#wizard vs witch
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I'm pretty much the worst person to even weigh in on this topic because I've been partial to Suvi since day one, but in my opinion there wasn't ever a need to explain or justify Suvi's choices/reactions.
Not because she's perfect, never wrong (though in my heart I know...) but because I'm very certain that the people that keep on hammering on her mistakes/shortcomings/tendencies are people that already dislike Suvi (or don't like Aabria very much, I wish this wasn't a topic of consideration but even 30+ eps in there's still people like that around) for whatever reason and gather excuses to justify their bias against her and no amount of explanation will turn their hearts in her favour.
It really feels like a parallel to the way Suvi herself tries to be understood by her friends and yet she fails time and time again.
And people insist on forgetting that Suvi is not the Citadel, she's just one young wizard of the Citadel.
And it's gut-wrenching how much I relate to that feeling of alienation before every corner she tries to fit in: amongst her citadel peers she's othered by her position and privilege, and now by her friendship to a witch and a spirit; between her friends she's the odd-one-out because of her Citadel connections and the nature of her power; and now amongst the witches she stands out by being the face of the "enemy".
I don't blame her for clinging to the little corner of the world that has not made her feel foreign despite the very nature of her presence: in Steel's family whom she's not related to by blood, yet completely by heart.
And it'll never be a fair game. The girls especially are very young and with new-found independence, they're given colossal decisions to make, and that before beings older than three generations of them combined and incomprehensively more powerful and less empathic.
As much as Mirara wants there to be a good witch and bad witch, there's no such thing as black and white, there are decisions and consequences, what one does with the power they're given. There is no right or wrong in a fight filled with so much heart, there was never a world where a fight between Ame and Suvi would be clean.
#wbn spoilers#worlds beyond number#wwwo spoilers#I don't know of the opinions spread on tumblr but reddit is doing what it always does#at no point there was in my mind a 'suvi vs ame' mentality#as the philosophers say: why pit two bad bitches against each other?#they'll always be stronger together and not apart#and yet people are crying screaming over people who like or try to see Suvi's side#'oh so you're defending fascism?' like shut up this is a RPG podcast#if you don't like suvi just say it as it is instead of trying to shame who like her through petty essays#people are trying to simplify something that is so vastly nuanced and complex with a billion factors to consider#people discuss about those girls on reddit like it's politics. it's nightmarish#suvirin kedberiket#suvi the wizard#ame the witch#rambles#rantish#long post#(( worth mentioning I don't have insight from fireside chats. so this is going off on the campaign alone ))
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back again to say there's something very interesting about the way the way particularly Antivalists talk about the citadel as if they're dirtying or disrespecting the seeming inherent purity of magic. Not the way they are exploiting great spirits, because yeah, that's abhorrent. But specifically the disdain for the magic going from "divine" to "mundane", specifically because they have harnessed the lingua arcana for themselves and their mortal goals.
But like, where is the divinity in Ame's cock ring in episode 1? Where is the divinity in using a Bag of Holding to carry your presentation materials, like Tefmet does? Why is it ok for those of the Spirit world to use magic to harm others and further their goals, but its not alright for mortals to do the same? To reiterate, I'm not talking about trapping great spirits, their relationship to the Empire, or any of the other things the Citadel is responsible for. There's a way that Tefmet talked about the Citadel using magic that sounded a lot less like "stop abusing spirits" and a lot more like "only those Worthy and Divine should be able to use magic". Which is the specific thing a lot of people take up issue with the Citadel for saying to some extent, so what gives?
They keep talking about the Citadel bringing about the end of the world, but my mind keeps going VAGUE, UNSPECIFIC, VAGUE AGAIN. If they trap a great spirit, what's their plan? They were using Naram to create rings of Water Breathing, so we can maybe guess military weapons. But for who? Galthmai/Ruve? Ok, that's not the end of the world. I don't agree with the principal of that, but it feels a little suspicious now that the Man in Black, who is working close with Ruve, would be railing specifically against the Citadel, their enemy.
TL;DR: I'm with the argument that the Citadel has overextended their ambition and done horrific things in the name of the Empire's war. But when witches and Antivalists, who are imperfect magic users that act of their own accord, argue that the way the Citadel has used the lingua arcana for domestic, ordinary use is wrong, I just can't agree. I need more proof that they are actually disrupting the sanctity of magic, or that that is something that actually exists. I also need more proof and specifics on what the Citadel's giant evil plan actually is, lol.
#worlds beyond number#wwwo#wbn#the wizard tefmet#it's so so interesting to see the conservative versus progressive ideas play out in aspects of Witches vs Wizards#the Wizards are the young upstarts in a lot of ways but the way they have harnessed the lingua arcana is one of my favs lol
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Given we are going to fall back into an Ozian time, I wish to say this again: I do believe that the original draft of "Oz the Great and Powerful" was much better, more efficient, and more well-written than what the movie ended up being.
And comparing the original draft with how the movie actually looks like is a good example of what happens when movie-makers take a good idea, interesting characters and cool concepts, and then water them down and limit things until it all becomes superficial, cliche, boring, and with nasty implicits.
The original draft wasn't perfect but damn it, it had heart and soul, understood the original material, and I would pay if it had to be made today. If we had the storyline and the characters from the original draft, with the visuals and special effects of the final movie, we could have had a fascinating piece of alternate Oz.
#oz the great and powerful#seriously when you read the script with the finished movie in mind#it teaches you a LOT about how creative projects can be stunted and disfigured#theodora in the original draft was a FASCINATING and complex character that fits well a pre-Witch of the West idea#theodora in the movie is... well whatever she is#oz#the wizard of oz#first draft#original draft#script#script vs finished movie#what could have been
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This question was sent to our inbox. If you’d like for us to post a This or That poll for you, send the 2 things you want to see against each other to our inbox and we’ll let the people decide which one they prefer. Everything will be anonymous.
