WMG / Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

Plot

The Chocolate Room was laced with LSD or some other dissasocative hallucinogen.

This explains the following boat ride, etc. Perhaps Mr. Wonka wanted to see which kids had the most tolerance for stress, etc. so he induced the most stress he could by making everybody stoned in the beginning.

The tickets were not random.

Wonka specifically targeted the children who were to get tickets. How else could the fake-Slugworth get to them so quickly?

He had to already know who would get them. For whatever reason, Wonka thought they might make good candidates for being his "heirs"; but he wanted to be sure, and so he invented a contest to get them to come to the factory where he could observe them. He rigged it so that only the children he wanted to get tickets would receive them. The contest story was a way to cover up his targeting and to make sure that they would come.

Note that, at the end, Wonka says he "knew" Charlie would win, but he had to test him to be sure.

• He might just have had the fake Slugworth sent wherever the boxes containing tickets went.
• You still have to know which boxes they are. And you would have to hope that no one else will game the system — though you have to do that anyway. In this film, there was one grown-up scientist/reporter who tried to game the system with a supercomputer, but was balked because that computer didn't understand what one would do with a lifetime supply of chocolate. Computers were more ethical in the 1970s...
• The fake Slugworth might have helped Charlie just a bit more than the others, leaving the money for him to find, bribing the candy dealer to give Charlie that particular bar of chocolate. He would be watching to make sure it worked out, how else would he meet Charlie so quickly.

There are even plausible explanations for why Wonka picked each kid for their strengths and tested their weaknesses:

• Augustus Gloop, obviously, loves eating. He'd be obsessed with creating the most delicious candy. But he's a glutton, and the chocolate river proved that he'd be overwhelmed by all the candy and never keep a clear head.
• Violet Beauregard is competitive and cutthroat, an important quality for the owner of any business. She'd work hard to keep Wonka #1. But she's too competitive, and would care more success than preserving the integrity of the brand, hence the Gobstopper Incident.
• Veruca Salt is wealthy and knows how to handle money. She'd be sure to keep the company in the black and probably expand it. But she's too greedy, and doesn't care about the candy itself or the welfare of any other person or part of the business.
• Mike Teavee is very clever, and would be a creative and effective leader. But he cares more about solving puzzles than anything else, and doesn't even really like candy.
• Charlie respects and admires Wonka's company, and would preserve the Wonka spirit. But he gets overwhelmed by the wonder and loses his discretion, not to mention he's too eager to do what others expect of him, which is how he ends up taking the fizzy concoction and floating up to the ceiling, plus being tempted by Slugworth.

The children are, in order, a food expert, an aggressive businessperson, a savvy money manager, a brainiac, and a true candymaker. Wonka just needed to check who could best serve the needs of the factory.

• This theory would add an extra reason as to why Wonka was so angry in the office scene. He wasn't just mad that Charlie broke the rules and now no one was gonna inherit the company once he died. He was letting out all his frustration of how each of the 4 other kids he selected failed to overcome their flaws and now Charlie, the one person he thought would succeed, got distracted and failed the test. At first anyway.

The factory normally does have OSHA-friendly safety features.

But Wonka removed them just for this one day, just to facilitate the kids' downfalls. Notice that, in the Fizzy Lifting Drinks scene, Grandpa Joe's hand hits a pane of glass right under the fan blade. That's one of the safety features which hadn't been removed. Also, there's Wonka's phrasing: "You bumped into the ceiling." Not "You risked getting cut to ribbons." He left that stuff there for Charlie to find, to make him think he'd broken a rule and so do the right thing at the end to make amends, but he also needed Charlie's fear and guilt to be real.

The Golden Ticket found in South America wasn't a forgery.

Wonka's plan to find a successor required that each Golden Ticket wind up in the hand of a child, not an adult. Wonka couldn't be sure that only kids, or parents of kids who'd bring their child along as their "plus one", would find the things. He therefore arranged for each of the five Tickets to have some apparent subtle flaw or typo, so that if a couple of adults found a Ticket and insisted on taking the tour themselves, their Ticket could be "exposed as a fake" and a new Ticket-loaded chocolate bar, shipped out to some lucky child.

Or, perhaps, to a candy shop that "just happened" to be within spitting distance of Wonka's factory, whose proprietor would be instructed to hand it over to the first gracious, needy kid who came along. Nothing like a heartwarming "Poor Kid Wins Contest!" story to distract attention from how Wonka just set some poor schmuck in South America up for fraud charges.

