47 pages • 1 hour read
The Cardboard Kingdom
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Chapters 13-15Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 13 Summary: “The Bully”
It’s garbage day, and a group of the kids collect cardboard and bring it to a young boy named Peter. Peter has been collecting cardboard for a secret project. The group speculates on what the project could possibly be, but Peter refuses to show them. He tells them it’s called Megalopolis and claims that it is coming soon.
As the children play in the street, Roy’s Nanna tries to convince him to join them, but Roy insists that he is too old to play dress-up. Nonetheless, Roy heads outside, but instead of joining the others, he gives them “constructive criticism” about their costumes. A couple of teenagers see this and tell Roy that it was cool of him to help the others with their costumes. They invite him to a costume party they’re having the next day.
The next day, Roy excitedly makes a praying mantis monster costume and heads to the party. However, when he shows up, no one else is in costume, and everyone takes pictures and laughs at him. Roy begins to cry and runs away, tearing off his costume. When he gets home, Roy is furious with his Nanna for pushing him to make friends. He yells that he hates the neighborhood and hates living with his Nanna, and he announces that he wants to live with his mom again. Nanna explains that his mom needs to take care of herself before she can take care of Roy, but she suggests that she and Roy can take care of one another in the meantime.
Later, while Roy is walking down the street, the teenagers that made fun of him approach. He hides behind a bush to avoid them and sees some of the other kids hiding in Amanda’s cardboard laboratory. He climbs a fence and sees more kids playing in a carboard castle. He then notices Peter’s secret project and sneaks under its covering to see what it is. This gives him an idea, and he spends the rest of the day in his room working on a new costume with a sinister smirk on his face.
Chapter 14 Summary: “Megalopolis”
Peter finally unveils Megalopolis to the group, and everyone spends the afternoon having chases and battles around the cardboard city. They’re interrupted by the arrival of Roy, who is wearing a Godzilla-like costume. He smirks as he pushes Peter over and begins to gleefully destroy the city. When the damage is done, Roy walks away. The other kids try to comfort Peter, who looks dejected. However, his dejection is quickly replaced by a look of determination as he gets a new idea.
While Roy is walking home, the teenage bullies stop him and push him over. That evening, both Peter and Roy work hard on creating new and improved costumes. The next day, Roy arrives in an even fiercer Godzilla costume, but Peter is ready to defend the city in a mecha costume. The two engage in an epic battle, and they both have fun until the teenagers show up and start throwing water balloons at them. Roy has the idea to combine their costumes, which scares the teenagers off. Meanwhile, the rest of the kids seize the remaining water balloons and throw them at the fleeing bullies. With Megalopolis defended, Roy joins the group and helps the other children to repair the city.
Chapter 15 Summary: “The Summer’s End”
With school starting next week, Becky tells Alice that while she has loved running the Dragon’s Head Inn with her all summer, she feels like she has missed out on having her own adventure. Jack and the Army of Evil overhear the conversation and concoct a plan. That night, they sneak into the Dragon’s Head Inn and steal the cardboard dragon’s head. The next morning, Alice is shocked to discover that she and Becky have been robbed. Professor Everything, the Scribe, and the Mad Scientist begin looking for clues, and Becky finds a map. The Sorceress bursts in to inform them that the Army of Evil took the dragon’s head, and that they need to follow the map for one final adventure of the summer. Alice is annoyed, but Becky is thrilled that she will get to go on an adventure.
There are three X’s on the map. To retrieve the dragon’s head, the heroes will have to defeat three fierce monsters. The first is Vijay the Beast King. He is sitting atop the Animal Queen’s playground set, which the Evil Army has fashioned into a giant monster’s head. The Huntress distracts the Beast King while the Gargoyle sneaks up behind him. Once he is defeated, the next enemy they have to defeat is the Mega-Blob–a larger version of the Blob that is now submerged in water. Big Banshee attempts to get close to him but keeps getting splashed in the eyes. The Mad Scientist gives Big Banshee her goggles, which solves the problem and allows her to make quick work of the Mega-Blob. The final challenge is the Ultra-Bot–a huge robot equipped with two water cannons. The Prince, the Rogue, and the Knight devise a plan to cut the Ultra-Bot down, but they cannot get past the cannons. Becky puts a kink in the hose, which stops the water cannons from working and allows her friends to close in and defeat their enemy.
