Quicknation, comprehensive information and links about Zathura

Zathura is an illustrated book by Chris Van Allsburg as well as a film based on the book. In this book, two boys, Walter and Danny Budwing, discover a space-themed board game where everything inside it becomes real. The boys are eventually drawn into an intergalactic adventure when their house is magically hurled through space. The story is similar to

Walter and Danny, two quarrelsome brothers, find the Jumanji game in the nearby park. Danny looks deeper into the box, however, and discovers another game inside of it, Zathura. He starts playing, and Walter finds himself having to help his sibling rival to get home. To finish the game, they must endure a malfunctioning gyroscope, a meteor shower, low gravity, a defective robot, and an invading Zorgon. The game is eventually "finished" when Walter is sent back in time prior to Zathura's playing by a black hole.

Fritz, a pit bull in all of Van Allsburg's books, appears in the book as a toy dog in a spaceship on the first page.

A film version gives a sister to the boys, introduces a derelict astronaut to the plot, and multiplies the number of the Zorgons and Zorgon ships. The film is set in the Twenty-first Century, while the book has illustrations that suggest a 1950s look, both before and after the board game starts.

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