Deep Dive Discworld: Wes Looks at Hogfather

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and happy the rest of them, you all know what winter holiday you celebrate. As a special holiday present to you all, I’ve decided to once again step outside the house of mouse to share with you another one of my favorite corners of geek culture, in this case, the late Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels, a series of fantasy books that approach the genre with a bit more of a satirical edge than something like Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Specifically, today we’ll be looking at the two night mini-series from 2006 that adapts my favorite of the Discworld novels, Hogfather. However, before we get too deep into all that, you all need to understand what the Discworld is. To that end, I suggest you all buckle up because from here on out, things are going to get weird. So, the Discworld. The Discworld is a flat earth that rests on the backs of four elephants who are themselves standing on the shell of a giant flying space turtle. For the select few of you who did not let out an audible “nope” and click off this page after reading that sentence, congratulations, you are now prepared for the weirdness to come. The whole space turtle business doesn’t really come into play in this particular story, but it is a good gauge of who is and is not ready for what the Discworld has in store. Anywho, remember last time when I said that this story both was and was not about Christmas? Well, allow me to clarify. Since the Discworld is not our world, it wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense for its denizens to be celebrating the birth of Christ, so, Pratchett invented Hogswatch, a winter festival that bares a remarkable resemblance to our Christmas, complete with its own Santa Claus figure, the titular Hogfather, a pig nosed fellow who rides a sleigh pulled by four flying boars. The book, and to a somewhat lesser extent, the mini-series, takes every opportunity to satirize many aspects of the Christmas season in a humorous fashion, as Pratchett was one to do. As for our actual story, well, The Auditors, spectral figures who are charged with making sure the universe runs logically and see things like belief and imagination as a threat, have hired a psychotic assassin named Mr. Teatime (pronounced Tay-Ah-Tie-May, though most just pronounce it as it’s spelled) to kill the Hogfather. Teatime, who is just enough of a lunatic to have dedicated some of his free time to contemplating the best method by which to inhume Santa Claus, takes the contract and puts into motion a very sinister plan. With the help of a gang of hired lowlifes, Teatime breaks into the Tooth Fairy’s castle and gathers up as much teeth as he can find. Now, you’re probably confused by this, but I’ll try my best to explain. See, in the Discworld series, Gods and other mythical figures are essentially powered by belief. The more people believe in them, the more powerful they are. And if people stop believing in them all together, they cease to exist. There is also a kind of old magic that allows you to influence someone if you manage to get ahold of their teeth, hair or nail clippings. So, if Teatime and his goons have access to the teeth of everyone in the world who is or has been a child, then you can influence the whole world to pretty much do whatever you want like say, stop believing in the Hogfather. Naturally, this is bad, so much so that it attracts the attention of Death. Death, by which I mean the Grim Reaper, is not about to let The Auditors and their hired sociopath upset the balance of the universe, but he’s forbidden to interfere with the affairs of mortals directly so instead, he takes it upon himself to pull a Jack Skellington and don the mantle of The Hogfather in order to keep belief alive. Meanwhile, Susan, Death’s granddaughter (long story), who is not under the same restrictions as her grandfather, heads to The Tooth Fairy’s castle to put a stop to Teatime directly. And they better work fast because if the Hogfather is not restored by tomorrow morning, tomorrow morning may not come. While the mini-series trims some of the fat and cuts out a few superfluous scenes, it stays surprisingly close to the book it’s based on and does a great job adapting it for visual consumption. So let us celebrate Hogswatch as we take a look at Terry Pratchett’s Hogfather.

Main Character:

