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

We're not sure the word "ordinary" could ever apply to Staff Sergeant Will James, but okay, we'll go with it. Basically, his "normal" is disarming bombs, and that's just what he's doing when we meet him in 2004 Iraq. He has his own unique way of doing things, but it seems to be keeping him alive...so far.

Call to Adventure

We are introduced to Will when he joins the Bravo Company EOD team, which has just lost its much beloved leader, Thompson. Will promises that he's not there to take Thompson's place. At first, his colleagues take that as a good sign.

Refusal of the Call

Will's team is surprised (and not in a good way) when Will wants to do things very differently. He doesn't really communicate on the radio when he's working on a bomb, which irritates his fellow soldiers, who are responsible for supporting him. He refuses to wear the bomb suit when he doesn't feel like it makes sense, and it doesn't seem like he listens to anyone else when he has his mind set on a particular course of action.

So, while he's certainly committed to the "call" of dismantling bombs, he isn't super great at fitting into the EOD team.

Meeting the Mentor

What mentor? Aren't you listening? Will doesn't really listen to anyone. If anything, he's the mentor, showing everyone else on the EOD team that you can still get stuff done even while being reckless and breaking protocol all over the place.

Of course, Sanborn tries to mentor Will in the ways of the team—you know, like when he strongly suggests that Will leave up the planks of wood to prevent stray shrapnel from getting in—but Will just ignores him.

Crossing the Threshold

Will gets a little cozier with his fellow EODers after a scrape with some enemy combatants out in the desert. Will helps Sanborn stay hydrated while he's playing sniper, and as the two of them sit out there with the sun beating down on them, the sand coating their faces and mouths, you feel like they are somehow finally on the same side.

Oh, and in that same incident, Will gives one of the other soldiers, Eldridge, a very nice pep talk, and that seems to set things on a nice path for those two as well.

Will and the other soldiers party really hard together after getting out of that situation, which is another sign that peace has come to the EOD team.

Tests, Allies, Enemies

New besties Will, Sanborn, and Eldridge are now getting along well, but that doesn't mean Will is any more inclined to play by the rules or avoid taking risks. When he comes across a body bomb hidden in a boy he thinks he knows, rather than agreeing to evacuate the area and explode the bomb (which is the initial plan), Will decides he's going to disarm it. Despite the fact that it's disgusting. Despite the fact that it's risky. It seems that because he thinks he knows the boy, he can't bear to blow up his body.

The good news is that Will is able to disarm the bomb and retrieve the boy's body. The bad news? Well, after they're all done and they're getting in the car, an IED goes off and takes out the camp's therapist, who had been tagging along with them.

Approach to the Inmost Cave

After the whole kid-with-a-body-bomb incident, Will is pretty upset, and he decides that the DVD salesman outside the camp was somehow responsible for what happened. You see, Will thinks the child with the body bomb was a young local kid named Beckham, who had been selling DVDs at that stand. Will decides to take matters into his own hands and get the DVD salesman to take him to Beckham's family.

How? Well, naturally he pulls a gun on the DVD salesman and then goes AWOL so the man can drive him to what he thinks is this kid's house. He prowls around outside before going in to see who and what he can find.

Ordeal

When Will gets inside the house, he finds a very frightened professor in the kitchen. The prof tries to act cheerful and make Will comfortable, but then his wife comes back and starts attacking Will. Will realizes these people are not whom he's looking for and skedaddles back to the camp, where the powers-that-be at the door are reluctant to let him in. Once he admits he was at a "whorehouse," though, the soldier agrees to let him in...as long as he shares the location of the whorehouse.

To make matters worse, when the EOD team is out on a run late in the film, Will's stubbornness leads them into a very sticky situation. While investigating the scene of a presumed suicide bombing, Will decides that it wasn't necessarily a suicide mission at all, and the bomber must be somewhere nearby. So, naturally, Mr. Daredevil wants to go looking for said bomber, even though the infantry, who are also there, are supposed to do that. No one else on his team is into the adventure, but they have to follow him on orders...and at the end of it all, Eldridge ends up shot in the leg.

Needless to say, Eldridge is peeved and really chews Will out for his recklessness.

Reward (Seizing the Sword)

Soon after Eldridge leaves camp to heal, Bravo Company's tour is over, and Will heads back to a "normal" (or normal-ish) existence with his wife and his son. Yay, happy ending…right?

The Road Back

Even though he's home, Will remains pretty preoccupied by what's happening in Iraq. He tries to talk to his wife about it, but she doesn't seem to want to talk about it. He mentions to her that the military really needs good bomb techs and...yeah, she says nothing. We're guessing the war isn't her favorite topic.

Resurrection

Will seems to realize pretty quickly that he doesn't fit in back at home. He even says as much to his little boy, basically implying that the only thing he really loves is dismantling bombs.

Return With the Elixir

At the end of the film, having realized that Iraq is where he desperately wants to be, Will heads back into the service. The title text at the end announces that his new company has 365 days left in its rotation.

So, Will has returned to his great "love," but we can't help but worry about him. The ending doesn't necessarily seem so happy or elixir-y after all.