Mr Eagle is the classic father figure – not in mythical purity, but in wounded complexity. He symbolizes authority, structure, and care, but also ambition, denial, and compromise. He is a parent who provides and protects, yet quietly lets things slip through his talons until it’s almost too late.

At first, everything seems in order: a dignified single father raising two boys in a broken world. But beneath the surface lie guilt, pride, and a workaholic instinct to manage rather than to feel. Eagle carries within him the wound of a departed partner – and an unspoken suspicion that the fault was his.

Mr Eagle doesn’t fall as a villain. He slips downward. He becomes a prison camp commandant – not out of cruelty, but exhaustion. He fills his days with crossword puzzles, not because he’s content, but because he’s lost faith in change. He is not evil. He is tired.

And yet – when it truly matters, he returns. Not in triumph, but in tears. He admits his failure. Seeks forgiveness. And in that fragile moment of honesty, he becomes the father he was always meant to be.

Mr Eagle is not a hero. He is something rarer: someone who almost fails completely – and yet doesn’t.

– Wings = strength that once lifted him, now folded in shame

– Beak = words sharp as weapons, but often left unspoken

– Medals = pride, tarnished and heavy

– Empty seat = the absence of the mother, the absence of moral clarity

– Crosswords = escape from responsibility

And please, don’t forget: I don’t want you playing with your food. I’ve told you a thousand times that well-mannered birds don’t play with their food.

What do you mean “gone,” what nonsense is that? You don’t know – how can that be? Your breakfast has disappeared, the calendar shows the wrong date! One might think there are ghosts roaming around here. Makes me want to spank you rather than take you to your lesson!

So this is where we’ve ended up? Standing against each other.

Hurry, hurry! For the first time in my life I’m breaking my military oath. Damn it, I feel awful!

📘 Book I

– Appears as a strict but devoted single father

– Hints of guilt surrounding the mother's disappearance

– Emotionally distant from his sons despite all efforts

📗 Book II

– Takes on the role of commandant at a mountain prison camp

– Bureaucratic and apathetic, hides behind routine

– Faces a sharp conflict with his sons

– Eventually breaks down and admits his moral failure

– Receives forgiveness in a deeply emotional scene of family reconciliation

📙 Book III

– Lives in self-imposed exile as a “noble outlaw” on the island

– Aids Anne’s group and protects the residents of the “Belly of the Whale”

– Leads the defense against General Huba’s attack

– Remains a complex, but ultimately dignified figure

– Did the prison camp break his moral backbone – or was it already broken?

– Is the reconciliation with his sons truly lasting?

– Does he still see himself as a leader… or as someone who failed twice?

– Was he ever the parent his children hoped for?