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Dream world (plot device)
Encyclopedia
Dream world is a commonly used plot device
in fiction
al works, most notably in science fiction
and fantasy fiction. The use of a dream world creates a situation whereby a character
(or group of characters) is placed in a marvellous and unpredictable environment and must overcome several personal problems to leave it. The dream world also commonly serves to teach some moral
or religious lessons to the character experiencing it – a lesson that the other characters will be unaware of, but one that will influence decisions made regarding them. When the character is reintroduced into the real world (usually when they wake up), the question arises as to what exactly constitutes reality
due to the vivid recollection and experiences of the dream world.
According to J.R.R. Tolkien, dream worlds contrast with fantasy world
s, in which the world has existence independent of the characters in it. However, other authors have used the dreaming process as a way of accessing a world which, within the context of the fiction, holds as much consistency and continuity as physical reality. The use of "dream frames" to contain a fantasy world, and so explain away its marvels, has been bitterly criticized and has become much less prevalent.
and Piers Plowman
are two such dream vision
s.
One of the best-known dream worlds is Wonderland
from Lewis Carroll
's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
, as well as Looking-Glass Land
from its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass
. Unlike many dream worlds, Carroll's logic is like that of actual dreams, with transitions and causality flexible. James Branch Cabell
's Smirt
and its two sequels taken together form an extended dream and most of their action takes place in a dream world.
The action of The Bridge by Ian M. Banks and The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever
by Stephen R. Donaldson
take place in dream worlds. Other fictional dream worlds include the Dreamlands of H. P. Lovecraft
's Dream Cycle
and The Neverending Story
s world of Fantasia, which includes places like the Desert of Lost Dreams, the Sea of Possibilities and the Swamps of Sadness. Dreamworlds, shared hallucinations and other alternate realities feature in a number of works by Phillip K. Dick, such as The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
and Ubik
. Similar themes were explored byb Jorge Luis Borges
, for instance in The Circular Ruins
.
In The Wheel of Time
book series, Tel'aran'rhiod
is a dream world that exists in close proximity to the real world. Objects and physical locations that do not frequently change in the real world have parallels in Tel'aran'rhiod
. Ordinary people can occasionally slip into Tel'aran'rhiod
, and events that occur within this dream world have physical consequences. A person that dies in Tel'aran'rhiod
will never wake up again, and in several cases it is shown that physical injuries gained there persist to the waking world. Tel'aran'rhiod
can be controlled similar to a lucid dream, and several characters in the series can enter and manipulate Tel'aran'rhiod
at will.
, Oz
from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
was altered from a fantasy world (in the novel) to a dream world of Dorothy's; characters who were independent inhabitants of Oz were transformed into dream parallels of introduced Kansas characters.
In The Matrix
, Neo and the rest of the humans live inside a dream world. Their brains are hooked up to a computer network that creates this dream world. However, some may argue that this is not a dream world, as it seems completely normal and indistinguishable from reality (aside from time differences). In the 1980s, the Nightmare on Elm Street series
of horror films introduced a dark dream realm inhabited by the supernatural serial killer Freddy Krueger
.
In the movie Sharkboy and Lavagirl the main characters enter a world dreamt up by a small boy in order to save the real world.
Down Town is the land of nightmares where all people who are in comas go in the movie Monkeybone
.Dreamworlds also appear in Total Recall
and Vanilla Sky
;
The film Waking Life
takes place almost entirely in a dream realm. In the 2010 film Inception
, main characters create artificial, vivid dream worlds and bring others into the dream worlds and perform various things with their brains, without them knowing. This may involve 'Extraction' (stealing memories and secrets), 'Inception' (planting an idea into the mind) and others.
's adventures in Slumberland
, had a dream world theme.
Writer Neil Gaiman
was tasked with re-imagining a Golden Age character, "The Sandman". In his version, the Sandman becomes Dream
, the Lord of Dreams (also known, to various characters throughout the series, as Morpheus
, Oneiros
, the Shaper, the Shaper of Form, Lord of the Dreaming, the Dream King, Dream-Sneak, Dream Cat, Murphy, Kai'ckul, and Lord L'Zoril), who is essentially the anthropomorphic personification of dream
s. At the start of the series, Morpheus is captured by an occult ritual and held prisoner for 70 years. Morpheus escapes in the modern day and, after avenging himself upon his captors, sets about rebuilding his kingdom, which has fallen into disrepair in his absence.
