Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with some tidbits from the Oz, The Great and Powerful panel at Comic-Con 2012.
Moderator Chris Hardwick was beside himself for the chance to meet Sam Raimi. I’ve been there, I know how geeky-nerdy excited you can get and it was great to see him share that with the audience. I have to say, after many years of watching some awkward or downright horrible moderators, Chris was a breath of fresh air.
It also didn’t hurt that he brought a Sam Raimi sizzle reel comprised of the Evil Dead films, Spider-Man, Darkman and all the good stuff. Being in room of 6,000 people cheering for Ash one-liners is kind of why I come to Comic-Con.
Sam Raimi was joined by Michelle Williams and Mila Kunis as they showed some footage. I was going to rundown the footage for you, but Disney has already released the trailer. Click below to watch it and I’ll be back for the Q&A bits!
The big news from the panel’s Q&A was that The Classic (Sam Raimi’s very recognizable car) does indeed make it into Oz… in some form. The Classic’s engine block and cam shaft are part of The Wizard’s machinery.
Raimi was asked about The Shadow and he said that didn’t happen because they could never nail the script and he loves the character too much to go with a weak script.
There won’t be any ruby slippers in this film because they’re tied so closely to the original Wizard of Oz and they don’t have any rights to specific imagery unique to that film.
That doesn’t mean there won’t be any loving nods to the film, but it’s very much more based on L. Frank Baum’s books.
Scarecrow and Tinman are not part of this film because they’re tied closer to Dorothy and this one’s all about James Franco’s Wizard character, who starts out a cad and a womanizer who finds that Oz is really “a land of second chances.” In fact, he’s an adulterer and is being chased out of Kansas in his balloon when the tornado sweeps him to Oz.
Raimi stressed that it’s his story and that it really shows how he becomes ensconced in Emerald City, becomes its protector.
I really dug the imagery involved and Raimi seemed to be in love with what he was doing… and throwing us Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams (who doesn’t speak in Glinda’s twittery cadence, by the way) and Mila Kunis for a couple of hours doesn’t hurt either.
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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