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Small correction, I kept saying "Frank L Baum" instead of "L, Frank Baum" (my dyslexia shining through) which is the correct name, im pointing it out here, so I don't continue to get annoying messages about it.
Hey man, no worries on a tiny mistake in yet another fantastic video, to be honest I only caught it consciously once. Once again you made a ton of great and interesting points about yet another underappreciated classic I've always loved (Like for you, I always held Return in the sort of regard which I had seen amongst adults for Wizard as I was growing up). On a much different note, I'm sorry but I just finished watching the Netflix series "Midnight Mass" (by Mike Flanagan of Doctor Sleep and Gerald's Game fame) and I have to ask if you've seen it yet. It's 7 parts (and hours) long and starts as a bit of a slow burn, but I went in to it almost totally blind (only knowing it's nature as a horror) and I'm now convinced it is a future classic. As a long time fan I'd love to hear your thoughts on it in a video if you can find the time for it, but either way my true point was that I really can't recommend a watch enough if you haven't caught it yet, what with your current schedule.
Was part of the premiere but wanted to say this after wards "it's too dark for kids" is a baffling statement, most kids actively seek out the dark stuff, when I was a kid I would read stuff like goosebumps and scary stories to tell in the dark and nowadays what kids are into is fnaf, bendy and poppy all horror games,regardless of what you think of these properties they are still pretty dark stuff, kids are more willing to go out of their comfort zones as long as it doesn't go to far out like say explicit gore or real world evil kids are not helpless victims they are so much stronger then the media gives them credit for
When I was a kid I was scared of just about everything. I still sought out scary entertainment. I kept my Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark book in my closet. I loved it but it scared the piss out of me. I’m sick of people thinking kids don’t deserve good entertainment because they’re young.
Kids love dark and scary stuff. I think there's quite a distinction between something that might spook the little 'uns and something that is inappropriate.
There's a quote floating around that I've seen time and time again, but can never remember from who. To paraphrase: Kids don't need scary stories to tell them monsters are real. Kids need scary stories to tell them the monsters can be fought.
I loved dark and macabre stuff as a kid. In fact the first horror film I saw was dog soliders. Followed by resident evil, and jaws the same year twenty years ago. I was 5
In the later books it's explained that Toto, just like Billina got the power to speak when he came to Oz but chooses not to, what I like is that this implies that throughout the first adventure it means Toto fully understood what was happening.
As a kid this was one of my faves up there with Willow and Labyrinth - and the dark aspects of each were a big part of what made them great. Great review as always old chap.
I was Dorthy's age when this movie came out and Ioved it . Agree that kids were much tougher than given credit for, and can be again if parents stop babying them. Great review as always. Thanks for the insight.
It was the 80’s/90’s 👉🏻 you just HAD to be tougher, and more stoic! Things were way different back then! You were expected to be a small adult and to fend for yourself essentially!!!
I see people saying this and having grown up watching this movie and Watership down I agree. I would live to hear what the people that said it's too dark have to say about Harry Potter or similar properties that are lived by children in our modern day.
@@michaelaurban4120 no you weren’t unless you had shit parents. You may have been expected to do chores, unlike most kids today, but your weren’t expected to be an adult. Remember “Won’t someone PLEASE think of the children” came from the 80s and so did parental advisory stickers. Now kids are watching porn at 6 because mom and dad are too busy making TikToks.
@@MamaMOB I didn’t have shit parents. I see more shit parents these days than I did back in the 80’s. Everyone is trying to be their kids best friend now vs. being an actual parent. I turned out better than most, I’ll tell you that much LOL! If you didn’t live the 80’s, then don’t try to tell me how it was because I actually LIVED the 80’s . . .
I always thought that was really dumb since it's later, but she's younger... I get your point but you're expecting the character you've already seen in a super famous movie...
@@anonamatron yeah but that was old Hollywood being unwilling to give a child a leading role. 50 years later you can do better. Would another 16 year old girl pretending to be 8 be the better choice?
