Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Something Wicked This Way Comes, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Good vs. Evil
Age, Time, and Acceptance
Love and Happiness
Fear, the Supernatural, and the Unknown
Summary
Analysis
As Charles and Will assess Jim, they hear someone cry for help in the distance. “Help! He’s after me!” a boy screams loudly. “That man with the tattoos!” the boy says. Will looks to Charles. “Mr. Dark!” he yells. Charles tells Will to stay with Jim and try to revive him. “Artificial respirations. All right, boy?” Will nods.
Jim can’t be revived with medical care; he requires love and happiness to destroy the dark power of the carousel and save him.
Themes
Charles runs to the young boy. “What’s your name?” he asks. “Jed,” the boy replies, still running. Charles asks the boy how old he is. “Nine!” the boy answers. “Only nine?” Charles asks. “I was never that young.” Charles asks the boy to roll up his sleeves, and when he refuses, Charles rips the shirt from his back. Jed’s torso is covered with scores of tattoos. “Why, Jed, that’s fine artwork, that is.” Charles says.
When Will hears the carousel running backward after the collapse of the Mirror Maze, it isn’t to transform Mr. Electrico—Mr. Dark is riding to become the boy Jed, trick Charles, and lure him to his death.
Themes
“You can’t hurt me!” Jed cries. Charles disagrees and pulls the boy near, “almost lovingly, close, very close.” Jeb begins to scream, “Murder! Murder!” Charles swears he won’t kill him. “You’re going to murder yourself,” Charles says. Jeb calls him “evil,” and Charles laughs. “So it must seem,” he says. “Good to evil seems evil. So I will do only good to you, Jed, I will simply hold you and watch you poison yourself.” He holds the boy tight, “like a father and son long apart, passionately met,” and Jed falls to the ground, dead.
Charles destroys Mr. Dark with only the love and goodness inside him—whereas his fatherly love saves Will, it destroys Mr. Dark, who is the opposite of love. Again, Charles must first face his fears before he can destroy Mr. Dark. In this way, Bradbury once more suggests that fear only has the power that one gives it. Once Charles faces his fears, he is able to overcome them.
Themes
