How did Max's supper get into his room?

[steepholm]

Sometimes I have to plump up books like pillows, until they're the right shape for my brain.

If, indeed, the trip to the land of the Wild Things was all in Max's head (as adult critics would have you believe), then his mother must have come up with his supper at some point and placed it on the table. But then, how did Max not notice this and break from his reverie? Was he in some kind of catatonic state? If so, how did his mother not notice that and call an ambulance? Surely she'd have been expecting some response from her naughty son, not just a blank stare? It makes no sense.

Or maybe - and this is my belief - the critics are wrong, and the bedroom really did turn into a forest. Maybe Max was indeed away for over a year. And maybe, like Mrs Darling leaving the window open, his penitent parent brought a hot supper to his room each evening, in the hope that it might lure him back.

Until, one day, it did.

Comments

[nixwilliams]

Well, that's the fic I want to read!

[nightspore.livejournal.com]

What did you think of the movie? (I loved it.)

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

I've not seen it, I must confess.

[gillo]

Possibly It Was All A Dream, and when Max came out of the shower everything was just as it needed to be.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Avaunt!

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

Maybe time flows differently in the land of the Wild Things!

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

The Narnia Sanction... yes, that's possible.

[gillo]

Surely that's a little-known move in a game of Mornington Crescent, Fantasy Rules?

[ashkitty.livejournal.com]

I always assumed it worked on the same time principle as Narnia.

[consonantia.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I have to plump up books like pillows, until they're the right shape for my brain.

Love this!

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

I think he was sulking and looking the other way. Or quite possibly asleep. Though in that case I wouldn't have expected him to wake up while the supper was still hot.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

If he was sulking, and I'd been his mother, I'd have taken that supper straight back down again. Or at least spoken to him. Sleep is an option, but if the trip to the land of the Wild Things is "just a dream", it seems much diminished.

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

He's just been sent to his room for bad behavior -- what else would he be doing? Seems quite normal to me. I'd have put the food down and left him alone. He'd already had a talking-to and a punishment.

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

Ah, you've uncovered the vital clue that shows that his safe return home to "reality" is in fact a lie. Being a small child, Max thinks of hot meals as things that appear by magic, so fails to notice this clue, and thinks that all is well. However, he is still trapped in the land of the Wild Things; it's merely taken a different form.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

He should have taken the red pill...