Return to Oz

26:15I don't remember. Toto didn't talk, did he? No. Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. Because the minute, because she has a chicken at home. And then when she's in Oz with the chicken, the chicken talks. Some place for a chicken. When did you learn to talk anyway? I thought hens could only cluck and cackle. Strange, ain't it? How's my grammar? If we were in the land of Oz, your talking wouldn't be strange at all.

26:44Jason Mantzoukas:And she's like, oh, we must be in Oz because now you can talk. But then I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. Did Toto talk when they went to Oz? And I, okay, good. Thank God. No, thank God. But as Paul said, the downgrade, the fucking downgrade. You da chicken. This is a low, I mean, can you imagine being there for the first one and getting the lion, the, the, you've got Toto, you've got the, the tin man, you've got all these great characters. And the B team that shows up in this movie, I was like, aside from TikTok. This is like Expendable 7. Except for TikTok, who I wonder if my character from John Wick 3, the TikTok man, is in any way related to TikTok.

27:24I feel like they have to be. Well, I do want to talk about TikTok because I do think there is something going on about like machinery. But I couldn't, I didn't really like understand it. Like, I know that they'll beware of the wheelers and wheels and the industrial world taking over. Me too. But then there was TikTok. Yeah. And I was like, yeah, but he's not the tin man. Nope. You know, who's worried about not feeling, who's worried about only being sort of, you know, metal and scraps and not being human. But that's not I couldn't understand, like, what is TikTok story?

28:12Jason Mantzoukas:Well, to me, I think that TikTok is like, chill the fuck out. You can't be excited. Like TikTok is that that machine. Right. So I think it's about controlling her emotions. But then at the end, he kind of gets emotions, I guess. Right. Or I think it's yes. Yes. To what we're talking about. But the movie is not doing us any favors to foreground it and say, this is the search that this that this character is on or this is the right, you know, in a in a way that I found just confounding. No, and this is like we are the tick tock pumpkin man and the couch, to be honest, have all the same emotional like interior.

28:54I just I couldn't. And what's such a bummer about that is her friends on the yellow brick road and how beautiful, rich, important those performances. My God, like to be saddled with not a single one of them has a human face. Oh, no. Which felt very pointed. I didn't know if it was like, oh, those characters are so iconic. Like they're so physical and beautiful from Wizard of Oz that we're not even going to try.

29:29Jason Mantzoukas:No, they went to like a cart. I feel like, again, if you look at the images on the Wizard of Oz books, they look similar to that. Like the way the Tin Man, I was like, oh, this doesn't even feel right here. I do want to bring up one. What we're up against is the decision to make the Wizard of Oz so much different from the books means that by participating in any future storytelling based on the books, it almost is unrecognizable to the movie Wizard of Oz. And I'll tell you one thing. I saw the original Wizard of Oz recently and the scarecrow, not that handsy with Dorothy originally. When he first wakes up, he's like, oh, I'm like, he's like, what's going on here?

30:10Jason Mantzoukas:I'll tell you this much. But it's also the same exact beat. Like when she's stuffing the scarecrow with his hay and like when she's doing the exact same thing with Jack the Pumpkin in this. The character that bums me out is Gump, the animal who's having this crisis of conscious being like, was I alive before this? I remember a life before being a mounted animal. I'm like, oh, what is that? Like everybody in the movie, with the exception, actually, no, including Dorothy, are having existential crises. Oh, yeah. Yes. They're all in deep psychic distress, and it's very uncomfortable to watch. Yes.

