Greg Over the Garden Wall Ending Explained: The Unknown ‘The Place Between Life & Death’?

A Cartoon Network miniseries based on Patrick McHale’s Over the Garden Wall has been released. The story revolves around two half-brothers trying to find their way home via a dark forest, where they come across all sorts of bizarre and fascinating creatures.

It is based on Tome of the Unknown, a short animated film by McHale that Cartoon Network Studios produced as part of the development of their short program. Wirt and Greg are voiced by Elijah Wood and Collin Dean, while Beatrice, a bluebird, is voiced by Melanie Lynskey.

Along with Christopher Lloyd, Tim Curry, Bebe Neuwirth, Chris Isaak, and Shirley Jones, the series features the voices of actors such as John Cleese, Jerron Paxton, Thomas Lennon and Jerron Paxton. The soundtrack was composed by The Blasting Company. An entire week of Over the Garden Wall aired from November 3 through November 7, 2014.

Reviewers lauded the show’s setting and cast for their strong performances. For Outstanding Animated Program, the series earned an Emmy Award in 2015.

Four more issues of a one-shot comic book adaptation written by McHale have been ordered. After then, it was turned into a 20-issue comic book series, and then into graphic novels and further miniseries.

Cast

• Wirt played by Elijah Wood
• Dean’s Gregory, Collin Dean (Greg)
• Beatrice is played by Melanie Lynskey.
• The Woodsman, played by Christopher Lloyd
• Greg’s Frog: Jack Jones
• The Beast is played by Samuel Ramey.

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Plot

Elijah Wood and Colin Dean play half-brothers Wirt and Gregory, who get lost in The Unknown, a mystical forest full with enchantment. “Edlewood” is one of the trees that the woodsman must fell in order to complete his work “Oil from the milled trees he uses as fuel for his lamp is what keeps him going.

A horrible creature known as The Beast lurks in the woods searching for missing children, and he tells the lads to be on the lookout. If they can find a town, the Woodsman tells the youngsters to leave the woods.

Greg’s pet frog (which is frequently given new names) joins the lads as they go down the path to meet Beatrice, a sharp-tongued talking bluebird.

In gratitude for Greg’s help, she promises to take the children to see Adelaide of the Pasture, the Good Woodswoman, so they can return home. The journey to Adelaide’s Pasture is filled with misadventures and encounters with a wide variety of creatures from The Unknown.

Is the Unknown ‘Between Life and Death’ Located Over the Garden Wall?

It was originally referred to as “the In-Between,” implying that it is neither a place for the living nor dead. The book The Art of Over the Garden Wall, which characterizes the Unknown as “the area between life and death, between dreams and reality,” provides additional proof for this claim.

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The penultimate episode explains that Greg and Wirt became lost in the Unknown after stumbling into a body of water and nearly drowning. Before they are carried to the hospital at the end of the miniseries, the characters make their way back through the same lake.

After all, author Patrick McHale said in an interview in 2020, “Any interpretation that seems right to individuals is a completely fair one for me.”” Many of his followers interpreted his statement to suggest that the hypothesis is now accepted as fact.

One Reddit user, u/Tesseract618, notes that the Woodsman returns home to find his daughter waiting for him, which suggests he has been absent for a lengthy amount of time. For some reason, it’s probable that he was imprisoned in the Unknown, and only when the Beast was defeated could he return to Earth.