Character analysis part one- The Chocolate War

Okay I'm gonna go through some of the major characters in The Chocolate War and analyze them here. Again, since the book and movie are so similar I'll be kind of conflating them a little bit and if you don't like that then go fuck yourself. I work at a grocery store, this isn't my real job.

Starting with woke king Archie Costello-

He's also got a great Massachusetts accent

Okay so he's like totally antisocial and when I say antisocial I don't mean that he's shy or quiet but he's what one might call a sociopath but I don't want to use the word sociopath because I don't know but I feel like it's not cool to use it so lackadaisically. I'm not a psychologist or anything. Also he's not entirely without empathy, as you'll see. I know I've spent like the last three posts talking about him but I've got more to say. Anyway, some words to describe his personality: intelligent, confident, manipulative, cruel, ambitious, creative, and fake. I've already gone through the first six traits in previous posts so let's talk about how fake he is. So, people are always saying that antisocial people like Archie are always so charming and that's how they are so good at manipulating people but honestly he's not that charming. He talks smoothly and confidently but everyone can see through his bullshit. In chapter 2 it's mentioned from Obie's point of view that Archie is 'quick with the words' but also 'phony' and tries to sound like a cool swinger when he's really a 'senior in a lousy little high school'. He puts on a cool and confident front to make up for the fact that he's just a teenager trapped in school. None of the other Vigils actually like him but rather they use him due to his intelligence and creativity in coming up with assignments. He doesn't get away with the things he does because he's charming and manipulates others into believing his innocence. Rather, he gets away with the things he does because those in power see his cruelty and intelligence and want to use him for their own personal gains.

And he is tired. While he no doubt enjoys creating assignments and gets off on forcing others to do what he says, he is also drained and struggles to come up with new ideas. The other Vigils only see him when he's intimidating other students and handing out assignments. They don't see how he loses sleep, pushes all other responsibilities to the side and deprives himself of any fun activities (and in the movie his bedroom makes it seem like he lives like an ascetic). Again in chapter 2 we get our first look into how tired he is. He tells Obie that it's not easy to come up with assignments, 'his voice dripped sadness', and that he's human too. In chapter 21 the narration describes that he's under 'constant pressure' to come up with assignments and it leaves him 'hollow and empty'. This pressure is doubled during the chocolate sale where he bit off more than he could chew in agreeing to help Brother Leon. Most of his sadness is left unsaid save for the short conversation with Obie at the beginning so it must have been difficult to translate that into film. Luckily, the actor playing Archie was talented enough to show this exhaustion on his face.

Sad boy

Yes, he's cruel, cold, calculating and unsympathetic, but he's also a teenage boy. He's only a human, still just a baby, not some confident, awe-inspiring, all powerful genius that he pretends to be. Some people fall for his mask, most of them don't. Moreover, I mentioned before that he's not entirely without empathy and that is seen first in chapter 2. When he and Obie are writing down a list of names for students to torture, Obie is worried about being late for work. Archie at first seems callous and doesn't care, but then all of a sudden switches to having compassion, 'his eyes gentle', and wrapping things up for Obie's sake. The narration says that Archie has 'changes of mood' and 'could be a wise bastard one minute and a great guy the next'. The only thing worse than just being straight up sadistic 24/7 is being unpredictable.

We don't get a lot of glimpses into his gentler side, and the movie omits that bit entirely, but he is not entirely unfeeling. In fact, it seems that he tries to make himself unfeeling sometimes. In chapter 21 he thinks about how Obie hates him but he is undisturbed by it. He feels that it is 'good to have people hate [him]' because when he puts 'the needle in them' he feels 'justified' and doesn't 'have to worry about [his] conscience'. This implies that he does actually have a conscience and a sense of empathy but he purposely makes people hate him so he can get away with doing horrible things and not feeling bad about it. Underneath everything he's just a lonely, friendless kid. We don't get a lot of clues about his home life or how he was raised, but I'm dying to know what happened to this kid that he's like this. Was he born this way or was this taught to him? Of course, he is still responsible for his own actions and while his sadness does humanize him and make him a more fleshed out character it does not justify his cruelty.