Dreamworlds also appear in Rozen Maiden
, in the Outback(s) of The Maxx
; in Dream Land, the main setting of many Kirby games, in the webcomic The Dreamland Chronicles
, and the movie Sailor Moon Super S the Movie: Black Dream Hole
also have dream realms in their universes.
The American Dragon Jake Long episode "Dreamscape" takes place mainly in a dream realm. Similarly, the Xiaolin Showdown
episode of the same title also uses the dream world in its plotline.
In Clamp
manga series such as X/1999, Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
and xxxHolic, the dream world is very important to the events that occur within each story. It is later revealed in xxxHolic that the dream world itself is its own world, as part of the Clamp multiverse. Similarly, in the Bone
graphic novel series by Jeff Smith, the primary plot device is a dream world called "The Dreaming." It exists independently from the real world, and it is
episode "Waking Moments" uses several dream realms and false awakenings. In the UFO
episode "Ordeal," Foster's abduction and rescue is explained away as a dream. The whole of season 8 of Dallas
was retroactively explained, at the start of Season 9, as a dream had by Bobby Ewing.
take place in a dream of Link's and Mario
's respectively.
Also, in the video game The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
, there is a short quest which takes place in a dreamworld.
In the video game, Fallout 3
, a main storyline quest involves the main character going into a virtual reality simulator, referred to as "Tranquility Lane," a dreamworld simulation of a 1950s suburban neighborhood.
In the Jay Jay the Jet Plane
cartoon series, adventures where air-breathing jet planes cannot go (underwater and in space) happen as dreams.
In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
part 3 "Stardust Crusaders
," Jotaro and his friends and grandpa are put in a dream world which takes the form of an amusement park by Mannish Boy and his Death 13 stand.
Other dreamworlds are the Maginaryworld from Sonic Shuffle
, and in Nightopia and Nightmare (collectively known in a place called the "Night Dimension") from Nights into Dreams...
and its sequel for the Wii
, Nights: Journey of Dreams
. The Life and Times of Juniper Lee
In the first two games of the EarthBound
series, the protagonist (Ninten in EarthBound Zero and Ness in EarthBound
) must travel to a dream world named Magicant. However, the two Magicants are different from each other. Ninten visits his Magicant, which is light pink and has seashell spires and clouds, multiple times during the story, until it is revealed to not be his own Magicant but instead just a collection of the memories of his great-grandmother, Maria. Ness's Magicant is a surreal, spacelike land in a purple sea that Ness only gains access to once he records the eight melodies into his Sound Stone, which he then must travel to the center of in order to overcome his weaknesses, characterized by a boss battle against his 'Nightmare' (with an appearance similar to the 'Mani-Mani Statue', a mysterious object encountered in another dreamworld called Moonside), and absorb the power of the Earth into his heart.
The whole of Zanarkand in Final Fantasy X
was a dream, along with the main character, Tidus.
In Dragon Quest VI: Realms of Reverie, the game is split between two worlds initially known as the Real World and the Phantom World, named such because any being from the Real World is rendered unseen by the inhabitants of the Phantom World, like a phantom, and are only capable of becoming visible after drinking a special elixir
. After a time, it is revealed that the Phantom World is in fact the true Real World, while the former Real World is called the Dream World, created from the dreams of the people of the Real World, in which each inhabitant has a Dream World counterpart. In addition, the main antagonist of the game, Deathtamoor, plots to try to merge both the Real World and Dream World with his own "Dark World" in an attempt for world domination.
In the upcoming video game Driver: San Francisco
, main character John Tanner suffers a car accident that leaves him in a coma. The game take places in his dream, but the character himself doesn't realize he's dreaming. Instead, he thinks he had a lucky escape and with this, thinks that he got an ability to possess
other people. During the game, many billboards will turn black and show "wake up" messages.
