Ever notice that every blockbuster movie has the same fundamental pieces? A hero, a journey, some conflicts to muck it all up, a reward, and the hero returning home and everybody applauding his or her swag? Yeah, scholar Joseph Campbell noticed first—in 1949. He wrote The Hero with a Thousand Faces, in which he outlined the 17 stages of a mythological hero's journey.

About half a century later, Christopher Vogler condensed those stages down to 12 in an attempt to show Hollywood how every story ever written should—and, uh, does—follow Campbell's pattern. We're working with those 12 stages, so take a look. (P.S. Want more? We have an entire Online Course devoted to the hero's journey.)

Ordinary World

Need to picture our narrator's everyday life? Check out an IKEA catalog. He practically lives in one.

Call To Adventure

Our narrator's call to adventure is one of the more explosive ones in cinema—his perfect IKEA apartment literally blows up. That'll throw a person off his routine.

Refusal Of The Call

When our narrator calls Tyler to ask if he can stay with him— remember, he doesn't know they're the same person yet—Tyler doesn't answer. It's a brief refusal, but a refusal nonetheless. By returning the call, the narrator has to attempt to merge his two personalities.

Meeting The Mentor

It's a rare person who can mentor himself, but it's also a rare person who believes he is two different people and hangs out with the imaginary side of his personality as if he is real. Our narrator mentors himself through his Tyler Durden persona.

Crossing The Threshold

Although our narrator will cross a literal threshold and enter the Paper Street house, his emotional threshold occurs in the parking lot of the bar when Tyler says, "I want you to hit me as hard as you can," and our narrator does it. His fist crosses the threshold of Tyler's face. There's no turning back from that.

Tests, Allies, Enemies

Tyler is kind enough to provide our narrator, and everyone else in fight club, with homework, a series of tests for them to prove themselves. Anyone in fight club is instantly allied with one another, and their enemy is society as a whole. These bros plan to destroy it.

Approach To The Inmost Cave

Fight Club takes a lot of these steps literally. In his guided meditation, our narrator enters his inmost cave to search for his power animal. At first it's a penguin. Aw. But later, it's Marla. Here, our narrator begins to have subconscious doubts about the mission of Project Mayhem. Maybe he'd be better off searching for love instead.

Ordeal

When Tyler disappears, our narrator flies all over the country searching for him. He has to investigate fight clubs that have popped up in various cities, and he begins to sense that Tyler may be more of a threat than an ally.

Reward (Seizing The Sword)

Our narrator's reward is learning that he is actually Tyler Durden. It's a double-edged sword, though, because he realizes that he has done some terrible things to people. But he also realizes that it is within his power to stop Tyler and restore the world to normal.

The Road Back

Our narrator desperately tries to undo everything Tyler has done. But sadly, you can't put the video back on an erased video tape (just like you can't easily bring the data back to a wiped hard drive). And you can't un-explode a bomb. So our narrator must stop Tyler before he acts again. Good thing our narrator is Tyler, and should have a sense where he'll go next.

Resurrection

In the climax of Fight Club, our narrator shoots himself in the face to kill Tyler. Then he is reborn a whole person. Okay, he has a giant hole in his cheek, but he is mostly whole. More whole than when he was two people running around.

Return With The Elixir

We don't get to see our narrator return to the real world. In fact, we see the real world crumble around him as he fails to stop many of Tyler's bombs. What we do see, though, is Marla by his side, which should give him the strength to try and return to some semblance of normality.