Next up is Emile Janza-

Janza is both Archie's foil and simp. He is everything that Archie is not. He is an aggressive brute and a much more traditional example of a schoolyard bully. He uses violence to get other students to do what he wants, he's a bad boy that smokes and steals gas, he's not stupid but also not much of a thinker and instead a man of action. Janza is everything that Archie detests but Archie is everything that Janza admires. Despite Archie blackmailing him, Janza deeply respects him and considers them to be 'birds of a feather'. He gets off on being cruel and it actually makes him 'horny' to roughhouse other kids and he feels that Archie is the only other person who could understand that feeling. He is also one of the only characters to fall for Archie's flattery despite being shown utter contempt he still falls over himself trying to impress him and prove himself to be Vigils material. First he bullies a freshman into buying him smokes in front of Archie, then later he has a bunch of children beat up Jerry and justifies it to Archie by saying it's the 'psychological' kind of thing that he likes. While bullying Jerry was something he was technically blackmailed into doing, he still took the extra effort to make it psychological just to impress Archie. This desire culminates in him agreeing to a boxing match with Jerry despite no longer being blackmailed. While he's not afraid of a fight, he's still taking a risk with this match.

Of course, while he genuinely likes and respects Archie, he's not solely trying to impress him just for the sake of it. He wants to get into the Vigils. That's his entire character motivation, but for what reason? The Vigils don't use his brand of violence. He does just fine alone, even Archie is chilled by him and considers that he could be a 'dangerous enemy'. Well, that's precisely the problem- he does just fine alone but he's still alone. He is never seen with any friends and appears to act out for attention. In his introductory chapter he is siphoning gas from another student's car and is disappointed that he wasn't caught. He wants to be 'cool' like Archie and be a part of a group. It's also implied that he comes from a lower class background compared to the other students. While nobody at Trinity is exactly wealthy (the wealthiest student's father is a dentist), most students come from middle class backgrounds (Archie's father operates an insurance agency, Jerry's father is a pharmacist). It is stated that Janza's father has a 'major dream' for 'his son to graduate from a fancy private school', and Janza considers his father to be 'stupid' which might imply that his father does not work what society might consider a 'respectable' position like dentist or pharmacist. In the movie, we get a brief glimpse into his home and it is a small, cluttered space.

Still nicer than Archie's bedroom

He's an outcast that alienates himself from his peers due to his feelings of being inadequate and desire for attention. Along with that, he also has an innate sadistic side and genuinely enjoys being cruel to his classmates. By the end of the story he grows to hate Archie and his condescending manner, his mind games, and his lies. However, like Archie, at the end of the day he's just a lonely teen boy without a single friend.


Keeping up with the villains we're gonna look at Brother Leon-

His motivation is the most obvious out of all the characters. He wants to be headmaster and to show off for the school board by raising more money than ever before through the chocolate sale. He's ambitious and dishonest, using money he wasn't supposed to use to invest in the chocolate sale. In my opinion, Brother Leon is the true villain of this story. He is an adult, the vice-principal and acting headmaster, a teacher, and a monk. All four of these roles are ones of authority and he holds power over all the schoolboys at Trinity. He is, in essence, a dictator. And like a dictator, he sees that the Vigils hold an enormous amount of power amongst the student body and seeks to absorb them into his rule so they won't pose a threat. He could just crush the Vigils and expel them, but he enjoys the terror they instill in the other students. If the students are too busy being afraid of the Vigils then they won't have the energy to fight against Brother Leon himself. His anger at Jerry's refusal of selling the chocolates goes deeper than just his anxiety of selling all the boxes. It's not just about the money, though that is a factor, it's also about how Jerry is rebelling against him, challenging his authority.

Ironically, in his first scene he encourages his students to challenge his authority. He brings one student, Gregory Bailey, to the front of the class and accuses him of cheating in front of everyone. He badgers and embarrasses the poor boy and then justifies it at the end by praising Bailey for standing his ground while admonishing the class for allowing it to happen. When I read this and watched the scene in the movie, it seemed that he just wanted to bully a student to demonstrate his power but didn't want to get into trouble for it and therefore turned it into a lesson on being a bystander. This scene establishes him as a cruel, unpredictable, and dishonest person. He is also the only person that can genuinely terrify Archie. Though Archie tries to mess with him at first, he eventually gives in and throws his whole weight into the chocolate sale due to Brother Leon's threats.

