Dissecting the Wizard – Finish Him Off!

The second half of the tale of Dorothy leads off with the girl and her pals wandering off to find the Wicked Witch’s castle, searching for a way to get her broomstick… so the Wizard will feel safer, more powerful, and hopefully grant the wishes of each of them.  A brain, a heart, courage, and a way home.  Just what should be on everyone’s list when shopping for your friends.

The Wicked Witch of the West?  Well, she sees them coming from mile away. 

I mean, after all… when you’re the envy of the neighborhood, you better keep your eyes and ears open, hadn’t you?

Adorable, ain’t she?

Yes, she is.  And I want one of those flying monkeys of hers.

Just sayin’.

Anywho…

Dorothy gets snatched up by the winged primates, and hauled off to be confronted by the witch, who really – really wants her shoes.  And I don’t blame her.  Ruby slippers?  Are you kidding me?  How fantastic are those?

And the boys are left behind, cleaning up after themselves.  They immediately strike off to find their friend, and to get her and Toto’s ashes out of the fire.

Remarkably?  They get into the castle with very little trouble, and find Dorothy almost the moment they step inside.  Funny… the castle looks pretty big from the outside.  How’d they ever find her so fast?  Oh, of course, Toto… the tiniest member of this motley crew, finds the boys and leads them to her door.   Anyway, they bust Dorothy out of her room without rousing the whole castle (even with breaking down the door with an AXE, mind you). 

Getting out of the castle, though?  They get stuck.  The Witch meets them at the door, and her guards pin them down at spear-point.  But, through someone’s quick thinking (ironically, the dude without a brain), they escape, only to get caught in a game of Tag, and end up in one of the towers on the edge of the castle.

And when the Witch takes her moment to tell them exactly what she’s going to do to them?  They douse her with a bucket of water, trying to put out the flames she’d laid on the Scarecrow.

(Really?  Who decided that they should use water?  All this told me as a kid – was that baths were bad for you, and would make you melt.)  Not really a message my parents wanted me to learn.

Well, they get the broom, and get it back to the Wizard.

Who tells them to get stuffed – he’s too busy for them.

Jerk.

So the dog turns him in as the fraud he is.  Good boy, Toto!  Who’s the Wizard now??

Hoist on his own – fraudulent stories – the Wizard comes clean, telling the troupe that he’s nothing but an old fraud, but that maybe he can help them out somehow, anyway.

Handing over some tokens, he shows each of the guys, that really?  They had what they were looking for, all along, they just needed to have someone else validate it for them.  Being seen through someone else’s eyes as a valuable, valued person, is something everyone strives for. 

And then, it’s Dorothy’s turn.

And the dud has nothing in his bag for her.  Well… except the balloon that dropped him in Oz in the first place!  Dude!  A ride!!

Of course, he doesn’t know how to drive, and ends up taking off without the girl by accident.  Of course it’s an accident – right?

Whatever.

And here’s where Glinda steps back into the picture.  Miss Obvious.

She explains her earlier silence by saying that Dorothy had to figure everything out for herself, or the magick of the shoes wouldn’t work.  Yeah.  Sure.  That’s why.

So, Dorothy clicks her shoes….. and wakes up.

Back at home, in  her own bed, with her family surrounding her.

Lessons learned?

Basically – You can’t run from your problems.  They’ll follow you, even over the rainbow.  Find your friends wherever they are, whoever they are, and hang onto them.  No matter how quirky, strange, or downright crazy they may seem.  They’ll help you keep on track toward your goals.

And don’t ever, ever forget – Home is in your heart, no where else.

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• Dissecting the Wizard – the Top Half (breaaire.wordpress.com)

Dissecting the Wizard – the Top Half

One of my all-time favorite movies, and something I have to watch every year, without fail, has always been —>

Ever since I was a little girl, this movie has caught my imagination, and my wonder.  And over the years, I’ve discovered that it has quite a lot to say to me.

There are a lot of funny, sarcastic moments in this movie for me, hidden behind the soft, “simpler age” cinematics.  And the music in the movie never gets tired.  At least not to my ears.

Many people are so rabid about their fan-dom, that they can’t take a joke about it.  I, on the other hand, love seeing things like this:

To me, this just proves my theory… namely, that the Wizard of Oz will resound with generations of children, and adults, far into the future.  Even if just to make them laugh.  But I think, really, that there’s a lot you can take away from this movie.  If you look closely, listen carefully, and really dissect the Wizard down to his socks.

At the beginning of the movie, we see Dorothy, living in a dull, drab landscape with her aunt and uncle.  She gets into mischief with her dog, Toto, because… well, there’s simply nothing else to do in her life.  And when the time comes to pay the price?  It’s excessive, yes, but she rebels, just like every normal teenager all over the planet.

By running away, fleeing from the consequences of her unthinking actions.

When she bumps up against an insurmountable problem, the “Twister” that threatens to tear up everything she loves, she’s knocked down, knocked out, and wakes up in a totally unfamiliar landscape, amongst strangers. 

The people are actually rather kind to her, after she does them an unforseen favor, that of ridding them of a bully – The Wicked Witch of the East- who’s been terrorizing them for a long time.

She also meets up with Glinda, the Good Witch of the North.

Now, part of me has always wondered why Glinda didn’t do something about her counterpart to the East, but, when I was  a young girl, I did actually read the books, and discovered that the witches were all sisters.  So, I guess it’s an unspoken family rule… you aren’t allowed to kill your sister.  Good rule to have, I guess, but awkward for the munchkins.

Anyway, Dorothy gets the bad-girl shoes, which have powers (which of course, Glinda won’t tell her about, or doesn’t know about, since she’s a “good girl” and not a “bad girl”).

Now enters my personal favorite character of the whole movie – The Wicked Witch of the West!

I’ve talked about her before, here, simply because she is someone that has always fascinated me, and I always thought got rather a bum rap.

She tells Dorothy off for killing her sister, and tries to get her birthright… the magickal shoes, thus setting the whole journey in motion.  Without her?  This would have just been a long, quiet walk through some rather pretty countryside… no excitement – all sugar, no spice.  Boooooorrrrrring.  And?  Dorothy would have never learned her lessons in the first place!

Dorothy then heads off on her own, to try to find someone to help her get back to her life and family.  Through some accidents of her travels, and some divine intervention (of the “Glinda” variety), she meets up with just the right people (ironic, that) to help her find what she’s been looking for. 

The Scarecrow, who needs to get a clue… The Tin Man, who needs to get over being such an emo sap…. and The Lion, who needs to get some… uh, (PG rating deletes comment).

They go with her, trying to help out, and stumbling right along with Dorothy, until they reach the Emerald City, where they’re told that they’ve traveled all this way, only to be turned back. 

“Nobody gets in to see the Wizard, not nobody, not nohow!”

Well, of course, they end up getting in to see him, anyway, because they’re just that fabulous, and he sets them what seems to be an impossible task before he’ll grant their wishes.

Ain’t that always the way?

(TO BE CONTINUED)