Long Live the Pumpkin Queen: Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas

Sally often speaks of her stuffing of dried leaves. For example, her leaves rustle or churn with her emotions. She wishes Doctor Finkelstein had stuffed her with something less associated with death, like air-puffed cotton or rose petals that would reflect the kind of person she wishes she was. Her stuffing symbolizes her sense of not being what she should be.

After her return home as queen of Halloween Town, Sally mixes cotton stuffing with her leaves, symbolizing her recognition of both parts of herself: her origin in Dream Town and her equally important experience growing up in Halloween Town. It took the combination of both those parts of herself to defeat the Sandman.

Fairy tales and fantasy often use the motif of a magical door between worlds to transport the protagonist into the magical world of the story’s quest. There must be some means for the protagonist to step from one to the other where the laws of reality are too different to overlap with those of the ordinary world,

Symbolically, doors represent both challenge and opportunity. By stepping over the threshold, the protagonist signals acceptance of the task ahead.