The Decemberists wrote “The Better Part of Bravery” because Colin Meloy was invited to create the closing song for Wildwood, LAIKA’s adaptation of the fantasy novel he wrote and Carson Ellis illustrated. Released on October 9, 2026, the track brings Meloy back to a fictional world he first introduced in 2011—this time through the band and songwriting rather than prose.
That connection makes the song more than a conventional soundtrack contribution. It completes a creative journey that moved from novel to illustrated world, then to stop-motion film, before returning to music 15 years later.
A Song Written for the Closing Credits
Meloy wrote “The Better Part of Bravery” specifically for the end credits of Wildwood. Pitchfork, SPIN and BroadwayWorld identified it as the film’s closing song, while Stereogum published Meloy’s account that director Travis Knight had asked him to write the track.
The placement matters. A closing-credits song occupies a space between the film and the audience’s return to the outside world. It can extend the atmosphere of a story without needing to accompany a particular scene or explain a plot point.
In this case, it also reconnects the adaptation with the writer who created its source material. Meloy was not approaching Wildwood as an unfamiliar film property. He was responding to a world that began in his own imagination and developed through his collaboration with Ellis.
That is the clearest answer to why The Decemberists became involved: the film gave Meloy a chance to return to his story using the artistic form for which he is best known.
Before the Film, There Was the Book
Wildwood was published in 2011, with Meloy credited as its author and Ellis as its illustrator. WorldCat documents the original Balzer + Bray edition, while HarperCollins’ announcement of the series also identifies Meloy and Ellis as its creators.
Ellis’ role is essential to that history. Wildwood did not begin as prose alone; its identity was shaped by the relationship between Meloy’s storytelling and Ellis’ images. That combination gave the fantasy world a visual character long before animators began translating it into sets, puppets and photographed movement.
For Meloy, the novel also represented an expansion of a creative voice listeners already knew through The Decemberists. His songs have long drawn on narrative, folklore, mythology and history. Writing a fantasy novel was a different undertaking, but it belonged to the same broad interest in building worlds and following characters through them.
“The Better Part of Bravery” brings those practices together. It is a Decemberists recording created in direct response to Meloy’s work as a novelist.
How Wildwood Reached Stop-Motion Animation
LAIKA announced its adaptation of Wildwood in September 2021, identifying Meloy’s novel and Ellis’ illustrations as the project’s source. The studio placed Travis Knight, whose previous directing work for LAIKA includes Kubo and the Two Strings, at the head of the production.
According to Fathom Entertainment, the BFI London Film Festival and Animation World Network, Knight directed the movie and was among its producers, with a screenplay by Chris Butler. Peyton Elizabeth Lee and Jacob Tremblay lead the voice cast as Prue McKeel and Curtis Mehlberg.
The adaptation turns the book’s illustrated environments into physical stop-motion spaces. That process places LAIKA between the original Wildwood and the new song: Meloy and Ellis created the world on the page, the filmmakers reinterpreted it through animation, and The Decemberists then contributed music to the film.
The result is not simply a straight line from book to screen. It is a creative exchange among forms, with each version carrying something from the one before it.
The Story’s Return to Music
Dario Marianelli composed the film’s score, while the soundtrack also includes new music by The Decemberists, according to Decca Records and Stereogum. “The Better Part of Bravery” therefore has a distinct role within a larger musical framework created for the movie.
Its importance comes partly from authorship. Plenty of films feature songs by artists with no direct connection to the source material. Here, the closing track comes from a band led by the writer of the original novel.
That does not mean the song should be treated as a literal summary of the book or film. The available sources establish its end-credit role but do not provide an official scene-by-scene interpretation. Its confirmed purpose is simpler: Meloy wrote it to close the adaptation.
Even without a detailed narrative interpretation, the gesture is meaningful. The world that once asked Meloy to think like a novelist eventually asked him to think like a songwriter again.
A Return for The Decemberists, Too
The song also marks a notable point in The Decemberists’ recording history. Pitchfork, SPIN and BroadwayWorld described “The Better Part of Bravery” as the band’s first new music in more than two years.
Their previous album, As It Ever Was, So It Will Be Again, arrived on June 14, 2024, according to the band’s Bandcamp page and Red Light Management. “The Better Part of Bravery” followed in October 2026.
That gap gives the release significance beyond its place in the film, but it does not necessarily signal another studio album. No confirmed announcement establishes the track as the beginning of a new album cycle. For now, it is best understood as a purpose-written contribution to Wildwood and a standalone return from the band.
A 15-Year Creative Loop
“The Better Part of Bravery” exists because Wildwood connects two sides of Colin Meloy’s creative life. He helped establish the world as an author alongside Ellis’ illustrations, watched LAIKA transform it into stop-motion cinema and then returned to it with The Decemberists.
The film is scheduled to open theatrically on October 23, following its planned world premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 11. When its closing credits begin, the story’s long path between artistic forms will arrive back at Meloy’s music.
That is what makes the song feel like a homecoming. Meloy did not merely write for a fantasy film. He wrote for a new version of a world he had carried from the beginning—and found a way to close its cinematic chapter in the voice of his band.
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