30:57Oh, God. And there's something about the changes to The Wizard. My guess is, well, no. Books are, tell me again, 1939 for the movie. Film is 39. And what were the books? The books, 1890 is where. 1890, okay. So there's something about, to me, 1939, like the movie being like a post-Depression era movie. so to make it as bleak as what these books must have been this is a bleak movie you know i mean this is not a hopeful joyful movie in the middle and it ends in a pretty bleak manner so i can see them in the 30s being like okay we have just come out of one of the most awful periods of time let's yes this source material but let's plus it up with some songs let's make it fun absolutely

31:45Jason Mantzoukas:Absolutely. That's why people responded to it. Absolutely. Not like let's bum people. It's like, I don't see a better version. It's like, I don't want to be in Oz. I don't want to be in Kansas. I don't want to be here. I kind of want to go back to that machine. Erase it all. I'll be happier. Let me just, and the girl who's living in mirrors, I'm like, I don't need any of this. Oh, at the beginning I was like, oh, thank God she has a friend. And I was like, oh, no, no, no, no. I think the thing that's also just so disappointing about this one is her journey in The Wizard of Oz is so clear and so relatable.

32:23That idea that someone's coming to save us, that if we could just get this one thing, if we could just figure this out, if we could just get this one job or whatever, that our lives will be unlocked and things will be so much easier and that someone outside of ourselves is going to make that happen. The moment in The Wizard of Oz, when it reveals that there's just no, you know, tiny man behind the curtain, is so incredibly powerful for her emotional journey. And in this movie, her journey, I think, is to prove, first starts off to prove Oz is real, but then to restore it. But for what, I guess?

33:09Yeah, that's it. Like, for what reason? How does that, like, how is that paying off anything that the movie began with? Like, any of the established wants or anything that the movie begins telling us is not even part of the resolution or her pursuit of a resolution, you know? She is so much more of a passive character inside of this movie. The movie is happening to her. Whereas in The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy is inexplicably driving them forward towards the Emerald City. And in this one, she is just reactive. It is just like, oh, no. Oh, look at that. Oh, look at that. You know what it actually feels like in a way?

33:59Jason Mantzoukas:it's like she's remembering the wizard of oz post a traumatic event like like post her mind right because it's like she's not really on a journey here she's not really like i guess she is trying to find the scarecrow but she's really just kind of like looking at what happened before right i mean she's also not trying to because there's the you could easily say like oh she's back nobody believes her yeah she's older she's like oh i need to be able to for my own sake like right i need to see it for myself i need to prove to myself that this is real if not to the people around me so as so as to not be perceived of as needing electroshock treatment you know well but of course that's confusing as it all falls apart when would we like confront the fact that it wasn't real?

34:50Jason Mantzoukas:Yeah. Now, I do want to say one thing. When our son talked a lot about Pokemon, we did get him electroshock therapy because he just was talking about this nonsense. We didn't understand it. And it was like, and we just like, get it out. We have to get it out. And that, you know, that's fine to do. But I mean, but besides that, I think back then it sparked. I mean, that's the thing, right? It's like she only is showing imagination. She's not even depressed about being away from Oz. She's excited to tell people. Well, but Paul, because she's staying up so late and can't sleep, she's not able to wake up early and tend to the farm.

35:27Yeah. I mean, that's the... Oh, they're here to be a worker. That is how the movie all starts off. She's not... That's why Anna-Am takes her there. She's got to work. She's got to work. She's got to work. Otherwise, she's going to get left at the asylum. A thousand percent. You can actually, in the world of Oz, be mentally insane as long as you wake up early and can help Aunt Em out with the farm. Big time. Whoa. Big time. Yeah. No, I think that's it. And again, this exists in a time when children worked. There are no child labor laws. There is no you get to be a teenager and go to college. That kid is going to work that farm now.

36:07You know, whatever, 10 years old. That's why you have kids. That is why you have kids. And that's why you have a lot of them. Because you got a lot of farm to cover. And some of them aren't going to make it. And she's doing a damn bad job.

36:19Jason Mantzoukas:Because you know what? By the way, the mom is threatening Bellina. She's like, if you don't shit another egg, we're going to eat you. I mean, that's the other thing, too. I would love it if she said, if you don't shit another egg. I mean, basically, that is what she's worried about. The mom's like, we're going to eat your pet. The only thing that you have here, your only connection to life, we're going to eat that thing. And she's a desperately look. Well, she has Toto. Yeah, Toto's still rocking around. Yeah, I guess. Yeah. Toto's still rocking around. But boy, if I'm Toto, I'm like, come on.