Plot device
A plot device is an object or character in a story whose sole purpose is to advance the plot of the story, or alternatively to overcome some difficulty in the plot....
in fiction
Fiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
al works, most notably in science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
and fantasy fiction. The use of a dream world creates a situation whereby a character
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
(or group of characters) is placed in a marvellous and unpredictable environment and must overcome several personal problems to leave it. The dream world also commonly serves to teach some moral
Moral
A moral is a message conveyed or a lesson to be learned from a story or event. The moral may be left to the hearer, reader or viewer to determine for themselves, or may be explicitly encapsulated in a maxim...
or religious lessons to the character experiencing it – a lesson that the other characters will be unaware of, but one that will influence decisions made regarding them. When the character is reintroduced into the real world (usually when they wake up), the question arises as to what exactly constitutes reality
Reality
In philosophy, reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined. In a wider definition, reality includes everything that is and has been, whether or not it is observable or comprehensible...
due to the vivid recollection and experiences of the dream world.
According to J.R.R. Tolkien, dream worlds contrast with fantasy world
Fantasy world
A fantasy world is a fictional universe used in fantasy novels and games. Typical worlds involve magic or magical abilities and often, but not always, either a medieval or futuristic theme...
s, in which the world has existence independent of the characters in it. However, other authors have used the dreaming process as a way of accessing a world which, within the context of the fiction, holds as much consistency and continuity as physical reality. The use of "dream frames" to contain a fantasy world, and so explain away its marvels, has been bitterly criticized and has become much less prevalent.
Literature
Dream frames were frequently used in medieval allegory to justify the narrative; The Book of the DuchessThe Book of the Duchess
The Book of the Duchess, also known as The Deth of Blaunche, Encyclopædia Britannica, 1910. Accessed March 11, 2008. is the earliest of Chaucer’s major poems, preceded only by his short poem, "An ABC," and possibly by his translation of The Romaunt of the Rose...
and Piers Plowman
Piers Plowman
Piers Plowman or Visio Willelmi de Petro Plowman is the title of a Middle English allegorical narrative poem by William Langland. It is written in unrhymed alliterative verse divided into sections called "passus"...
are two such dream vision
Dream vision
A dream vision is a literary device in which a dream is recounted for a specific purpose. While dreams occur frequently throughout the history of literature, the dream vision emerged as a poetic genre in its own right, and was particularly popular in the Middle Ages. This genre typically follows a...
s.
Wonderland (fictional country)
Wonderland is the setting for Lewis Carroll's 1865 children's novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.-Geography:In the story, Wonderland is located underground, and Alice reaches it by travelling down a rabbit hole, possibly on the banks of the Thames between Folly Bridge and Godstow...
from Lewis Carroll
Lewis Carroll
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...
's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is an 1865 novel written by English author Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll. It tells of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar, anthropomorphic creatures...
, as well as Looking-Glass Land
Looking-Glass Land
Looking-Glass Land is the setting for Lewis Carroll's 1871 children's novel Through the Looking-Glass.-Geography:The entire country is divided into squares by a series of little brooks with hedges growing perpendicular to them.-Government:...
from its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass
Through the Looking-Glass
Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There is a work of literature by Lewis Carroll . It is the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland...
. Unlike many dream worlds, Carroll's logic is like that of actual dreams, with transitions and causality flexible. James Branch Cabell
James Branch Cabell
James Branch Cabell, ; April 14, 1879 – May 5, 1958) was an American author of fantasy fiction and belles lettres. Cabell was well regarded by his contemporaries, including H. L. Mencken and Sinclair Lewis. His works were considered escapist and fit well in the culture of the 1920s, when his...
's Smirt
Smirt
Smirt: An Urbane Nightmare is a 1934 satirical romance by James Branch Cabell, the opening volume in his trilogy The Nightmare Has Triplets. The two later romances of this trilogy are Smith and Smire....
and its two sequels taken together form an extended dream and most of their action takes place in a dream world.
