Afterword

First of all, I would like to thank all of you for reading, reviewing, following, and favorite-ing my story! This is my very first attempt at fanfiction. Like most of you, I have fallen in love with Inside Out at the moment I walked out of the theater, and eventually decided that I want to weave a story using its beautifully designed characters. The quality of my first attempt isn't bad, I guess.

My first fanfiction revolves around Anger and Fear, my favorite characters from Inside Out. The movie and its related materials portray Anger and Fear as having a close, albeit somewhat love/hate, relationship. This is an ingenious touch, and I am impressed that Pixar has done their research: This is exactly how Anger and Fear should be related.

As a Psychology PhD candidate, I am specialized in the study of brain systems involved in emotions, so I may share some expertise here. Put simply, Anger and Fear are linked to the same spectrum of behavioral response – namely, the 'acute stress response'. Both emotions arise in response to dangers, and help the person to engage in behaviors that protect him/her from harm (i.e., Fear prompts the person to hide and flee, while Anger prompts him/her to fight back). Thus, these two emotions are functionally very similar. In fact, neuroscience has shown that Anger and Fear are, for the most part, mediated by the same set of brain structures.

However, the emotional responses of Anger and Fear are also in a sense antagonistic, in that Anger is a response that reflects assertiveness, while Fear reflects a lack of assertiveness (or in more laymen terms, Anger helps the person to reassert his/her dominance, while Fear does more or less the opposite). Therefore, the emotional responses of Anger and Fear are inherently intertwined, but they are also at the opposite ends of the scale of assertiveness. This is translated into the film and related materials as a love-hate relationship between the characters of Anger and Fear. It is also notable that while Anger is personified as a tough guy with a great temper, Fear is incarnated as a nervous guy with low self-esteem (i.e., he is routinely abused by Anger and taunted by Disgust).

Anyway, I hope you have enjoyed my story and are not bored by the babbling of a neuropsychology geek. Now that this story is done, I may well be moving on to another piece of fanfiction or reading others' stories. And please don't forget to leave comments in the review section to tell me your thoughts!

Lastly, I would like to say this again: Thanks for reading.

– Merlin of Kensington