Comprehension and Composition of Characters in the Maze Runner

Summary

Thomas wakes up in a box with no memories. He only remembers his name. Doors open above revealing a group of young boys living on a type of farm surrounded by huge walls. The place is called the Glade. Outside the Glade, behind the walls is a vast Maze inhabited with monsters, known as Grievers. Every month a new boy is sent to the Glade. Every week, some supplies come up through the elevator that Thomas arrived in. Soon Thomas learns that there are monsters outside the glade known as Grievers and if you get stung by a Griever, you will go through a process known as the Changing, which is quite painful. Thomas meets the leader of the Glade, Alby, and his second in command, Newt. He also met Chuck who becomes his friend. Gally arises as an enemy who is doubtful of Thomas.

Minho is the keeper of the Runners, Runners are the the Gladers who go out into the Maze in an attempt to map it and find a way out. The day after Thomas arrives a girl is comes up into the Glade, the first girl to ever enter the Glade. Her name is Teresa. Teresa tells everyone that everything is about to change. She then gives in to a coma. She will be the last one sent to the Glade. Thomas feels a connection to her, as if he knows her. He becomes obsessed with her. Thomas decides that he wants to be a Runner as well but he still has to learn much about the Glade and the Maze outside. Later, Thomas is attacked by a boy named Ben, who is stung and has gone through the Changing. He claims that he remembers Thomas and knows who he really is. Alby expels Ben for attempting to murder Thomas. While exploring the Maze Alby is stung by a Griever. Minho tries to get him back into the Glade before the walls close but they were not going to make it. As soon as Thomas sees them he races out into the Maze to help, breaking a prime rule. He finds himself trapped outside in the Maze with them.

The Maze is most dangerous at night because that is when the monsters outside the Glade are most active. Despite being the most experienced Minho panics and runs away when the grievers approach. Thomas refuses to leave Alby and manages to save his life and his own. The three survive the night in the Maze, something no one has ever done before. It makes Thomas a hero in for some people but for others he is a suspect. Thomas is put on trial for breaking the rule and is sentenced to the Glade jail for one day. Some diplomatic manipulating by Minho allows Thomas to become a Runner upon his release. Gally opposes of Thomas's presence in the Glade. He accuses Thomas of being a spy and working for the people who imprisoned the Gladers in the first place. Minho and Gally go for each other and Gally runs away after vowing revenge. Alby is also recovering from the Changing. He too believes he has seen Thomas before. It is believed Thomas played some part in the design or building of the Maze. Thomas visits Teresa who is still passed out. Soon she begins to communicate with him telepathically. Thomas gets frightened and runs into the Maze to escape her voice. She tells him that the two of them were involved in the operation of the Maze. He eventually returns to the Glade.

After returning from jail, Thomas starts his training under Minho. He learns how to map the Maze and to look for patterns as the walls move every night. Still they were unsuccessful. Later that night Teresa tells Thomas that she has initiated the end. The next day the sun disappeared from the sky and was replaced with a dull gray sky. Thomas then realizes that the Glade is a made-up place. The sky was never real. Teresa tells Thomas that the Maze is a code. Teresa awakens and she and Thomas meet for the first time in a wooded section of the Glade. Thomas is attracted to her. They seem to share a history. However, Alby and Newt are suspicious of her. That night the doors to the Maze do not close as they usually do.

Alby and Newt imprison Teresa, much to Thomas's dismay. The Homestead, a large house in the Glade, is lodged up and reinforced as the Gladers wait for the Grievers to enter the area at night. Gally makes an unexpected return before tossing himself onto the Grievers. He tells the Gladers that they will kill one of them each night until they are all dead. Later they discovered that the maps of the maze have been scorched by an unknown arsonist. Thomas reveals a new way to examine the map information. To every one’s surprise, the burned maps were all decoys. Thomas is able to look at the real maps with Teresa's help. Soon enough they find a series of letters hidden in the maps which were spelling out words but the words did not make any sense as they were not related to each other. Thomas was desperate enough to allow himself to get stung by one of the grievers. After recovering, Thomas explains that he and Teresa were forced to help the Creators design the Maze and that they share a telepathic link.

He also tells them that the way out of the Maze is over a cliff face. The cliff is used as an illusion to trick them because it is where the Grievers enter and exit the Maze. According to Thomas if they follow the Grievers down the cliff, they can find the way out by entering the code into a computer on the other side of the cliff. Thomas then leads all the Gladers into the Maze and there they face off against a small army of Grievers. Almost half of the Gladers die in an attempt to fight the Grievers but Thomas, Teresa, and Chuck somehow make their way down the hole and are able to enter the code in the computer and shut down the Maze. Suddenly a door opens nearby. The remaining Gladers, about twenty of them descend down a spiraling slide that tossed them out in a massive underground bunker. They come face to face with the Creators in that bunker who were thin, pale and joyless adults and were taking many notes while observing them from behind some glass.