36:50Hey, guys, can I get some action? Like, how come she gets to go back and I don't? Like, the movie from Toto's point of view is like, hey, I'd like to go back to Oz as well.

37:00Jason Mantzoukas:The Toto that I know would have followed that horse and carriage and jumped in the back and gotten it. Yes, I felt that too. I felt that too. Do you guys think, and maybe this is for later in the episode, but if this, I can't even, if this had no relationship to the movie The Wizard of Oz, but was just a 1980s, like I'm saying, like Pan's Labyrinth, Dark Crystal, regular Labyrinth. I might feel different. Would you enjoy a movie in which a little girl descends into a fantasy, like an Alice in Wonderland type of a story that's dark and scary. And I mean, I still agree. This is so aimless and I don't quite know who wants what and how.

37:46And I'm not tracking if we're getting closer or further away. But I liked a lot of the movie, if I'm being honest. Watching the movie, I liked quite a bit of it once I let go of the fact that any of it was going to somehow be related to the movie that I remember as The Wizard of Oz. Well, I didn't let go of that and I was simply disturbed.

38:07Jason Mantzoukas:Like that, like that was the thing. Like I was disturbed by. But that's what I didn't mind. I was like, oh, I don't mind like dark kid, kid, like dark. This is scary. This is, I didn't mind that as much, I guess, if I took it away from the fact, well then this, but this isn't Oz. This is, you know, this, I kept kind of bumping out by being like, oh, this is not the Wizard of Oz. this is like right the dark crystal you know yeah i mean i think that it was very hard for me to divorce from the wizard of oz i just i i couldn't even though there were things that i really loved too there i loved that hallway of heads i loved you know her trying to get the the key or whatever it was from the headless from princess mumbai and there were there were moments that were so great But I also to not have any of the beauty of Oz or even to not have like the beauty of Glenda or this Princess Oz in the mirror to not have any of like the magical beauty was really hard for me.

39:17And even the way Dorothy was dressed, I actually took I actually need to speak about this for a while. Great. Let's go. Clear the deck. Here, hold on. Excuse me, I'm going to mute my... Great Jesus is muted. You know, I understand that you're not going to ever just replicate or reach the height of what that iconic blue and white kingdom dress was. And I get that. So don't even... So don't try to do that or a version of that. But to do what they did, to put her in that white, weird white dress, which I can't even track. Did it change from the asylum to Oz? I don't think so. Exactly the same. And it's like, it was so, not that it needs to be flattering on a nine-year-old child, but it was so sort of shapeless and strange, billowy.

40:15It was all sleeves.

40:16Jason Mantzoukas:It wasn't, there was nothing about it. Like if I'm a kid watching this movie, I don't feel connected in any way. That's exactly my point. There's nothing for me. And by the way, I think her bows are too big in her hair. Her bows were too big. Right. It felt to me like they were trying to be, I wouldn't be surprised if they were like, oh no, no, we did the research. This is what a 10 year old girl would have worn. And that's what kills this movie. these years. And so that is, the movie we're making is a more grounded, more faithful representation. You know what I mean? But when I tell you, Jason, when those ruby red slippers came out, I just was like, thank you for giving me something to look at.

41:02Yeah. To feast my weary eyes upon. And I did love, I thought it was like a wonderful little gender bending moment when the King Gnome or whoever he was, like, pulled up his little, pulled up that fabric that he was wearing to reveal those slippers. Yeah. Again, there were moments I liked in here. Oh, yeah.

