00:00Movies and TV shows bring to life so many of our deepest desires
00:04and let us vicariously experience worlds and lives we could only dream of.
00:09But just as often, we're shown the flip side
00:12and reminded that we should be careful what we wish for.
00:15Sometimes it just serves as a reminder that we shouldn't forget to be grateful for what we already have,
00:19but other times it can get quite a bit darker.
00:23So let's take a deeper look at this trope's function as a cautionary tale
00:26to unpack the message we should really be taking to heart.
00:30The be careful what you wish for trope is a staple across genres,
00:34but especially in fantasy and horror,
00:36where supernatural beings and objects trick gullible people to ruin their lives
00:40without realizing until it's too late.
00:43First published in 1902, W. W. Jacob's short story The Monkey's Paw
00:47has seen endless page-to-screen adaptations.
00:50In the ominous tale, a man named Mr. White takes the titular artifact,
00:54a mummified monkey's paw that can grant three wishes to whoever possesses it
00:58from a friend who immediately warns him of the disastrous consequences
01:01that will befall anyone who attempts to use it to change their fate.
01:05Encouraged by his son Herbert, the man ignores the warnings
01:08and wishes for 200 pounds to help their finances.
01:12The next day, Herbert dies in a horrific accident at work,
01:15and the company gives his family 200 in compensation.
01:18Mrs. White's grief pushes her to wish for her dead son to return,
01:22and soon there's a knock at the door.
01:24But realizing that it won't be their actual son,
01:27but just some horrifying reanimated version of his already decomposing body,
01:31Mr. White quickly uses his last wish to undo whatever was done,
01:35and the knocking stops.
01:36We've seen this story played out in so many of our favorite movies and TV shows,
01:41like an episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark,
01:43where two boys up to no good get a twisted claw that grants them three wishes.
01:47It's played for laughs in the Simpsons' second Treehouse of Horror special,
01:51showing the family making mostly selfish wishes that backfire.
01:55Buffy the Vampire Slayer used this trope multiple times throughout the series,
01:59mostly thanks to the vengeance demons, like the time Cordelia wished to erase Buffy.
02:03I wish Buffy Summers had never come to Sunnydale.
02:06Which ended in her dying, because without Buffy, there was no one around to save her.
02:11In a Season 7 episode, a girl is humiliated and mocked for being dumped in front of everyone,
02:16and in feeling utterly heartbroken, wishes that they all knew
02:19what it was like to have their heart ripped out of their chests.
02:22Which ends exactly how you'd imagine.
02:24Season 5's Forever sees Dawn trying to revive her mom, just like Mrs. White,
02:29but thankfully, before she can see her walking corpse, Buffy talks her out of it,
02:32knowing whatever comes back wouldn't be their mom.
02:35Genies have long been portrayed as benevolent helpers and as sinister tricksters,
02:40and just like with the monkey's paw,
02:42their granting of wishes usually comes with unintended consequences.
02:46In What We Do in the Shadows, Nandor gets 52 wishes granted by a djinn,
02:50whose job is to show their masters the error of their ways.
02:53I teach lessons about greed, desire, etc. by f***ing with the wishes of my so-called masters.
03:00Nandor has to very carefully choose his words, because every detail can and will
03:05likely be intentionally misinterpreted in a way that makes his life harder, not better.
03:09Aladdin uses this loophole to entrap Jafar, encouraging him to wish for absolute power,
03:15only to be made into a genie who, as we know, is enslaved inside a lamp until a new master comes along.
03:20In The Princess and the Frog, the privileged but stifled Prince Naveen is lured by Dr. Facilier,
03:26and believes his voodoo magic will free him to hop from place to place by making him independently wealthy with green.
03:33But like the evil trickster he is, Facilier interprets these words literally,
03:37taking away Naveen's humanity and turning him into a frog.
03:41Sometimes stories take these wishes one step further, having characters make deals with the devil.
03:46While monkey's paw and genie wishes usually lead to negative consequences unintentionally or through trickery,
03:52when making a deal with the devil you know exactly what you're giving up to get what you asked for.
03:57And the pain comes from realizing just how much your own greed and ego ruined your own life.
04:02And there's always a trick, and a price.
04:07Chilling Adventures of Sabrina as Daniel Webster sold his soul to the devil looking to become a more successful lawyer.
04:13But of course, there was a catch.
04:15He ended up defending the worst of the worst, and making sure these dangerous criminals always got free.
04:21And in the end, he faced one of the worst consequences of all,
04:24as one of the very people he freed took the life of his own daughter.
04:27And after I freed him, when I wasn't home, he broke in, and he did those things to my daughter.
04:39When the fall of the House of Usher's Roderick and Madeline Usher were young,
04:43a mysterious woman promised them a more than privileged life for their present and future family.
04:48But at the end of it, everyone had to die together.
04:51They could live decades with every luxury, every opportunity.
04:56Or they could live a little longer, but struggle.
05:01They accepted the deal pretty quickly, but decades later, all of his kids would die in gruesome ways.
05:07In all of these kinds of stories, the dealmakers are punished for their endless ambition,
05:11but more specifically, their impatience with reaching success.
05:15Sure, some of them still work hard, but their deals and wishes give them a significant boost.
05:20And in some stories, the very things they desired become their punishment.
05:24In The Sandman, a writer enslaves a muse so he can keep his career going.
05:28When he refuses to set her free, Dream essentially curses him with what he wanted.
05:32If it's ideas you want, then you shall have them in abundance.