The Gladers were greeted by a woman. She tells them they have done well. She has a young boy in a hood with her. The boy is revealed to be Gally. Suddenly Gally draws a knife and throws it at Thomas but Chuck jumps in front of the knife, sacrificing his life to save Thomas. Thomas is devastated. He had promised Chuck he would find a way out and get Chuck back to his family. He attacks Gally, nearly beating him to death. Suddenly, a group of armed people storm the room and shoot the woman. They rescued the Gladers and take them out of that facility into the rain where a large bus was waiting for them. As they are entering the bus a horribly mutilated woman grabs Thomas and tells him that he is here to save everyone from the Flare. Thomas and Teresa learn that the world has been destroyed by extraordinary solar flares and a disease known as the Flare has threatened humanity. Thomas gets away from the woman and jumps onto the bus. After two hours the bus stops at a dorm like building. Inside, the Gladers find proper beds with blankets, food and bathrooms. They finally feel safe. Thomas went to sleep hoping for a better future. A message from Ava Paige to her acquaintances reveals that this has all been part of the plan for the Gladers and now they have moved on to the next stage of their trials. The message also reveals that there is another group of children who were put through the same experiment. The goal of the experiment is to find children who are resourceful and intelligent enough to find a way to beat the Flare and save humanity.

Character sketch

Thomas

The novel’s main character, Thomas is a teenaged boy who enters the Glade with no memories. He only remembers his first name. Thomas comes to the Glade scared and confused and the new mysteries of the glade terrifies him, but he shows himself to be brave and confident when he saves the lives of the fellow Gladers Alby and Minho. Thomas’ courage and his new Perspective lead the Gladers to trust and follow him as well as believe that there may be a way out of the Maze. Thomas also shares a telepathic connection with Teresa, whom he may have known before arriving in the Glade. With her help, Thomas tries to uncover his memories and discover his true identity. By the novel’s end, Thomas realizes that rather than his memories, it is his actions in the present that determine his identity. Thomas also defies the strict rules of the Glade, introducing new perspectives and ideas that the Gladers eventually accept since they prove useful for finding an exit to the Maze.

Teresa

Teresa arrives on the same day as Thomas, and she is the only girl to ever enter the Glade. Most of the Gladers insult her because she is a girl, but as time passes she proves herself to be brave, bold and self-confident. Due to being brave and self-confident and picking up fights with the boys as well as freely speaking her mind she becomes a close ally and friend to Thomas. She and Thomas can also communicate telepathically. Like the rest of the Gladers Teresa also has no memories of her past and she thinks that her telepathic connection to Thomas is a result of a close, possible relationship that they had before they arrived at the Glade

Gally

Thomas describes him as a bully, who is hot-tempered as well as arrogant and uses violence to threaten other boys. Despite his flaws, Gally deeply cares about the safety of the Gladers and in doing so he almost sacrificed himself to prevent the grievers from hurting the other boys. At the end of the novel, he throws a knife at Thomas because he was under the influence of mind-control.

Chuck

Chuck is the youngest of the Gladers and the Thomas’ first friend. Chuck is mostly not liked by the Gladers due to his childish pranks and practical jokes, but Thomas recognizes that Chuck is a loyal and caring friend. Thomas soon feels that Chuck is like a brother to him. And due to this brotherly relation, Thomas promises Chuck that he will help Chuck find his family once they’ve escaped the Maze. In the novel’s finale, Chuck sacrifices his own life by jumping in front of the knife that Gally throws at Thomas.

Alby

Alby is the oldest and most trusted teenager in the Glade. He is the Leader of the Gladers. Alby has enforced strict and merciless laws to the Glade, but he is a competent leader who is loyal and brave and tends to inspire the same in the other Gladers. After going through the Changing and learning about the outside world and the devastation that struck it, Alby becomes withdrawn and loses his will to lead. Unable to face the harsh realities of the outside world, Alby sacrifices himself to protect his friends from the Grievers.

Newt

Alby’s second-in-command, Newt is kinder, smarter, and more level-headed than Alby. While fear of punishment is Alby’s preferred method for maintaining order, Newt believes work and labor are the best ways to preserve order in their society. Newt is one of the first of the Gladers to befriend Thomas. He also takes over Alby’s role as leader after Alby goes through the Changing.

Minho

Minho is the keeper of the runners and he himself leads other runners through the Maze. Challenging and somewhat thoughtless, Minho leads by intuition rather than thought-out planning, which sometimes gets him into trouble. Minho, however, is always willing to own up to a mistake he’s made, which makes him a trustworthy and loyal friend to Thomas.