"There and Back" Story: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:TeenTitansGoS02E22RoadTrip - Map.png|thumb|400px|link=Teen Titans Go! (animation)|It's not the destination that matters, it's the journey!]]
The '''"There and Back" Story''' is a common form of plotline also referred to as a "home-away-home", centered around a form of (usually) [[Hero's Journey|heroic journey]] undertaken by a small group of characters from starting point A to destination B. The intermediate stops made along the way are usually tangential to the journey itself, and the ensemble of interesting characters that the group almost inevitably meets have their own varying levels of relation to the central plot. The trope is named for [[The Hobbit (novel)|''The Hobbit'']], which was subtitled ''"There and Back Again"''.
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The journey is usually treated as a major plotline, if not ''the'' main plot itself, and the secondary and tertiary locations and characters that our group encounters are at most a source of smaller subplots, which are usually resolved shortly before that location is left - after all, it's about the journey, not the destination. That said, if a specific subplot ''isn't'' resolved immediately, [[Chekhov's Gun|expect them to come up sometime down the]] [[Stealth Pun|road.]]
[[Christopher Booker]]'s ''[[The Seven Basic Plots]]'' calls this "[[Voyage and Return]]".<!-- MOD: Please leave this link in place, so that the redirect isn't deleted as unused. -->
[[Tropes Are Flexible]], and this one is more flexible than most. (It ''is'' one of [[The Seven Basic Plots]], after all.)
This plotline is a key fixture of many works of [[Children's Literature]] and [[Coming of Age Stories]]. [[The Big Race]] is a frequent form of this, as is many a [[Vacation Episode|Vacation]] or [[Road Trip Episode]] ([[Road Movie|including the movies]]). Expect "[[Are We There Yet?]]" to be asked quite often.▼
* This can overlap with [[Orphean Rescue]], if the people doing the rescuing encounter beings or wonders (or both) during their rescue mission.
* [[Yet Another Christmas Carol]] tends to have the trip take place through time, rather than through space.
* The [[Fantastic Voyage Plot]] and [[Journey to the Center of the Mind]] send the travelers into somebody else (one way or another), fully expecting to make their way out at the end of their trip.
* This plotline is a key fixture of many works of [[Children's Literature]] and [[Coming of Age Stories]].
▲
* If you go "there" but can't get "back" so easily, then you're [[Trapped in Another World]].
And so on.
If multiple people are brought along for the ride, expect "[[Are We There Yet?]]" to be asked quite often.
For other uses of the phrase "there and back again", see [[There and Back Again|the disambiguation page]].
{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* Most ''[[Digimon]]'' series have the characters [[Trapped in Another World]], doing their best to find a way home.
== [[Fan Works]] ==
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* The 1965 film ''[[The Great Race]]'' is about a road race that takes the cast from New York to Paris.
* ''[[Labyrinth]]'': Sarah's ill-considered words force her into a journey through the Goblin King's labyrinth. The trip back is much easier.
* ''[[The Devil Wears Prada]]'' is a more metaphorical version of "There and Back". The heroine enters a new world (her new job at the magazine), where she finds her normal behavior patterns won't work
* ''[[Inception]]'' shows the joyful exploration of the dreamworlds in flashbacks of the {{spoiler|fifty years Cobb and Mal spent in limbo}}, and Cobb is certainly a different man at the end of the movie than in the beginning.
** Don't forget the training of Ariadne where she got to romp around in Cobb's dreams, an adventure that produced the now iconic image of a city being folded in half.
* The [[Where the Wild Things Are (film)|''Where the Wild Things Are'' movie]] is a good modern example, with Max running away and then returning home.
== [[Literature]] ==
* ''[[Around the World in Eighty Days]]'' is [[The Big Race]] and a [[Race Against the Clock]] on a global scale, with the participants tasked to
* [[J. R. R. Tolkien|Tolkienverse]]:
** The [[Trope Namer]] ''[[The Hobbit (novel)|The Hobbit]]'' covers
** ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'' covers a several-volumes-long journey from Hobbiton to Mordor in search of a way to destroy the One Ring.
* Dorothy's journey from Kansas to Oz and back, in ''[[The Wonderful Wizard of Oz]]'' and the versions of ''[[The Wizard of Oz]]'' that don't claim it was [[All Just a Dream]].
* ''[[The Phantom Tollbooth]]'' tells the story of Milo's journey.
* If it wasn't [[All Just a Dream]], ''[[Alice in Wonderland]]'' reveals Alice's journey through Wonderland.
* ''[[A Christmas Carol]]'' takes Scrooge on a journey through time rather than space, and he returns to his home a changed man.
* Pat Murphy's novel ''[[There and Back Again (novel)|There and Back Again]]'', being ''[[The Hobbit (novel)|The Hobbit]]'' [[Recycled in Space|in Space]] with a dash of [[Lewis Carroll|Carroll]], follows the Voyage and Return plot.
* ''[[The Pilgrim's Regress]]'', the ([[anvilicious]]) early-20th-century updating by [[C. S. Lewis]] of ''[[The Pilgrim's Progress]]'', has the protagonist not only make his journey, but also return home a changed man.
==
* ''[[Tin Man (TV series)|Tin Man]]'', which is based on ''The Wizard of Oz''... only in that show, the ending differs.
==
* Even ''[[NetHack]]'', for all its [[Excuse Plot|sparseness in plot]], fits the bill in a somewhat subverted fashion. The details ([[Gameplay and Story Segregation|which don't figure very heavily into gameplay on their own]]) are as follows.
** Based on the [[All There in the Manual|guidebook]] and the introductory paragraph upon starting a game, the implication is that you (the player character) have been [[Mission From God|chosen by fate]] to eventually find the Amulet of Yendor, and set off as an adventurer after completing your role's basic training. After wandering far from home, you are haunted by dreams of treasure-hunting - at which point you get wind of the Dungeons of Doom and the many treasures it holds (including the Amulet), remaining hesitant about the odds of you surviving such a trek until you finally commit to the decision and make the long trek to the Dungeons. And so the fun begins: you are now There - can you make it Back?
** "There" is the Mazes of Menace, the collective name for the multi-branched dungeon that can reach a depth of anywhere between 40-50 levels if not more. Assuming you survive long enough, you'll eventually hear a telepathic call from your [[The Mentor|quest leader]] and be told to seek out a magic portal. The portal takes you Back - back to your homeland, where you then must retrieve your quest artifact (along with [[Plot Coupon|a separate item]]) from your nemesis. Should you survive the encounter and successfully make it back to your quest leader, you then resume pursuing your main objective with their blessing. From there... it's all up to you.
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* ''[[Dora the Explorer]]'' does this [[Once an Episode]], with Map detailing the path Dora and Boots will take. The path always includes two primary landmarks prior to the destination itself, and at least a couple of subplots (often involving one of Dora's friends) occur that requires their assistance before they can continue.
** The spinoff series ''[[Go, Diego, Go!]]'' operates much the same way, with Click acting as the guide, and Diego saves any endangered animals he meets along the way.
* [[Teen Titans Go! (animation)|''Teen Titans Go!'']] episode "Road Trip" (which provides the page image) has Cyborg egging the other Titans into [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|going on a]] [[Road Trip Episode|road trip]] to... wherever. It's about the journey, after all. {{spoiler|[[Subverted]] at the end of the episode when the "back" never happens - the other Titans refuse to repeat the experience and instead build a new [[Brick Joke|B-shaped tower]] right at their destination.}}
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[[Category:Pages Original to All The Tropes]]
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