Over the past few weeks I have had the pleasure of discovering the masterpiece miniseries created by Cartoon Network titled, Over the Garden Wall.

Overall, Over the Garden Wall is a tale of two brothers lost in the woods trying to find their way home. The two brothers are voiced by Elijah Wood, Frodo Baggins, and Collin Dean, Chowder. Within this tale the two brothers go through many misadventures.

Foreshadowing has been used throughout the years of film and entertainment, often referred to as Chekov’s Gun. Chekov’s Gun is a practice that every element has a relevance and importance to the progression of the plot. There is no filler or fluff. A film theory like this could best be demonstrated in ten minute blocks which, conveniently, each of the ten episodes in the series run for.

Over the Garden Wall is a very fast paced series where if you blink, you may miss something of importance. Even on your third, fourth, and fifth pass of the show, you will notice something new every time.

This being said, this article is an in depth analysis of the first episode and contains spoilers for the entire season. So, if you have not seen Over the Garden Wall, it is a short series with a runtime of about an hour and forty minutes, please go watch it before proceeding if you do not want the series to be spoiled for you.

The opening title sequence is chock full of foreshadow for the rest of the series. We see a quick flash for each and every episode to come.

We see Beatrice, the blue bird, in her human form with her dog as a blue bird flies from out of the brush. The Potsfield turkeys pull a wagon and they are guided by a black cat we later find out to be Enoch, the leader of Potsfield. There is a circus scene with a gorilla who we later learn to be is Jim Brown who is trapped in the suit. On a shelf sit a clutch of carved toys made by the toymaker who we meet in the inn. The toys depict the baker, butcher, barmaid, shaggy dog, band members, and most distinctly the highwayman.

A well-dressed man, Quincy Endicott, stares at the portrait of a beautiful woman, who he learns to be his greatest business competitor, Margaret Grey. As he peers upon the portrait a shadow flashes behind him, presumably the spirit of Margaret that plagues the man in his episode. An old woman manipulates the scissors that look like a bird. We later learn that these scissors can release Beatrice’s family from the curse of being blue birds.

Two young unknown boys play along a river bank with a toy boat. The boat looks remarkably similar to the riverboat Wirt and Greg ride later on. We see the back of a woman in a crypt sorting bones who we later learn is Lana who is tasked with the duty of sorting the bones. A fish sits in a boat on a lake. We meet this fish again towards the end of the series but the lake has frozen over.

A rock with a face painted on it is picked up from a patch of grass. We meet this rock very soon as the “rock fact” rock that Greg totes around throughout the series. A young woman stands by a well as her father, who we meet as the woodsman, voiced by Christopher Lloyd, Doc Brown from Back to the Future, chops wood in the background.

And that’s just the title sequence. Forty-five seconds. We as viewers are barraged with foreshadowing.

The opening shot is the silhouette of a blue bird, Beatrice, watching over the two boys as they wander along a trail in the woods. We hear Greg calling out several random names that we later learn to be the very first thing he does in these woods. He is trying to name a frog that the duo carries around for the rest of the series.

Greg for whatever reason has a seemingly endless supply of candy in his pants. Enough so to leave a candy trail behind him through the woods. This candy comes from it being Halloween night before their tumble over the garden wall [roll credits].

Wirt often rattles off random lines of poetry in this episode about his “lost love” which we learn in the finale to be a girl, Sarah, who Wirt has feelings for. The random cantos become a character trait for Wirt throughout the series and is even commented upon by Beatrice later on. His poetic linguistic habits come from a tape that he intended to give to Sarah that night.

Beatrice’s introduction comes off as very strange as she takes notice of the boys for the first time. She notices how lost the boys are and decides to take advantage of. We, the viewers, learn later that she has an ulterior motive to bring a child to Adalade, the scissor barer from the title sequence, in order to set her family and herself free from the curse of being blue birds.

Idly Greg seems to be sticking candy everywhere as the wander through the woods; a blue piece on a turtle who wanders off, a red piece on the back of Wirt’s cloak, but this comes up later.

When the boys finally stumble upon The Old Grist Mill, the title of the first episode, several parallels can be drawn to this being Beatrice’s family home. The wallpaper and bellows are identical in style and location when we see Beatrice and her family finally reunited as humans. Many blue bird sculptures decorate the home, as well.

The woodsman haphazardly breaks a branch and tosses it aside. We later find out that this stick is a branch from an edelwood tree. This branch is later scrounged for as the woodsman uses this particular wood to press into oil to fuel the lantern he carries throughout the series.

After the woodsman leaves the boys to their devices in the living room of the mill, Wirt rambles of a plan to knock out the woodsman and escape. The impressionable Greg absorbs every detail and sets to action despite Wirt casting off the idea as a bad one. We then see Greg pick up a log and a statue and swing them only to put them down again. We later learn that Greg is figuring out how to knock out the woodsman, the plan still in his head.

While looking for his still unnamed frog, Greg winds up in a barrel with the frog. A beast, Greg dubs “Kitty”, with harrowing eyes corners the boy and frog and howls as Greg blurts “you have beautiful eyes.” These eyes are seen again as the true eyes of the main antagonist “The Beast”.

Greg temporarily escapes Kitty by rushing into the mill once more. Inside, Wirt and the Woodsman attempt to fight off Kitty who breaks down the door. Remember all of those things Greg had been swinging? Greg takes a crack at the Woodsman with a broken piece of the barrel he had been in. The Woodsman trips and is knocked unconscious upon hitting the strewn about objects.

The boys run into the mill portion of the mill where they spy a bag of potatoes with a blue bird on it. The potatoes references a future episode where Greg sings the song “Potatoes and Molasses”. The blue bird strengthens the evidence towards this being Beatrice’s home.

It is revealed that Kitty has been eating the candy trail but now that the boys are backed into a corner and out of candy and ideas, they are in serious danger. Luckily, Greg had stuck that red piece of candy on Wirt’s cloak. He grabs the candy and tosses it into the water wheel of the mill. Kitty leaps after it and is squeezed until he hacks up a black turtle baring a blue piece of candy.

The taint gone, Kitty is now a normal looking dog. The very dog that we see with human Beatrice in the opening title sequence. This furthers the bond that this is Beatrice’s family home.

The Woodsman goes on a tirade about “The Beast” being more than a farmer’s pet, in reference to Wirt commenting that they defeated the beast. The Woodsman goes on to warn the boys about The Beast. “He sings like the four winds... He steals the children.” This pings to that the beast sings to draw away lost children of the woods.

As the Woodsman points the boys in the direction to a town he says, “Beware the Unknown, fear the beast, and leave these woods… if you can.” This leaves an eerie sense that these woods may be more than what they seem.

All in all, Over the Garden Wall is full of foreshadowing that can be as plain as day or a finite detail that you wouldn’t notice until your fourth pass. Every detail is planned and thought through for this show. At ten minutes a pop, it is usually very difficult to give enough entertainment to warrant the time but this show puts you on a rollercoaster of emotions and intensity.

Special thanks to my friend Chris for introducing me to the show and for suggesting and helping me with this article!