05:38Jealousy is something we're all guilty of from time to time.
05:41We see someone with the attributes, successes, or possessions that we want,
05:45and we can't help but long for the same.
05:48But trying to change your life by mimicking or stealing someone else's can have its consequences, too.
05:53Wonder Woman 1984's Barbara Minerva is portrayed as a mousy nerd who worships her co-worker Diana.
05:59She wants to have that confidence and the power that comes with it.
06:03After she uses the Dream Stone, she discovers she has new abilities which allow her to look and feel attractive,
06:09but also feels safe in her own skin, able to protect herself.
06:13Turns out wishing to be like you came with some surprises.
06:18But in this process, she also loses her true self, the good part of her that Diana admired.
06:23This concept is at the center of body swap comedies.
06:26One person thinks someone else's life is easier slash better than their own,
06:30and through some magical method, they wish to trade places.
06:33Sometimes this is because a kid wants their parents to understand how difficult life is for them, and vice versa.
06:39Anna, high school is not that hard.
06:41You couldn't last one day in my high school.
06:43Honey, you need a serious and bracing reality check if you think my life is perfect.
06:49Freaky Friday, in its various adaptations, is the quintessential body swap story,
06:54where a mother and her teenage daughter end up living life as the other.
06:57They quickly realize how wrong they were about each other's daily struggles, and it strengthens their relationship.
07:02This also happens with siblings, like in DC's DCOM Wish Upon a Star.
07:06Smart loner Haley and her popular mean girl sister Alexia never get along,
07:11but in making their wishes and literally walking in each other's shoes, they realize that they don't hate each other.
07:17They secretly envy each other.
07:19There's a time in a kid's life, usually puberty, when they desperately want their parents to stop treating them like children.
07:25They want more freedom to hang out with their friends, go places on their own, go on dates, or to just be taken seriously.
07:31But over the course of their story, they usually come to find that actually being a kid is pretty great,
07:36and they're happy to hold off on the whole adulthood thing for a little while longer.
07:40On Ginny and Georgia, Ginny confronts her mother Georgia about how she's tired of being treated like a kid and wants to be treated like an adult,
07:47not realizing all of the dark truths she's been protected from up to this point, like her mom's traumatic past, or that they're struggling financially.
07:55We're dead broke.
07:57What?
07:58Dead freaking broke.
08:00Welcome to adulthood.
08:01It sucks.
08:02Thirteen going on thirties, Jenna was just too eager to reach adulthood,
08:06and her wish to be thirty and flirty and thriving skipped over an entire life,
08:10only to find that she hated the awful person she had become,
08:14and that she had a romanticized notion of being in your thirties that didn't really line up with reality.
08:20We can see a dark example of this trope in Game of Thrones' Sansa Stark.
08:24She begged her mother to let her marry Prince Joffrey Baratheon and become queen one day,
08:28but instead of the fantasy royal life she had dreamed of,
08:31her life in King's Landing was filled with misery and pain.
08:34Please let me go home, I won't do any treason, I swear I'll just-
08:38Mother says I'm still to marry you, so you'll stay here and obey.
08:42As this trope appears so often and in so many different iterations,
08:46it has come to be interpreted in a number of ways.
08:49The more positive outlook is that these stories of wishes gone wrong
08:52remind us to appreciate what we already have,
08:54and not to get consumed by jealousy or greed.
08:57Shows like Goosebumps and Are You Afraid of the Dark are morality tales
09:00in the form of spooky entertainment, teaching kids that actions have consequences,
09:04including making a wish that negatively impacts another person.
09:07Be careful what you wish for.
09:10You might just get it.
09:14However, many versions, particularly the ones dealing with adults,
09:18can begin to lean into feeling like we're being told
09:21that we should never want more than what we already have.
09:24And if we somehow find a way to achieve more or elevate our station,
09:27we deserve any bad things that happen as a result.
09:30And even if our wish does come true,
09:32any feeling of happiness will only be temporary.
09:35Here's the thing about wishes.
09:37The more you have, the more you want.
09:40Because now we're on a never-ending cycle of being unsatisfied
09:43and always wanting more, more, more.
09:46In an interesting twist on the trope,
09:48the good place reminds us that too much of a good thing can be boring.
09:52Having been tricked into not knowing they were actually in the bad place all along,
09:56they learn that even in the real good place,
09:59everything being perfect ultimately leaves everyone unhappy.
10:02On paper, this is paradise.
10:05All your desires and needs are met, but it's infinite.
10:09And when perfection goes on forever,
10:11you become this glassy-eyed mush person.
10:15Instead, the group is able to find true contentment through other means,
10:18not by giving up their quest for more or getting stuck in a good rut,
10:22but instead just focusing on evolving as people and learning from their experiences.
10:27At the heart of the be careful what you wish for trope
10:30is the idea that we shouldn't expect there to be any one magical solution to our problems,
10:35and that setting all of our goals on that kind of singular wish for change
10:39will likely lead to disappointment, or even worse.
10:42But just because we shouldn't give up everything for a long-shot dream
10:45of turning back the clock or instantly improving everything
10:48doesn't mean that we shouldn't dream at all.
10:50It's just that instead of getting stuck on the idea that one thing,
10:53one wish, one adjustment will fix everything,
10:56we should instead try to focus on the larger picture of changes we can make,
11:00in ourselves, in our families, in our communities,
11:03and in the world at large.
11:05We don't need a mummified monkey or a genie as long as we have each other.
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