41:23Jason Mantzoukas:Yeah, I think if you're right, Jason, if you change your point of view on it, there's something very, like, weird. It's like, it is, to me, what I love. So much of what's weird about it is that it's a Wizard of Oz movie. Right. You know what I mean? Now, here, you know, it's like, there are these things about it that are very specific. It doesn't feel like what they were trying to do, right? It feels marketed to a kid's movie. Here's the thing that upset me, though, which is I'm OK. I'll take the dress. I'll take the less likable characters. I'll take all of that. But when you turn Oz back, let me see something.

42:01Jason Mantzoukas:And it looks like the shittiest wedding venue on the outskirts of New Jersey that you could possibly get to. I was like, this is not Oz. This is not my Oz. This is not my Oz. Hashtag not my Oz. Not my Oz. Hashtag not my Oz. My Oz is Dr. Oz, who I haven't checked in with in a number of years. Oh, wait, no. Oh, no, no, no. Oh, no, exactly. You have to align yourself with him. You want to get yourself on. Dr. Phil, that's the one that you want to align yourself. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Dr. Phil, he's the one. Man, Oprah picks terrible doctors. Oh, my gosh. Is the note there? I mean, or the power goes to their head.

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45:30Jason Mantzoukas:Spelled B-A-B-B-E-L dot com forward slash bonkers. Rules and restrictions may apply. I'm going to be thinking about this movie more than I should because there are images in it and I need to talk about a character that's near and dear to you, Jason, which is the gnome, the rock monster gnome who does not want chickens in Oz. We don't know why he doesn't want chickens. And at the end of the movie, yeah, Belina the chicken shits an egg down his throat and kills him. Yes. Oh, no, dear. I finally ate my egg. Don't you know that eggs are poison? Poison, indeed. Poison. Poison.

46:25Okay, wait a second. Does she know that that's poison to him?

46:30Jason Mantzoukas:I think the chicken was just scared. And is that how you shoot an egg? Like, that's what happens physiologically? You get really scared? My assumption was that the chicken knew that the egg would kill him because it's only visible slightly in one scene. He's wearing a medic alert bracelet that says severely allergic to eggs. Stop it right now. which is a bracelet which is a bracelet that my mother made me wear for my entire childhood Jason but you had to wear it oh no no without a doubt it was essential essential but it meant me wearing a silver bracelet that just said severely allergic to eggs on the back of it engraved oh my gosh it breaks my heart but I'm also like Yeah.

47:19Hey, thank God.

47:21Jason Mantzoukas:Good. Like, you know, I do. I, you know, I thought that there was something really odd or interesting about the fact that instead of just, well, he just wanted chickens gone. Like he had like a chicken genocide in Oz in a way, you know, it's like he like and only because the fear that that might happen. I mean, and he got it good. He got it. Oh, God, did he ever. I mean, did that feel healing to you in some ways, Jason? It really, yeah, it really brought something home for me. You know, it really, I felt as though all of my angst and anxieties with my allergy, really, this was a salve. It really helped.

48:05Jason Mantzoukas:Could you have been this person, you know, Jason? If your mom didn't make you that bracelet, could you have become a gnome king and freezing everybody? Oh, if my parents had simply, if my mother had simply said to me, chickens are the threat. You know what I mean? Instead of people are the threat. People are going to give you eggs. So that my trust, I learned to not trust people. But if I had been told don't trust chickens, much different, much different. And frankly, maybe we wouldn't have the podcast. Like we can't go through those sliding doors because, you know, everything kind of happened for a reason as well.

48:45Sure. How I think of it. Oh, yeah. And let me be very clear. There would be no chickens on Earth because the last 45 years of my life would have been spent just murdering chickens. Oh, God.

48:58Jason Mantzoukas:I mean, yeah, they don't really get into why the chickens are outlawed or how he got rid of the chickens. But I'm going to say it definitely was not pleasant. I mean, he tortures. I mean, the fact that he does that little game with them. Oh, to turn them into ornaments? Yes, to ornaments. Yeah. To ornaments. And by the way, but then when we see them, they're not ornaments as we know them. No. But to call them ornaments? To call them ornaments rather than like tchotchkes. Yes! I would have loved it if everybody got turned into curios and tchotchkes. but I actually I will say that was one of the things that I actually liked which is when she goes into that room and that room is you know there are these elements that they're playing with that I thought were fun at times where it's like they're in the stone cave and it's all it looks like a stone cave and he's made of stone he's part of the cave blah blah blah and then when she goes through the thing into like an opulent beautiful city like castle level sitting room You know, it has like it there are visual things that I felt like were like, oh, this is cool.

