- Hello internet, my name is Daniel. It sure was hard growing
up with an apostrophe in your name for like
scantrons and stuff O'Brien. Welcome to another unforgettable episode of Obsessive Pop Culture Disorder. The only show in the
internet that is called that I think. When we came up with the show
we didn't have lawyers yet so we didn't look into
things like titles yet. Someone else could
easily own the trademark. Today's thing is, today's
thing I have no idea why it's so important to me to pretend I don't put work into my show. I'm sure it adds the charm. Anyway, the Wizard of Oz. Even if you're never
watched the 1939 classic the Wizard of Oz, you're probably familiar with its plot and characters. Dorothy, a lonely Kansas farm girl who counts middle aged farmhands and a dog as her only friends bumps
her head during a tornado and passes out. While sleeping, she has what
most of us would consider a traumatizing nightmare. Oh yeah, we should have a title card. In which she casts herself
as an unwitting murderer, not once, but twice, three times if you count what she did to fashion
wearing socks with pumps. Does that count as a fashion murder? I don't know, I'm not the authority because below this desk
I'm wearing a bathing suit. But it seems like probably a
fashion crime of some kind. Her first episode of manslaughter happens when her house lands on the
Wicked Witch of the East, a living, breathing, humanish person who's death immediately
prompts a joyful song about how she's totally dead
and burning in hell now. ♫ Ding dong the witch is dead ♫ The wicked witch Manslaughter number two happens when Dorothy accidentally throws water on the Wicked Witch of the East's sister, the Wicked Witch of the West. I guess if you have siblings, your Wizard of Oz name
is the one adjective you share with your siblings plus the most basic thing that you are plus your location relative
to your brothers and sisters. Which I supposed makes
me Sweaty Boy West Coast. I have lots of nicknames and that's not even in the top 10 of the worst. Anyway, water it turns out
was WWW's only allergy. She probably melts and it's terrifying. Take it from me, Old Splash Mouth. Her death is also greeted with cheers because the only other
person who loved her is decomposing under a
house in Munchinland. Sidebar, I know there
was a series of books and a huge musical that
humanized the witches Elfba and Nessa as they came to be known, but no one was thinking about that when they made this movie. They're just like (beep) these witches 'cause I hate them, I sure hope no one retroactively makes them
sympathetic when we're dead. That's messed up. We should talk about it but we won't because there's another title card coming. Before we get into color and Munchkinland, Dorothy gets upset because
her beloved dog Toto bites a mean neighbor Ms. Gulch and Gulch is like you
gotta kill that (beep) dog. Here's a letter from the
sheriff that says so. - That's for the sheriff to decide. Here's his order allowing me to take him. Unless you wanna go against the law. - And I agree that the neighbor is awful and the audience is
supposed to agree as well which is why she is the analog
for the main witch in Oz. But like you can't have dogs biting people, that's a law we still have. Certainly if my perfect dog bit some jerk and they were like put it in my basket so I can take it to the
sheriff to be destroyed, I'd be like one second, but
first real quick, get (beep) and then I'd run away
and my dog and I would change our identities. But the law is definitely the law. Toto bite that woman. The main reason I bring up Toto is that we spend the whole movie in Oz with Dorothy's adventures
and then she comes back to the real world
and everything's okay because it was just a dream except the dog stuff right? Except Ms. Gulch still wants
to murder her dog right? The inciting incident of the movie. That doesn't get resolved
just because Dorothy got her (beep) head bashed in. They're still gonna kill that dog. If most of the movie was
supposed to be a dream, the only real parts we have are Dorothy's dog bit a woman
who owns half the county and it's and issue. But still, that's not
even the biggest problem I have with the movie and plot twist, this is barely even about
what happened in the movie. Joining Dorothy in her
imaginary technicolor escape from justice are the three men
who work on her family farm now dressed up like freaks. Her choice companions are
problematic in my book but I'll get to that in a minute. The real problem with the Wizard of Oz is that Dorothy's dream was never meant to be a dream at all. When L. Frank Baum wrote the Wizard of Oz, he played it straight
as in Dorothy really did travel to Oz and met a
scarecrow, lion and tin man and those three friends
weren't just lazy analogs for the adult men in her life. Magic was real. It was MGM, the studio behind the movie, who looked at the box office numbers behind recent fantasy movies
and decided audiences needed their witch and wizard
stories grounding in reality. So they settled on the tired
old Allison in Wonderland, it was all a dream ending. Why was this a big deal? In one two minute scene,
the studio stripped Dorothy of her entire adventure and
turned her into a crazy person. - She got quite a bump on the head. We kind of thought there for a minute she was going to leave us. - But I didn't leave you Uncle Henry, that's just the trouble. I tried to get back for days and days. - There, there, lie quiet now. You just had a bad dream. - Without the dream,