#this or that#this vs that#poll#polls#wicked#wicked 2024#glinda x elphaba#elphaba thropp#galinda upland#ariana grande#cynthia erivo#witch#witches#wizard of oz#movie#movies#random polls#fun polls#poll time#incognito polls#tumblr poll#tumblr polls#game#games
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Imagine us being a witch and a warlock living in a little cottage, collecting herbs and celebrating pagan holidays!
#pagan witch#paganblr#paganism#magic#witchcraft#witchcraft community#folk witchcraft#witchblr#witchcore#witchy vibes#eclectic witch#forest witch#green witch#witch aesthetic#witches vs patriarchy#witches of tumblr#witchy aesthetic#cottagecore#nature witch#magick#witch community#warlock#wizard#wizardcore#harry potter#wizarding world#pagan community#pagan blog#pagans of tumblr#pagan
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This book is told from the perspective of a witch-woman who is abused by the patriarchy generally and by her terrible husband specifically. Regular listeners know that we are a magic mom-skeptical podcast but this one pulls it off.
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Oz the Great and Powerful: Script VS Movie (1)
If you haven’t kept up with my updates: a long time ago, soon after the release of “Oz: The Great and Powerful”, I heard about one of the original script for the project being passed around the Internet. A script that showed how the movie was originally conceived, a script that showed a movie that was originally much closer to the world of Baum’s books than the final movie, a scrip that actually was better and much less flawed than the movie we ended up with.
At the time I had searched for this script, to no avail, but now, after so many years, I finally found it! And… yes, the script I got to read is actually better than the actual movie (mind you, it still has some flaws, because it was still a script-in-progress, but it also lacked a lot of the problems of the movie) and much closer to Baum’s books. In fact, reading this script while looking at the side at the finished movie is a wild experience – not only do they end up feeling like two different movies with the same plot, but also… the actual movie feels almost like a caricature of the original script. As if someone read the script, went “Let’s add as much stereotypes as we could, and twist the characters so that they became annoying instead of interesting, and let’s reinterpret what the script says in the most negative way possible” and we ended up with this movie, that would be someone’s wrong re-interpretation of the script… But anyway, I’ll let you judge by yourself, because I will break down the differences between the script and the movie.
I) In Kansas
Right ahead, the opening scene. In the movie we have this long sequence that starts with Oscar seducing his new assistant, scenes insisting on him being an unfaithful lying womanizer breaking the heart of all girls, and we are shown how his show is just shoddy tricks and fake magic, with an insistence on the “scam” nature of his show with the whole “girl in a wheelchair” thing. In the original script? NONE OF THAT! The script begins actually with Oscar in the middle of his own show – which is actually a pretty decent and impressive magic show. We begin with Oscar choosing someone in the audience to handcuff him solidly, and then asks the man what time it is – the man looks at his wrist, but his watch is gone, and then Oscar hands him his watch, with his magically un-cuffed hands. And then he proceeds to do a series of “transformations” by having an egg appear in his hand, that turns into a rabbit, then into a dove… Standard but impressive magic tricks. And the thing is that the audience, despite the show being good, is left unimpressed by it. Unphased. Oscar even has to use his ventriloquism to invent enthusiastic audience voices in front of the deafening silence (oh yes, because that’s another point the script took from the book – Oscar is a very good ventriloquist). As the script says, the main problem here Is that Oscar is an “unappreciated artist”, whose magic tricks do not impress an imagination-less audience.
And so, in front of magic tricks doing poorly, Oscar turns to his second business… basically snake oil selling. Given his magic show doesn’t do anything, he starts promoting and selling a fake elixir called “HOME” – the Homeopathic Ontological Miracle Elixir – and there he gets a TON of money and a huge success. This is another good point of the script – it shows that Oscar/Oz isn’t a scam by default, unlike the greedy jerk we see in the movie. The script establishes well that Oscar needs to do scams because his natural talent and initial projects do not work.
As a nod to the MGM movie there is a “Mr. Gulch” in the audience of Oscar’s show plus oil snake sale, in charge of the local bank, and there is also a couple known as the “Hamilton”, with the wife being called “Margaret”. A not-so-subtle nod to the actress of the Wicked Witch of the West in the MGM movie… But an homage that actually would have been REALLY offensive and of poor taste if it had ever been done. You’ll get why when I describe the character of “Mrs. Hamilton”. For you see, Mrs. Hamilton is a very attractive woman that was the only one who applauded when Oscar did his magic tricks, while Mr. Hamilton is a stern, no-nonsense, unhappy man who spends more time with his friends than his wife and is just as unimpressed by Oscar’s tricks as the rest of the audience. And as Mr. Hamilton leaves Mrs. Hamilton alone, she quickly joins Oscar for a passionate embrace. For you see, Oscar is Mrs. Hamilton’s extra-marital lover. We have still the “philanderer” aspect of Oscar there, but interestingly it is downplayed a lot. We do not see him interacting with any other women, we know of his seducing nature by secondary hints. More importantly, the character of Mrs. Hamilton is basically a mix-up of all the conquests of Oscar in the final movie, from the circus girls to Annie. I’ll explain… Mrs. Hamilton has affairs with Oscar whenever he comes to Kansas with the carnival/circus/fair he is part of, and she apparently truly loves him unlike her husband – but she also is aware that he has other “girls” he has adventures with during his tours, and is quite fine with it, especially since as Oscar puts it, all the other girls are just “bauble” compared to the true “jewel” that is Margaret, the only reason he even comes in Kansas anymore. So, while not a perfect relationship, we still have something much more “balanced” somehow than we have in the movie. In the movie, Oscar is a man unable to commit the woman he truly loves and that loves him in return, and would rather abandon her to another than straighten himself up and stop his scheming, devious ways – plus, a man that literally pushes love aside for his dream of glory and being the “greatest man of them all” AND a man that keeps his true loved one in the complete ignorance of his other sexual relationships with women. But in the script? We have a man that is honest with his true loved one about having meaningless sexual affairs when far away from her, and she understands it because she herself is married and cannot be in a full relationship with him, all the while they keep reassuring each other that they do love each other, but that their life conditions prevent them from being together full time and dooms them to occasional times of secret love. Of course, the fact that the whole “lies and scams girls to sleep with them” part is not in the original script also helps – since in the script, Oscar keeps winning the heart of women due to his natural charm, eccentric charisma and random acts of kindness.
