The Wizard Of Oz Shops At Hot Topic

As far as I'm concerned, Todd McFarlane retired sometime in the mid 90's. He's been spending the past ten years dabbling in toys and such the way senior citizens dabble in watercolors or square dancing. Now he's dabbling in film again and the results promise to be as original as Marilyn Manson's ooo!-scary take on Alice In Wonderland.
McFarlane is teaming up with writer Josh Olsen (A History of Violence) to make a film Variety calls "...a revisionist take on the L. Frank Baum books that hatched The Wizard of Oz." This is not to be confused with that other announced "reimagining" of Oz starring Zooey Deschanel. This version is presumably inspired by McFarlane Toy's bizarre line of Oz S&M figures.
Here are some pearls of wisdom from the same creative genius who brought us Spawn Vs. The Pedophilic Ice Cream Man: "My pitch was ‘How do we get people who went to Lord of the Rings to embrace this?’ I want to create (an interpretation) that has a 2007 wow factor. You’ve still got Dorothy trapped in an odd place, but she’s much closer to the Ripley from ‘Alien’ than a helpless singing girl."
Clearly this man has a firm grip on what makes Baum's classic work.
Now, as I said, the screenwriter is the same man who adapted A History Of Violence, so this may not suck. From Variety's article- "I saw those toys, and Dorothy as some bondage queen isn’t something I want to do. The appealing thing about the Baum books to me is how wildly imaginative they are. There are crazy characters from amazing places. I want this to be ‘Harry Potter’ dark, not ‘Seven’ dark."
Here's the aforementioned McFarlane Toys figure of Dorothy as bondage queen:



You know, I may not mind seeing Zooey Deschanel in this version after all.
Find the full Variety article HERE.