Big Dog Ink's THE LEGEND OF OZ: THE WICKED WEST, has been one of the best things on the comic book market since it first came out. Even it's lowest points are better than most of what I read in comics. This week, two issues came out, #15 and 16, and while I'll be including the first in my regular comic book reviews, issue 16 warranted an extended review.
During the story arc concerned with the origin of the flying monkeys, we got to finally see Dorothy Gale again, but she wasn't really 'in action'. Instead she was the recipient of the story told by the leader of the flying monkeys, a leader that is now under her direct command. The whole time, while we got to see that colorful and engaging story unfold, there was this underlying tension. "What has happened to Dorothy?" we ask ourselves. There is no doubt she has changed, but to what extent? What has become of her?
Well here we started to have some of those questions answered. Dorothy, no longer the audience of a story now enters into another story that has been bracketed off for a few issues: The Tin Man, Jack and the others looking for Ozma of Oz. We've waited a long time for Dorothy's return to action, and damn was it good.
Dorothy has been transformed into a larger-than-life character, a being of vast power and a living mystery. It reminds me of what Time Lincoln did to Abraham Lincoln, though in this case it is a familiar fictional character who is raised to supreme heights. Dorothy is chided by her friends for not taking a more direct hand in events, but it is clear that the Dorothy before them is not the friend they once new. She is still 'in there', but this new almost cosmic being has duties and ways that cannot easily be understood by mere mortals.
This transformation intrigues me. The Dorothy of the original film is a far more vulnerable character, and so was the Cowgirl Dorothy Gale in LEGEND OF OZ, earlier one. That vulnerability, combined with a spirit of adventure, has been elevated to grand heights. And isn't that the central conviction of the Christian faith: that the vulnerable adventurer, after the final battle with evil in which they always seemed to have the lesser hand, has been elevated to heights unimagined, and is now synonymous with that mysterious force that both stands over our lives and yet seems so far apart from what and who we are now? Strange that the God who became one of us, who is our friend, is yet still that mysterious force that stands beyond all we know. That paradox, that Jesus made God something we can relate to and yet because of His association with God still stands 'as one apart' is evident here in this book.
Dorothy challenges Glenda as not being quite as 'good' as she always pretends to be, and in her own way asserts her new found authority: we can be sure that she is not one to be manipulated. She is no longer the victim of various forces, but is a force unto herself. She is warned that others very much like her have found themselves in positions similar to hers and were corrupted by the power. But Dorothy shrewdly asserts that this risk exists so long as the power exists, and she will not relinquish her new duties nor her new position to anyone.
I simply loved this issue. It had everything, the pacing was (as has been the norm for this book), perfect. The dialogue does not seem forced or awkward, even though the dialect is idiosyncratic for the book. That kind of interplay is hard to get right, but the writer Tom Hutchinson pulls it off brilliantly. The color is always amazing, and the art work is some of the best out there. On every level, this book works, and it includes themes that elevate the genre.
My overall rating for this issue is a rare 5 Stars!
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