The Fairy Tale Brides of Willow (2022)
An Analysis of Chapter 6: Prisoners of Skellin based on ATU-408: The Three Oranges or The Fruit Maiden
Adapted from my Twitter thread
As @whattheforce mentioned in our recent podcast episode around 21:47, a prominent theme of this chapter was Thirst, and the desperation and poor choices that result from thirst of the spirit as well as the body.
This is also a main theme in the Fruit Maiden tale, where a prince cuts open three oranges (or lemons, pomegranates, apples, and even eggs) to reveal a maiden who begs him for water. The first two die when he fails to offer a drink, but the third survives and becomes his bride. Next, a false bride appears to impersonate the fairy bride and steal the prince. The fairy wife is transformed into a bird or fish, and she is cast into a well, a pond, or sometimes is even cooked on the order of the false bride. After her death, an orange tree grows at the place where she was buried or cast aside, and when the prince next cuts open a fruit from the tree, his true bride emerges and the false bride is punished for her impersonation.
In #Willow Ch6, we have several characters suffering thirst of body and soul, or replacing/impersonating others: Kit, Elora, Airk, and Hot!Crone. Taken with existing themes of consumption and rebirth, fruit maidens and imposter Maidens abound.
Kit Tanthalos is desperate to find her father Madmartigan, or at least find proof that he loved her more than Elora. This desperation leads her to nearly throw herself through the door to the otherworld, and eventually she *dies* from this unquenched thirst.
In fact, Elora hears Kit's desperate call for the spiritual water of truth twice before facing her a third time, when she literally casts her into the fiery lake. In this instance Elora is both the false bride who has replaced Kit, and the prince who will cut her free. In some versions of the tale, the false bride looks into the water and mistakes the true bride's reflection for her own. Elora has usurped Kit's role as Madmartigan's daughter and Airk's rescuer, and sees that reflected back at her as Kit struggles beneath the lake's surface.
Now, Kit has *died* and is floating in Elora's *womb.* Elora must cut open the fruit so that Kit might be reborn and Elora will finally see the aspect of her own psyche that Kit represents: her imposter syndrome, the belief that she can/should not be the Chosen One. Kit will then be restored to her rightful place as the true maiden hero: carrying on Madmartigan's legacy in the Kymerian Cuirass, rescuing Airk to atone for her dismissal of him, and uniting with her faithful lover Jade.
Airk meanwhile wanders the wasteland, ignoring not only his own thirst but the calls of the Crone as she tries to entice him into union with her. Eventually, his desperation wins out over his sense, and he drinks the cursed elixir. And no sooner does he *cut open the fruit* than the false bride appears, the Hot!Crone wearing a fair face who innocently asks to be released. Now the whole kingdom is at risk until the true maidens (Kit and Elora) reappear to reveal the Crone's true face.
Hunger, thirst, and desperation of spirit have led our heroes to their breaking points. Now they must confront the masks they wear and drink or bathe in the water of truth so that they can be reborn in wholeness.
Notes for further reading: Pretty much every version of this tale contains overt racism: anti-Black, anti-Roma, or antisemitic. False bride tales are consistently problematic for this reason and should be approached with caution, maturity, and a critical lens.
Sources:
In Search of the Swan Maiden: A Narrative on Folklore and Gender by Barbara Fass Leavy
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Love_for_Three_Oranges_(fairy_tale)