Throughout the story, it is uncomfortable to see him acting erratic, aggressive, desperate, and on edge about getting all the chocolates sold. He's close to falling apart when it seems like the sale is failing, but unfortunately it turns around for him and all the chocolate is sold and the money raised. In the book, Jerry loses. In the movie, Archie loses. In both, Brother Leon wins. He creates a pecking order within the school where Brother Leon is the head bully and the Vigils and Archie are merely a result of his cruelty. They have to bow to his authority and subsequently desire to have authority over others since they can't have it over themselves. Of course, it is unclear when the Vigils were first formed or for how long Brother Leon has been working at Trinity, but in the scope of this story he is the main authority and creates an unsafe environment at the school that allows the Vigils to flourish.

Art by Richard Sargent

One more interesting point about Brother Leon is that he first states that 'a line must be drawn between teachers and students' that cannot be crossed. The teachers can't be one of the boys and they have to act as authority figures. However, Brother Leon crosses this line constantly. He enlists Archie help in the sale, then calls him at his home in the night to deal with Archie not succeeding well enough. No doubt it's inappropriate for not only a teacher but a vice-principal to call a student at their home without their parent's knowledge, and even Archie was caught off balance by it. Earlier, after the incident in room nineteen, he forcefully grabs Archie and shoves him against the wall. Brother Leon crosses this line again when speaking to David Caroni. He usually calls the students by their last names to keep the line of separation between them, but in this meeting he calls Caroni by his first name. The narration remarks how that is crossing the invisible line and closing the distance between teacher and pupil. Both of these times he crosses this line to make the students do what he wants. With Archie, he uses intimidation and with Caroni he uses a mask of friendliness with the underlying threat of failing him to get him to tell him what he wants to hear.


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So that's it for part one of analyzing the characters. Stay tuned for when I analyze some more.

The Chocolate War is kinda gay??

Okay, I'm gonna talk mostly about the movie here but also a little bit about the book.

CW for homophobia and cisnormative language

Anyway, I watched the movie twice. Once, I was alone. The second time, I was showing it to my roommate with my other roommate poking her head in every so often. The main thing that both of them had to say about the movie: "It's gay".

When I watched it alone, I only sensed gay vibes in like one scene that I'm gonna be talking about. However, my roommate looked at every scene and thought it was gay, even when they were just standing there. She's a lesbian so she's probably better at picking that stuff up than me. Of course, it's a movie about an all boys Catholic school with a majority male cast so it's bound to seem slightly homoerotic.

Okay a little more than slightly

(For those that have not seen the movie, the kid on the right is not Porter. That is Jerry Renault and Porter is just out of frame. I'm saying this so you won't be confused when I'm posting more screenshots).

Are any of the characters actually gay? I don't know, and author Robert Cormier is dead so we can't ask him. When I was reading the book it did not seem homoerotic at all, but I'm also not the best at picking up on gay tension and my roommate wasn't reading over my shoulder to tell me. It should also be noted that in the book it is mentioned that Archie is interested in girls, and both the book and movie show that Jerry too likes girls. However, the book and movie are not one and the same so I can't really use that in my analysis of the movie. 

If we're gonna talk about homoeroticism and the use of sexuality in The Chocolate War (1988) then the first thing I want to talk about is the girl that Jerry is interested in named Lisa. She's not a major character and only has a few lines but she is important in analyzing Jerry's psyche. Near the beginning of the movie she talks to Jerry as he is waiting for the bus. She calls him out for staring at her and her friends, taunts him about how he's not really living while he just stands there and takes it. However, her taunting doesn't seem cruel but rather flirtatious and Jerry is charmed. He later dreams about kissing her and this cements her as clearly an object of his affections. She represents freedom and rebellion to Jerry, something he lacks in his life, as well as illustrating how Jerry is coming of age and developing interest in girls. The most important takeaway I want you to get from this paragraph is that she uses taunting to express sexuality and Jerry responds well to it.

Later in the movie, this scene is sort of reversed and acted out between Archie and Jerry. Archie has taken Jerry to a Vigils meeting to interrogate and intimidate him into selling chocolate. Archie is very touchy-feely with him, and gets all up in his personal space. Like when he was being taunted by Lisa, Jerry again just sits there and takes it despite being visibly uncomfortable. Here, Jerry is being taunted again, but it is the opposite of how Lisa did it. She taunted him upfront to express her sexuality and interest in Jerry. Here, Archie uses sexuality and an interest (probably feigned) in Jerry to taunt him. If that makes sense? 