The scary tunnel was a failed attempt to lessen the numbers of the group.

Wonka wanted a way to scare off some of the weaker-stomached children to help weed out his successor, who would need to have a taste for the bizarre, of which the factory obviously has no shortage (note that Charlie and Grandpa Joe seemed to enjoy the ride, only being startled by the image of Slugworth.) He almost had his way, as they were clearly disturbed, but they all proceeded to simply shrug it it off instead of demanding to leave.

• Alternately, he was testing the children to see whether they could be scared into stealing Gobstoppers (which is why the fake Slugworth appeared as one of the images in the tunnel). He anticipated that a cash bribe wouldn't be enough of a test for the wealthier members of the group (who wouldn't need the money nearly as badly as Charlie), so he tried testing them with fear and intimidation.

Wonka wanted all of the children to succeed, and the tickets weren't random

Think about it. Every kid would fit somewhere into a big scheme. Augustus was passionate about food, especially chocolate. He would be either the new concept person for new candies, if you will. Veruca would use her obviously rich connections from her father and sell the candy. Violet, what with her impulsiveness and competitiveness, would be part of sales too. Mike would take care of marketing on the ever-growing popularity of the television, and soon, the Internet. And Charlie? Well, who doesn't love a poor blonde kid winning the prize and becoming the new face of Wonka Enterprises? See, it was a Batman Gambit by Wonka that sadly failed and left him only with Charlie.

• On the other hand, he may have (correctly) figured that they would eliminate themselves through their various weaknesses, and decided to watch and wait for the survival of the fittest. As stated above, Wonka was ready to deal with whichever child was left.

The other children didn't all survive.

Unlike the book or Tim Burton's adaptation, this film made no attempt to show us that they did. That means it's quite possible that they didn't.

The Tunnel is a morality detector.

Only Charlie and Grandpa Joe react to the tunnel with fun. The only thing that scared Charlie was Slugworth being one of the scary images. The rotten children and their parents reacted repulsively to the more scarier images. The line from Veruca Salt was an excellent Even Evil Has Standards moment:

Veruca: Daddy, I want a boat like this! (after the tunnel)Daddy, I don't want a boat like this.

Wonka's reaction to the gobstopper wasn't because Charlie showed honesty, it was because...

...Charlie realized that Slugworth was a test.

Look at Wilder's portrayal of the character throughout the movie and ask yourself something. Would that character look past a major rules violation that disqualified Charlie from the prize because he did another thing right? For all we know, Wonka didn't disqualify the other kids for their moral failings, he was disgusted by their stupidity.

No, this Wonka would reward a child who saw through his game. And maybe Charlie did know. His suspicions were confirmed by Wonka, but who's to say he hadn't suspected all along? Maybe in Dahl's original book Charlie was too good to take revenge on Wonka, but this sometimes terrifying, slyly cynical adaptation wouldn't be above rewarding Charlie for having read that MagnificentBastard's book and Wilder's Wonka would agree.

Willy Wonka deliberately set up various aspects of the tour to ensure that the kids would be forced to take part in the Gobstopper test.

As someone who is somewhat of a Manchild himself, Wonka's main concern wasn't the kids' misbehavior, as that would be a result of their fascination of what they saw during the tour. Rather, his concerns involved whether he can trust them with the factory, as his business was almost destroyed by spies from rival candy companies. As such, after learning about each kid's Fatal Flaw (either from the news reports about each winner or from Mr. Wilkinson personally), Wonka made sure that the tour would include one aspect that would take advantage of each kid's flaw, thus ensuring that they lose their lifetime supply of chocolate and and subsequently take part in Wonka's Secret Test of Character involving the only piece of candy that they would end receiving due to their actions, the Everlasting Gobstopper. While the basic elements were the same for each kid, there were two kids where things had to be done differently:

1. Augustus Gloop. Wonka probably figured that given how much he likes food, Augustus would be the one kid who would definitely keep the Everlasting Gobstopper for himself than either try to sell it to Slugworth or give it back to him. As such, Wonka made sure that the part of tour which takes advantage of Augustus's gluttony happened before he gave the rest of the kids the Gobstoppers.