The action of The Bridge by Ian M. Banks and The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever
The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever
The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever is a trilogy of fantasy novels by Stephen R. Donaldson. It was followed by The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, also a trilogy, and The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, a planned tetralogy....
by Stephen R. Donaldson
Stephen R. Donaldson
Stephen Reeder Donaldson is an American fantasy, science fiction and mystery novelist, most famous for his Thomas Covenant series...
take place in dream worlds. Other fictional dream worlds include the Dreamlands of H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
's Dream Cycle
Dream Cycle
The Dream Cycle refers to a series of stories by author H. P. Lovecraft. These stories concern themselves with "The Dreamlands": a vast, alternate dimension that can be entered via dreams.-Geography:The Dreamlands is apparently divided into four regions:...
and The Neverending Story
The Neverending Story
The Neverending Story is a German fantasy novel by Michael Ende, first published in 1979. The standard English translation, by Ralph Manheim, was first published in 1983...
s world of Fantasia, which includes places like the Desert of Lost Dreams, the Sea of Possibilities and the Swamps of Sadness. Dreamworlds, shared hallucinations and other alternate realities feature in a number of works by Phillip K. Dick, such as The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a 1965 novel by US science fiction writer Philip K. Dick. It was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1965....
and Ubik
Ubik
Ubik is a 1969 science fiction novel by American writer Philip K. Dick. Critic Lev Grossman described it as "a deeply unsettling existential horror story, a nightmare you'll never be sure you've woken up from."-Plot synopsis:...
. Similar themes were explored byb Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...
, for instance in The Circular Ruins
The Circular Ruins
"The Circular Ruins" is a fantasy short story by Argentine writer and poet Jorge Luis Borges. Published in the literary journal Sur in December 1940, it was included in the 1941 collection The Garden of Forking Paths and then in part one of the 1944 collection Ficciones...
.
In The Wheel of Time
The Wheel of Time
The Wheel of Time is a series of epic fantasy novels written by American author James Oliver Rigney, Jr., under the pen name Robert Jordan. Originally planned as a six-book series, the length was increased by increments; at the time of Rigney's death, he expected it to be 12, but it will actually...
book series, Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod or the World of Dreams is a fictional reality where the reality is mutable, mentioned in the fictional world of Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. The word itself is from the in-universe language known as the Old Tongue, and literally means 'the unseen world'...
is a dream world that exists in close proximity to the real world. Objects and physical locations that do not frequently change in the real world have parallels in Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod or the World of Dreams is a fictional reality where the reality is mutable, mentioned in the fictional world of Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. The word itself is from the in-universe language known as the Old Tongue, and literally means 'the unseen world'...
. Ordinary people can occasionally slip into Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod or the World of Dreams is a fictional reality where the reality is mutable, mentioned in the fictional world of Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. The word itself is from the in-universe language known as the Old Tongue, and literally means 'the unseen world'...
, and events that occur within this dream world have physical consequences. A person that dies in Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod or the World of Dreams is a fictional reality where the reality is mutable, mentioned in the fictional world of Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. The word itself is from the in-universe language known as the Old Tongue, and literally means 'the unseen world'...
will never wake up again, and in several cases it is shown that physical injuries gained there persist to the waking world. Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod or the World of Dreams is a fictional reality where the reality is mutable, mentioned in the fictional world of Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. The word itself is from the in-universe language known as the Old Tongue, and literally means 'the unseen world'...
can be controlled similar to a lucid dream, and several characters in the series can enter and manipulate Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod
Tel'aran'rhiod or the World of Dreams is a fictional reality where the reality is mutable, mentioned in the fictional world of Robert Jordan's fantasy series The Wheel of Time. The word itself is from the in-universe language known as the Old Tongue, and literally means 'the unseen world'...
at will.
Film
In the 1939 movieThe Wizard of Oz (1939 film)
The Wizard of Oz is a 1939 American musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed primarily by Victor Fleming. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but there were uncredited contributions by others. The lyrics for the songs...
, Oz
Land of Oz
Oz is a fantasy region containing four lands under the rule of one monarch.It was first introduced in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, one of many fantasy countries that he created for his books. It achieved a popularity that none of his other works attained, and after four years, he...
from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is a children's novel written by L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. Originally published by the George M. Hill Company in Chicago on May 17, 1900, it has since been reprinted numerous times, most often under the name The Wizard of Oz, which is the name of...
was altered from a fantasy world (in the novel) to a dream world of Dorothy's; characters who were independent inhabitants of Oz were transformed into dream parallels of introduced Kansas characters.