As the heroes all celebrate, a massive, multiheaded dragon appears over the fence. Alice is worried that they will ruin the dragon’s head, but Becky thinks the monster they’ve made is incredible. The dragon sprays the heroes with cold water and renders their cardboard weapons useless. As they’re about to give up, Alice retrieves the table from the Dragon’s Head Inn and uses it as a shield while Becky runs to get sturdier weapons. Behind the shield, the group charges the dragon, and for the first time, Alice appears to be having fun. They defeat the dragon and head back to the Dragon’s Head Inn to celebrate and relive the day’s adventure.
The next week, everyone heads back to school. On the bus, the scribe shows everyone the book he created, which chronicles the adventures of Cardboard Kingdom. As they get off the bus and head into school, each child’s shadow is shaped like their Cardboard Kingdom alter ego.
Chapters 13-15 Analysis
The chapter titled “The Bully” incorporates several different layers of bullying, referencing both Roy’s wanton destruction of Megalopolis and the teenagers’ determination to terrorize Roy himself. This story structure emphasizes the fact that bullies often do what they do because as a reaction to their own mistreatment or turmoil, for Roy’s destructive acts occur as a misguided reaction to the bullying he endures from the older boys. The teenagers therefore function as the embodiment of the social pressure that Roy feels to grow up and leave childhood behind. This idea is further reinforced by the opening of the chapter starts, for Roy initially claims to be too old to play dress-up, a statement that is silently contradicted by his longing look out the window (203).
Despite his desire to play, the reason for his reluctance to join in becomes clear when he eagerly jumps at the opportunity to join the teenagers; he feels a deep social pressure to move past “childish things” and grow up. However, after it is revealed the teenagers are playing a mean trick on Roy, the scene reveals the tension between his two desires—to play with things he enjoys and to grow up and leave these things behind. Roy is stuck in limbo between two ostensibly incompatible worlds, and he takes his frustrations out on the only target available to him: Peter’s cardboard city.
The entirety of The Cardboard Kingdom can be read as an argument in support of The Transformative Power of Play, and this philosophy is further supported by the fact that the more “grown up” teenagers function as the villains in the piece. In a sharp contrast to the teenagers’ mistreatment, Peter chooses not to push Roy away despite the destruction that he has caused; instead, Peter embraces The Celebration of Diversity by welcoming Roy’s ideas and integrating his Godzilla-like role into the game. In this moment of acceptance, Roy finally looks happy, and he even helps the group fight off the teenagers when they show up with water balloons, symbolizing his decision to embrace his playful instincts rather than rejecting them in a misguided attempt to fit in with the wrong crowd.
To bring the multifaceted events of the summer to a comprehensive conclusion, the chapter titled “Summer’s End” represents the culmination of the children’s collaborative play, and it also places Jack in a central role, emphasizing the leadership abilities that he demonstrated in “The Army of Evil.” The grand plan he enacts to help Becky have an adventure demonstrates that he has learned to be “evil” and kind at the same time. His “evil” act of stealing the dragon’s head from the Dragon’s Head Inn actually shows his recognition of everything that Becky has done by hosting the children throughout the summer. On a broader level, Jack’s “evil” plan is also a celebration and a demonstration of everything that the group has learned and gained through their play. As the antics of the quest unfold, the intricacy of the preparations implies that Jack and his army have dedicated extensive creativity and effort into designing and building the props and costumes. Additionally, the completion of the quest requires problem-solving, teamwork, and bravery from everyone in the group. As the children make use of all their skills, it is clear that their attributes and interests will serve them well in the “real” world beyond the fantasy realm of the Cardboard Kingdom. When the children step off the school bus for the first day of school, their shadows are shaped like their alter egos, underscoring the idea that they are carrying their new skills and hard-earned confidence into the next chapter of their lives.
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