This scene isn't so much saying that Archie is gay but rather showing how he uses threats of sexuality to intimidate his targets. These are Catholic teenage boys in the 1980s and have been indoctrinated into homophobia. Nothing is scarier to them than a gay man expressing interest or the thought that they themselves might be gay. Archie understands this and uses it to his advantage and to exert his power over his classmates. Further demonstrating Archie's understanding of homophobia, he has Janza use homophobic slurs to enrage Jerry enough to get him to agree to a fight. 

He's left handed, I thought Catholic schools didn't allow that??

And it seems that Archie gets into Jerry's head by doing this. A little later in the movie, Jerry has a dream about the people he knows with their voices switched around. The first person he sees is Archie speaking in Lisa's voice. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but it doesn't feel like a coincidence that Archie, a boy who used sexuality to taunt Jerry, is speaking in the voice of a girl that Jerry is sexually/romantically interested in. The words "you're missing a lot of things, Jerry" are spoken, an echo of what Linda said to him earlier. It seems to imply that the wires got crossed and Jerry may be having confused sexual feelings for Archie as well and is 'missing out' by refusing to explore that. I'm gonna talk more about this specific dream later in the next post I write. The movie doesn't hint at anymore interest from Jerry's side after this scene but I thought it was worth mentioning. 

Idk why the subtitles say 'woman' when it's clearly Lisa but whatever

That brings us to the next question: Is Archie gay? My roommate certainly thought so. My answer is that I don't know. For these next few points keep in mind that certain stereotypes about gay men are often used in media and does not reflect real life. One stereotype about gay men is that they are effeminate. There is absolutely nothing wrong with being effeminate, but it is often mocked and used as shorthand to imply a man is gay. Archie doesn't display typical 'masculine' traits. He disdains sports and enjoys eating chocolate, which is typically stereotyped as something women love. He is polished and owns a really nice coat, showing that he takes pride in his looks as opposed to his more 'rugged' classmates. He shuns violence and can't hold his own in a fight, preferring psychological warfare instead. This doesn't automatically make a man gay but this is a movie written by people that may hold the idea that it does. There are other small things that might imply Archie to be gay, such as earlier in the movie telling Carter to sit back and let 'some pretty little freshman' sell his chocolates for him. Moreover, late in the movie Archie calls Jerry up on the phone and speaks to him without a shirt on. Though their conversation isn't sexually charged this still adds a layer of homoeroticism to the scene. Of course if you read my last post then you know it seems like Archie only owns the one outfit so maybe he just didn't have another shirt to put on.

Regardless of whether or not the writers intended for Archie to be gay he is still not traditionally masculine which is a common theme in media for male villains. Of course, he's not exactly overly effeminate and still has what some consider to be 'masculine' qualities of being powerful and intimidating. Likewise, Jerry our hero is not exactly a super macho rugged man though he is a football player. He's quiet and generally a peaceful guy until he's pushed too far. It should be mentioned that both boys display a mix of 'feminine' and 'masculine' traits. 

Does that mean that The Chocolate War is homophobic? I don't know. Maybe. It wouldn't be the first time a film gave the villain gay undertones. Archie isn't the only villain however, as Carter, the president of the Vigils, is still a bad guy and more conventionally masculine. Brother Leon is also a villain and I wouldn't classify him as being either particularly masculine or feminine but I'll talk more about him in the next post. On the hero's side is Roland Goubert who, despite being a football player, is a sensitive and gentle soul and a loyal friend to Jerry. Moreover, it can be argued that Jerry has bisexual feelings as well. There's no clear cut answer as to what the director was trying to say. 

The book lacks this homoeroticism, or at least I didn't notice any when reading it. It is stated that Archie likes to pick up girls but never has the time and when Janza asks him if Jerry really is gay Archie assures that he's not because if he was he wouldn't get so worked up at being accused of it. I don't know where his logic is coming from but whatever. Either way, Archie is in tune with how homophobia works and uses that to his advantage. 