Before we go any further, you’re probably wondering about all that Death’s Granddaughter business. See, a long time ago, Death adopted a daughter named Ysabell. Some time after that, Death took on an apprentice named Mort. Long story short, Mort & Ysabell fell in love and Susan was the eventual result. However, there’s a bit more to it than that. As Death’s apprentice, Mort was endowed with some of Death’s abilities, specifically the ability to walk through walls and use his voice to persuade or intimidate others. Since Susan is Mort’s daughter, that means she has those abilities as well. However, while Susan and Death care for one another, Susan wants nothing to do with the family business. Instead, Susan has opted for a quiet life away from the supernatural madness of her grandfather’s world. To that end, Susan has taken a job as the governess to a wealthy family despite many feeling such work to be beneath her station (it’s not really relevant to this story, but Susan and her family are technically nobility). Susan is easily one of my favorite characters in the Discworld setting. She’s a tough as nails no-nonsense cynic who takes no crap from anyone. I love her approach to taking care of these kids, especially her cynical way of telling the children bedtime stories. Apparently, according to Susan, Jack of Jack & The Beanstalk is guilty of trespassing, theft and murder and the moral of the story is “You Can Get Away With Anything if You’re a Hero because No One asks Inconvenient Questions.” I would pay very real money to get Michelle Dockery, in character as Susan, to describe the plot of Disney’s The Little Mermaid. Susan’s other duty involves checking under the bed for monsters. Now, in our world, monsters under the bed or in the closet is a fear most grow out of. However, you may recall the power that belief has in the Discworld setting. If the children believe that monsters are there, then they will be. However, Susan knows how the magic of belief works and knows how to play into it. If she tells the children that a simple fireplace poker can kill monsters, then as long as the children believe it, that poker is the most powerful weapon on the disc. However, even though she tries to stay out of her Grandfather’s world, when she needs to, she still steps up for the greater good, and when she does, she is a fearless badass who isn’t afraid of anything, not even a psychopath like Teatime or the horrors that safeguard the Tooth Fairy’s castle. Bottomline, Susan is awesome and this mini-series absolutely does her justice

I suppose I should also discuss Death himself in this section as well. Death is another one of my favorite characters in Discworld. Despite being the actual Grim Reaper, the living personification of the inevitability of succumbing to mortality, Death isn’t actually that bad a guy. In fact, Death is actually rather fond of humanity. After all, he’s not the one going around killing people, he just shows up afterwards to usher dead souls into the afterlife. He seeks to better understand humanity, something we see in other books, my favorite being Reaper Man, but he still can’t quite make sense of some of the nuances of what it means to be human. I compared him to Jack Skellington, but unlike Jack, who took to the role of Sandy Claws with enthusiasm, perhaps too much enthusiasm, Death only does so out of necessity and finds the whole thing confusing, ridiculous and stupid, at least at first. If I could compare Death to any other character, it would probably be Buzz Killington from Family Guy. He clearly means well, but can often bring down the mood just by showing up. Mind you, Death does over time grow to enjoy playing Hogfather, but still takes every opportunity to question some of the traditions of Hogswatch, specifically poor families only getting gifts that their families can afford or allowing the poor little match girl to die in the snow so everyone else can feel better about themselves. Death gets so into the spirit that he even breaks the rules of his station and brings said match girl back from the dead. As he puts it, “The Hogfather brings Presents. What better present is there than a future.” He’s still finds humanity confusing sometimes, but other times he seems to understand them better than they understand themselves, but we’ll get into that a little later.

Villain:

I’ll start by mentioning the Auditors, Nazgul looking apparitions who make sure gravity works and keep atoms spinning. The Auditors are confused and offended by things like belief, imagination and independent thought, so much so that, in the book, if one of the auditors ever refers to themself as an individual, they cease to exist. So desperate are they for the world to make sense that they will go so far as to hire an assassin to murder Santa Claus, which is honestly one of the most evil things I can think of.

Said assassin, Mr. Jonathan Teatime, is a real nasty piece of work. Imagine Alex Delarge from A Clockwork Orange if he was trained by the greatest assassins in the world and you have Teatime. Actor Marc Warren does an excellent job of replicating Teatime’s creepy, childlike mannerisms as they’re described in the book. I especially like how this special nails his creepy eyes, one stark white, the other pitch black and both of them terrifying to look into. Teatime is a pure sociopath who sees nothing wrong with the brutality of his assassinations. See, despite the nature of their business, the Assassin’s Guild is actually well respected in the city of Ankh Morpork (the largest city in the Discworld where much of our story takes place) and many of its members are seen as gentlemen of status who provide an occasionally necessary service. There’s a fine line between a professional assassin and a twisted murderer and Teatime crossed it a long time ago. Because of this, many of his fellow assassins are too scared to kick him out of the guild for fear of what he might do if they weren’t there to keep him in line. As I said, Teatime is the kind of psychopath who spends his free time thinking of ways to kill The Hogfather so I’m assuming he takes the contract purely to prove he can. And as I mentioned, Teatime is not alone in his endeavor. Joining this insane assassin are Medium Dave Lillywhite, a thug for hire who is named so because, since there are so many people already named Dave in the Ankh Morpork Underworld (I.E. Big Dave, Little Dave etc.), this comparatively normal sized man had to take the name “Medium Dave” in order to distinguish himself, Dave’s brother Banjo, who has the mind of a toddler and is roughly the size of a small mountain, Chicken Wire, a low-life known for strangling people with his namesake, Sydney, a down on his luck Wizard and Mr. Brown, the greatest locksmith on the Discworld. That’s a pretty impressive collection of criminals and low-lifes, but all of them know not to cross a freak like Teatime. There's actually a couple more in the book, but, as I said the special trims a lot of the fat and pairs down the thugs to only what we need. Teatime is more than just a killer, he's a monster without a trace of remorse or empathy. However, this ultimately proves Teatime’s downfall. Remember that Fireplace Poker? Well, thanks to the power of belief, it can kill any monster it’s used on, so it is by the poker that the evil of Teatime is brought to an end.