In The Matrix
The Matrix
The Matrix is a 1999 science fiction-action film written and directed by Larry and Andy Wachowski, starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano, and Hugo Weaving...
, Neo and the rest of the humans live inside a dream world. Their brains are hooked up to a computer network that creates this dream world. However, some may argue that this is not a dream world, as it seems completely normal and indistinguishable from reality (aside from time differences). In the 1980s, the Nightmare on Elm Street series
A Nightmare on Elm Street (franchise)
A Nightmare on Elm Street is an American horror franchise that consists of nine slasher films, a television show, novels, and comic books. The franchise began with the film series created by Wes Craven. The franchise is based on the fictional character Freddy Krueger, introduced in A Nightmare on...
of horror films introduced a dark dream realm inhabited by the supernatural serial killer Freddy Krueger
Freddy Krueger
Frederick Charles "Freddy" Krueger is a fictional, horrifying character from the Nightmare on Elm Street series of horror films. He first appears in Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street as a disfigured dream stalker who uses a glove armed with razors to kill his victims in their dreams,...
.
In the movie Sharkboy and Lavagirl the main characters enter a world dreamt up by a small boy in order to save the real world.
Down Town is the land of nightmares where all people who are in comas go in the movie Monkeybone
Monkeybone
Monkeybone is a 2001 American comedy film that combines live-action with stop-motion animation. It was based on Kaja Blackley's graphic novel Dark Town...
.Dreamworlds also appear in Total Recall
Total Recall
Total Recall is a 1990 American science fiction action film. The film stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rachel Ticotin, Sharon Stone, Michael Ironside, Ronny Cox & Mel Johnson, Jr.. It is based on the Philip K. Dick story “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale”...
and Vanilla Sky
Vanilla Sky
Vanilla Sky is a 2001 American psychological thriller film directed, co-produced and co-written by Cameron Crowe. The film is an English-language remake of the 1997 Spanish movie Abre los ojos , the screenplay for which was written by Alejandro Amenábar and Mateo Gil...
;
The film Waking Life
Waking Life
Waking Life is an American animated film , directed by Richard Linklater and released in 2001. The entire film was shot using digital video and then a team of artists using computers drew stylized lines and colors over each frame.The film focuses on the nature of dreams, consciousness, and...
takes place almost entirely in a dream realm. In the 2010 film Inception
Inception
Inception: The Subconscious Jams 1994-1995 is a compilation of unreleased tracks by the band Download.-Track listing:# "Primitive Tekno Jam" – 3:23# "Bee Sting Sickness" – 8:04# "Weed Acid Techno" – 8:19...
, main characters create artificial, vivid dream worlds and bring others into the dream worlds and perform various things with their brains, without them knowing. This may involve 'Extraction' (stealing memories and secrets), 'Inception' (planting an idea into the mind) and others.
Comic books, graphic novels and animation
One of the earliest newspaper comic strips, recounting Little NemoLittle Nemo
Little Nemo is the main fictional character in a series of weekly comic strips by Winsor McCay that appeared in the New York Herald and William Randolph Hearst's New York American newspapers from October 15, 1905 – April 23, 1911 and April 30, 1911 – July 26, 1914; respectively.The...
's adventures in Slumberland
Slumberland
Slumberland Furniture, Inc. is a furniture retailer in the Midwestern United States, founded in 1967. Originally the company specialized in mattresses and La-Z-Boy recliners. Today Slumberland has 114 stores in 10 states. It is America's top seller of La-Z-Boy upholstery and the top seller of...
, had a dream world theme.
Writer Neil Gaiman
Neil Gaiman
Neil Richard Gaiman born 10 November 1960)is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, graphic novels, audio theatre and films. His notable works include the comic book series The Sandman and novels Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, and The Graveyard Book...
was tasked with re-imagining a Golden Age character, "The Sandman". In his version, the Sandman becomes Dream
Dream (comics)
Dream is the fictional protagonist of DC Comics' Vertigo comic book series The Sandman, written by Neil Gaiman. One of the seven Endless, inconceivably powerful beings older and greater than gods, Dream is both lord and personification of all dreams and stories, all that is not in reality...