2. Charlie Bucket. As Charlie only found the final Golden Ticket the day before the big tour, Wonka didn't really have time to plan something proper that could cause him to lose his lifetime supply of chocolate. As such, the Fizzy Lifting Drinks were included in the tour in hopes that Charlie (or whoever found the fifth ticket, if it wasn't him) would take the Schmuck Bait and actually take a sip of the drink (which is what he and Grandpa Joe eventually did).

The trip through the Chocolate Factory is Charlie's dream.

"Let him have one last dream." And he does. The rest of the film after that point is all a dream experienced by Charlie. It explains the unrealistic and fantasy elements. Everything he experiences is the product of a wishful, vivid dream.

Bill was really Willy Wonka.

Bill the owner of the sweetie shop at the start of the film was really Willy Wonka in disguise. That explains why he gave Charlie a chocolate bar with a gold ticket in it. He also placed a coin in the gutter so Charlie can find it and buy the chocolate bar. It also explains why 'Slugworth' deliberately bumped into Charley. So in other words Willy Wonka lived a double life.

"Wonka" is Willy's pseudonym, and he chose the bad children specifically to get revenge on their parents.

Building on the theory of the tickets not being random, each of the children besides Charlie was picked because Wonka felt slighted in some way by their parents and wanted to intimidate or humiliate them through their children:

• The Salts: Mr. Salt processes and sells nuts, sometimes an ingredient in candy. Perhaps Salt works with the real Slugworth (or another competitor), or unknowingly supplies Wonka himself with nuts and once supplied him a bad batch.
• The Gloops: We never find out what the Gloops do, so they may well be another competitor.
• The Beauregards: Sam Beauregard is a stereotypical sleazy car salesman, so it wouldn't be a surprise if he sells awful vehicles. Maybe he or a subordinate salesman once sold a lemon to Wonka before he became famous for his chocolate.
• The Teevees: In her early years as a geography teacher, Mrs. Teevee failed the boy who would become Wonka and dismissed his odd theories of faraway countries like Loompaland.

Charlie had already been chosen and it was all a test.

Wonka had already decided to give the factory to Charlie (this makes even more sense if you subscribe to the view that Wonka is Charlie's father). Everything that followed was just a test for him to prove his worthiness. How did they get a ticket to Charlie without arousing suspicion? The Candyman was on the Wonka payroll (or perhaps even Wonka himself in disguise) and he actually handed a golden ticket to him.

The other children were all picked to be stooges (hence Slugworth was always in the vicinity when one of them found a golden ticket - he was Wonka's employee and knew in advance) to give the impression of a legitimate competition (and also to sell a few billion extra Wonka bars - the man runs a business after all) and all were supposed to fail. Note the very specific mishaps they suffer, as if every room they went into was tailor made to trip one of them up. Chocolate-loving Augustus is shown a chocolate river with no guard rail and a slippery bank. Gum-chewing record holder Violet is presented with a stick of magic gum, then told not to try it. Spoiled Brat Veruca, who gets everything she wants and already owns an entire zoo of exotic pets, is shown a golden goose, then told she can't have one. TV-obsessed Mike is shown a TV teleporter, then half-heartedly warned not to use it.

Charlie unexpectedly trying the fizzy-lifting drinks was almost a Spanner in the Works, until he redeemed himself by handing back the everlasting gobstobber.

Characters

Mr. Wilkinson is Slugworth's son after a Heel–Face Turn.

• Or some other close relative.

Wilkinson is Wonka's trusted assistant and a flawless actor, earnestly convincing Charlie that he's almost as rich as Wonka.

• Arthur Slugworth, president of Slugworth Chocolates, Inc. introduces himself to Charlie, offering him untold wealth if Charlie can get hold of an everlasting gobstopper and deliver the goods. At the end, Wonka lividly tells the Buckets that they're just as bad as the others, and they violated the agreement they first signed. According to the contract, they stole fizzy lifting drinks and hit the ceiling which now needs cleaning and sterilizing. The Buckets forfeit everything. Afterwards, Charlie knows that Wonka was right when he found out, with no excuse. He feels so guilty, because giving the Gobstopper to Slugworth would add insult to injury. Charlie apologizes, knowing that As the Good Book Says..., a gentle answer turns away wrath. Charlie gently and quietly puts the Gobstopper on Wonka's desk, Wonka was madder than a wet hen, and he's so ashamed of what he just said, bluntly blaming Charlie and Grandpa Joe. How could Charlie could do such a thing to Wonka, who was so generous until they figured out something was wrong. Wonka is pacified by Charlie's generosity, quickly cools off, and introduces them to Mr. Wilkinson and who works for Wonka, saving the best for last.