50:09And then all the ornaments around that you realize, oh, these were people or these are people or things, I guess, that he's changed into these ornaments. And and I dug that, you know, there's there was stuff in here that I liked. I just wish I understood the why, you know. Right. Yeah. In the service of what? In there about the Earth's resources and him feeling like they were stolen. But that sort of fell apart for me, too, because of her argument, which was like, well, the scarecrow, it was already Emerald City. Yeah. Right. When he started to reign there. Right.

50:48Jason Mantzoukas:So there's a world in which he was also like the Wizard of Oz was all powerful. But then the gnome knight was just waiting in the wings. Well, no, it's interesting. is the Wizard of Oz was not powerful. He was just revealed to be a man. But what then this movie suggests is, but don't worry, that lesson, don't learn it because there is an all-powerful bad guy and that is this guy. But what I'm saying is like in the world of Oz, people were scared of the wizard because he had portrayed himself as the all-powerful and with a big crazy face. But yet there was a man with a big crazy face. And that's the thing.

51:26Jason Mantzoukas:if you're going to make a sequel to The Wizard of Oz, and maybe that's where I'm coming down in this whole movie. It's like, why are we doing the same? Why does she have three companions? Why does she swap the dog for the chicken? Just do a whole different event. Not every journey to Oz needs to go on a trek to a place and then a coronation at the end. It's so interesting because it's like we have, and it's different because it's a retelling, but let's just use as an example The Wiz. I like The Wiz. As another installment in this story's evolution, because The Wiz is a riff on The Wizard of Oz, the movie, obviously not the book.

52:07So so like and that is unquestionably incredibly successful and a an amazing movie, you know. So to me, to get from there, I'm like, we've now had multiple generations where we have institutionalized the version of these characters and these stories where they sing and it is colorful. Why make this so drab? Why? And I get it. It's the books. And you can say that all you want. But you really. I'll never say it. I'll never say it. No, no. I mean them. I'm sure that was their thing. You know, them being like, well, no, we're taking it back to the books, you know. But then why if the books are so much less visually enjoyable, I guess?

52:52Jason Mantzoukas:I mean, look, it's a real bait and switch. That's what we're saying here. It's a real bait and switch. Now, put Toni Collette in there. You know, give me the again. I do want hereditary. I'm all for it. I would love an Ari. Ari Aster needs to start making the rest of the L. Frank Baum books. Oh, yeah. Let's get it. Let's start from the beginning. I want to see it from his perspective the whole way through. But because I do think this is a horror movie. It's about a girl who is about to go through very traumatic electroshock therapy. She escapes through her imagination, but which is not actually her imagination.

53:31Jason Mantzoukas:I mean, I think the ending of this movie, and I think that they pulled away from it, is she wakes up and you see the doctor pulling the the the two things away from her head and and she's like she's like oh where am i and he's like you're home yeah and then they wheel her back out and that that would be great that would be great and what if he was like you know he said something to the effect of like like do you what what do you think about oz and she was like what's that you know i mean because isn't that what they say in the beginning is you won't remember it or like They go, here's your key back.

54:05Jason Mantzoukas:She's like, what is this? Yeah. And then she just starts, blood just comes out of her nostril, this one nostril. Yeah, and she starts to float in the air. Okay, but in this movie, Return to Oz, is the woman who, like the head nurse at the institution, is she in jail at the end? She is. Is she in a jail horse carriage? Apparently, so apparently there's a lot of deleted scenes that did not make it into this film. There's like a work print that people have seen. And so much so that I found them to be like, there's A through J of deleted scenes here. But the idea being that she basically was, there are other prisoners, not prisoners, patients that were like abused and mistreated and kept in the basement.

