In Mr. Hooper’s case, he is unable to exercise control over his son’s behaviour. He often thinks that children are very difficult to fathom and thus never bothers to spend much time getting to understand his son. As a result, there is a great gap between Hooper and his father. Mr. Hooper is often so full of himself that what he thinks is right, is always right no matter what. Therefore, this causes him to be over confident of his position as a father to Hooper and thinks that he is already a very good father, when in actual fact; he did not fully understand the behaviour of Hooper. For example, he is unable to communicate effectively to Hooper the cruelty of war when he saw his son building a model-like war game. And also, the way Hooper treats his father in a cold and unaffectionate manner when Mr. Hooper talks to him on the train, while Hooper is reading the Marsh Monster comics. Hence from these incidents, it can clearly be seen that both father and son do not share a close relationship with each other.
Mr. Hooper is unable to control Edmund whereas Kingshaw is unable to confide in his mother, to tell her what is worrying him, or to even rely on her to help him. For both cases, trust is lost between parent and child. Therefore both families are dysfunctional.
Even though situations of Hooper and Kingshaw are parallel, the personality of them both turned out to be the total opposite. Without a mother, Hooper becomes unloved, uncared for and thus, turns hostile, territorial and even aggressive towards others, including his own father. By living in Warings which is a huge place, Hooper feels powerful and in control as he knows that he owns the place and no one can take the title away from him. To him, Kingshaw is only an outsider whom he must rid of at all costs, showing his extreme territorial side. On the other hand, without a father, Kingshaw feels weak and insecure, probably, the lack of courage to stand up to others as there is not a living example for him to follow, hence, he is always bullied and manipulated. His security also comes from the fact that they do not have a permanent house to call their own and are constantly on the move. By placing these two extreme children together, Hooper’s evilness thrived as it is fully concentrated on Kingshaw’s fears and helplessness. Their characters are shown further at the point of climax whereby Kingshaw burnt Hooper’s battle chart and that he was to be sent to Hooper’s school on September 10, to be further tormented by Hooper. Here, Hooper’s evilness reaches its maximum point as he forced his Kingshaw to take his own life. Thus, by forcing these two characters to like together, we are able to see their characters, Kingshaw’s fears and helplessness are fully exploited because he is trapped and forced to act according to circumstances while a child’s evilness (Hooper) has reached to its maximum.
