Random Ways The Narnia Universe Is Incredibly Disturbing (13 items)

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  (#13) Impossibly Powerful Gods Are Just Casually Running Around

  As with many mythological pantheons, the Narnian gods are part of everyday life. You might run into Aslan or Tash, both of whom are fearsome regardless of your religious alliance. And they aren't the only ones. Roman gods show up too, such as Bacchus. Narnia, then, is a place where you can casually bump into a god (or god-like figure) just going about your business, and the results might not be as good as you'd hope.

  After all, Aslan isn't a tame lion, and Bacchus is well known for having followers driven to madness and violence. With sentient beasts, witches, and numerous other threats to deal with, having gods walking around is just another nightmare to contend with in Narnia.
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  (#8) Teaching Little Kids To Kill Is Super Dope

  Battles may be ugly when women fight, but when 13-year-old boys fight, battles are proving grounds. In The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, Peter must prove himself in front of Aslan by slaying the wolf that's threatening his sister. Nevermind that Peter is only a year older than Susan, nor that Aslan (the giant f*cking lion) is right there; instead, he has to test his new sword against a battle-hardened wolf.

  Aslan may have known Peter would win, and that there were even harder battles in Peter's future, but there's still something deeply disturbing about a Jesus-inspired lion teaching a young boy how to kill so he can properly rule a country that isn't his own.
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  (#4) Changing An Entire Race's Appearance And Function Is Fine If You're Aslan's Buddy

  The entirety of the Dawn Treader's stay at Coriakin's island is bizarre. After speaking to a group of invisible beings, Lucy is tasked with making them visible again, only to find out that the Dufflepuds turned themselves invisible, not, as they claimed, the magician Coriakin. But then it gets disturbing.

  It turns out the Dufflepuds were originally dwarves, and they were turned into one-footed creatures by the magician because they disobeyed him. Coriakin is a kindly figure shown to be friends with Aslan, making this whole situation utterly bizarre. Though the magician is the Dufflepuds' overseer, it seems unnecessarily cruel to completely change their appearance because they didn't listen, but apparently it doesn't matter because he's friends with Aslan.
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  (#9) Progressive Parents Make For Selfish, Weak Kids

  Eustace Scrubb is introduced as a boy so awful that he deserves his stupid, dumb name. The reason for his terrible nature? His parents, because they are liberal vegetarians who don't smoke or drink. While it's true that Lewis doesn't explicitly make the connection, all this information is given in conjunction with the proclamation that Eustace is just the worst.

  To be fair, Eustace could just be a little jerk on his own. But because traits like vegetarianism were considered somewhat highfalutin by a man as nostalgic for the past as Lewis, it's hard not to read Eustace's upbringing as the reason for his selfish, whiny, awful mannerisms. Well, at least until he turns into a dragon.
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  (#6) The Almost Inherently Bad Guys Are Racially Coded As "Not White"

  While Narnia, thankfully, doesn't entirely code white as good and black as bad – The White Witch is a nice thumb in the eye of that trope – that doesn't mean the series is free of troubling associations with race. Specifically, the Calormenes.

  Described as having dark skin, occupying a desert, and wearing turbans, the Calormenes are a pretty clear analog to Middle Eastern people, who, in Lewis's time (and, frankly, in modern Western culture), were often vilified. In Narnia, the Calormenes are violent, barbaric slave traders and the biggest supporters of Tash (a demonic deity of a state-sponsored religion) in The Last Battle. The Horse and His Boy does feature two Calormene characters who are clearly good, moral heroes, but they're painted as the exception, not the rule. Just because you feature "some of the good ones," that doesn't make your book less racist.  
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  (#3) Time Differences Mean Your Consciousness Might Be Centuries Old

  The Pevensie children enter Narnia as children, with the oldest, Peter, only 13 years old. The first time they leave Narnia, they're fully grown adults with little memory of their previous lives until they stumble back to England through the wardrobe. And this isn't the last time they travel to and from Narnia. It happens a couple more times, with strange time dilation making it feel as though no time has passed in England at all.

  Sure, it's the ultimate escapist fantasy, but it's also a little troubling. The Pevensie children, and later Jill and Eustace, all spend lots of time in Narnia experiencing terrifying situations and events suited for adults. Though they might be children in appearance, their actual age is quite different. Even if it fades as they spend time in their own world, it's a little creepy, not to mention frustrating. Can you imagine having the consciousness of a 42-year-old woman trapped in a child's body? You couldn't drink wine or go on a date or have any kind of meaningful discussion with your peers. 

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