Next year marks the 75th anniversary of The Wizard Of Oz, and television executives all over California are freaking right the hell out about it. As of this posting, there are currently five different adaptations of the 1939 film in development. Five. Try to guess if at least two of them invoke Game of Thrones in their descriptions. Spoiler alert: Of course they do. (If all of this results in Dorothy having sex with the lion while the Tin Man burns the scarecrow alive, I will be very disturbed.) And, somehow, neither of those are the most outlandish of the bunch. That honor, as it usually does, goes to SyFy, who has turned Dorothy into a man and made her a warrior. Everyone is on really good drugs. That is the lesson here.
Anyway, here is a quick guide to the projects currently in development.
Title: Dorothy
Network: CBS
Dorothy is a medical drama from the people who brought you Elementary. It is set in New York, and is “inspired by the characters and themes” from the movie. I have no idea what that means. I’m kind of hoping Dorothy is a doctor at a hospital and the Lion, Tin Man, and Scarecrow are all sassy med students studying under her.
Title: Emerald City
Network: NBC
There’s not much out there about this one yet. All we know is that it’s a dark, Game of Thrones-style reimagining that will draw its inspiration from all 14 books in L. Frank Baum’s Oz series. Translation: Dorothy has dragons now. Probably.
Title: Dorothy Must Die
Network: The CW
This one is based on an upcoming young adult novel. Here’s Deadline’s rundown:
It is a revisionist take on the classic tale set in present day, 80 years after Dorothy Gale supposedly came home. In reality, the magically-ever-youthful Dorothy has stayed in Oz, presiding over a now fascist fairyland with her perfectly manicured iron fist and the help of her henchmen – the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion. But when another young woman from Kansas is swept up in a tornado and magically dropped into this war-torn Oz, our hero discovers a revolutionary underground of witches and enchanted beings only to learn that she is destined to lead their people in the fight to reclaim Oz from a power-hungry Dorothy’s ruthless clutches.
To recap: The Wizard of Oz is now The Matrix. Please make a note.
Title: Red Brick Road
Network: Lifetime
PERSON MAKING PITCH: So, like, there’s the Yellow Brick Road, right? But there were also red bricks. And the red bricks go somewhere else. Yeah, to, like, the oldest and most dangerous parts of Oz. Super-dark, super-edgy.
LIFETIME EXEC: So it’s like Game of Thrones?
PERSON MAKING PITCH: Not really. It’s more like a versi-…
LIFETIME EXEC: Because I’d really like it if it were like Game of Thrones.
PERSON MAKING PITCH: It is exactly like Game of Thrones.
LIFETIME EXEC: Perfect.
Title: Warriors of Oz
Network: SyFy
SyFy and the Russian director of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter are teaming up to make a post-apocalyptic Wizard of Oz miniseries in which Dorothy is a man who is armed to the teeth and hellbent on taking down the despotic wizard who rules the land. Let that sentence wash over you for a while, then set your DVRs, because WHOA DOLLY that sounds like some kind of bonkers television show.