The other main change brought to the character, and a very important one, would be the motivations of Oscar. In the movie, Oscar’s whole goal is, in his own words, to become a great, rich and famous man, the greatest wizard ever known – he pursues ambition. He puts career before anything, he is selfishly acting always and only for himself, and he has hatred for honest work and poorness due to seeing his father dying “his face in the dirt” as he worked to the bone to survive. If used well, this motivation could have created a “lovable rogue” character, but unfortunately in the movie Oscar just comes off as a selfish greedy jerk and there is nothing lovable about him. In the script? Oh boy, that’s night and day! The reason Oscar refuses to stay in Kansas despite Mrs. Hamilton’s insistence, is because he actually searches for a “great land”. He doesn’t care about being a great man, in fact during his explaining sections he rarely uses “me” or “I” (unlike the movie character who is all “me me me me”) – he explains that his hatred of Kansas is due to how dull, grey and empty the land and its people are, and upon seeing his father die “face in the dirt”, he didn’t develop a hatred of an humble life and hard work like in the movie, but he rather developed a hatred of Kansas as the land that “grinded to dust” his good father of a man. Oscar’s only goal, and the reason he keeps travelling and he doesn’t settle anywhere, is because he is looking for a land of “color and light and life”, a land of beauty and marvels. He does dream of fortune and glory yes, but only as a side-effect of finding the “perfect land”. Basically, Oscar’s original character was that of a dreamer trying to escape desperately the dreary and grim world he comes from – he was basically a parallel to Dorothy in the original MGM movie, or even better, he was a depiction of what an escapist dreamer like Dorothy could end up in the “wrong” side, if pushed to a more extreme. A man forced into selling snake oil to fuel his dreams, and who lives so much in his dreams that he cannot settle even for the woman he loves. It isn’t that he thinks of him before anyone else, like in the movie, but rather that he is such an extreme optimist that he literally believes there is some paradise on earth waiting somewhere, and that he can reach it one way or another.
Now, Mr. Hamilton and his friends end up discovering Oscar in an embrace with Mrs. Hamilton, and this leads to the chase scene present in the finished movie, but with a few differences. Mrs. Hamilton herself helps Oscar escape ; the other members of the circus (the “freaks and roundabouts”) also help Oscar in his chase, because apparently they are used to him being hunted down by angry husbands, but still like him enough to come to his help ; and finally, instead of having obstacles everywhere he runs, the original script called for a whole set of cartoony acrobatics, as Oscar would have escaped through the big tent, using trapezes and trampolines, before finding the balloon. You see, there is a real “comedy” aspect to the script. In fact, when reading the original characterization of Oz/Oscar, I couldn’t help but have a “Pirate of the Caribbean” vibe – as in, he seems to have made into a sober and less unhinged version of Captain Jack Sparrow. Another part of the script that shows its flows: as he gets into the balloon, Frank, Oscar’s assistant, throws him his hat – just like in the finished movie. But in this script… this is the first and only apparition of Frank, who isn’t even named by the dialogue, and the only indication of who he is and what his relationship to Oscar is, is found in the notes of the scripts. If shot as indicated, it would just be a random man throwing Oscar his hat. This is something that was definitively corrected in the movie, by having Frank’s character be presented and explored in the previous scenes – but this shows one of the bad habits of this original script, it tends to introduce characters or things very abruptly, without any actual explanation or presentation of who they are supposed to be.
II) Arrival in Oz
The whole “tornado” sequence is also very different in the original script. Already it isn’t a true tornado that sweeps up Oscar’s balloon, but rather a heavy and violent storm. And unlike in the movie, where Oscar is terrified and whimpers for his life, begging whatever God there is to spare him while promising to “change”… the script Oscar’s actually enters into a King Lear-like defiance (the scripts’ words) and starts shouting “Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! Blow!” while confronting the “deathswirl” of thunder, lightning, violent winds and heavy rains.
No “floating” scene like in the movie, and Oscar doesn’t actually arrive immediately into the beautiful scenery of Oz: in the original script, Oscar first arrives above the Deadly Desert, an endless spread of sun-scorched sand, and in front of this place, Oscar starts panicking when he realizes he has no food or drinks. He actually briefly considers killing himself with his pistol (yeah, it had quite some dark parts), but then ditches the idea way by saying he was in “worst predicaments” before – though he later admits to himself he can’t think of any worst predicament on the top of his head. Overall it is a sort of dark-humor which, as you can see, helped in the feeling of a more “Jack Sparrow-like” Oscar. As his engine starts dying out, Oscar insults it and there he has regrets – but due to the shift of goals from the character, instead of regretting “not having accomplished great things”, this Oscar regrets all the things he will never see “Paris and India” and all the great landmarks of the world.
