The Theory Schmucks

“Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle was great.”

You heard it a lot when it came out in 2004. You’ve heard it a lot recently, since the sequel came out last Friday. You’ve probably thought it a few times yourself — like, “Harold and Kumar was great.”

Not to step on your toes, but what you probably meant was that Harold and Kumar was awesome. And it was! Not only did it do everything right, like Freakshow and the cheetah scene, it went above and beyond the call of duty to include Neil Patrick Harris. There’s almost nothing to improve on. It was just that good.

Great, though — that’s saying something else. The Godfather (part 1) was great. Catcher in the Rye was great. Hell, Great Expectations was great. Great works of fiction are timeless classics, and they aren’t easy to spot when they’ve just come out. Mostly, history decides what’s great and isn’t.

Not this time, though. I’m calling it early: Harold and Kumar, like Arthur and Lancelot before them, will be remembered as truly great.

To start with, here are a couple of academic terms for you: teleological and teleonomical. They have to do with narratives — specifically, with what’s driving the story forward.

A teleological story (or narrative) is goal-driven. The protagonist of a teleological story wants to acquire something or get somewhere. The whole story revolves around that place or thing, and the story’s over once the protagonist links up with it.

A teleonomical story, by contrast, is goal-seeking. A teleonomical protagonist still has a goal, but he isn’t too worried about meeting it. He’ll take his time and, if his original plan falls through, he’ll figure out a new one. The story doesn’t end when a teleonomical protagonist meets his goal, either; often, the goal is just an excuse to get the story moving.

(A trick to remember the difference is that teleological, like logic, is rigid and straight-forward. That’s how I learned it in school, anyway.)

On the surface, Harold and Kumar looks like a teleological story. Its protagonists have a clearly-stated goal — White Castle — and spend the whole movie trying to get there. Every single thing they do is directly related to finding and arriving at White Castle. And yet, when you think of the movie like that, it seems a little boring.

That’s because Harold and Kumar is actually a teleonomical story in disguise. White Castle is the excuse for the protagonists’ trip, not the goal. What are the best parts of the movie? The cheetah ride, Freakshow and his wife, Neil Patrick Harris stealing Harold’s car — all of which kept them away from White Castle. Moreover, the story doesn’t end when they get to White Castle. There’s a good fifteen-minute stretch afterward when Harold hooks up with Maria in an elevator and decides to follow her to Amsterdam.

Now, when I mentioned Arthur and Lancelot earlier, I wasn’t just name-dropping; Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle is genuinely similar to the Arthurian Grail Quest. As per Le Morte d’Arthur, the Round Table sets out “to seek that [which they] shall never find, that is the Sangreal.” The quest for the Grail is the ideal archetype of a teleonomical journey, because its characters by definition can’t achieve the goal they’ve set themselves.

Harold and Kumar works the other way around: its goal is so achievable that its main characters can’t lose. No matter what happened during the movie, they were bound to get to White Castle eventually. It was a foregone conclusion, just like the Round Table’s inability to achieve the Grail. The good bits of both stories happen between setting out and finishing up.

In other words, the Grail — like White Castle — was just an excuse for a road trip.

Why is Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle great, then? Because it’s an excellent trick: a straight-forward stoner flick on the outside and a truly funny comedy on the inside. Without all its cleverness, it would’ve made plenty of money. It would’ve been that summer’s must-see take on Dude, Where’s My Car?. It wouldn’t have been the Grail quest for the early 21st century. It wouldn’t have been nearly as great as it is.