, the Lord of Dreams (also known, to various characters throughout the series, as Morpheus
Dream (comics)
Dream is the fictional protagonist of DC Comics' Vertigo comic book series The Sandman, written by Neil Gaiman. One of the seven Endless, inconceivably powerful beings older and greater than gods, Dream is both lord and personification of all dreams and stories, all that is not in reality...
, Oneiros
Oneiroi
In Greek mythology, the Oneiroi were, according to Hesiod, sons of Nyx , and were brothers of Hypnos , Thanatos , Geras and other beings, all produced via parthenogenesis...
, the Shaper, the Shaper of Form, Lord of the Dreaming, the Dream King, Dream-Sneak, Dream Cat, Murphy, Kai'ckul, and Lord L'Zoril), who is essentially the anthropomorphic personification of dream
Dream
Dreams are successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. The content and purpose of dreams are not definitively understood, though they have been a topic of scientific speculation, philosophical intrigue and religious...
s. At the start of the series, Morpheus is captured by an occult ritual and held prisoner for 70 years. Morpheus escapes in the modern day and, after avenging himself upon his captors, sets about rebuilding his kingdom, which has fallen into disrepair in his absence.
Dreamworlds also appear in Rozen Maiden
Rozen Maiden
is a manga series created by Peach-Pit. The story centers on Jun Sakurada, a young hikikomori boy that forms a bond with Shinku, a living doll of the "Rozen Maiden" series, who was created by the mysterious dollmaker Rozen hundreds of years ago...
, in the Outback(s) of The Maxx
The Maxx
The Maxx is an American comic book series created by Sam Kieth and published originally monthly by Image Comics and now collected in trade paperback collections from DC Comic's Wildstorm imprint. The comic book, which stars a character of the same name, spawned an animated series that aired on the...
; in Dream Land, the main setting of many Kirby games, in the webcomic The Dreamland Chronicles
The Dreamland Chronicles
The Dreamland Chronicles is an all-ages fantasy webcomic and comic book series created by Scott Christian Sava with 3D computer graphics.-Plot summary:...
, and the movie Sailor Moon Super S the Movie: Black Dream Hole
Sailor Moon SuperS movie
Sailor Moon Super S: The Movie is the third theatrically released Sailor Moon film. This simplified name is the one given to the English-dubbed edition released by Geneon Entertainment, while its full name in Japanese is in the style of the series' episode titles:...
also have dream realms in their universes.
The American Dragon Jake Long episode "Dreamscape" takes place mainly in a dream realm. Similarly, the Xiaolin Showdown
Xiaolin Showdown
Xiaolin Showdown is an American animated television series that aired on Kids WB and was created by Christy Hui. Set in a world where martial arts battles and Eastern magic are commonplace, the series follows four young warriors in training that battle the forces of evil...
episode of the same title also uses the dream world in its plotline.
In Clamp
Clamp (manga artists)
, is an all-female Japanese manga artist group that formed in the mid 1980s. Many of the group's manga series are often adapted into anime after release. It consists of their leader , who provides much of the storyline and screenplay for all their works and adaptations of those works respectively ,...
manga series such as X/1999, Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
is a shōnen manga series written and illustrated by the manga artist group Clamp. It takes place in the same fictional universe as many of Clamp's other manga series, most notably xxxHolic. The plot follows how Sakura, the princess of the Kingdom of Clow, loses her soul and how Syaoran, a young...
and xxxHolic, the dream world is very important to the events that occur within each story. It is later revealed in xxxHolic that the dream world itself is its own world, as part of the Clamp multiverse. Similarly, in the Bone
Bone (comics)
Bone is an independently published graphic novel series originally serialized in 55 irregularly released issues from 1991 to 2004. Bone was drawn and written by Jeff Smith....
graphic novel series by Jeff Smith, the primary plot device is a dream world called "The Dreaming." It exists independently from the real world, and it is
TV
The Star Trek: VoyagerStar Trek: Voyager
Star Trek: Voyager is a science fiction television series set in the Star Trek universe. Set in the 24th century from the year 2371 through 2378, the series follows the adventures of the Starfleet vessel USS Voyager, which becomes stranded in the Delta Quadrant 70,000 light-years from Earth while...