@@robertyeah2259this is old, but I’m pretty sure they simply aged up the character. Sure, Judy had her chest binded down, but the studio always hid her figure and tried to keep it understated. I never got the impression her acting was attempting to act like an 8-10 year old. Younger, sure, but not that young. The studio promised Judy the role. But they also said, don’t get your hopes up, kid because we want Shirley temple. Fox didn’t want to hand over Shirley and Shirley simply didn’t have the voice they were looking for. Can you image Shirley singing somewhere over the rainbow? In a cutesy and aw sort of way? Not in that grand way Judy managed to do it at only 17? That’s why she got it. It’s funny how everyone’s being critical on the fact Judy made the character mainstream famous, yet fairuza is literally doing an impression of Judy’s cadence/voice. She’s baked into pop culture and I don’t think it was a ‘dumb move’ for her to be Dorothy. We shouldn’t even be super excited about child stars even existing with how it tracks, I have no issue for older girls doing gruelling lead parts.
Holy shit Return to Oz i love this film. My gandma had it on VHS when i was a kid and i would watch it every time we visited. I used to have nightmares about the Wheelers and to this day things with wheels instead of limbs give me the heebie-jeebies but its that fun kind of uncomfortable. So awesome.
Frank L. Baum received a lot of letters from children. It's really sweet. They loved his books and he seemed humble and pleased about it. So, as you can plainly see, even with the strangeness and darkness, lots of children loved his works! Shows how aware Siskel was!
The critics of this movie were familiar with the first movie and not the books. That's basically the entire thing about it. Siskel and Ebert should seriously be given the side-eye with time, they were a laughingstock to me!
Nah. Sorry movie reviewers are reviewing a movie based on the movie. Not on the book it might be tied to, not on a video game, not on a comic book, but what was put on film.....There is no universe where film reviewers should be required to have an attachment or deep knowledge of source material.....IF your meant to do homework to enjoy a film, you've failed as a filmmaker, your shit at your job and should be fired.
@@lutherheggs451 PFF. Wow. You don't need to do homework to enjoy a film but you DO need to do it to offer valid criticism. This is why people go to school for this stuff. If you're comparing a movie to another movie it's not at all tied to, as if it was a direct follow up rather than return to subject, your criticism is invalid. Film critics are professionals and should act as such. You want to be an internet chump REVIEWER, that's on you. You want the proper job title of critic, you put in the work. 'This doesn't taste like an apple!' isn't valid criticism of a peach.
Siskel and Ebert were morons. I never heard those guys open their mouth to say anything mildly decent about a movie, and I don't mean praise only. It's very easy to be a critic when you are a TV celebrity and don't need any theoretical background to back your ideas up.
@@lutherheggs451 Then video game movies have all been falsely judged. They are always judged against the base material, as were most movies based on books, like LotR and Harry Potter. Many people STILL have no clue the Oz movies were based on books whatsoever.
I will never get over how even though they don't follow the books faithfully the level of details from the books... It's a gorgeous love letter to FLB and Oz in general even taking a bit from the MGM film. Sadly because it wasn't the MGM sequel it wasn't appreciated. I loved this way more than the musical (that isn't the Wiz which is this with black NY culture for me). Edit: during the hospital escape Ozma told Dorothy the screaming was from people in the basement damaged by the machine.
Because its common sense. You should NEVER try making a film where your following the book beat for beat. Some things are not able to be filmed, some thing are not even in the realm of affordable to be filmed, some thing may be good written but would be garbage in a film. Its an ADAPTATION, they ADAPT a book into a film.
@@lutherheggs451 Yeah, with the exception of Sin City, that was nearly panel for panel from the comics. But still very much agreed, I can't put it to words because everything just contradicts. You have to take from the source but not be exactly like the source. You have to tell the same story but not tell the same story. You have to give people something new but not something different, something different but not new and different. You have to go 'If they were making a movie what would they do?" without losing focus on what you want to do. Modernize it without losing the old. It's something some just can't get right.
I think a good question would be, "Does TikTok WANT to be alive?" I think, as a soldier he may prefer to stay mechanical to make him better at his job. If he's mechanical, he is effectively an immortal soldier.
