Okay, can we just talk about this for a second? In my opinion this 5 second clip says more about Pitch than any other single moment in the movie. This is right at the point where the Guardians are collecting the teeth so that the children will keep believing in Tooth, and Pitch is watching his globe, wondering why the lights aren’t going out, and this is his reaction.
Just look at his face at the beginning of this, there’s confusion, frustration and worry, yes worry. Pitch had obviously thought that his large-scale attack on Tooth Palace would have yielded greater rewards than what it did. It had taken him a very long time to amass the amount of power and nightmares that it took to stage his attack, and it hadn’t worked nearly as well as he had hoped. Children were still believing in Tooth, so even though he had won that battle, the Guardians still had a very high advantage for the war ahead. For somebody in Pitch’s position, this was a very trying time, since he had potentially lost more power than he had gained in his victory, and this worried him. This frightened him.
Now look at the nightmare’s reaction to this, it starts sniffing the air, smelling Pitch’s worry, his fear, and it moves closer to him, almost as if it’s debating attacking him. Now I’ve heard many people asking why the nightmares attacked Pitch at the end of the movie when he was the one who created him, but what they don’t understand is that the nightmares don’t care. The nightmares have no morales, no sense of loyalty, they are plain and simply creatures of fear, creatures that feed off fear and will feed at any opportunity. They will listen to Pitch and obey him yes, but only as long as he is able to remain dominant to them. The moment that he displays any fear of his own, they will take advantage of that, as is shown.
Pitch notices its interest and he hisses at it, he reinstates his dominance and immediately disposes of the creature before it can potentially alert any of the others of his fear. This is what Pitch has to be, it’s not a choice for him, it’s not something that he just decided to do. Pitch is the Boogeyman, and that’s what he has to be every single second of the day. Any weakness that he shows will be instantly preyed upon by his own creations, any human qualities devoured instantly in the darkness which he is forced to reside in.
Pitch isn’t like the Guardians, where his companions and abilities will help him through his weakest moments. Pitch isn’t allowed to have any weak moments, because his own creations, his own abilities will eat him alive. Pitch can only control fear, when he doesn’t let it control him.
This is my headcanon worded far better than I will ever manage. It’s the only thing that makes sense given what the Night Mares do at the end of the film, and if you also consider his backstory, it makes total sense. Now, here’s some of my follow up headcanon.
Pitch is just a vessel for fear. I personally think the reason we don’t see Fearlings in the film is because they are constantly inside of him to keep his humanity at bay. Anyone who’s read Toothiana, Queen of the Tooth Fairy Armies knows that Pitch was attempting to rid himself of whatever humanity he had left inside him (read: his love for his daughter) because he considered it a weakness. Now, why would he consider it a weakness? Maybe because, once he began to remember who he was, he would try to fight against fear.
Think about it like this: Kozmotis Pitchiner fought against Fearlings for most of his life. He was considered the hero of the Golden Age. Surely he’d be be able to resist the Fearlings’ influence more readily than other candidates? Yes, and no. Given the amount of Fearlings that possessed him, he is incapable of defending himself against their continuous onslaught. He’s no longer Kozmotis underneath all that, except for the rare instances he recalls his daughter—and this was only prompted by Katherine showing him the locked and him having touched Nightlight prior, turning his hand “human”. And recall how the “humanity” had moved further than his hand to turn his entire arm “human” later on? Despite all the Fearlings’ influence, the combination of this “attack” had made Pitch vulnerable, so vulnerable that the only way he could get rid of his vulnerability was to remove his own humanity.
I’ll take this opportunity to pimp an example that I find appropriate to explain the Pitch/Kozmotis analogy. I really love existsoutsideoflogic’s headcanon that Pitch Black is essentially the result of someone colouring over a puzzle of Kozmotis Pitchiner with a black marker. Kozmotis is still there, but Pitch can’t go back to simply being Kozmotis anymore. So, even if Pitch had allowed his “humanity” to settle back in, he would never be able to go back to simply being Kozmotis, just as Pitch himself is not a carbon copy of the Fearlings. He’s the result of the Fearlings’ influence upon Kozmotis.
So yes, the Fearlings/Night Mares serve him, but only for as long as they maintain the same goals. The moment Pitch starts to want something other than fear (read: a family) is the moment they have to intervene to crush that emotion before it can develop. In the books, that translated into Pitch himself wanting to be rid of his humanity. In the film, it was the Night Mares themselves that dragged him down to his lair to “punish” him for not killing Jack when he had the chance. Think about it. If he’d killed Jack after the winter spirit had refused his offer, Pitch would have won. But he didn’t, even though Jack refused to join him and Pitch regretted letting down his defenses and allowing himself to be vulnerable for those few, fleeting moments.
And so, for Pitch, this translates into him never being able to show weakness. At the slightest hint of his resolve wavering, the Fearlings will only tighten their hold on him. And the Night Mares, who can sense fear, will be the ones to “remind” Pitch of his place.
Given all this, the only way I can reason the absence of the Fearlings in the film is to theorise that whatever Mother Nature will do in the next book will be considered such a threat to the Fearlings that they will, from that moment onwards, constantly remain inside of Pitch’s body to keep his humanity at bay, and keep his memories locked away to prevent him from ever “rebelling” against them.
Not one of my better theories, I’ll admit, but it’s the only one that I can see making sense with our current information. I’m sorry I hijacked your post, hehe. xD
I completely agree with this analysis of the scene and Pitch’s character. He is always fighting to get what he wants, so it makes sense that he is use to being in an environment where he is in a constant struggle for dominance.
I also really like the way you described how Pitch is Kozmotis changed by fearlings and how he can never go back to being Koz but still isn’t just a Fearling. I think that’s a good analogy for any character that’s gone through a lot of tough situations, no one is ever the same at the end of a journey as they were at the start. I agree that Pitch is more of a vessel for the fears instead of a part of them. In the movie he does show a human desires for company, so there is still some humanity left in him.
In my headcanon I think that when Pitch first became the nightmare king he went completely insane with all of the creatures trying to posses him and it was their rage that caused him to destroy the Golden Age and try to kill the Tsar and his family. But through so many battles, being locked up by nightlight, and just him conquering his own daemons, Pitch has started to gain back some of his sanity. He will never be Kozmotis again, but he is becoming more human.
This is why in the book, under the influence of the fearlings, he tries to forsake his humanity, so that they can remain in control. But whatever Mother Nature and the other characters in the books do to defeat him causes most of the fearlings to abandon him or be destroyed. This is how we get to the Pitch in the movie, a strategist who is willing to wait and build up his strengths before setting his plans in motion.
To me movie!Pitch seams much more level headed than book!Pitch. Not that book!Pitch isn’t able to be strategic, he did plan out a lot of things like attacking the library and using the Monkey King to find the Flying Elephant, he just seems to rush into the situations more, only focusing on his present goal. While movie!Pitch is much more willing to wait and do things like lure Sandy away from the other guardians to defeat him or getting them to all go to the workshop so he can attack the Tooth Palace.
But that’s just my heacanon.