Dorothy is Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter and ET rolled into one. She was conceived in print before most Americans had flushing
toilets in their homes. Without the dream, she's a
real deal witch slaughter who traveled on foot across a country that no one in her world
had ever seen before. She built a team of fellow adventurers, exposed a fraudulent leader, and liberated two different races of
Oz dweller from bondage. She even survived a heroin overdose. - Here Tinman, help me. Oh this is terrible. - Turn her whole story into a
dream and we've got problems. For one thing, this
teenage girl passes out, wakes up and blurts out that the three men who work on her aunt and uncle's farm were with her on her dream. - And you and you and you and you were there. - Not her aunt or her uncle,
just their work hands. That's a sex dream right? Oh you know the farmhand
well I had this crazy dream where I helped get him a
hardon and he loved it. Even if we take the high
road and dismiss the obvious indisputable fact that
Dorothy's whole adventure in Oz was a sexual
awakening, there are much bigger problems at play with her story becoming a dream sequence. The first is that everyone in the room laughs at her when she
tells them where she went. - All I kept saying to
everybody is I wanna go home. They sent me home. - When she asks doesn't
anybody believe me, her uncle answers of course we believe you with the enthusiasm of a wet sock. - Doesn't anybody believe me? - Of course we believe you Dorothy. - In the next breath
Dorothy gives up believing her dream was real, cheerfully exclaiming, well anyway Toto we're home. And announces I'm not ever going to leave here ever, ever again. Or you know, that line
but with a reasonably convincing Judy Garland impression. I'm better at guy voices. - But anyway Toto, we're home. And I'm not gonna leave
here ever, ever again. - The book ends with
Dorothy landing back home, hugging her aunt and saying I'm
so glad to be at home again. The movie ends with Dorothy professing her undying love for her home, like her house is a new God that needs her exclamations of loyalty. Everyone but our camera
operator take a step back and think about who was
in those first audiences watching Dorothy accept
that her death defying romp through Oz was just a fantasy and being at home is all that matters. It may have been 1939,
but I'm guessing the seats were filled with the same kinds of people who go to family movies
today, moms and kids. But these weren't just any moms. In a few short years, the
moms in the Oz audience would be asked to do
something that no generation of women had ever done before, get out of the house and start working for the good of the country. That's right, it's a
feminism and a war thing. You thought I was just
making fun of a perfect movie because I'm weird. Well guess what, I am
but I'm also passionate and preaching. By 1944, here were over 19 million women in American factories,
shipyards, and offices presumably riveting everything
they could get their more weathered than my current hands on. But when their husbands and boyfriends and brothers came back from World War Two, the ladies were sent home
so the vets could have jobs. In other words, they got Dorothyed. After learning how to build cool stuff and manage the home front
while the men were away, women got the message that
their adventure was over and home was where they belong. One of the first people
to give them that message was Dorothy herself. America got one main stream fantasy hereon through most of the 20th century and some nameless
executive not only turned her whole hero's journey
into a make believe story in her head but they
also landed her exactly where she started with no lessons learned other than stay home forever. Also, and I need to point this out, this is one of my favorite
Obsessive Pop Culture Disorder observations and I think the
obvious reason behind that is that I didn't come up with this one. Christy Harrison wrote this
because she watches the Wizard of Oz and thinks
have you considered how studio executive
turns what was a feminist hero story into propaganda to keep woman out of the workforce after the war? I watch Wizard of Oz and
think flying monkeys, I'd like a flying monkey. If I had one I'd name it Walter. That's the most I've ever
thought about this movie. Anyway, Christy, what was
that, there was a war you say? Get right outta town. Christy should be doing
this video instead of me but she can't because she's busy doing literally the exact same
nine to five job as me while also raising three children. I'm the guy who gets to
say God, it's exhausting coming up with another OBCD every month. Christy legitimately emailed to say, hey I found some free
time and wrote this thing that might work for your
show if you need it. Christy is talented and
thoughtful and supportive. You should all have a
Christy in your life. Women! Anyway, that's it for this month. Join us next week when our topic will be Christy said what about me? She thinks she can take my job? Well guess what honey I got,
bye, I got news for you. You are a serpent, you are
a duplicitous snake Christy. Your kids are (beep) (laughter)
the dog is probably bullshit.
This guy have to talk like he's 15? WTF cracked is usually... Well once in a while decent. This blows! I couldn't watch more than 2 mins cause he's trying to hard to be dumb when... Uh he's clearly pretty smart... Oh Youtube. You shape people in odd ways.