Chapter Title
It's from the fairy tale Snow White, by the Brothers Grimm, where the evil queen says, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?" In the 1937 Disney film, they changed this line to "Magic mirror on the wall", leading to great confusion ever since.

There are two mirrors in the chapter, hence Mirror, Mirror.

Quote
From the 1991 song "Calling All Angels", sung by Jane Siberry and KD Lang, which appears in this chapter. I love this song, and the sentiment of this excerpt. 

https://youtu.be/KRUErh47sao

Upsadaisy Downs
Bronwen tells them about the ramble in the Upsadaisy Downs, which had hills covered in a rainbow of different coloured daisies, as far as the eye can see. I imagined the downs as being like the foothills of Heaven. Why I associate daisies with Heaven, I do not know. I suspect it comes from some obscure passage in Anne of Green Gables.

Bronwen already seems to be thinking of herself as being sent Back to Earth, because she says she hopes she retains some memory of these heavenly daisies. Not the sight of them, but the feeling that they gave her. How often do we possess some wild bittersweet pang in our hearts, that doesn't seem to connect with anything we know on Earth? Where do these feelings come from, if not from Beyond?

The Hall of Mirrors
This is based on the Mirror World in The Mighty Boosh, a mysterious dimension that exists (somehow) between Limbo and the world of the living. Vince/Noel is able to access it through a magic portal in the kiosk of the shaman Naboo at the zoo. Despite its impressive name, it is in fact just a tiny room with only seventeen mirrors – in this chapter, Julian faces the mirrors in a likewise small room, and makes a similar joke about its size, as in the show.

It is also based on The Past Lives Pavilion in the film Defending Your Life [pictured]. This is an entertainment in Judgment City, where the recently deceased may enter a booth and see holographic images of their past lives. I made The Hall of Mirrors much more serious than either of these joking references.

As a little nod to The Past Lives Pavilion, and Julian asking Marcus if it is some sort of "Afterlife funfair", the Hall of Mirrors is made to resemble an old-fashioned pier palace of the sort sometimes seen in English seaside towns. I based it on the one at Brighton. It has the same big glass dome and four towers, and round porthole windows.

Of course, a "hall of mirrors" is a traditional funfair attraction, consisting of a maze of mirrors, often distorted to confuse you further. Are the mirrors in The Hall of Mirrors really to be trusted?

Room Numbers
Julian is assigned to Room 65 and Noel to Room 64. These are my own house number, and that of our friends and neighbours who live across the street from us.

In numerology, 65 is known as The Royal Star of the Earth, and brings good fortune in love and money, as well as great wisdom and knowledge of the divine. Its tarot card is The King of Pentacles, ruled by Taurus, Julian's sun sign. It shows a fatherly man with a rich life – not only rich financially, but spiritually as well.

64 is a number of a deep and sharp intelligence, and a strong will to make good decisions for the family. In the story, Noel does make a wise choice in the Mirror Room.

The Funeral
When looking into the Mirror, Julian is expecting to see his family five years after his death. This is the time that the Waystation has decreed is a good time to view loved ones; when they have sufficiently recovered from the grief of their loss.

I didn't mean to suggest that everyone will be "over" the death of a family member in five years, only that the grief, although still present, and on some days sharp and extremely painful, will not be so all-encompassing and immobilising. Psychiatrists seem to be in agreement that at least three years of serious grieving is necessary after losing someone very close, and for me, the five year mark did feel as if life had begun to move on and become a new normal.

Julian is bewildered by what he sees in the Mirror, because he unexpectedly sees a funeral taking place, and doesn't recognise the people there. However, the dead woman in the casket looks something like his grandmother, a pair of middle aged men who appear to be brothers bear a family resemblance, and a little boy at the funeral has the same name as Julian's father, Andy.

We get a few more hints about the funeral in a later chapter. However, it may be worth noting that Julian has a pair of twin sons, born in 2007.

Note that the middle aged brothers place rosemary in the elderly woman's casket, as is traditional. This is another plant mentioned by Ophelia in her funeral monologue in Hamlet; 'Here's rosemary, for remembrance.' According to studies, the herb rosemary has been found to improve the memory. Watch to see this herb make a reappearance later to underline this theme.

Julian's Family
A fictional version of Julian's family – although his father is named Andy and his sister is called Emma. I only included those family members in the story that Julian himself had made part of "canon" by including them in The Mighty Boosh, as either characters or references. Julian has also made a short film with a character who is a fictional version of his sister as a child, played by a young actress.

When Susan tries to show Julian his family closer to the present (since the five year one didn't work out), he is shocked to see them around his hospital bed, apparently at the exact time of his own death. It is unclear as yet how long the family have been with Julian since he was brought to hospital, but they are emotional wrecks at the point of despair. Julian is catapulted into the grief that he has so far been spared in the Afterlife.

Characters
Neville
The bus driver who takes them to the Hall of Mirrors. He's based on Neville the Reaper, who works for Death Cabs in the "Bollo" episode of The Mighty Boosh. The role is uncredited, and might be played by Dave Brown?

Matilda Ramsey
The woman who welcomes them to the Hall of Mirrors, and is in charge of the Recovery Room as well (a sort of combined facilitator/social worker role). She is named after the character Matilda in the episode, "The Legend of Old Gregg", in The Mighty Boosh. In the show, Matilda was the wife of an artist named Ramsey, and was portrayed by the curly-haired Rich Fulcher. She had a face entirely covered in shells – that's why she wears a shell-pink uniform in the story.

In the show, Matilda was shown only briefly and spoke no lines, so I was free to imagine almost anything about her. I gave her quite a loud, clear voice, partly for practical reasons, as she has to welcome a large crowd to the Hall of Mirrors. But also because I've noticed small women quite often have loud, carrying, or deep voices for their size. Maybe we had to develop them so that people wouldn't immediately dismiss anything we had to say!

There is a Matilda in Dante's Divine Comedy as well, who guides him part of the way through Purgatory and performs a baptism on him in two rivers. The two rivers/two mirrors is probably enough for this to work on another level. Dante's Matilda is a no-nonsense sort of character, a bit like Matilda in Between Life and Death.

Susan Meister
Julian's Mirror Guardian. She is based on Mister Susan, the Guardian of the Mirror World in The Mighty Boosh, and played by Julian himself. There aren't many female characters in the world of The Mighty Boosh, so this was a chance to gender-flip one of them for the story. (Although I suppose you could make a claim that Mister Susan might be gender diverse, having a male title and a female name).

In the the show, Mister Susan is a large creature made from fluffy brown cleaning cloths (for cleaning the mirrors). I tried to imagine him as a human, so Susan Meister is a big, comfortable-looking woman with fluffy brown hair. I wondered if Susan and Matilda might have been soulmates, since they work together.

Susan is also vaguely analogous to the character of Shirley MacLaine, played by herself, in the film Defending Your Life.  She appears as a hologram who welcomes people to the Pavilion of Past Lives - Shirley MacLaine has a strong interest in New Age spirituality, and believes she had a past life in Atlantis.