However Oscar is suddenly save by gusts of hot winds from the desert, which sent him above cold, snowy mountains, and then over a rainbow (heavy MGM nod – I also forgot to say Oscar tells the line “I’ve a feeling I’m not in Kansas anymore” while above the desert) and finally he arrives in a fantastical, marvelous Oz… But here’s the twist. It is a yellowish landscape. And as he falls in a river, like in the movie, he is greeted not by Theodora, but by a bunch of odd people all wearing different shades and hues of yellow, while “looking and sounding a lot like the Winkie Guards from the original movie”. Yep, Oscar is actually greeted by the Winkies themselves, who start shouting and cheering, heralding him as the Great Wizard and their Savior, and telling him he is here to defeat the “Wicked Witch”. Before the shocked Oscar can have more explanations from the bowing Winkies, Theodora actually arrives – and she arrives carried by two winged monkeys. Yep, that’s another change from the original script: instead of the “winged baboons” being depicted as the vicious servants of the Wicked Witch, here the winged monkeys are very clearly associated with the “good witches” Evanora and Theodora. Theodora’s only description is: beautiful, dressed in an open-collared white shirt, black pants, and black high-knee boots. She promptly explains to him the basic situation (she is a witch, the wicked witch has to be defeated, yada yada), but with several key differences. For example, the Wicked Witch is here clearly referenced to as “The Wicked Witch of the South” (clearly it is both playing on the MGM canon where there is no southern witch, and also a nod to book-fans about the real identity of the “wicked witch”), and Evanora is already talked about as the “Queen of Oz”. She isn’t some “royal advisor” or keeper of the throne like in the finished movie – she is introduced as the rightful queen of Oz, that the wicked witch tries to overthrow.
Unlike in the movie, where Theodora is a soft, gentle, almost shy character, the script’s Theodora is depicted as fast (quick eyes, quick movements and a lively mind, which is part of why Oscar likes her) and as very insistent – while the Winkies immediately assume he is a Wizard, she keeps asking “Are you a Wizard?”. And unlike in the movie, where Oscar, as the greedy jerk that he is, only plays in the whole Wizard thing because he hears there’s gold and a crown as a price, in the original script, Oscar goes into the whole Wizard thing without hearing about any riches or powers. He simply adores the appreciation these people have of him and his “magic”, and as the script says, the “showman” in him takes over and he decides to play the role of a great Wizard, going on a boastful rant about being a wizard of pyrotechnics and prestidigitation, and the master of illusions – and to show his magic, he does some traditional magic tricks, which impress the Winkies heavily. Oscar is too happy to have finally found people appreciating his magic for him to let go, and he even calls the Winkies an “audience” at the end. But Theodora… and this is another one of the positive “change” compared to the movie (can you call it “change” when it is retrospective, since the script came before the movie?). Theodora doesn’t care so much about the magic tricks themselves – she is not particularly amazed by them – but she pays a close attention to the way they impress the Winkies, and to how they react to the Wizard’s antics. And as she keeps insisting “Are you a Wizard?”, Oscar, not wanting to lie but not wanting to dispel his newfound glory, answers ambiguously, such as “Seeing is believing” in reference to the tricks he just performs and “I wouldn’t want to contradict a lovely lady such as yourself”.
Somehow satisfied, Theodora then, with a smile… get ready for that… sparks lightning out of her fingers to have Oscar’s balloon explode. In front of his shock, she explains that if he is indeed a great Wizard, she cannot let him go, because her sister the Queen needs too much a Great Wizard to help her defeat the Wicked Witch once and for all. She also adds that her sister, Queen of the Emerald City, is a powerful witch that can offer him anything he dreamed of or desired – to encourage him to go with her see Evanora (again, the script heavily parallels Dorothy’s arrival in Oz, with Evanora replacing the promises of the “wonderful wizard of Oz” in the original narrative. Another bit that show the original character of Oscar in the movie: even when it becomes clear he has no choice but follow Theodora, since she literally had his only mean of escape explode, he still keeps up a bravado and declares “Given your kind offer, I will cancel all planned and prior arrangements, to go speak with your sister and see if we can arrange something”.
Theodora insists on travelling by foot, much to Oscar’s indignation – cut to the broom dialogue of the movie. Theodora came carried by two winged monkeys, one is Nikko (from the MGM movie), that she sends back to Theodora with a letter she quickly wrote, and the other is Kala, who carries Oscar’s luggage – he is the equivalent of the little helpful bellhop winged-monkey from the movie I forgot the name of. Except that in this script, the winged monkeys do not speak.
III) Travel down the Yellow Brick Road
Theodora, Oscar and Kala first go through farmlands with “curious-looking houses almost shaped like faces” (a nod to the original illustrations of the Oz houses, from the Baum books), and as they do Theodora explains the whole story of the wicked witch, and due to the shift of power relationships it is quite different from the one we get in the movie. In the original script, Theodora’s story is that the Wicked Witch of the South was an evil sorceress, daughter of the previous king of Oz, himself a powerful wizard and evil king. Despite Evanora being Queen of Oz, she needs all the help she can to fight the Wicked Witch of the South (and this help is resumed to Theodora herself, and the “good people of Oz”) – and finally we get the little fact that Evanora and the Wicked Witch used to be very good friends, but they had no idea “how wicked wickedness could be, and how friendship could be betrayed”.