episode "Waking Moments" uses several dream realms and false awakenings. In the UFO
UFO (TV series)
UFO is a 1970-1971 British television science fiction series about an alien invasion of Earth, created by Gerry Anderson and Sylvia Anderson with Reg Hill, and produced by the Andersons and Lew Grade's Century 21 Productions for Grade's ITC Entertainment company.UFO first aired in the UK and Canada...
episode "Ordeal," Foster's abduction and rescue is explained away as a dream. The whole of season 8 of Dallas
Dallas (TV series)
Dallas is an American serial drama/prime time soap opera that revolves around the Ewings, a wealthy Texas family in the oil and cattle-ranching industries. Throughout the series, Larry Hagman stars as greedy, scheming oil baron J. R. Ewing...
was retroactively explained, at the start of Season 9, as a dream had by Bobby Ewing.
Video games
The video games Link's Awakening and Super Mario Bros. 2Super Mario Bros. 2
Super Mario Bros. 2, often abbreviated SMB2, is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System as a sequel to the 1985 game Super Mario Bros. The game was also remade as part of the Super Mario All-Stars collection for the Super Nintendo Entertainment...
take place in a dream of Link's and Mario
Mario
is a fictional character in his video game series, created by Japanese video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto. Serving as Nintendo's mascot and the main protagonist of the series, Mario has appeared in over 200 video games since his creation...
's respectively.
Also, in the video game The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is a single-player action role-playing video game developed by Bethesda Game Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks and the Take-Two Interactive subsidiary 2K Games...
, there is a short quest which takes place in a dreamworld.
In the video game, Fallout 3
Fallout 3
Fallout 3 is an action role-playing game released by Bethesda Game Studios, and the third major installment in the Fallout series. The game was released in North America, Europe and Australia in October 2008, and in Japan in December 2008 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360...
, a main storyline quest involves the main character going into a virtual reality simulator, referred to as "Tranquility Lane," a dreamworld simulation of a 1950s suburban neighborhood.
In the Jay Jay the Jet Plane
Jay Jay the Jet Plane
Jay Jay the Jet Plane is an American CGI children's television series based at the fictional Tarrytown Airport. It has about 60 episodes and it is aimed at ages 2-6. The characters are talking airplanes, a helicopter, some humans, and two talking ground vehicles...
cartoon series, adventures where air-breathing jet planes cannot go (underwater and in space) happen as dreams.
In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
is a manga written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki. Every main character's name in each part can be read as JoJo. The manga, published by Shueisha, first ran in the magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1987 to 2002, before being transferred to the seinen magazine Ultra Jump in 2004. The current story...
part 3 "Stardust Crusaders
Stardust Crusaders
, initially referred to as , is the third story arc in the Japanese manga series JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. It spans chapters 114-265 of the series, which were collected in volumes 12 to 28 of the Jump Comics tankōbon edition...
," Jotaro and his friends and grandpa are put in a dream world which takes the form of an amusement park by Mannish Boy and his Death 13 stand.
Other dreamworlds are the Maginaryworld from Sonic Shuffle
Sonic Shuffle
is a video game for the Dreamcast and was Sega's answer to the Nintendo party game, Mario Party. The game was developed by Hudson Soft, who also developed Mario Party, and co-developed by Sonic Team.-Overview:...
, and in Nightopia and Nightmare (collectively known in a place called the "Night Dimension") from Nights into Dreams...
NiGHTS into Dreams...
Nights into Dreams... , is a video game released by Sega in 1996 for the Sega Saturn video game system. The game's story follows two children entering a dream world, where they are aided by the main character, Nights...
and its sequel for the Wii
Wii
The Wii is a home video game console released by Nintendo on November 19, 2006. As a seventh-generation console, the Wii primarily competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. Nintendo states that its console targets a broader demographic than that of the two others...
, Nights: Journey of Dreams
Nights: Journey of Dreams
Nights: Journey of Dreams is a video game for the Wii console developed by Sonic Team and Sega. It is the sequel to the 1996 Sega Saturn title Nights into Dreams......