Look how nice Archie's coat is though

But yeah that's it :) stay tuned for the next post

Let's talk about this kid's room

This is one of the creepiest bedrooms I've ever seen in a movie. I want to know what this kid's home life is like that his parents are cool with him having a room like this. I will list all things wrong with this room.

1. Queen sized bed. What teenager has a queen sized bed? Twin is the norm, sometimes full if they're really rich. Archie is not rich though, at the beginning Brother Leon calls him poor 'not wealthy'. How did he get this queen sized bed? I don't think that's his parents room either because just a few scenes later he's walking around shirtless on the phone in there and that's not something you do in your parent's room.

2. No headboard. So, you have a queen sized bed. That's a nice bed deserving of a nice frame. Any frame worth its salt will come with a headboard. Yet this bed does not. It's just pushed up against the wall. That can't be comfortable to just sit with your head up against the wall at all times.

3. Only one pillow. Pillows aren't that expensive, just get another one???? Another reason I don't think this is his parent's room because that would require more than one pillow. Granted, he could have a single dad but either way that's definitely not his father's room. Also, since he doesn't have a headboard why not get one of those backrest pillows? That would be way more comfortable than just sitting with your back against the wall with just one pillow.

A nice backrest that I would suggest he buy

4. Two of the exact same lamp and two of the exact same nightstand. He's just one teenage boy, why does he have his room set up like a couple's? The bed is centered and he's got two lamps and two nightstands. He doesn't have a girlfriend because he's fucking creepy so there's no reason for the room to be set up like this. Did his parents buy lamps and nightstands in bulk and decided he could have two of each? And he doesn't even have anything on the nightstands besides an alarm clock and some kind of box that I don't know what it's supposed to be. Oh and a phone I guess but he moves that around. It's also impeccably clean, probably because he apparently owns a grand total of three things.

5. The artwork. So on the left we see that he has a painting of a wolf in a living room. It's kind of in an impressionist style and actually a pretty nice painting. Then in the center we see a bunch of framed dead butterflies. Is butterfly collecting a hobby of his? He's got a bunch of them and is even holding one in this scene. That's a strange hobby for a teen boy to have, something I would expect of someone older. Finally on the right we see a small painting of Napoleon Bonaparte??? I get why the director would include that in there for foreshadowing/metaphorical purposes. Archie is like Napoleon and will be brought down like in Waterloo bla bla bla. I don't know that much about Napoleon, I skipped over the chapters about him when I read Les Miserables. Probably all the artwork is metaphorical but it's still super creepy. Does he not have any band posters? Does he even like any contemporary bands? All we see is him listening to classical music. What about movie posters? Or drawings? Anything?? Literally anything that normal teen boy would have hanging in his room? He's so weird. 

There's the butterfly

6. Why is he sitting like that? He is sitting so properly with his back straight against the wall, his legs just stretched flat out in front of him. Is that comfortable? It cannot be easy to sit like that for long amounts of time. I don't know about you, but when I talk on the phone in my room I like to be comfortable and lie down. Or sometimes I walk around. I don't know anybody who sits perfectly still in that position. To be fair, earlier in the movie he's talking on the phone in there and is just hunched over what I assume is like a desk or something, and then later he's walking around talking on the phone. But here he's just sitting like that. To prove a point, I am also sitting in that position at this exact moment and okay it's not that bad but also not how I would choose to sit. Also, he takes the time to remove his shoes before getting in bed but he doesn't bother with the tie? I've never had to wear a uniform for school so I don't know how common it is for kids to just keep their uniform on when they get home. Does he not own any other clothes? He can't even put on a t-shirt? Did his father blow all their money on buying queen sized mattresses and nightstands so that his son has to wear his uniform 24/7?

Okay anyway, his room freaked me out but I dig the symbolism of the artwork. The painting of a wolf in a living room- clearly the wolf represents Archie and how he's a bloodthirsty animal hiding in a civilized place. He makes school a living hell for the other students when schools claim to be safe spaces, much like a wolf would make a cozy living room dangerous. 

The butterflies, to me, represent the other students. He doesn't do what he does to crush and destroy the boys at school, but rather to make them into trophies to show off his great power, and if they don't comply then to make examples of them. Every time an assignment is completed it's like another butterfly added to the board for him to show off. To collect and frame butterflies one cannot just crush and kill it, they have to be careful not to damage it and then gently pin it to the board. This reflects how he comes up with his assignments. He detests violence and prefers psychological manipulation, something that requires precise planning and a deft hand much like butterfly collecting.