They arrive in front of a large, wild river, and Theodora uses leaves from a strange bush growing nearby – by rubbing them on people’s feet or shoes, it allows one to walk over water. And while Theodora walks “like a queen”, majestic, Oscar is noted to laugh like a child as he tries to walk on water, slipping like a baby giraffe taking its first steps. This is one of the main differences with the movie-Oscar: script-Oscar actually keeps being amazed and having fun in Oz, truly loving all the wonders and magic of the land, like… well like a child, as I said before. It is only after they crossed the large river that they finally arrive at the Yellow Brick Road – and there Oscar is amazed to discover that the road is paved with pure gold. Theodora just replies “Don’t they have roads, where you come from?” (gold apparently being of no real value in Oz), and Oscar promptly takes off one of the bricks from the road, keeping it from his pocket and justifying his actions by “scientific purposes” – he claims he wants to check if it isn’t the “fool’s gold”, this fake gold produced by alchemists to scam people (that’s a real thing, you can check it out). Down the Yellow Brick Road, they arrive at the “Enchanted Apple Orchard”, a nod to the apple tree segment of the MGM movie – Theodora says that if Oscar wants to take an apple, he has to ask politely the trees first, and while he does so dubitatively, the tree then shakes its branch to let apples fall at his feet so he can eat them. We also get a brief line where Theodora reveals that witches do not need to eat to survive.
We then get to the night scene by the campfire, like in the movie, and here the fire was started by lightning shot out of Theodora’s fingers – in the script Theodora’s element clearly isn’t fire but lightning, and there is also no mention of any glowing ring she might have (unlike the movie where witches power come from gems they wear). Now, Oscar does the whole “give her a music box and offers her to dance” thing from the movie, but there are MAJOR differences. Difference on Oscar’s side, as there is no “this was my grandmother” lie, or any lie at all – he just gives her the music box, and when Theodora asks him why, he explains that he just wanted to make her a gift. It is a random act of kindness, nothing more, with no ulterior motif. And there is also a major difference when it comes to Theodora’s character. As I said previously, the original Theodora was far from the shy, quiet, naïve character is in the movie. She is quiet in the script – but because she is calm, majestic and constantly analyzing the situation. It is notably made clear that she keeps observing Oscar through their travels and trying to figure out what his “deal” is. And when he shows her then offers her the music box, it is the first time she actually shows genuine emotion – a childlike wonder and delight that cracks the cold and statuesque mask she put on. This makes the line “No one ever gave me something because they wanted to” line from the movie much more impactful, as we actually see a cold Theodora warming up to a true act of kindness – and during the dance scene, it is made clear that not only has she never danced with a man before, but the script insists she probably has never touched or been in the presence of a man for this much. Which leads her to get so nervous, when the music box stops she goes into the woods to “collect fire fuel”, just to calm herself all alone.
And here we get a whole new scene, that isn’t present in the final movie, and truly puts things in another perspective. As she is alone in the woods, Theodora is caught up by Nikko, returning with a letter from Evanora, asking her sister to make sure the Wizard is a real wizard. And so to test it, Theodora takes a rabbit in the woods… and transforms it into a ferocious lion she then orders to attack the Wizard. Oscar, in front of a wild lion, while all alone, first pushes it back by making a torch out of the fire, then by using his pistol (the one we saw earlier during his consideration of suicide). He merely wounds the animal, which retreats, and Theodora later returns as if she had been away and knew nothing of the situation. Upon hearing the tale of Oscar, she marvels at such a strangely-shaped “wand” (the pistol), and Oscar, in his bravado, explains he is used to fight off lion where he comes from, and that if he could he would have wrestled him with his bare hands… all while hiding his actual hands, trembling with fear, away from Theodora’s eyes. We also learn that the pistol only had one bullet, so now is completely useless, and… oh yeah, and the lion Oscar wounded is actually the Cowardly Lion. This info is dropped in the notes of the script, and this is another flaw of the writing here – in effect, in neither the dialogues nor the visuals, we do not know it is supposed to be the Cowardly Lion, and if the scene was shot it would not be known except for reading the script. Whoever wrote this scenario forgot that sometimes you need to include info in ways that the audience will know, not just the director.
IV) Meeting Evanora
Finally, our team arrives in the central land of Oz – which is said to be “brown-hued” and they see the Emerald City, described as “Sleeping Beauty’s Castle on steroids”. Interestingly, there is a heavy insistence on dreams in this script – from the Wizard claiming roads paved with gold only existed in dreams, to here reacting in front of the City by saying “I saw this before… In one of my dreams.”. As they go down the Yellow Brick Road, they are surprised by boulders in the field nearby suddenly moving and revealing themselves to be the turtle-shell-shaped shields of an army of gnomes, “short, squat, fierce-looking warriors with skin the color and texture of stone and beards so long they tie them around their waist” and armed with all sorts of broadswords, cutlasses and battle-axes… And as they appear, on the surrounding hillside, other creatures appear – Growleywogs, “silent, half-clad, eight-foot-tall Aboriginals armed with knives, bows, arrows and spears” (*cough cough* maybe it’s a good thing this part got lost) and Whimsies “distinguished by their extraordinarily broad shoulders and enormous crazy-colored papier-mache Mardi Gras masks, wearing over their undersized heads. As you can see, this is a true feast for any book fan.
But much to Oz’s surprise, Theodora explains that these savage warriors are actually here merely to escort them to her sister, Evanora – and they form a march around them, chanting “Oh-we-oh, yo ho!”. The interesting thing with this script is that, unlike with the movie, they didn’t try to make us entirely believe that Evanora and Theodora were purely good before their turn to wickedness, and they didn’t try to play the “Oh, the wicked witch of the west is somewhere, but where?”. Instead, the original script approach was to present these two characters, Theodora and Evanora, that appear good to Oz, but clearly are much more morally ambiguous to the viewer, and who are promptly guessed as the Wicked Witches – from Theodora making the balloon burst into flames, to her testing the Wizard magic with a lion that could have killed him… And another early scene that shows the discrepancy between what Oscar as a character knows and what the audience knows: arriving in the magnificent and beautiful city, Oscar and Theodora are cheered on by all the citizens of the City, who play music and throw rose petals and applaud. The script insists that the citizens of Oz are actually formed of inhabitants taken from the four corners of Oz: Winkies and Munchkins, Gillikins and Quadlings, all dressed “in different regional colors, and all enthusiastically waving green and white flags and pennants”. Oscar is said to “eat up” and wave back at the crowd like a “returning war hero or a campaign politician”… but the audience actually get to see what Oscar doesn’t see – the fact that the palace guards of Evanora, “uniformed bully-boys”, keep passing behind the crowd, making sure the citizens are cheering the wizard’s entrance with “enough gusto”, and overall giving the audience a strong sense that all is not what it quite seems in the Merry Old Land of Oz… (Funnily we also get here the line “What, no fireworks?” from Oscar, delivered to a confused Theodora who asks “What are fireworks?”