Side Characters:

So, there are A LOT of characters in this special as well as the book it’s based on and while some are pretty important to the overall history of the Discworld, many of them don’t play a large role in the book and are only in the special to show up on screen for a few minutes and say “Hey, we were in the book.” So, I hope some of you Discworld purists out there don’t mind if I don’t bring up characters like Nobby Nobs or The Death of Rats. However, I will use this time to point out a few noteworthy cameos. First, the late David Warner makes a brief appearance as Lord Downey, the head of the Assassins Guild and, because he’s David Warner, he does a great job. Nigel Planer plays the previously discussed Mr. Sydney. This appearance is significant because Nigel Planer has read the audiobook versions of many of the Discworld novels, including this one. Tony Robinson, best known for his role as Baldrick in the very funny British sitcom Blackadder, appears as the owner of a Toy Store where Death, as The Hogfather, puts in a public appearance. Finally, the late Sir Terry Pratchett himself makes a cameo appearance as a shopkeeper in a post credits scene.

We may as well start with Albert. To make a long story short, Albert was a wizard who died centuries ago but made an arrangement with Death to stick around as his assistant. Not only does Albert get a lot of laughs in this special especially, he also serves as the one to educate Death on the finer points on the Hogswatch traditions, like how poor children are only given gifts that their families would be able to afford. The idea is that the real gift is the hope for something better. Death rightfully calls this out as a load of horseshit, prompting Albert to tell a story from when he was a very small child and all he wanted for Hogswatch was a fancy rocking horse that he saw in a shop window but his family was as poor as a disabled banana (I swear to God, those are the words he uses) so they couldn’t afford it. The next morning, Albert woke up to find a brand new rocking horse that his father had made with his bare hands. I really love how you think the story is going to go in a different direction. Death even assumes that the homemade horse was better than all the expensive horses in the world. But, surprisingly, no, that’s not how it went down because, according to Albert, “You’re a Selfish Little Bugger when you’re Only Seven.” Also, Albert apparently eats all the pork pies and drinking all the sherry left for the Hogfather, so it’s a miracle that by the end of the movie, he’s not shitting out his own kidneys.

Now, let’s talk about The Unseen University, the college of magic located in the center of Ankh Morpork. Something I love about the UU is how even though it technically predates Hogwarts, it nonetheless feels like a direct parody of it. The faculty of UU don’t get a ton of character with two noteworthy exceptions. The first is Ponder Stibbons, a scholarly young wizard who is the creator of Hex, which is basically what you’d get if Rube Goldberg designed a super computer. The other is Arch-Chancellor Mustrom Ridculley, played here by the great Joss Acklund. Ridculley is a great character. He’s a larger than life pompous blowhard who makes reckless decisions in his own self-interest, but despite all that, you can’t help but like the guy.

So, one of the side effects of people not believing in the Hogfather manifests itself in the form of other anthropomorphic personifications of forces being called into existence. See, even the power of belief has its limits and can only sustain so many gods and mythical beings at once. However, with one of the largest concentrations of belief removed, creatures like the Veruca Gnome, the Hair Loss Fairy and a creature that eats socks come into existence left and right. And since UU is one of the largest concentrations of magic in The Discworld, most of these new beings show up there and generally make like hell for the Wizards. I really wish the special had time to include the Cheerful Fairy, one of the most genuinely hilarious characters from the book but it’s not that big a deal.

