Tobias’s Defense Mechanism

52

CHAPTER V CONCLUSION

The problems that the protagonists of theAnimorphs have are how their life is endangered because of the Yeerks’ invasion. The battle against the yeerks has caused a situation which caused great terror in Animorphs’ mind. They occasionally fell into fear and despair in the story. The condition force the protagonist both consciously and unconsciously to adopt a defense mechanism to defend their mind and to struggle against the terror. The terrors not only threaten the life of protagonists, the terrors also threatened the life of those who are close to them. This condition made the terror worsen because the situation where someone who are close to them are in danger will make their fear and anxiety multiply to certain level. The terrors not only come from their battle against the Yeerks, it also comes from how they cope with their new morphing ability, how they must familiarize themselves with their new experience whenever they morph into other creature. Each character have their own technique of dealing with the terror, the way they choose their own technique is based or caused by their characteristic. Marco, who is well known as the jokester because of his habit of making joke out of everything he can, utilized a defense mechanism known as humor, in which the user tell jokes or making a funny comment to enlighten the situation. His use of humor as defense mechanism can be seen as his attempt to hide his true feeling toward his friends. He doesn’t want his friend to see his sadness or weakness, so he wear a mask called humor in order to hide those feeling. Rachel, who is brave but reckless which caused her to be nicknamed, as Xena the Warrior Princess by Marco as a joke to her brave and reckless attitude, adopted a defense mechanism known as courage. Courage, as the name suggests is a defense mechanism in which the user boldly faced their terror without showing any fear toward others. Aside from her brave and reckless attitude she is also short tempered. Whenever R achel’s anger is pushed into its zenith, she will let her anger burst in front of other people. Each time she is in this state her action will be clouded by her emotion and or anger, causing her to do something which is deemed unacceptable by other people. Jake, who is considered the most responsible member of the Animorph, was chosen by his teammates to become the leader. They chose Jake to become the leader because of his capability the most reasonable plan or decision. Based on his natural capability as a leader, Jake adopted a defense mechanism known as anticipation. Anticipation is a defense mechanism in which the user create plans to counteract the terror before it can cause any harm to their mind or even harm them physically. Jake also combine Anticipation with another defense mechanism known as courage. The combination of his courage of facing every challenge enables him to make the most reasonable decision to counteract the terror.