Why did Leslie died off stage?

I think the director wants Leslie to die off-stage is because the director wanted Leslie to disappear off mysteriously and gives the audience a surprise. By doing this, the audience would not have expected an outcome of which Leslie died so suddenly. Also, this could let the audience focus on Jesse's character as it was not carried out specifically in the start of the movie. His character came out more by letting him show his emotions of how he would react when his best friend died and was his only friend in the world.

Who/what does the dark lord represents?

For Jesse, I think his dark lord would be his father. Often, Jesse would be scolded by his father for almost everything he does. Besides that, Jesse thinks that his father doesn't love or care about him. Even though Jesse's father ordered Jesse to do house chores but i think deep down in Jesse's father's heart, he cares and also loves Jesse alot. For example, at the end of the movie, he gave a set of racing car track to Jesse as a christmas present. On top of that, he also comforted Jesse when he broke down from the plight where his best friend, Leslie Burke, died.

For Leslie, the dark lord would be loneliness. As Leslie is the only child in her family, she cannot experience how it feels to have siblings. There is no one who can play with her or spend time often together. Furthermore, her parents are authors and they don't spend much time with Leslie as they have very busy schedules. In school, she gets teased by many and therefore nobody likes to hang out with her and her only friend is Jesse.

For me, my dark lord would be the obstacles i would face in life. The obstacles like learning to be a better person, facing more responsibilities, graduating from school and of course learning to defend yourself in the life where you start to work in the outside world, where everybody is a masquarade and you have to stay away from those who wear masks.

Which version do you like better and why?

I would prefer the movie version better as honestly, I'm not a person whose imagination can be very wild. By watching the movie, I can understand more of what is happening. Also, it described Terabithia beautifully in the movie unlike the novel, where it just overlooked the kingdom which was supposed to be a very important subject in the movie. In the movie, it's easier to see the action and to understand the characters as it not easy to write it out and decribe it fully.


- Huan Ting