Escorted by Theodora, still “grand and glorious”, Oscar finally meets Evanora, Queen of Oz, sitting on the Emerald Throne – older than Theodora, but no less attractive, with a “powerful presence” and “penetrating gaze”. Evanora, curious and amused at the sight of the Wizard, notes that he does not kneel in front of her, and Oz answers that he is American “and Americans kneel to no one”. Evanora, delighted by the Wizard’s character, has him escorted by Munchkin maids to his chambers, and once she is alone with Theodora, she reveals that she saw everything that happened since the Wizard’s arrival in his crystal ball (just like in the movie – and Theodora is also clearly aware of her sister’s surveillance, since earlier she seemed to spoke to her sister despite her not being there, and now it is revealed that it was because she knew she was watching their every move). Evanora also has a “big sister” moment with Theodora, as she points out she noticed how Theodora grew to like the Wizard, and how he “likes” her in return. Theodora is almost blushing and can’t look at her sister in the eyes… And then we are dropped the frightening lines of Evanora: “And who can blame you? You’re still so young… and you still have feelings, don’t you?”. After this ominous line implying that Evanora doesn’t have any feelings anymore herself, she reassures Theodora that she did the right thing by bringing the Wizard here.
After Oscar enjoyed his private chambers and a large meal, he has a private chat with Evanora who, just like in the movie, goes to show her the “Room of Resplendence”, the Crown Jewels of Oz, enormous piles of gemstones and jewels. And just like in the movie, Evanora is trying to play on Oscar’s greed, as she heard from her sister that he liked “shiny things” (a nod to the Yellow Brick incident). But there are some differences here and there in the scene… Such as how Evanora actually slips word about how “pretty” her sister is and how she is fond of the Wizard (clearly trying to put them together), and also how the treasury is actually guarded by both guards AND a curtain of fire that Evanora needs to make disappear by magic (plus a stout wooden door with iron bands and multiple locks that Evanora also opens by magic, with just a wave of her hand).
But then… Things take a dark turn and we go away from the movie’s chronology. Evanora presents to Oz an artefact known as the “Diamond Dagger” – a six inches blade of razor-sharp steel, with a cross guard of filigreed gold, and a hilt encrusted in glittering diamonds. And Evanora says that he will inherit the treasury of Oz if he kills the “Wicked Witches”. Oscar is confused, as he only knew of one Wicked Witch. And Evanora reveals to him that her own sister, Theodora, is actually a Wicked Witch herself, secretly conspiring with the Wicked Witch of the South. Evanora insists that Oscar must use the Diamond Dagger to kill Theodora, and that Theodora only brought him to the city in hope of tricking him into killing her and become the new Queen. She seems convinced that Theodora offered the Wizard to share the crown in exchange for this murder, but Evanora warns him that after obtaining what she wanted, the seducing Theodora will “eat you like a spider”. And as Evanora dematerialize, fading into nothing, she declares “Prove to me you’re the Wizard you say you are, the Wizard we’ve all been waiting for. Kill my sister, then together you and I will defeat the Witch of the South once and for all. Kill my sister, Wizard – and you’ll be King.”
Now, Oz is deeply confused, and he tried to explain to Evanora she was wrong, to no avail. So, hiding the Dagger in his belt and understanding the danger Theodora is in, he promptly goes to her home and tries to convince her to leave the City… But before he can anything else, Evanora promptly appears in Theodora’s room – forming herself out of a moving shadow that was sliding along the wall. Using her magic, Evanora pushes Oscar against the wall and uses some telekinesis to choke him so he can’t speak, and she plays a Reverse Uno card on him. She pretends she is saving Theodora’s life, that Oscar was sent by the Witch of the South to murder her, and she uses the Diamond Dagger he has on him as a proof. Theodora, shocked but unable to truly believe her sister’s accusations, is flabbergasted – and it doesn’t help that Oscar has been knocked out cold by Evanora’s magic. However, playing the card of the subtlety, Evanora agrees that maybe she is wrong – maybe he wasn’t sent by the Witch of the South, but by another, or maybe he wanted to act on his own… and to make sure she isn’t acting “unfairly” here, she promises she will interrogate the Wizard tomorrow and get the truth out of him. But upon seeing Theodora’s horrified face, we understand that for Evanora “interrogating” means something truly awful.
#oz#Oz the Great and Powerful#theodora#evanora#wizard of oz#script#what could have been#oz movie#witches#script vs movie
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listening to wwwo and waiting to hear about Eursulon and his date/not-date as he's getting absolutely sloshed but got a gruesome murder instead :/
#these witches smh#we did learn hes a painter tho love that for him#fuck the wizard vs witches drama i want spirit shenanigans#wwwo#wizard witch and the wild one
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In the realm of utterly stupid things I've encountered on tiktok, I saw two people arguing about whether wizards or witches were superior, and naturally one was claiming wizard status and the other was representing for the witches. Wizard boy said that wizards are about understanding the mysteries of the universe while witches just make homemade cough syrup out of herbs. I inserted myself into this saying that at least cough syrup helps other people and the only thing wizards do for anyone outside of the wizards community is pose to have their portraits airbrushed onto the sides of vans. He accused me of being deaf to the music of the cosmos, and I told him to go ponder his orb.