Not to mention, as a machine he'd be bereft of emotion(at least that's the implication of being a machine), which, speaking as a combat vet, I can relate to...
I never even knew this existed, much less that they'd even go there with a sequel thats this dark. That said, I gotta thank Daeus for introducing me to it, now I gotta track it down and watch it.
This is a treat! One of my favorite reviewers discussing one of my favorite childhood nightmares. Edit: it was every bit as good as expected, and then some. Off to find this magical novelisation!
It's kind of funny how similar this is to the Alice Mcgee video games, where Alice's damaged mind corrupts and twists Wonderland into a nightmare realm. Wonder if the creators of that game took notes after watching this movie.
I have ALWAYS loved this movie. I agree with Siskel and Ebert "Talking out of their ass". I think people underestimate kids. They are sometimes able to handle things that even adults can't.
In Jack's defense with the "mom" bit, Dorothy may have been 9 or 10, but he was all of a few *days* old. And I figured the crack from Dorothy about how people speak without thinking all the time was a mild jab at thoughtless words/actions rather than mental health issues.
I get your point, although jacks not a few das old from what I could interpret he was created before Ozma was imprisoned so in theory before the destruction of oz which going by how old and dusty everything looks was a very long time indeed
@Deusdaecon Reviews that's one part that often confused me and really gets messed up when you try to figure out the timeline and continuity. Rambling and theorizing incoming, it's not that serious so feel free to ignore. From Jack's words Mombi was already present in the Emerald City when he was given life then tossed into the tower. Or at least that is what he seems to imply or infer (can't remember which to use). Meaning Ozma was in the Emerald City as well. But the problem arises when you take into account that the Wizard (who originally gave Ozma to Mombi to hide, I know it's been retconned but i like it better when he did it) then the Scarecrow were acting as rulers in the place of the missing royal family. So where in Oz was Ozma and where does the birth of Jack fall? Meshing this info together Ozma had been missing before Dorothy first arrived via the tornado (books and both movies confirms this). So that leaves a few possibilities: Ozma was just a kid who made Jack a long time ago to scare Mombi who may have lived in the EC. Mombi tests the powder of life on him them locks him up before everything gets turned to stone (except him and Tick Tock somehow). A possibility but we know that's likely not the case. Another possibility is a bit convoluted but given the events of the movie is a but more likely. Ozma had been captured by the nomes and put in mombi's care as per the book events with Tip and before the events of WoO. He tells her he'll reward her with 30 pretty heads and the EC once it's weak enough without a ruler or he's strong enough if she keeps Ozma hidden. But then Oz pinhead comes and convinces everyone he's great and powerful, even the Nome king falls for it So he waits. So the EC hadn't been conquered and ozmaisn't behind the mirror yet just elsewhere during Dorothy's first visit. Why isn't she behind the mirrors yet? Same reason the powder of life is rare. Magic takes time. Mombi isn't one of the stronger witches and she doesn't have a magic item like shoes, wand, a belt, or house so it's gonna take time or she hasn't decided exactly how to imprison her. But then Dorothy returns home dropping the slippers into the Nome king's lap. Now he has the power and he puts his plan into action. Conquering oz doesn't take a single day. First all of the humans were turned to stone leaving the animals and inhumans active. They try to fight off the nomes...somehow. But then they later get petrified. Scarecrow sees it's all gone FUBAR puts Tick Tock in the storage then has the key sent to Dorothy before he's captured. Now the nomes take their dismantling the emerald city and getting mombi her head collection. Once it's all done Mombi and Ozma return to the destroyed city. A day or so before Mombi's finally able to cast ozma into the mirror Ozma makes Jack. Mombi tries the powder on him and locks him up. Ozma gives Jack the run down on being his mom and how he came to be before Mombi finally works her magic putting her in the mirror. Leaving Jack perhaps a few weeks to a month old by the time Dorothy returns.