54:51You know what this is like? Sucker punch. Oh, yeah. Oh, interesting. Remember? I have a big memory of it. Because there is a world in which the first Oz is she's in a coma from, you know, the tornado. And there's a world in which this one is the entirety of Oz is during her electroshock treatment. Like it is always a trip inside the mind rather than a real trip into a different world. There's a Jacob's Ladder scenario potentially happening here. You know, like there's just boy, I just wish the movie. Hmm. Because that would be a fun, scary movie. Little kids, scary movie. Yeah. To descend into a world that isn't joyous and full of song, but is nonetheless full of characters that you need to befriend and help them on their journeys.

55:43Jason Mantzoukas:And, you know, Jason, you know, and June, I apologize for saying this right now. I don't like to get into politics, but I did not like the fact that they elected the scarecrow as the king of Oz. I felt like, how did we decide that? How did, like, he was a weak, he was a straw man, literally a straw man. You know, and we see what happens. We got a scarecrow in power and the entire he spent all of the emeralds and the country fell. All of Oz fell into complete disarray. The infrastructure is out of control. The yellow brick road is all torn up. There's no infrastructure going on. There's no wheelers out there to clean it up.

56:28Jason Mantzoukas:You know, this is what I'm saying. The wheelers are unchecked. They don't have badges. Oh, the wheelers. I thought the design of and the execution of those wheelers was cool as hell. Very cool. I like that. Those wheelers were incredibly unsettling in a great way and in a very compelling way. They were, I think, scarier than the monkeys, because I think that's what they were supposed to be. A thousand percent. They were supposed to be the monkeys, but they were scarier because they were human. And they were scarier because they were chaotic in a way that the monkeys seemed ruled by something like the wheelers had an energy to them that was just so like just they seemed completely out of control.

57:15Well, their movements are so foreign, you know, those big, long front arms ending in wheels like monkeys flying are just monkeys flying. Everything in The Wizard of Oz kind of went normal ish. these guys looked like it it felt like like body horror you know yes exactly this felt like david

57:36Jason Mantzoukas:cronenberg's return to us crash i would like to see crash with the wheelers now here's the thing um when oz turns back the wheelers are still wheelers i thought the wheelers would be like normal people but they are just still wheelers they're just nicer wheelers because here's the thing they weren't the wheel i actually i don't remember where even the wheelers came from but i I didn't get the sense that they had been... What do you mean? What do you mean? Oh, oh. I think if we're trying to find the connection of the wheelers are the guys pushing the gurney when she's strapped down to the gurney in the real world.

58:09Oh. Okay. But it didn't seem like they were... Like the people who were transformed into stone, like other members of Emerald City, like they had been different things before. The ornaments had all been different. Like the wheelers just seemed to exist there as wheelers. I agree. Yes. They seemed like a gang. You know, and not for nothing, they did. And I know this is good. I said they were cool and I really liked them. But they also had a bit of a Starlight Express element.

58:37Jason Mantzoukas:Oh, big time. I mean, that felt like they just grabbed them off the set. This was shot in the UK. I bet you they just say, guys can come over here for a day. Yeah, you guys can come do this. And they're like, this terrain is too rough. Andrew Lloyd Webb will give you the day off. This is, I mean, so much here. Obviously, we have opinions about this movie. But you'd be surprised to find out that there was a lot there. Okay, I'm not surprised. I am sure when I was watching this, I was like, I bet there's actually a lot of people. This is going back many years. Yes. Yes. Going back many years, I dated a woman who this was one of her favorite movies.

59:09I'm not surprised. Wow. From her childhood. I'm not surprised. Like from her era of.