Grandpa Joe was faking disability so Charlie would work instead of him.

Joe was the healthiest old person of the house, but supposedly wasn't able to walk. Charlie had to work and care for his family because his family was sickly and old. When his grandpa saw Charlie had the golden ticket, he was miraculously cured, not just walking but singing and dancing. He went with Charlie to the factory with no repercussions on his health related to any preexisting conditions.

• Alternately, Grandpa Joe was faking disability because his genuinely-disabled wife was clinically depressed, and he feared she'd commit suicide if he didn't stay at home, keeping her company and (apparently) sharing her condition, at all times. Charlie's mother suspected her father was faking, but went along with the ruse because she didn't want her mother to kill herself. Fortunately, seeing Charlie overjoyed about finding the Golden Ticket made Grandma happy enough that Grandpa Joe felt it was safe to leave her alone for a few hours, just this once ... hence, his "miraculous recovery".

Grandpa Joe was feeding his grandson feces

• When Charlie got that Wonka Fudge Mallow for his birthday, he offered some to everybody else but they refused in sheer horror.
• Charlie claims he doesn't like the taste of chocolate in class but when he finds money in the gutter and goes to a candy shop, he scarfs down a candy bar like it's drugs. We didn't see Charlie scarf any "Wonka Bars" his grandparents gave him like that.
• Grandpa Joe pulled a candy bar out of his ass, literally. We all know that he couldn't got to a candy story if he didn't go out of bed to even use the can for 20 years and unlike Mr. Wonka, Grandpa Joe can't do magic.
• They had to do something to empty out those bed pans.

The Oompa Loompas are enslaved.

Mr. Wonka "rescued" them from Oompa Land where they were becoming endangered by the conditions there. He has them run his factory all their lives.Nobody ever comes out.

The Oompa-Loompas claim that they "live in happiness"; but in all the scenes they appear, they have a permanent scowl on their faces and look like they absolutely hate the world and everyone in it. Those Oompa-Loompas are one moralizing song away from declaring war on society and starting a massacre, starting with the children that annoy them so. (We only have Wonka's word for it that they were all right in the end; it's more likely that the Oompa-Loompas finished off both the kids and the parents as soon as the tour had moved on.) Willy Wonka himself is definitely next.

The Oompa Loompas are fine working for Wonka, but not for the reasons Wonka says.

You'd probably be cranky too, if you had to put up with a bunch of asshole kids interrupting your day with their stupid problems that you spent months practicing songs to shame them with. Perhaps since the Oompa-Loompas haven't seen human children at all, they are uncomfortable with them. Or even with humans in general, and are perfectly happy when it's just their boss.

The Oompa Loompas disdain the modern world because they know exactly how scummy it is, and being orange-skinned, green-haired midgets, they know they have no chance of making a gainful life in it anyway because they tried. Maybe not in England, but at some point the Oompa Loompas tried to live among humans and found out how badly that didn't work out. Returning to work for Wonka gave them a safe place to live, gainful work, and acceptance; they seem unhappy during the movie because they don't like children of the real world invading their otherwise paradise-like workspace.

The Pots-and-Pans Man is the real Slugsworth, or at least an old factory worker (or spy).

You all know about the freaky old man from early in the movie who speaks eerily to Charlie while he lurks about the factory's gates.

"Up the airy mountain, down the rushy glen, we daren't go a-hunting, for fear of little men. You see, nobody ever goes in... and nobody ever comes out."

This hints that he knows about the Oompa Loompas, which means that at least some of the old factory workers knew about them.

Perhaps the Pots man was Slugworth, who went "down in his luck" after Wonka's factory closed. This is related to the fake Slugworth going all around the world to the Ticket Finders and offering them a deal for some of Wonka's secrets.

The Pots-and-Pans was an old worker, or a spy for Slugworth, who tried to follow Wonka after all the workers were locked out. He was freaked out by the monsters of Loompaland; when he returned, he was reduced to a maddened old coot. Or Slugworth himself followed Wonka and was terrified, with similar results.

The tinker was a Mystic Romany.