He said that as a witch I was being a huge hypocrite to bring up orbs since the moon ain't nothing but an orb, and then he blocked me and now I can't access any of those videos anymore, and I feel vaguely more stupid than I did before the whole conversation occured
I am completely genuine when I say this: thank you so much for sharing.
#astounded but also not surprised that magic practice tiktok has turned into unironic witch vs wizard discourse#“go ponder your orb” is such a good insult for that purpose
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Time for some head-canon:
Magicians/Magus/Mage deal primarily in the art of incantation (that is to say speaking words, or the waving of hands or implements to invoke magical effects), while witches deal closer in alchemy by infusing ingredients with magical properties and thereby creating potions/tinctures etc. It is not uncommon for one or the other profession (because that is what they are. Jobs.) To dabble in the other because they both fall under the umbrella of "Wizard". A magician is one who imposes their will upon latent forces of chaos to produce an effect that otherwise had no reason to happen (setting a hex, or producing fire). This is why attaining the title of "Supreme Wizard" is so difficult, because it implies mastery of both crafts.
I think its also important to distinguish alchemists from what witches perform. While an alchemist uses the natural properties of elements to produce a natural result (enhanced strength, explosions, mutagens, etc); a witch infuses magic into her ingredients. Theoretically an experienced witch could use any ingredients to create a brew but some ingredients tend to retain certain facets of magical imbuement better (e.g. eye of newt will manipulate light magic more readily than say frogs legs, or wormwort).
Its also important to distinguish these abilities from sorcery, and patron based magic such as warlock, and clergy. The magics of the Wizard profession are exclusively attained by diligent study and practice, where as sorcerers, warlocks, clerics and the like deliver chaos from outer planar sources, like deities, cosmic radiation, and dense chaos anomalies. I won't be getting into those in this post though.
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[Plain text: "Real Magic". End PT.]
[Image description: digital art of two versions of Luz from The Owl House. One Luz is in her Season 1 design and kneeling on the ground, wearing her Azura hat and clutching her fake staff from Witches Before Wizards. She's looking at her Titan form in awe, as Titan Luz holds Stringbean's staff and conjures a swirl of magic around herself. She smiles at her younger self. End ID.]
Real Magic
#op please consider editing this id into the original for accessibility! no credit needed; your own edits welcome#ohhh i LOVE the choice of witches before wizards elements#the “you need to choose yourself” episode vs the episode where luz finally did :') (crying smiley)#the owl house#luz noceda#eyestrain
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Lucas el Hechicero: Oye, Hazel, debes abrir portales, voy a destruir la magia.
Hazel: Claro, hazla volar.
Porky: E-Espera, Hazel, tú e-estás hecha de ma-magia.
Hazel: Mira, para serte sincera… Siempre creí que traía más caos que beneficios.
Fuente: Star vs. las Fuerzas del Mal (2015 ~ 2019)
#looney tunes#incorrect quotes#el show de los looney tunes#the looney tunes show#daffy duck#pato lucas#lucas el hechicero#the wizard#porky pig#bruja hazel#witch hazel#star vs the force of evil spoilers#star vs las fuerzas del mal
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watched a bootleg recording of wicked because i wanna write a seminar about it and there's no official recordings of it and truly i love this musical so much, i hope the movie will live up to it 💖
#idk if i ever mentioned it here since i pretty much left tumblr when i started uni#but i'm studying literature and gender studies#this seminar is so interesting#it's about fairy tales and disney and how it shapes our views around women#especially the heroines relationships with the morher figure#but we also talked about witches which is why i decided to use wicked#i'm making a comparison between the og wicked witch in the wizard of oz vs elphaba in wicked#i haven't started writing it yet but i hope it's gonna turn out well
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Take A Chance On Me Masterlist
Pairing: Soldier Boy x f!Reader, Reader POV
Summary: When you decided to work with Butcher and his merry band of supe hunters to take down Homelander, you never expected to be saddled with a sullen, grumpy, jerk like Soldier Boy when the job was done. The more you’re around him the more you hate him, but you can’t help but wonder, is he really as big a jerk as you think? Reader is a supe with plant powers. This takes place in an AU about a month after the end of The Boys Season 3, in which Butcher has let Soldier Boy continue to work with him on his team. (I'm real bad at summaries, please forgive me!)
Tropes: Enemies to Lovers (Eventual), Little bit of Grumpy vs. Sunshine, Age Difference (Reader is in her 20s), Protective Ben/ Soldier Boy
Spotify Playlist 🪴
Chapter 1: Are You Always Like This?
Chapter 2: What A Great Freakin' Way To Start The Day
Chapter 3: Please Remember To Take Your Happy Pills
Chapter 4: You Want to Live Where?
Chapter 5: We Got Us An IKEA Virgin
Chapter 6: Best Friends Forever
Chapter 7: It’s Not A Date
Chapter 8: It's Still Not A Date
Chapter 9: Don't Let The Bed Bugs Bite
Chapter 10: Brother Dearest
Chapter 11: It’s Giving Kidnapping?
Chapter 12: Skip The Bagel Next Time
Chapter 13: Taking Out The Trash
Chapter 14: Don't Be A Bundt Cake
Chapter 15: I Don't Know What You Did To Me!
Chapter 16: I Thought I Was In Love Before
Chapter 17: Coming Soon!
{One Shots}
Open Mic Night: When Ben and you go out on a double date with Annie and Hughie, you realize that maybe it was a bad idea.
