the main reason this movie got a theatrical release. Unfortunately, the CGI hasn’t aged well.

Fortunately, I find the scene great anyway. It’s probably the highlight of Return to Neverland.

Strangely though, once the movie actually does return to Neverland, it gradually but steadily goes downhill.

Hook uses Jane as bait in a trap for Peter, threatening to feed her to a giant octopus. Peter, however, rescues her and gives Hook a taste of his own medicine-and the octopus a taste of Hook. This is the movie’s other big twist on the original. Instead of Hook being pursued by a crocodile who, thanks to Peter, is obsessed with getting another bite of him, he now has this new nemesis who is so similar that the squelching noise he makes even sounds like a ticking clock. I guess the filmmakers felt that more of the crocodile would just be repetitive but that a sequel without him would feel weird.^[5]Jane and Danny’s nursemaid is a dog like their mother and uncles’ by the way. Nana wasn’t replaced by a walrus or anything. It’s not like the crocodile died or anything at the end of Peter Pan.

Jane initially enjoys getting to see the place she’s only heard about in her mother’s stories, but she’s horrified to learn from Peter that the only way for her to get back home is to fly. Due to her lack of faith and trust, Tinker Bell’s pixie dust won’t stick to her. Peter guesses that Jane’s notebook, in which she writes down important things she needs to remember, is what is weighing her down with all its grownup concerns. He and the Lost Boys play a game of keep away with it which ends with the plump Lost Boy (Spencer Breslin) accidentally ingesting it. In a way, I applaud the movie for making Peter and the Lost Boys such immature jerks since J. M. Barrie’s thesis in Peter Pan was that “children are gay and innocent and heartless.” It’s nice that this spinoff doesn’t shy away from that last part. But it works against this movie’s own thesis which is unambiguously that Jane needs to be more like Peter and the Lost Boys. It’s hard to see why ^[6]To be fair, Peter does sympathize with Jane when she explains just why she’s so desperate to get home. And it doesn’t help that the slapstick comedy of the Boys isn’t nearly as funny as the original movie’s slapstick. (That’s not to say Return to Neverland boasts no good comedy. It just doesn’t typically involve these characters.)

Actually, this relates to the movie’s biggest problem for thoughtful viewers. On the one hand, I think it’s great that they gave Jane sympathetic reasons for wanting to grow up so fast. It’s much more interesting than having her just be an arrogant killjoy. But I feel like they made her reasons too sympathetic. Her bedside manner could certainly use some work but is Jane really wrong for saying that she and her brother need to be responsible and mature? Under their grave circumstances, it’s pretty much true. I think the movie is trying to say that the themes of good conquering evil in Wendy’s stories can help people of any age. But I feel like Peter Pan is simultaneously too fluffy^[7]The Disney version anyway. and too amoral a fantasy to support that message.^[8]In an interesting coincidence, it wouldn’t be many years later that Disney would release another movie that was (partially) about a young girl being evacuated from London during the Blitz who … Continue reading

The next three paragraphs are full of spoilers. Skip to the conclusion if you’re interested in seeing the movie. Getting back to that scene of Jane’s notebook being destroyed, she lashes out in anger, saying, “I don’t believe in any of this! And I especially don’t believe in fairies!” This causes Tinker Bell to fall dangerously ill. Peter and the Lost Boys’ goal for the rest of the movie is to save her by getting Jane to believe in fairies.^[9]By the way, in the 1953 movie, Tinker Bell was only referred to as a pixie, not a fairy, for some reason. I like that this sequel is harkening back to a memorable plot point from the original book and stage play but they don’t get it quite right. It’s true that in Peter Pan, “every time a child says, ‘I don’t believe in fairies,’ there is a fairy somewhere that falls down dead,” But it wasn’t just any random child saying so that made them die.^[10]To be fair, the 2003 Peter Pan makes this mistake too. Each fairy was born when a child laughed for the first time and perished when that child stopped believing in them.^[11]Barrie wrote that Tinker Bell died long before Jane was born, presumably since her corresponding child lost faith but no adaptation I can remember has had the heart to keep that detail. Moreover, it’s pretty obvious that Jane just says she doesn’t believe out of spite. Earlier, she told herself that this was all a dream but by this scene, she clearly doesn’t believe that anymore since she’s desperate to find a way home. This makes the whole plotline with Tinker Bell kind of dumb since Jane doesn’t seem cruel enough to deliberately kill her. Realistically, all Peter needs to do is explain the situation to her and, of course, he doesn’t do that until the movie is almost over.

Shortly after Jane’s statement of disbelief, Capt. Hook approaches her with a proposition much like the one he made to Tinker Ball in the 1953 film. He’ll take her back to London in his ship if she helps him find the chest of treasure Peter stole from him long ago.^[12]In the book, Peter and the Lost Boys also had a pirate treasure though it wasn’t stolen from Hook. He promises not to harm a hair on Peter’s head and gives Jane a whistle, telling her to signal him with it when she finds the treasure. When the crucial moment comes, however, she throws the whistle away. But then one of the Lost Boys finds it and innocently blows on it, summoning the treacherous Hook who captures them and credits Jane. I guess the filmmakers realized it would be pretty stupid for Jane to trust Hook after growing up listening to stories of his villainy, especially when, you know, he recently kidnapped her.^[13]Credit where credit is due, the scene of him faking remorse is the funniest in the movie, especially the picture of his mother that he shows Jane. But they couldn’t think of another direction to take the story. The result is that Jane feels guilty and has to redeem herself when it doesn’t really feel like she needs to do so.^[14]I suppose she should have just not accepted the whistle in the first place.

Of course, all ends happily (except for Hook and his crew) and we even get a scene of the adult Wendy reuniting with Peter Pan that’s a lot less depressing than the scene J. M. Barrie wrote. (That’s not necessarily a complaint by the way. I found the movie’s scene quite touching.)

Ordinarily, I’d avoid writing about a movie like Return to Neverland since it’s ultimately neither particularly good nor particularly bad, just kind of meh, and pieces of entertainment like that usually aren’t very interesting. But, as I said, I’m in a Peter Pan mood and I do find it interesting how the best things about Return to Neverland, like the character of Jane, also tend to lead to its biggest dramatic problems.

Next Week: I Cover Two Lesser-Known Peter Pan Adaptations