I think the Napoleon painting is obvious. Foreshadowing that he's a conquerer that's gonna fall bla bla bla whatever. That one is too on the nose for me. 

Alright that's all I got about his room. Stay tuned for more analyses.

The Chocolate War some thoughts

I just finished reading The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier about 20 minutes ago. A couple days ago I watched the 1988 movie adaptation as well. I remember reading the book in high school because another book I read (I think it was called Grasshopper Jungle or something like that) talked about it. I didn't think much of The Chocolate War at the time but a few weeks ago I saw a little article from some site recommending the movie. The other day I decided to finally watch it because I vaguely remembered the book (okay, also the article included a picture of one of the actors and I thought he was hot). It was a lot weirder than I remember it being but maybe that's because I am now looking at it from an adult's perspective as opposed to a teenager's. Overall though, I really enjoyed the movie and it inspired me to reread the book. I just bought the e-book and it only took me two days to finish it because it's so short. It surprised me how much the movie follows the book almost exactly (save for the ending, but we'll get to that later), right down to ripping the dialogue straight from the pages. Because I both read and watched The Chocolate War in such close succession and because the book and movie are both so similar so I have been kind of conflating the two into one but for this post I will be discussing the book more.



The Chocolate War is an odd little story. The main thing that makes it so strange to me is the idea that a group of teenage boys are able to form and maintain a secret society. Not because I think the school would shut it down or anything, I know plenty of schools don't crack down on bullying, but because it requires so much planning, attention, and cooperation. These boys have to stay at school longer to meet, have to get the same group of kids get together for meetings, have to get them to swear to some level of secrecy, have to assign roles, have to vet other students for possible new members, have to keep track of all the boys in their school and not even just their names but their birth dates and their families too and then come up with assignments for them to do. I find it so odd but compelling that teenage boys, still just kids, are able to keep up with such a complex society. How did this start? Were the Vigils there since the founding of the school? Who was the first boy to bring up the idea? How do they find the time and energy to be so devoted to it? If this was a boarding school where all the kids were forced together in makeshift homes it might make a little more sense but they simply attend a Catholic school and go home to their own families every night. All the boys involved in the Vigils seem downright miserable to be a part of it. The narration describes Archie as being worn out, neglecting all other responsibilities and having no time for fun activities. Carter, the president, seems tired of the Vigils' antics. Obie, the errand boy, downright dislikes his role in the club. None of these three boys truly like each other, in fact Carter and Obie hold absolute disdain for Archie. So why do they keep this tradition up? I suppose it's not entirely illogical. If the Vigils were there for a long time before these students joined then it's not so easy to dismantle it. The Vigils seem like some sort of mass hysteria that can't be broken. And to explain the miserable feelings of the members we can quote Mean Girls: "She knew it was better to be in the Plastics, hating life, than to not be in at all". There would most likely be repercussions for anybody that dares leave and if one is kicked out than that would leave them vulnerable to the wolves of the regular student population possibly seeking revenge or just wanting to exert control over someone who seemed once untouchable. The Vigils are all miserable boys that only find joy in making the other students as miserable as they are.


The story is often recounted as the story of one student, Jerry Renault, acting as our hero and leading a rebellion against the Vigils by refusing to sell chocolates for the school and ultimately failing. Even though Jerry is usually considered the main character, the narration tends to follow Archie Costello much more often. This has lead me to believe that it is really Archie that is the hero of this story. Now, I don't mean hero in the modern sense of some great person devoted to fighting for goodness (Archie is downright sociopathic), but rather in the ancient sense of simply a person with superhuman qualities that the narration follows. Of course, Archie is not of divine origin, he is just a regular teen boy, but I would argue that he does possess a rather superhuman capacity for intelligence and manipulation not normally found in schoolboys. I'm not saying that teen boys can't be intelligent or manipulative, but they often have bigger things to worry about than keeping every single person under their thumb. Most teen boys are concerned with friendships, girls (or boys), smoking pot,  listening to music and getting cars. Their bullying is rarely as in depth as Archie's plots that require planning and coordination. Why force a boy to unscrew every item of furniture in a classroom, send someone to ensure he does so in the middle of the night, all with the threat of making his life hell when you could just shove him into a locker? Archie is not like other boys, he is set apart in his desire for power and absolute control. This power hungry sadism is what makes him such an interesting character to follow and a worthy main character that could never be accused of being boring. Of course, Jerry is also a fellow set apart in his headstrong bravery and rebellion. He too is worthy of the title of hero, in both the ancient and modern sense, but overall seems to act as deuteragonist to Archie. The story begins with Jerry on the football field but quickly switches to introducing the audience to Archie. We get a sense of Archie's worldview, how his mind works, the confident face he puts on for others and the disturbed soul within. More telling, the story ends with Archie as well. We follow his journey more than we do Jerry's.