59:14Jason Mantzoukas:Well, I know why she dated you now because you reminded her of her favorite villain of all of the movies. Yeah. She kept calling me her rock king. No, but she did travel with skates on her hands and feet And feet, yeah, not skates, single wheels By the way, I will say this You didn't know this I'm sorry, this movie being your favorite movie is a red flag For me That's a red flag But you know, it's also like that Peanut Butter Solution movie Sometimes when you get traumatized by a movie very young It can like seep in because it's like It's almost like a rite of passage You know, a badge of honor I think, and I would wonder And if you're listening to this and you are that generation for whom this movie was right in your sweet spot, I bet this was a good, good in quotes.

1:00:02Yeah. Scary movie for kids that wasn't so scary.

1:00:06Jason Mantzoukas:You know what I mean? I really wanted to show it to our kids. I was going to suggest that to you tonight, June. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Okay. So now I will say this. Obviously, there are people out there with a different opinion. It's now time for second opinions.

1:00:24The movie was a piece of shit, yet this person recommends it. Tell me what is the message? Maybe that art is subjective. I need a second opinion.

1:00:45Jason Mantzoukas:Now, hopefully one of these is written by your ex-girlfriend, Jason. Oh, that would be great. But I will tell you this much. There are 5 ,634 reviews for Return to Oz. Wow. And 80 % are five-star reviews. Holy shit. Okay? 80%. Now, some of these are written by the wheelers, I think, because there's a lot of skid marks around here. It says this. Sean Plorty says, Make your kids watch this. It gave my daughter nightmares. 10 out of 10 approved five stars. We got to check on Sean Plorty, please. I don't think that that's the way to parent. This one is an interesting one because all of these are odd.

1:01:43Jason Mantzoukas:KLW's title is, I enjoy being able to share childhood memories with my children. Okay, great. I bought the digital copy instead of the actual DVD only because I didn't want to wait the two days for shipping. And I love that it is on our TV, computer, tablets, and phones. We can watch it no matter where we are. Now, I do remember being a little creeped out by some of these characters that hasn't changed. Luckily, my children aren't creeped out. They can watch this movie multiple times a day. The Wheelers and the Headless Queen are disturbing to me, but it's still a great movie. just don't overthink it it doesn't add up just go along with it five stars i don't disagree with some of those sentiments not five stars but like um just go along with it is a good because there is stuff in here that's interesting to watch just don't if you're trying to find story in here it's just not there i want to say that you know while we have pointed out that there's not much here A viewer who titled their review, most underrated major studio film from 1950.

1:02:53Jason Mantzoukas:I don't know if that is right. It is about this movie. Says, a strong statement on modern commodification, social alienation, and the ethical courage to pierce through it, which may appear tantamount to insanity. A truly underappreciated classic. Five stars. so saying like in in a world and a world where insanity is being creative yeah which i don't get because at the end she's not creative but she's i bet she's gonna work on that fucking farm again oh yeah she can't do and it's i mean it'd be so hard the the the gravitational pull for somebody on a farm in kansas to get away from that in 1930 whatever i mean impossible it's no i'll tell you this much the final scene of the film that was cut out is a minute and a half long scene of darthie and toto playing in a field wow and then here's my final review uh because i know we have to wrap it up my final review is simply this from the title you know review you know if you like it or you don't so i don't know why you're reading a review maybe you like it maybe i won't five stars wow that's great so there we go i mean i guess that's true it is uh would you i mean i I don't know how to feel.

1:04:07Jason Mantzoukas:Would you recommend it? I kind of, I'll just jump in first and say yes, because it's so odd. It's so weird. It's worth a watch. I don't think it flies quickly by, but it is. It is almost two hours as well. It's long. It's long. And A through J is cut out, by the way. You should see the amount of scenes that are cut out of this thing. That's an editor. That's an editor's movie. He's willing to cut out all those scenes. Well, I guess at a certain point, he's going to be making like a four hour opus over here. But I mean, I think that if you can like really go into it, putting the Wizard of Oz aside.