Little Things: All Soldier Boy wants for Christmas is to find the perfect gift for you and all you want is for your boyfriend to have the best Christmas he has in forty years.
Last Updated: 12/20/2024
Taglist:
@roseblue373 @mrsjenniferwinchester @corruptedcruiser @winchesterwild78 @the-super-who-locked-wizard
@criminalyetminimal @52ndstreeet @bitchykittenconnoisseur @anna6307
@faephoria @possiblyafangirl @jqtaro @quietlybitchy @tinydancer40
@roger-that-cap @megara0224 @miskwaadesiwag @rainyeggvoidpurse
@soldiergrimes @tiffsbagels @podiumackles
@ifyouwerethemoon @ririshkin @peachhiz @fitxgrld @sukunassfinger
@xx-spooky-little-vampire-xx @ej13928 @deans-spinster-witch @kr804573 @modiddys-blog
@acciosherlockholmes @minas-fantasies @fireskyy
@n-o-p-e-never @nesnejwritings @am0rem @tpwkcalli @momggn
@fitxgrld @whimsicalcherry @ladysparkles78
@spxideyver @zepskies @impala67stellawinchester
@reidtomewinchester @samanthadegaro @glossy01 @nikimisery
@tunnelvisionlove @incandxscents @winchester-stark @samahanta
@melonmochi
@kamisobsessed @whichwitchwanda @karolina-12110905 @jcollins03-blog
@pixviee @filmologetica @yvonneeeee @c1nnamong1rl29 @kmc1989
@livya99 @cherrygirl444 @tulipsvanilla @angrydragon90 @chi-raz
(Photos on Mood Board From Pinterest)
#soldier boy x you#soldier boy x reader#soldier boy#soldier boy x female reader#jensen ackles soldier boy#soldier boy x y/n#soldier boy/ben#soldier boy fanfiction#the boys amazon#the boys fanfic#jensen ackles#soldier boy fic#the boys fanfiction#the boys season 3#jackles
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I know that Toto is gonna love the heck out of Elphaba and be growling the second he sees the Wizard. Animal rights activist vs. guy who seems like he’d be scared of puppies. I want to see Toto be Elphaba’s best friend.
In the Wizard of Oz, Dorothy and Toto are kidnapped by the witch, who tries to drown poor Toto, but he escapes to get the others. This time I imagine Elphaba gently taking the dog in her arms and asking him to help lead Fiyero and the others to her. Then she enchants the shoes to give Dorothy a way home, because Elphaba knows the Wizard can’t give that to her whether Dorothy kills her or not, and Dorothy is a lost child who clearly doesn’t want to kill anyone and regrets killing Nessarose (even though it was clearly Morrible).
#“If the wicked witch is so wicked why does my dog love her?”#“And if the Wizard is so wonderful why won’t Toto stop growling at him?”#dorothy gale#wicked#wicked 2024#wicked movie#wicked the musical#wicked Elphaba#elphaba thropp#toto#The Wizard#the wizard of oz#wizard of oz#elphaba wicked#wicked musical
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I know this has been noticed before, but Glorfindel delivering a prophecy about the Witch-king's destruction does not mean that Glorfindel is laying down the law about the Witch-king's vulnerability. Glorfindel in no way has that ability. He's struck by foresight about how the Witch-king will eventually fall and knows it won't be by the hand of "man." This doesn't mean any non-man/Man on the battlefield could have done it, or that Merry or Éowyn have some special "not a man" powers or abilities vs the Witch-king, but that Glorfindel prophetically knows the person/people who are going to end up doing it will not be men in any sense.
The ambiguity of Glorfindel's use of "man" here works really well for the English text, I'd say. In Tolkien's usage especially, "man" can mean "the species of humanity" or "adult male person," allowing for Glorfindel's prophecy to refer to Merry or Éowyn or both, but definitely not to Eärnur (an adult male and a human, however special).
BUT ALSO to be a pedantic nerd (when am I not?):
In-story the direct context of Glorfindel's prophecy is Glorfindel trying to convince Eärnur of Gondor not to pursue the Witch-king in Gondor's campaign against Angmar after the destruction of Arthedain. Glorfindel held him back at the time by telling him that he wasn't destined to defeat the Witch-king. But Glorfindel is a High Elf out of Valinor and Eärnur is a Númenórean prince of Gondor. Even by the end of the age, it's still very likely that a conversation between two such people would be in Sindarin or Quenya, and this interaction happens long before then.
This matters because, while the man/Man ambiguity works really well on a literary/meta level in English with what ends up happening, in the world of the story it wouldn't have been delivered in a language that actually contains that ambiguity (even Common may not, for all we know, but is unlikely to have been used here anyway). So, for instance, if Glorfindel was speaking to Eärnur in Quenya, he would have likely used either nér (adult male) or atan (human being), depending on which he actually meant.
From everything I've read of Tolkien's thoughts on the defeat of the Witch-king, I personally think it's likely that the prophecy would have referred to Éowyn rather than Merry, instrumental as he was.
But weirdly, this actually makes a lot of sense for the characters as well, IMO. Given how extremely unusual it appears to be for women of any species to be in direct combat in the regions where the Nazgûl are mainly active in the Third Age, it fits the Witch-king's overconfidence if he understood it to refer to gender and regarded himself as no more likely to be slain by a male Elf or dwarf or wizard than by Eärnur. And that would also fit with the uncertainty that strikes him when Éowyn declares that she's a woman.
So, in-story, I think the prophecy actually is about her and, more broadly, about gender.
#anghraine babbles#long post#anghraine's meta#anghraine's headcanons#éowyn#legendarium blogging#lord of the rings#glorfindel#witch king of angmar#meriadoc brandybuck
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