Camazotz is a planet that appears in Madeleine L'Engle's novel A Wrinkle in Time. Two different incarnations of the location appeared in the 2003 Dimension Film adaptation and in the 2018 Disney film adaptation.
Background[]
Origins[]
Camazotz is based on the planet of the same name from Madeleine L'Engle's young adult science fantasy novel A Wrinkle in Time, the first entry in the Time Quintet series written by L'Engle herself.
In the original works, Camazotz is a "Dark Planet", meaning it has succumbed to the "Black Thing". It is described as a planet of extreme, enforced conformity ruled by a malevolent being known as the It, which resides in a building called Central Central Intelligence. Similar to Earth, Camazotz is described with birch, pine, and maple trees, an ordinary hill where the protagonists arrive, as well as having a town filled with smokestacks. The houses located in Camazotz are "all exactly alike with small square boxes painted gray", often compared with the burgeoning "American suburbia" resembling the developments in Levittown, Pennsylvania. People who live in houses are described as "motherly people who all gave the appearance of being the same". Every aspect of life on Camazotz is coordinated by the It, with its people moving about in a mechanical, synchronized fashion.
Appearances[]
A Wrinkle in Time (2003)[]
This version of Camazotz was built to resemble a modern city consisting of a neighborhood and various buildings and concessions with the It's name engraved on most buildings and signs such as the sign for It Burger (a burger restaurant) or Iteon (a movie theater that plays movies related to the It). The inhabitants who live in this planet obey the It's tyrannical orders in causing darkness across the universe. The main building located in this planet is the Central Central Intelligence, the It's headquarters where Meg, Calvin, and Charles Wallace arrive where in a plan to face off the It and save Mr. Murry to reunite him with his family. However, the surviving inhabitants of Camazotz became aware of Meg's heroic actions after the It was destroyed, resulting all the people to be free from the It's control.
As Meg, Charles, and Calvin arrive at Camazotz with help from Mrs. Which, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Whatsit, they wander around the deserted place where a vicious being known as the It watches over them. The three then arrive at a suburban community to which the three find everything strange in the Camazotz neighborhood. Arriving at a movie house, the three discover many merchandise related to the It, who rules over Camazotz at the Central Central Intelligence headquarters as a local Camazotz resident girl points the trio to the It's headquarters. After discussing with a Camazotz resident teen about It, Meg, Charles, and Calvin approach the Central Central Intelligence headquarters to face the It.
Arriving at the headquarters, Meg, alongside Charles and Calvin, enter Room K07 without filling the forms required to access by following an agent nearby without getting caught by the security guards. Noticing that the security guards placed Calvin into a room where a lab employee gives Calvin a hallucination of his basketball dream, Meg and Charles find lab coats in order to enter the lab to which Meg tells him to snap out of it as this hallucination is a trap, to which Charles manages to help rescue him from this trap. Having rescued Calvin, the three continue their mission to find Meg's father, to which upon noticing that they cannot escape, Meg sees an image nearby believing it is her missing father where she attempts to enter but is unable to. Meg shouts for her father's name to which Calvin tells her that her father could be anywhere. Calvin tells Meg to be patient and think calmly before she causes more problems by remembering what Mrs. Whatsit said to which Meg puts on Mrs. Who's glasses and is able to access the image where her father is at.
As Meg enters the room via tesseract, she finally finds her father inside to which she tells him to remember her to which she didn't recognize her at first to which he suddenly recognizes his daughter. Megs tells her father that his son Charles is with Calvin, Meg's friend from school. After explaining her long story to her father, she gives him the glasses provided by Mrs. Who so that the two of them can escape together and arrive at the spot where Calvin and Charles are at to which the moment is disrupted when the It enters, where he separates the platforms between Charles Wallace's allies and Charles himself. Suddenly, Charles, under control by the Man with Red Eyes, puts Meg midair, much to Calvin's worry about Meg in trouble just as Calvin tells Jack to put on Mrs. Who's pair of glasses to save Meg from the tyranny of the It. Meg attempts to escape with her father and Calvin, but suddenly gets separated from the two where Calvin and Meg's father end up at Ixchel via tesseract.
After Meg became self-conscious, she returns back to Camazotz at Central Central Intelligence and arrives at the spot where Charles Wallace (under control by the Man with Red Eyes) is serving It at a dining room. Meg confronts the It where he offers a strawberry banana smoothie to Meg to which she rejects his offer. Later while confronting It, Meg warns Charles that It is the one talking to him and putting him under control to which Meg faces It. While planning to free Charles, Meg begins counting the numbers the elements of the periodic table from one to thirteen in order to which a vision of Calvin suddenly appears to distract Charles and get him out of It's influence. Meg approaches Charles again who now finally understands what Meg is really saying about the bad influences from It to which Meg suddenly hugs Charles to help him escape from It, much to his rage.