The most noteworthy of these personifications of forces is Billius, the Oh God of Hangovers. Any time someone has a hangover, Billy is the one who feels it. And since it’s the Discworld equivalent of Christmas Eve and everyone is partying and boozing it up, yeah, poor Billy is having a rough night, but despite all this, he still helps Susan fight off the bad guys at The Tooth Fairy’s Castle.

Billy ends up falling in love with Violet, a Tooth Fairy who never seems to shut up and looks exactly like how you’d imagine the daughter of Wendy and Ronald McDonald.

Note, I described Violet as A Tooth Fairy, not THE Tooth Fairy. See, there are many Tooth Fairies who work for the original running around and Violet is just one of them. Eventually, it’s revealed that the original Tooth Fairy is also the original Boogeyman, the creature we feared was lurking in the dark when we were still living in caves. Its original job was to frighten children, but eventually grew to care for them and wanted to protect them from the real monsters of the world, I.E. men like Teatime, hence why she keeps their teeth safe in the way she does.

Memorable Scenes:

Hands down my favorite scene comes at the very end of the film. Susan has just returned from defeating Teatime and his thugs at the Tooth Fairy’s castle, but the night is not over yet. The Auditors, seeing that their plan has failed, have grown desperate and have taken the form of wild dogs and are chasing down what’s left of the Hogfather, who has been reduced to the primal form of a wild boar. However, this is where the Auditors have gravely miscalculated. See, in their normal forms, they aren’t truly alive or dead, hence why Death is forbidden to interfere, but by taking the form of wild dogs, they have become living beings, which means all bets are off and death is free to do with them as he pleases. After making an incredible entrance by popping out of a snowman, death confronts the Auditors directly. See, up until this point, we’ve mostly been laughing at Death’s Hogfather antics, but now we are suddenly very aware of the fact that Death is a terrifying seven-foot-tall skeleton wielding a nasty farming tool whose very presence signals impending doom, and so are the auditors. Death chastises the Auditors for their actions before asking them one final question, “Have you been Naughty, Or Nice.” And with that, Death slays the auditors in one fell swoop. It’s one of the most badass scenes in this special and I love it to death.

Story:

I believe what Pratchett is going for here is to stress the importance of fantasy and the role that plays in belief as well as being human. A line that’s very telling is when Susan asks what would have happened if they hadn’t saved The Hogfather. Death responds that the sun would not have come up. Instead, a mere ball of flaming gas would have illuminated the world. Pratchett’s own words sum this up more eloquently than I ever could, so I’ll simply leave you with this excerpt from the book that sums up the overall theme.

“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

"They're not the same at all!"

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"

MY POINT EXACTLY.”

The Dark Discworld Factor:

Probably the darkest thing in the movie is the Tooth Fairy’s castle and its particularly nasty method of defending itself. See, the castle itself is alive somehow and it was created by the original Boogeyman, so naturally, if it senses a threat, it will unleash hell, but it’s so much more sinister than that. The castle exists within the reality of a child’s imagination, in fact, the castle exterior is literally just a child’s crude painting of a house. As such, the castle’s unique method of defense involves reaching into the intruder’s mind, finding their deepest childhood fears and bringing them to life. Chickenwire is taken away by a spooky looking wardrobe from his parent’s bedroom when he was little while Mr. Sydney, whose mother always warned him about sucking his thumb, meets his end at the blades of The Scissor Man, who cuts the thumbs off of naughty children who suck their thumbs. When dealing with Medium Dave and Banjo, the castle pulls out the big guns and calls forth the ghost of Ma Lillywhite, who was apparently the meanest, nastiest woman who ever lived. So terrifying is the very sight of his own mother that a hardened criminal like Medium Dave Lillywhite is reduced to a simpering coward in mere moments before he is consumed by the woman’s frightening shadow. Awesome!

Final Thoughts: And that was Hogfather, and I loved it. Both the special and the book have become part of my Holiday rotation and I'm glad I was able to share that with you. I truly hope you've enjoyed this article and have been inspired to check out the work of Terry Pratchett if you haven't already. And, from the bottom of my heart, I wish you all a happy holiday season, no matter what it is you celebrate. In January, it'll be the return of Deep Dive DC month and we will be kicking it off with a multi-part tribute to one of Batman's most chilling foes.