From an outsider's perspective, it may seem that the whole story has no meaning as nothing is accomplished and nothing changes. Jerry tries and fails to rebel against the Vigils, Archie remains in power. There seems to be no payoff. However, this lack of accomplishment is only apparent when you view Jerry as the protagonist and Archie as the antagonist. Take a look at Joseph Campbell's hero's journey and think of the story from Archie's point of view: Archie begins in his ordinary world, then the call to adventure comes when brother Leon asks for his help in the chocolate sale. He at first is ambivalent towards the call, working against the school before throwing his full weight behind it. He fights the challenges that Jerry presents and tears him down. He takes the Vigils from being a secret bullying ring to having official recognition and backing from the headmaster. He ends the story victorious but a changed man. He learned that Carter and Obie, his supposed allies and fellow club members, are actually his enemies waiting hungrily for his downfall. The last few paragraphs of the book follows a short conversation between Archie and Obie. "Maybe the black box will work the next time, Archie," Obie said. "Or maybe another kid like Renault will come along." With these ominous words, Archie doesn't bother with them but he is still made aware that his power is a fragile thing and he has enemies all around. He asks Obie for a Hershey and Obie simply says "no". At the beginning of the novel, Obie always kept chocolate on him to please Archie but here the mask is off and he no longer cares to keep Archie's favor. Even though Archie has maintained his position and made the Vigils more powerful, the tides can turn against him at any moment. He is only an individual, though a clever one, and powerless without the Vigil's backing him. Of course, the Vigils too would lose a considerable amount of power without Archie, who acts as the mastermind of their club and has the loyalty of brother Leon. Things are not the same as they were in the beginning. Jerry's rebellion was not in vain. Though he failed to bring down the Vigils entirely, he messed up the structure of their society. I know that there is a sequel, but I haven't read it yet but when I do I hope that I can elaborate further on the new makeup of the Vigils. For now, looking at The Chocolate War as a stand alone work the story that I gathered was one of Archie fighting against a rebellion, succeeding, and coming out a changed man.


The 1988 movie offers a different ending however. In the movie, Archie pulls out a black marble from the box and has to fight Jerry himself, ultimately losing. Jerry realizes that in his victory he still lost by playing into the Vigils' hands. One criticism that I have read of the changed ending is that it gives it a Hollywood happy ending, but to me this ending seems bleaker than the book's. The Vigils still become more powerful due to the success of the chocolate sale, receive official recognition, and knock Archie down a peg. For Archie as an individual he is taken down, but the entire structure that allowed him to rise to power in the first place is even stronger now. Jerry's 'failure' in the book created a precarious power structure within the Vigils that could fall apart at any moment, but here the Vigils are stable and free to torment the other students. Though Obie becomes the new assigner and his plans aren't quite so cruel psychologically disturbing as Archie's, it's still bullying that makes everyone's high school experience worse. Though it is satisfying to see Archie brought down, it won't be long until a new Archie appears and seizes control. To quote Audre Lorde: "the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house". By playing along with the Vigils, Jerry has only brought down their scapegoat and left them their power.


Overall, I prefer the book's ending but I don't think that the movie's ending deserves all the criticism it received. Books and movies are two entirely different beasts and the subtlety of the book's ending might have gotten lost in translation for the movie and seemed far less satisfying or meaningful. But that's just my thoughts, I am certainly no film scholar or anything. I think in another post I will discuss the movie more in depth though, share some screenshots I like and such.

:)