Portals! Magical, mystical, or technological marvels of the ages, for the ages, and by the ages. Why so many ages? Well, that's because Portal Fantasy is, perhaps, the quintessential form of fantasy. A bold claim for a subgenre, sure, but hear me out and perhaps you'll agree by about halfway through, or maybe right at the end of this little literary diversion.
Let's get the definition in short form first – Portal Fantasy encompasses the use of a portal to move a character from one world and/or time (often, but not limited to, the 'real world and the present') to another. What is a portal? Practically anything, actually. In Alice in Wonderland we find a rabbit hole doing the job, a wardrobe moonlighting as a portal in The Chronicles of Narnia, while magical barriers like platform nine and three quarters fit the bill in Harry Potter (moving from a muggle world to a wizarding world, in his case). But Mark! That sounds pretty much like Crossworlds fantasy! Yes, completely correct. Often the two terms are interchangeable, and you'll see examples here that are often used as Crossworld examples too, but Crossworlds Fantasy doesn't (usually) travel in time, for one. Besides that, the two are actually pretty damn similar and may one day meld into one if there isn't further seperation.
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In the preceding paragraph, we have three vastly different examples from various ages (those ages again!) but the subgenre goes so much further. We have the Stargate series from television, the Portal games for pc, and Gate is a great Portal Fantasy anime. If you want a bit more Bowie in your life, watch Labyrinth (1986) for a great Portal Fantasy movie. In fact, I could use my whole word budget giving you examples on this surprisingly recently defined genre.
So it's all about the portals, I hear the fictional person who runs about in my head ask me. No! Like any good genre, every element combines to give us something great. Portal Fantasy has some of the most heroic characters around, and that's great news because they're often dropped right into the thick of things as an unsung hero. Well, sometimes they're sung heroes, too (here's looking at you, The-Boy-Who-Lived). The world beyond the portal has to be different enough to our own to engage interest, and furthermore needs a measure of conflict. Cue some pretty powerful bad guys here. Solving these conflicts often helps our heroes to face their real world issues too, leaving them far better off if they return home, which they usually do. So Dorothy (Wizard of Oz) learns that our limits are often created by ourselves, The Narnia (do I need to name the book?) pals learn to get along and accept their war torn reality and Neo (The Matrix) becomes strong enough to do some really cool moves and fight the machines. Seriously, his moves are sub-zero. Not joking here.