. The Life and Times of Juniper Lee
The Life and Times of Juniper Lee
The Life and Times of Juniper Lee was an American animated television series, created by Judd Winick and produced by Cartoon Network Studios. The show premiered on Cartoon Network on May 30, 2005. The series ended on April 9, 2007...
In the first two games of the EarthBound
EarthBound (series)
EarthBound, known in Japan as Mother, is a role-playing game series created by Shigesato Itoi for Nintendo. The series started in 1989 with the Japan-only release of Mother for the Famicom, and was then followed up by a sequel, released in North America as EarthBound for the Super NES in 1995, and...
series, the protagonist (Ninten in EarthBound Zero and Ness in EarthBound
EarthBound
EarthBound, also known as EarthBound: The War Against Giygas! and released as in Japan, is a role-playing video game co-developed by Ape and HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System video game console...
) must travel to a dream world named Magicant. However, the two Magicants are different from each other. Ninten visits his Magicant, which is light pink and has seashell spires and clouds, multiple times during the story, until it is revealed to not be his own Magicant but instead just a collection of the memories of his great-grandmother, Maria. Ness's Magicant is a surreal, spacelike land in a purple sea that Ness only gains access to once he records the eight melodies into his Sound Stone, which he then must travel to the center of in order to overcome his weaknesses, characterized by a boss battle against his 'Nightmare' (with an appearance similar to the 'Mani-Mani Statue', a mysterious object encountered in another dreamworld called Moonside), and absorb the power of the Earth into his heart.
The whole of Zanarkand in Final Fantasy X
Final Fantasy X
is a role-playing video game developed and published by Square as the tenth title in the Final Fantasy series. It was released in 2001 for Sony's PlayStation 2, and will be re-released for PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita in 2012...
was a dream, along with the main character, Tidus.
In Dragon Quest VI: Realms of Reverie, the game is split between two worlds initially known as the Real World and the Phantom World, named such because any being from the Real World is rendered unseen by the inhabitants of the Phantom World, like a phantom, and are only capable of becoming visible after drinking a special elixir
Elixir
An elixir is a clear, sweet-flavored liquid used for medicinal purposes, to be taken orally and intended to cure one's ills. When used as a pharmaceutical preparation, an elixir contains at least one active ingredient designed to be taken orally....
. After a time, it is revealed that the Phantom World is in fact the true Real World, while the former Real World is called the Dream World, created from the dreams of the people of the Real World, in which each inhabitant has a Dream World counterpart. In addition, the main antagonist of the game, Deathtamoor, plots to try to merge both the Real World and Dream World with his own "Dark World" in an attempt for world domination.
In the upcoming video game Driver: San Francisco
Driver: San Francisco
Driver: San Francisco is a sandbox-style action driving video game developed by Ubisoft Reflections and published by Ubisoft. The game formally was unveiled at E3 2010 and was released in Australia on September 1, 2011, Europe on September 2, 2011 and North America on September 6, 2011 on...
, main character John Tanner suffers a car accident that leaves him in a coma. The game take places in his dream, but the character himself doesn't realize he's dreaming. Instead, he thinks he had a lucky escape and with this, thinks that he got an ability to possess
Possession
In law, possession is the control a person intentionally exercises toward a thing. In all cases, to possess something, a person must have an intention to possess it. A person may be in possession of some property...
other people. During the game, many billboards will turn black and show "wake up" messages.
See also
- Deus ex machinaDeus ex machinaA deus ex machina is a plot device whereby a seemingly inextricable problem is suddenly and abruptly solved with the contrived and unexpected intervention of some new event, character, ability, or object.-Linguistic considerations:...
for when the author of a series deletes the last part of its timeline and reverts to a previous situation, by stating that the rejected matter was a dream by a character.
- Astral planeAstral planeThe astral plane, also called the astral world, is a plane of existence postulated by classical , medieval, oriental and esoteric philosophies and mystery religions...
- Mental planeMental planeThe mental plane, or world of thought, in Hermeticism, Theosophical, Rosicrucian, Aurobindonian, and New Age thought refers to the macrocosmic or universal plane or reality that is made up purely of thought or mindstuff...
- Lucid dream