Saturday, January 04, 2020

Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz: The Old Classic

Dorothy, Ozma, and the boys are having a picnic, and Dorothy takes the Ruby Slippers off to run in the grass and go swimming. Naturally, Wilhelmina makes a number of unsuccessful attempts to steal the Slippers. Dorothy and Ozma try to convince her to just give it up, but Wilhelmina confesses that that's never going to happen. Ozma suggests, however, that even the most persistent witches need a little vacation—and zaps Wilhelmina with an anti-magic spell! Wilhelmina won't have any powers for three days! The Wicked Witch is not happy, but Frank thinks a break might help. Nope, Wilhelmina's latest plan involves a trench coat, fedora, fake mustache, and Frank standing on Lyman's shoulders! They trip, and swap places, so that Lyman can play Paul Human-man, gain the gang's trust, and take the slippers that way. Lyman helps the Tin Man arrange things for the next day's tea party, and the monkeys are in! "Paul" has ice cream with the gang, plays a weird version of volleyball on unicycles (good thing everyone is wearing their helmets!), get their nails done (even Toto), and generally ingratiate themselves. They all have a great day, and invite "Paul" to the tea party. The next day, to make sure the monkeys steal the Slippers, the Wicked Witch and Wilhelmina come along to keep an eye on them. "Paul" sits down, and the Scarecrow says, "We know you're just Frank and Lyman in a trench coat," (at which I laughed my head off!) but they enjoyed their company so much anyway that Dorothy thought they'd do the right thing. Oh, and Dorothy invited Wilhelmina and the Wicked Witch to the tea party, too, much to their surprise. With neither of them having magic powers, neither is really much of a witch, so they may as well be friendly. The witches enjoy some tea, but Wilhelmina vows that as soon as the tea is done, she's going back to being their archenemy—then she digs into a crumpet.

Yup, this was another silly, fun one, which really underlines just how ridiculous all the plans to steal the Ruby Slippers are. Even when things appear to work for the witches or their monkey flunkies, Dorothy not only sees right through them, she decides to take the high road and be nice to hem anyway. I'm still enjoying Wilhelmina and her reluctance at trying to steal the slippers, too, although here she makes it clear that it's still her main motivation. Still, she clearly knows when it's in her best interests to stop trying and just enjoy herself and Dorothy's company. Wilhelmina reminds me a lot of Andrea from The Oz Kids, in that she may not really be wicked as much as she just does what's expected of her.

And hey, I just discovered that there's even more episodes that have started airing, so it appears I may be doing this for a long time still (or I may have to start doubling up). One episode title mentions the Shaggy Man, so there are going to be even more classic book characters showing up.

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