The Wonderful Wizard of Oz/Headscratchers

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • The Tin Man is so kindhearted that he can't stand to see a mouse killed by a predator...and so he takes out his ax and lops off the predator's head? How does that work?
    • Well, the mouse's death would be quite painful and graphic, where the beheading is relatively clean and painless, right?
      • Plus, the wildcat was knowingly trying to kill the mouse (all animals in Oz are sentient, remember), so really, he was saving her from a murderer.
    • Nick is the kindest fellow...but that kindness extends to protecting the innocent from harm. When innocents (or his Nakama) are in danger, all bets are off. Scarecrow's not much different, but he didn't have as many opportunities to show off the Badass streak.
  • Just what did the Wicked Witch of the West do to earn the "wicked" title? That is, what did she do in the past (before Dorothy arrived) that made her so feared amongst the populace?
    • The usual stuff - a tyrannic rule with the help of the flying monkeys?
      • That's about right. She enslaved the people of Winkie Country. Likewise her sister had enslaved the Munchkins.
    • According some of the later books, Oz used to be ruled by a line of kings and queens. The last king disappeared and four wicked witches split up Oz among themselves. The Wicked Witches of the North and South were overthrown by The Good Witch of North and Glinda the Good.
      • Also, she's guilty of accessory to musical theater.
  • If water is the only thing that can kill a witch, why did that first witch die from having a house fall on her?
    • Having a house dropped on you is NOT going to leave you in good shape, no matter what else your weakness.
    • Weaksauce Weakness. They never said it had to be pure water or liquid water for that matter. Even if the house itself is disconnected from the water supply, Dorothy herself being in the house at the time could have been enough. Or more realistically, Dorothy's house lands on witch, causes injury to witch's lungs, and complicated stuff ensues which leads to the wicked witch essentially drowning in her own bodily fluids.
    • Tornadoes also come with nasty rainstorms in tow, if I recall right. Caught in the rain probably didn't help matters.
    • Where is it said water is the only thing that can kill a witch?
      • To my knowledge, only in the "How It Should Have Ended" animation for The Wizard of Oz.
      • In one of the books, an early one, it says the wicked witches had been dried out as the result of being wicked for so long, making them vulnerable to water. Sort of like living mummies. So you'd expect them to get powdered pretty well by falling farm-houses, too. Now you just have to figure out why evil has a dehydrating effect.
  • Tin doesn't rust.
    • Could be partially justified, in that one of W.W. Denslow's color illustrations shows the Tin Man's joints are a different color, perhaps indicating that his joints are made of a different metal.
      • Actually, The Tin Man is made from tin sheets — which are sheets of iron coated in tin, which is what tinsmiths use to make products from. The tin coating prevented the iron from rusting, but the Tin Man's coating may have chipped in places, and — more likely — is probably worn through at the joints.
    • Volkov's adaptation avoids this by making him made of iron instead of tin, but still.
  • The Tin Woodman's transformation occured gradually, with individual parts of himself being replaced as they were hacked off by his cursed axe. 1) How do you survive chopping off your own head (or) what injury is severe enough to require completely replacing your torso, but you still survive it? and 2) After the second or third limb, did he not think to just get rid of the axe? (or stop chopping wood for a living?)
    • 1) No-one dies in Oz. 2) Munchkinland was probably in a caste system at the time.
  • So is the Emerald City made of emeralds after all? Supposedly the Wizard built it out of glass, and that's what the green glasses law is for, but about halfway through the second book all mentions of glasses disappear and the emeralds are treated as real afterwards. Continuity error?
    • I assume the Scarecrow made it into a city of emeralds.
Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/The_Wonderful_Wizard_of_Oz/Headscratchers?oldid=1745510"