The impression I always got was that Ozma was NOT, strictly speaking, imprisoned in the mirror; she was imprisoned between worlds. In Kansas, she could briefly make appearances as her actual, physical self (albeit without her royal finery), but never for very long before disappearing, while in Oz, she could only appear as a ghostly blob of light. Because of Dorothy's ties to Oz (and, it's implied, because on some level she's Dorothy's Oz counterpart), she could be seen by her, but no one else - except the Nurse, because she, too, has an Oz counterpart; like Mombi, she's Ozma's jailer.
All the 80's kids I knew who had seen it loved it, I've yet to meet a single person who saw it as a kid and was "too scared" by it. It was the adults deciding to for kids without ever consulting actual kids. Like have you even met kids? Me and my friends would tell each other ghost stories about deranged murderers, and read books about supposed real life haunted houses, and play D&D when we were 6 and 7. There's scarier stuff in The Bible that adults made me read as a toddler like the Devil as a snake, the literal Devil tempting Jesus, Jesus performing exorcisms, genocides, crucifixions, people being thrown in ovens to burn alive, etc., etc., etc. but somehow those are all just fine to tell a little kid and make them read about the second they learn how lol
Thank you Tipper Gore for buying into scare tactics. I agree, as an 11 yo I accidentally rented alien, thinking it was something else. My penny-pinching parents said, "you rent it, you watch it." It may have taken 15 years, but eventually i could eat cottage cheese again! Children are resilient!!
Not to mention a father trying to kill his son, because he thinks God told him too, that does make you a bit suspicious of your parents. I had brothers Grimm's stories in two volumes as a child, I vividly remember one story about a mother (or stepmother) decapitating her son with a heavy chest's lid, cooking him in a stew than serving to his father. Apparently later addictions didn't had it as people in one of my book groups on face, were surprised. Same for the one about a girl with silver hands.
I distinctly remember my parents bringing me to see this as a child and apologizing as I cried the whole way home. Now it's dope, but my child mind was broken by it at the time.
I remember watching this with my dad (who really loved this movie) and when it was finished, I turned to him and said, "I think I like this (movie) more than the original". He was so proud lol.
Thank you for this. I never understood this, and as such, I never watched it. The mental health aspect was never on my radar. Now I can't wait to give it a proper try!!
I first saw Return to Oz when I had a blistering 103 degree fever and loved what I remembered of it. However I thought it was a fever dream for years because when I told anyone of it they hadn't heard of it and my mother didn't believe the story I told her about the plot. I felt so vindicated when I found a VHS of it when I was 12.
I had this movie on VHS taped from TV & would watch it regularly as a kid. It holds a special place in my heart. I love how the electroshock machine becomes Tick-Tock, the orderlies become the wheelers, and the Doctor becomes the Nome King in her mind (or not?). It was this movie that made me start reading the books, taking out 2 or 3 at a time & immersing myself in the mythology. Love this film. BTW, I always thought the same about Tick Tock being the manifestation of the machine.
I was in the target audience when this film came out and I loved it. I also enjoyed Gremlins, The Dark Crystal, and other "too dark for kids" movies. They scared the heck out of me, but I still loved them, and continue to enjoy them as an adult. This was a wonderful review. I appreciate the background details on the novels and the film itself.
So happy you did this film! I watched it when I was younger and I was so confused how it fitted into oz as it was so different and haven’t watched it as an adult but will now :)
27:38 - 28:42 Recently, I started watching the series The Maxx, based on Image Comics Darker Image #1 debut, and subsequent spin off series. In the story, it was explained that both the main characters, Maxx and Julie have this weird counterpart that exists in this subconscious primeval dream world known as "The Outback". To Maxx, he sees himself as this brute animalistic force of nature hero who protects his "Leopard Queen" that Julie represents. But in the real world, he's just a homeless vagrant wearing a strange costume and Julie is a social worker. But through the series, the Outback tends to bleed through to the real world despite of maybe only taking place in the mind. I could be stretching it, but I see a bit of what Wizard of Oz does with their characters in that show, The Maxx. Also, recently saw Babes in Toyland (1986) which also does the Wizard of Oz route with their story, but that one is definitely fiction of imagination. But it's nice to see how far both Drew Barrymore and Keanu Reeves have come in the last 35 years since then.
