It is easy to see how Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud shared ideas about the collective unconscious. Although Jung's and Freud's ideas varied, Carl Jung's ideas of archetypes most closely resemble those ideas shown in Tim Burton's The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories. Jung's archetypes of the shadow, trickster, and monster are all present within Burton's story entitled "Mummy Boy."
The shadow archetype is explained as the darker side of an individual's personality. Jung explains it as being worse the more a person or character suppress it. In "Mummy Boy," Burton illustrates the young boy chasing children around doing threatening things and letting out his dark side. In the end, they kill him because he was misunderstood. This illustration could be Burton's way of expressing how he felt angry at children when he was younger and wanted to take out his anger. On the other hand, it could mean that when Burton would let out his feelings and do things he considered fun, he would be shunned by the other children. This archetype is not the only one that appears in this story as the archetype of the trickster is also related to Mummy Boy's shenanigans.
When Mummy boy chases the children around and plays the game of "virgin sacrifice," he goes against the rules of how the normal children play. This unorthodox method of having fun and being malicious makes Mummy boy the archetype for the trickster. Again, it could be that Tim Burton used to have fun in unconventional ways that the other children did not understand or agree with when he was younger. Because of their misunderstandings, both Mummy boy and Tim Burton suffered consequences.
Mummy Boy's demise begins when his parents deem him a "pharaoh's curse" and ends when when the other children mistake him for a piñata and kill him. Mummy Boy did not have the choice to be born the way he was. Yet his parents allowed him to wander around and seemed to not care about him or want anything to do with him. Both Mummy Boy's parents and children his age dehumanize him, thus making him the monster stereotype in their eyes.
In conclusion, Carl Jung's archetypes of the trickster, shadow and monster are all presented in Tim Burton's story "Mummy Boy." The shadow archetype is presented when Mummy Boy chases the children around with a knife. Although closely related to the shadow, the trickster is presented as well. Finally, the monster archetype is presented when the other children and Mummy Boy's parents ostracize him. The children finally destroy him, and no one seems to care. Through the whole story, Mummy Boy tries to be an individual through these archetypes, but the result is that society literally destroys him.
Great comparisons using Jung's archetype's I feel the same about Mummy Boy being a trickster because he did try to sacrifice a little girl. I am assuming maybe as a joke? It is very similar to Edward Scissorhands he was trying to fit in with what he knew best and with what he was dealt which in that case are his scissorhands. Mummy Boy is trying to adjust the only way he knows which is through the ways of the Egyptians. Great job at analyzing each stanza of the poem and relating them to Burton's way of writing and his film making.
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