I’ve already commented on this from my main blog but wanted to come back to it more thoroughly and address a few things here.
Let me start out by saying that as much as I adore Hook as a character, I have no qualms with recognizing that he is a villain. Hook canonically kills his own men in several versions of the story, and it’s pretty obvious that he is willing to kill not only Pan but other children who might get in the way of that goal. That said, however, I do take issue with two points: (1) That Hook is on the island of his own free will. (He may or may not be.) and (2) His intentions toward Wendy.
NOTE:For the purposes of this argument I’m going to assume you’re referring to Barrie’s text as canon.
With regard to the first point, Barrie tells us very little about how Hook might have come to the island or why. Did he sail there intentionally? If so, could he sail away? Maybe… While it’s true that Barrie never actually says Neverland is a star, we also really only see people come and go from the island via flying, and I think it’s safe to say that Hook didn’t fly in. To be fair, though, Hook does say the crocodile has followed him, “from sea to sea and land to land,” which would imply that he can leave. Even so, I’m not sure Hook would willingly stick around and put up with Peter’s pestering all the time if he had the option of leaving and never looking back. Revenge probably isn’t worth it when he could be out plundering other ships and doing better things than fighting a boy who will gladly kill off his men just because he thinks it’s fun. We also don’t know how long Hook has been on the island. The Golden Age of Piracy has long since passed by the time the Darlings arrive. If he was truly “Blackbeard’s bosun” (implying he came from the “real” world that Wendy comes from) and “the only man the Sea Cook feared” then he has been on the island for a couple hundred years. Maybe he could leave once…but I’m not sure he has been able to for awhile. Or perhaps Hook himself is one of Peter’s creations or the dream of one of the Darlings or some other child come to life. Barrie is intentionally vague about a lot of these things, so it’s difficult to definitively argue one way or another.
The second point, I feel more strongly about. Hook is many things, but I don’t believe a pedophile is one of them. We honestly have no idea what Hook’s sexuality is like because Barrie doesn’t give us anything to go on in his book. (If you count “Hook at Eton” as part of Barrie’s canon we do learn that Hook was not attached to any woman but nothing else about his love life/sexuality or lack thereof.) Hook does use his charm to his advantage with her, perhaps, but no more than he would with anyone else, I think. The idea of taking Wendy captive as a “mother” for the pirates isn’t even Hook’s idea. Smee (who is probably about as innocent as a pirate can be) is the one who initially proposes it, and Hook just agrees that he likes the plan and expands upon it. As ridiculous as it sounds, I don’t think there is any hidden meaning behind it. They literally DO just want a “mother.” Lots of things on the island are what we might think of as being ridiculous: a clock so loud it can be heard from (and still function) inside of a crocodile, a kite that can lift a child into the air, imaginary food that somehow actually provides sustenance… Why does Barrie’s story feature such ridiculous plot points? Because they are meant to be things that a child would come up with. Hook’s attempt to kidnap Wendy and make her the pirates’ mother, therefore, makes more sense in this context. There is a lot of “play acting” going on in this story and, to a certain extent at least, the pirates are obligated to do so as well, being a part of a child’s dreamland and subject to the rules of a child’s mind. Death is something most children don’t quite understand but have some vague concept of. (“To die will be an awfully big adventure.”) Rape, however, for most children raised in a safe environment, never crosses their minds, and I truly don’t believe Barrie ever intended to make his audience think about it either.
@concordia-cum-sinistro has done a lot more textual research than I have and could probably explain these points more eloquently than I can, but these are my basic thoughts on the matter.
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