10 Dark Storylines That Disney Movies Left Out

J.M. Barrie began the story of Peter Pan in his 1902 novel The Little White Bird, which was a disturbing (and partly autobiographical) story of a man who became infatuated with a little boy and tried to steal him from his mother by making up a story for him, which ended up being Peter Pan.

Peter leaves his home to play with the fairies and thinks his mother will always wait for him leaving his window open, but on returning, he finds the windows closed and his mother is cuddling another child. Bitter and angry he moves to Neverland where he remains a boy and returns to entice Wendy Darling to take the place of his original inferior mother.

The story shows Peter as a willing killer, murdering both pirates and the Lost Boys when they become too numerous or grow too old for his liking. He even starves some of them as he cannot tell the difference between real life and pretend, so doesn’t understand that they are still hungry when he gives them imaginary food. And of course he has no problem with feeding Captain Hook's hand to a crocodile!

The end of the book shows a distraught and emotional adult Wendy who feels terrible guilt that she has grown up and abandoned Peter like his own mother did. However, ‘luckily’ she has a daughter who Peter goes on to take as his new mother, continuing this cycle with all her descendants.