Thanks for letting us know why you're shows aren't regular right now. I really missed Lovecraft month and your Hannibal reviews, so I'm glad to know there's a good reason they're not coming. Good luck with your degree.
You don't know me but you were such a huge part of the last 6 years of my life. You were my favorite channel to listen to at my shitty retail job and I just quit recently and remembered your channel. Sorry that was long but yeah thanks i appreciate the awesome content!!!
Fine video.... I absolutely enjoy a long video essay on one of my favorite childhood films. I was horrified by the wheelers but they were always oddly fascinating. Thanks for the content.
In regards to children being able to handle darkness in their entertainment, as a child of the 80s I couldn't agree more. Movies like Time Bandits, Secret of NIMH, and Labyrinth? Those are the kind of films that stuck with me the most over the years and I keep finding myself coming back to. The only movie in the last 20 years that even comes close to that IMO is Coraline. I feel sort of bad for kids who came before and after me who got so much sanitized saccharin crap in their childhoods.
I also have a special place in my hart for sf series and movies for kids from Australia and New Zealand like "Children of the Dog" Star" or "Boy from Andromeda" I called it kid's Predator actually.
I'm a huge fan of all the Oz content from L. frank Baum, Gregory Maguire, the 39 film, and the Broadway show as well 👌awesome video as always man! thank you
It's been so long since I've seen one of your reviews and I have to say, feels good to be back. There's so many of your videos / movie opinions that made me into the movie enjoyer I am today.
sweet! after some boxing day traveling i now got to sit down to a review/dissection of a classic from my childhood. awesome! i will face the Wheelers now as a grown man! now knowing their true weakness....STAIRS!!!!😁
This is SUCH a fantastically done review,and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I loved all the background info you sprinkled throughout the video,it's rare to come across reviews that are this informative & well researched! It's perfect timing for me to stumble on this video actually,because I just watched Return to Oz after not having seen it since I was a child. I only saw it once,but it was something that fascinated (aaaand mildly traumatized lmao) me,and the imagery of the "head room" in particular was absolutely SEARED into my little brain. It has that same eerie,haunting feel to it as films like The Neverending Story, Dark Crystal, Little Nemo,Last Unicorn,etc. The '80s/early '90s really produced some uniquely bizarre kids movies,eh?
This was a film I initially thought of as a cheap cash-grab when I first saw it as a child. Man, was I wrong about that! Also, I can't help but notice the particular theme of "escapist fantasy to avoid/explain away traumatic events" throughout this film.
its so interesting to see someone who grew up watching a lot of the same movies and reading the same comics talking about things I'm nostalgic about... good god I just saw the code... oh shit the agents are coming for me.
Awesome review once again! One of my favorite childhood films (even if it scared the shit out of me - the reason why I rewatched it so much on VHS, ha ha)! Warm greetings!
Congrats on working on your degree. I was wondering why there wasn't as much content. I remember that killer opening you used to have and watching HP Lovecraft month. Thanks for this video and look forward to your future endeavors.
I remember seeing this as a kid, and sure, it was dark, and quite the departure from the first movie for anyone (like me) who hadn't read the books. But it wasn't too dark by any means, it was simply.. dark and different. Loved the behind the scenes on the Wheelers, those skillful movements are really impressive!
I love your channel man really awesome details and I really hope you make some more videos soon!! Thank you for all your hard work! Hope you're doing good, an can't wait to see what you got planned next!!!
I just wanted to say thank you for all the work you do, Deus. I love your reviews and the unique, even scholarly level of knowledge and presentation that you bring to your content. Best of luck with your forensics degree pursuit, I know you will do well. I hope you have a successful and prosperous New Year and every day after it. :)
58:05 - 59:10 As a kid, this imagery did freak me out a bit, but growing up, I had grown up with watching movies with stop-motion art, such as with work done in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, which had a cyclops centaur in it who got stabbed and they show blood. So while being jarring and disturbing, I had grown used to it and admire the technique as well as the effectiveness.
