The Wild Robot Sends a Pro-Life Message
In the film adaptation of The Wild Robot, we see both themes of adoption and anti-abortion woven together in this poignant story about mothering a child that's "different."
In the 2024 film adaptation of The Wild Robot, themes of motherhood and adoption will cut to your heart and bring tears to your eyes. Yet more subtly still is the pro-life language and imagery beginning with the sudden and unplanned life of motherhood forced on Roz, the robot. As the film progresses, even deeper issues arise as both Roz and her adopted son Brightbill struggle with how to live in a society where neither of them fit in. This post contains mild spoilers.
The following is a list of pro-life events/circumstances my husband and I compiled after seeing the film last week:
The male/father figure, Fink, initially wanted to kill (*cough* eat) the unhatched gosling.
The mother, Roz, fights him off, choosing to save the goslings’ life.
The egg then hatches inside Roz’s body.
She is a very reluctant mother and calls the baby an inconvenience.
The tiny gosling is the runt of the litter.
Roz must change her “programming” in order to love the baby bird, Brightbill.
In this context, the “programming” she refers to is societal expectations:
The “urban” expectations she gained from her city of origin are to remain aloof and disconnected.
The island (i.e. their community of other wild animals) expectations are to let the runt die off.
Longneck (the mentor-goose) tells Brightbill that if Roz hadn’t chosen to raised him, he would have been killed.
(Spoiler warning) In the end, Roz rips out her robot guts to store Brightbill inside her body and save his life once again in a beautiful expression of self-sacrifice and unconditional love.
Yet after the baby is born, what does Roz discover but that her runt-son is just as different as she is. She’s forced to watch him struggle to fit in with the other geese while she feels powerless to help him. As a neurodivergent mother with neurodivergent children myself, Roz’s struggle here struck a cord with me. It seemed as though the gosling that was saved was not just representative of an unwanted pregnancy but of an unwanted child with Autism.
The following is a list of events/circumstances that align with Brightbill and Roz being representative of a neurodivergent mother and son:
Brightbill is the runt and smaller than the other geese.
He can’t do things normally like fly, walk, speak, etc.
He’s bullied because he acts like a robot—like his mother.
Roz must break away from her “programming” (societal expectations) and love her different son as a different mom.
Roz realizes she must let go of society’s rules and do what is right for her family and her child.
If you’ve seen The Wild Robot, did you notice any of these pro-life themes?