The tinker was a Fairy Tinker.

This allows for weird fairies in unlikely places. Why this one would use Washington Irving's poetry (or is it older than that?) to refer to Oompa Loompas is anyone's guess.

• The poem was by William Allingham.

Wonka is Charlie's father.

Charlie's father is supposedly dead. But the way Wonka tells Charlie he's won is suspicious ("Oh, Charlie? ...My boy. You've won"). Grandpa Joe says he used to work for Wonka (assuming this is true like in the second movie, but what if he is truly his estranged father? Lacking faith in Wonka's ambitions, he and Wonka's wife betrayed Willy to a rival chocolate factory for money and were thrown out. Years later, Wonka realized he needed an heir and concocted a scheme involving five Golden tickets to test if his son was of good character.

• Willy is an extraordinary dick for much abandoning his extremely young son (and his senile mother) to the streets for something that's not even his fault. It's not totally out of character for Willy, but it's still one hell of a dick move. It's not like it would be the only dick move he's ever made. It would explain why Charlie's mom says his dad is dead — for her, that's easier to stomach than the truth.
• Alternatively, Charlie could be the result of a one-night stand between his mother and Willy Wonka. And Wonka - in a rare moment of guilt - decided to organize a gigantic media extravaganza as a means of choosing an heir to his empire, rigging it so that Charlie would win. This would go along nicely with the WMG that the contest was somehow rigged in Charlie's favor from the beginning.

Charlie's dad is in the military in Vietnam.

Possibly as a temporary assignment too brief for the Defense Department to move his family back from his prior overseas posting. It would explain both the Disappeared Dad and the fact that Charlie is both obviously American and obviously in Germany.

• Sorry to rain on your parade, in the '71 movie, he's dead. One of the lines in the movie:
  "If only his father were alive"
  • Maybe he was KIA.
  • Or POW, assumed dead.
  • Maybe he was eaten by a Vermicious Knid! Loompaland might be near Vietnam. It would help explain why there were so many casualties in that war...

The Oompa-Loompas are robots.

Synthetic-looking hair and skin. Blank facial expressions. Stiff movements. And as any geography teacher can tell you, there's no such country as Loompaland.

Wonka didn't get new workers; he simply automated in a Wonka-esque fashion. The Oompa-Loompas even work off a central computer, making them a hive mind, so they can improvise elaborate song-and-dance numbers in perfect unison.

The Candy Man isn't Wonka.

This could go two ways. Either the Candy Man is the candy shop curator, or the Candy Man is the general idea of candy and imagination (as expressed through the enjoyment of such things as a sunrise, the sparkling of morning dew, or, yes, candy) rather than any specific person.

• The Candy Man could also be The Candyman.

The Oompa-Loompas are communists.

"If you're not greedy, you will go far"?

• The actors who played them were all Russian...

Alberto Minoleta is descended from Martin Bormann.

Because Argentina Is Nazi-Land.

Or, Alberto Minoleta is Martin Bormann.

• He's been living under a false name and made a living for himself, with everyone too stupid or oblivious to figure out who he is. He used his millionaire in Paraguay status to fund and forge a fake ticket to hopefully acquire the Chocolate Factory as part of some weird 4th Reich plan.

Wonka was married once, and divorced.

• Just take a look at his office- his wife clearly took half of everything.

Slugworth works for Wonka the whole time.

Wonka is aware there are spies in his factory, so he sends one of his trusted employees to sniff them out. He changes his name to Slugworth to hide his identity, and Wonka creates a dummy corporation (Slugworth's Chocolate Inc.) for him to work as its boss. "Slugworth" is able to mingle with Wonka's competitors and report to him any important information. He made a reputation as Wonka's worst competitor to throw away suspicions. Slugworth's employees may also be Wonka's employees. He continue to work even when Wonka briefly closed his factory.

Augustus could have taken it all himself.

There's a blink and you miss it moment where during the contract signing the children are crowding to get to the contract. Augustus is the only child to act politely and actually hands the pen to Charlie. In this movie, little signs like that show strong moral fiber. It was bad luck and temptation that took out Augustus. If he had been able to avoid the river none of the other traps would have gotten his attention while every other child could have fallen to the other traps.

Wonka is one of The Fair Folk.

• The Oompah-Loompahs, too. They're a weird race of gnome/munchkins from from weird fantastical land unknown to science or geography that's full of weird alien monsters.