Returning to the real world with Charles Wallace (actually an illusion), Meg approaches her mother who is happy to see Meg back after not seeing her for a long time, alongside Charles Wallace to which while Meg's mother is preparing pineapple for Charles Wallace, he recaps about his adventures through the power of tesseract. Meg then explains to her mother about what really happened to her father to which Meg starts to realize that everything around Meg in this dimension is not real. It is then known that Meg's return to the real world so that she can reunite with her mother with Charles Wallace back was actually an illusion after not explaining of what is wrong with her as Meg finds herself again at Camazotz, to which when Meg catches the chalk tossed by It, she finds herself in the Westover Community School (also an illusion). Thereupon, the Man with Red Eyes confesses with Meg, telling her that everybody has quality and everyone is alike to which Meg denies, explaining that like and equal are not the same thing, just as Meg explains to Charles Wallace that anything that It told him has never been the real truth just as she finds herself at Camazotz again.
Still being cornered by the Man with Red Eyes, Meg attempts to convince Charles Wallace that she loves him but he refuses to listen to her trust. Meg tries hard again to explain to Charles that she loves him so much to which the Man with Red Eyes starts reacting to Charles following Meg's advice to which the Man with Red Eyes warns him that Meg is a threat to him, Meg explains to Charles that he is her baby brother and after Charles finally trusts Meg, where Meg explains that she loves him to which Charles accepts, defeating the Man with Red Eye, the It's agent, gets knocked into the pipeline, defeating him and the It as well.
After the It was destroyed, the darkness spreading all over the universe was wiped away thanks to Meg who saved her father. This not only defeats the It, but the glass on the top of the building begins to shatter with several survivors affected by the It's destruction. Meg frees a teenager who is playing with a basketball, telling him that he is free from the It's control, while all the other people react of what happened after the It was destroyed. Meg tells the survivors inside the building that they are all free from the It's control, explaining to them that no one will hurt them, even without the It, just as the other people hear what Meg says. Meg and Charles Wallace leave Camazotz and travel to the real world via tesseract where the two of them return, along with Meg's father, and Meg's friend Calvin. Meg's father later reunites with his wife in the real world.
A Wrinkle in Time (2018)[]
Camazotz in this film is described as a planet of many faces often shapeshifting into several landscapes such as a field, a forest, a beach, or a neighborhood, depicted being very fluid and always changing. The planet itself is also a home to Central Central Intelligence, a building home to a malevolent being known as the It. Unlike in the 2003 film, Central Central Intelligence is depicted as a sphere-shaped white room rather than a tall building.
Meg, Charles, and Calvin find themselves at Camazotz in a field where they approach the Mrs. Ws where it is found that they are weakening, due to the fact that Meg's will to find her father weakened their power as she re-directed it from Earth, just as Mrs. Which tells Meg that she cannot help her, telling her to find her father on her own while being tested every step of the way. Just before leaving, Mrs. Who gives her a pair of glasses as a gift for Meg to enfold just before all three Mrs. Ws leave just as Mrs. Which tells Meg, Charles, and Calvin to stay together, followed by the other Mrs. Ws bidding a farewell to them. As a forest grows onto the field, Meg and Calvin are having trouble finding Charles Wallace as a massive tornado engulfs the trees in its path while the voices of the Mrs. Ws advice Meg to find Charles who is safe by a wall. Seeing no way to go over the wall, Meg and Calvin hide inside a hollow of a tree where the tornado lifts up the tree where they are hiding. Meg later finds herself at a stream where she becomes self-conscious just as she approaches Calvin not before they finally find Charles Wallace who is alive after all.
As the three stroll across the suburban community, they encounter various children bouncing rubber balls in sync just as Meg, Charles, and Calvin approach a local woman offering them dinner, which Meg warns them to avoid trusting any resident, fearing that it could be a trap. Meg, Charles, and Calvin find themselves at a deserted beach where Charles finds out that Camazotz changes sceneries throughout their adventures. They encounter a beach packed with a large crowd of people and amongst the crowd is a man with red eyes who approaches the three. As they approach the Man who reveals himself as Red, Meg, Charles, and Calvin sit down while Red offers them a plate of sandwiches (which turn out to be made of sand and are not real food) not before Charles Wallace becomes the It's servant.
Meg and Calvin go after the Man with Red Eyes as they attempt to stop Charles Wallace from trusting the It as the two find themselves in a building known as "Central Central Intelligence". When Meg realizes that her father is missing (though unable to see the room where her father would be), she uses Mrs. Who's glasses to scan the room, seeing images of mathematical diagrams of topological order and a fractal dimension while finding an invisible staircase. Following the path, the sketch of a staircase appears while Meg puts determination in herself following the path of sketches and into a hidden alcove. Meg enters a hidden tunnel and finally finds her father.
Happy to see him back, Meg emotionally reunites with her father. Meg feels happy to see her father back after being gone for four years just as Alex tells his daughter that he was trapped by the It as Meg was trying to bring her father back home while recapping that Charles and Calvin came here to rescue him. After a tearful reunion, Meg guides her father out of the hidden chamber. Having escaped, the It (controlling Charles Wallace) feels furious that Meg is stopping his plans just as he drags Meg, her father, and Calvin across a dark corridor while the It reveals his true form (as enveloped in Meg's mind) as Meg's father tells her daughter to resist everything the It succeeds just before Meg finds herself in a dark space.
After the It was destroyed, the darkness spreading all over the universe was wiped away thanks to Meg who saved her father. While all the negativity was wiped away from Camazotz, it is unknown if this affected the surviving inhabitants of this planet.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Camazotz is named after the Mayan bat god of the same name who serves his duty as one of the lords of the underworld.
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