Monday, September 10, 2012

Oz Mythbusters: Sister Act

Alot of people are under the impression that both the Wicked Witches were actually sisters, but the fact of it was in the original Oz books, L. Frank Baum didn't have them being related at all. Both the East and West witches were in cohoots together, but they weren't sisters.

The Wizard Of Oz movie from 1939 was the first to tie in both of the characters as being sisters, possibly to give the Wicked Witch of the West a little more motivation and so that she'd show up in the story earlier than when Dorothy goes to her castle. From this, alot of other adaptaions of Oz included this as being official canon. Journey Back To Oz mentiones that the witches were sisters, as well as Mombi being their sister. The Oz comic book series from Caliber Press had the witches as sisters, who were later combined into a single entity called The Wickedest Witch. Oz: The Manga from Antarctic Press also featured them as sisters, as well as the OZF5: Gale Force one-shot.

But one of the most "popular" adaptations of this are from the Wicked book series by Gregory Macguire, and the Wicked musical where the West Witch was Elphaba, a child who was born unnaturally green, and her sister Nessarose. Nessa, was born with no arms in the original books, but in the musical was instead born with legs that wouldn't move, at least not without the help of some special slippers. Elphaba and Nessa had an on-and-off relationship, although they went on to lead very seperate lives throughout the course of the story, in both the books and musical.

1 comment:

  1. Apparently, they'll be sisters in "Oz the Great and Powerful" as well.

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