1:04:43Right. I mean, an almost impossible ask. But I think there was a lot of parts of this movie that I had fun just watching just because it was gonzo nutso stuff. you know be and lots of what we haven't talked about obviously is this is an era where in 1985 all of these fantastical elements um the pumpkin guy the tiktok all the these are practical elements these are puppets these are there is a lot of cool stuff here to look at and be inside of is it a good story does it make sense no but is it like boring or uninteresting no i don't think so. I just think it doesn't hold together as a movie and it really doesn't feel like it's any kind of continuation of what I understand to be the Oz saga, even though I know it is.

1:05:39But so, yeah, I would say watch it. But if you can, I think you'll enjoy it more if you just are like, oh, I wonder if I can watch a 10 year old girl be surrounded by horrors for two hours and still keep going yeah i bet there's like there's not really an overlap between people who love the wizard of oz and i consider myself one of those people love the movie and who love this movie i think there's probably a lot of people who love the books deeply and like are fat huge fans of the series and then love this movie return to oz and didn't had issues with wizard of oz because it's not really faithful.

1:06:22Well, I bet that's true. And I bet the other thing that's true is I bet there's a lot of people for whom this was a movie that was constantly available to them to watch all the time, anytime, like on cable or on Disney Channel or whatever. Like I bet this - Was it? I mean, I have never seen any of these images before.

1:06:45Jason Mantzoukas:I have seen these characters. I definitely have seen, but that's because I trolled video stores as a kid. Like it was like one of those ones. This was one of those things that like people saw more of this because it was more available. And the Wizard of Oz felt like, well, that's so old. That's from olden days. You know, this is yet this looks so much older. Oh, yeah. I don't know. I'd be curious to hear from. Actually, I'm not. Yeah. Yeah. I was going to say, I'm not curious to hear from fans and I don't want to hear from fans. So, you know, Scott, you can cut that straight out of the podcast.

1:07:20Jason Mantzoukas:All right, Jason, June. Wow, I almost just made a huge mistake. Yeah, you really opened yourself up to a lot of conversations. Wow, I stopped myself midway through to be like, what are you doing? Don't be so curious. This is the invitation they've been waiting for. I've already said it. People who love this movie, that's a red plaque. Yes. And this is all I'm going to say is that I hope that this brings you back together with your ex, Jason. That she finally understands that you have some appreciation for what she liked. Oh, I did. Don't worry. I did text her to say, we are doing Return to Oz on the podcast.

1:07:58Jason Mantzoukas:Jason, June, do you want to promote anything? Let anybody know what is out there, what they should be looking for. Sure. Percy Jackson season two is going on right now. A man on the inside. And if you're hearing this and you're in the New York area, I will be on Broadway in the show All Out at the Nederlander Theater. You can get tickets now. Ooh, exciting. Exciting. June? Nothing from me. All right. There you go. And I'll tell people, I released this little mini documentary where I talked to Taylor Swift dads. And you don't have to be a Taylor Swift fan. You don't have to be a dad. You just have to be a human.

1:08:36Jason Mantzoukas:If you're a child, you have a child, you've ever been to a concert, I think you might like it. It's 15 minutes. You can check it out. It's so great. And just to be clear, you mean dads of Taylor Swift fans, not Taylor Swift's dads. Yes, that is. I did not get to talk to all of her dads. That is another documentary I'm working on. And a lot of people say, well, you're digging. There's only one that we know of. I know there's more. I know there's more. I'll get to the bottom of it. We'll get to the bottom of it. All right. That's it. If you listen to us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, please rate and review us.

1:09:05Jason Mantzoukas:Also, make sure you're following us and have automatic downloads turned on. It helps the show, and we appreciate it. And a big thank you to our producers, Scott Sonny, Molly Reynolds, and our engineer, Casey Holford, as well as our social media manager, Zoe Applebaum. And of course, we'll forever be grateful to the one and only Averill Hallie. Thank you, everybody, for listening. We'll see you next time. Remember, give us your corrections and omissions, but not your opinions.

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