Gone Girl Themes
Lies and Deceit
Let's be real here: we've all lied. Some are little fibs, like saying you're fine when you're actually not, or denying eating the last cookie in the jar even though you can still taste the chocolat...
Manipulation
Gone Girl is a story about puppet shows. Not just literally, as in the sicko Punch and Judy puppets Amy gets Nick for their anniversary, but metaphorically. A majority of the characters have ulter...
Revenge
We've all been there. A friend or family lies, disrespects, or otherwise betrays us through their words or actions, and our minds become a mess of hurt and anger. If we dwell on it long enough, one...
Dissatisfaction
Forgive us for stating the obvious, but pretty much every single character in Gone Girl is totally miserable. Nick's hometown of North Carthage has been hammered by the recession, Nick and Amy's pr...
Literature and Writing
Metafiction—fiction that somehow comments on the process or act of writing—is a pretty mind-twisting genre. While Gone Girl obviously messes with your head in tons of ways, part of its complexi...
Technology and Modernization
It's hard to remember what it was like before iPhones, iPads, eBooks, DVR recordings, and the rest of the proliferation of technological growth that's happened in the recent past. That's how deeply...
Versions of Reality
From little kids playing dress-up to adults trying to score dates with attractive people by getting all dolled up, pretending to be something you aren't is woven into the fabric of our identities....
Men and Masculinity
Andy Griffith and Opie. Homer and Bart Simpson. Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. With father-son dynamics such a rich source of conflict, it's no wonder that they're a widely explored theme in telev...
Women and Femininity
While Gone Girl is primarily about Nick's dealings with a struggling, dysfunctional marriage (and that's putting it mildly), the story's not all about him. The story's female characters are also wi...
Marriage
Marriage is a sticky, complicated business—and it's especially complicated if you're the child of divorced parents who has serious daddy issues and marries a self-centered sociopath who's lived h...