Wonka is a lot more benign than one would assume.

• His apparent sociopathy and such is mostly an act because he knows deep-down that the kid's lives aren't really in danger. The stuff about boiling fudge, furnaces and such was just to freak everyone out and the aim of the mishaps was to teach kids about the folly of their faults.
• Wonka is still a freaky Trickster who lies but it's all....at it's core....a bit a trolling with the purpose of character-building.
• Having him outright murder children just would make him less an eccentric hero and more a monstrous villain and a nice kid like Charlie isn't the sort of guy to team up with a mass-murdering psychopath.

Wonka owns the candy shop.

"Bill" and "Willy" both serve as variations for "William". Wonka uses "Bill" for the candy shop so people won't suspect he owns it. He sells competitors' products there because it both keeps the facade and serves as a way to know what the local kids prefer.

Wonka is the father of John "Jigsaw" Kramer.

John's real name is John Wonka. He changed his surname to Kramer when he abandoned the Wonka family & fortune because he couldn't stand being associated with the Wonka company. John used his father Willy Wonka's talent for endangering factory guests, which Willy used to stop them from spilling trade secrets, for a plan of world domination via booby traps and murder.

Mr. Curtis was saved by the phony ticket.

Once the people who abducted him heard about the last ticket being found in Paraguay, they let him go. Once his wife told him they wanted their Wonka Bars, he congratulated her for not handing them over.

Charlie's Mom is Draco in Leather Pants or maybe a Jerkass Woobie

Sure, she's a widow trying to feed six people on a washerwoman's pay, but still...

• Bed ridden Grampa Joe is lamenting that Charlie works too hard and should be playing, to which she responds with "There aren't enough hours in the day." could be interpreted as a passive aggressive "Reason You Suck" Speech.
• Charlie (fake) complains that cabbage water isn't enough a pulls out a loaf of bread. "Where did you get that?" sounds rather accusatory.
• Charlie gets a raise and hands it over to her, she doesn't even hesitate to take it.
• Charlie wants to buy Grampa Joe's tobacco? Sure, go ahead.
  • Grampa Joe says he's quit smoking? No, keep smoking.
• Her end of her conversation with Charlie before her Tearjerker Award-Bait Song is telling him he's not special and doesn't stand a chance of finding a Golden Ticket, and then wonders why he's sad.
• The last Ticket's been found, the contest is over? We should wake up Charlie and tell him his dream is dead.

Settings

The tunnel was actually the psychological portion of Wonka's recruitment strategy.

Like any other businessman,Wonka needs to know his successor can mentally handle the weight and responsibilities of running a factory,especially one such as his own. Why this particular test involved a creepy song and even creepier imagery witnessed by CHILDREN is anyone's guess.

The scary tunnel is Hell.

Making Wonka god (Who can make the sun shine?), Slugsworth satan (Note that Satan will pretend to be Jesus in the second coming or whatever), Charlie Jesus, the rest of the factory purgatory, and the final scene heaven.

The factory was actually another dimension.

At first glance the factory looks normal but it is a cross between the land of OZ and Wonderland. The Oompa Loompas are similar to the Munchkins as they are tiny men and like in Alice in Wonderland the factory is full of nonsense such as rooms getting smaller and being full of optical illusions and Willy Wonka is very like the Mad Hatter as he wears similar clothing including a top hat and waistcoat and like the Mad Hatter he is crazy and insane. So in a way Charley and the other guests left the human world to another alien like world.

The scary tunnel is a hyperspace jump

• If the technology of The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy is to be believed, this theory can make perfect sense -
  Slartibartfast: Human, the room we are about to enter is technically not within our planet, it can only be reached by a vast tract of hyperspace. It may disturb you.
  Arthur Dent: Oh...
  Slartibartfast: It scares the willies out of me. Hold tight...

The fizzy lifting drinks room is underneath the W-O-N-K-A smokestack.

That room is WAY tall, Charlie and Grandpa Joe are going up the inside of the smokestack.

"Snozzberries" are S(ch)nozz Berries.

Getting your saliva everywhere is a nasty habit, but Wonka considers picking one's nose (probably) to be a worse one. Ergo, the snozzberries on the wallpaper are his idea of a nicotine patch for nosepickers.

• See My Uncle Oswald.
  • Considering that interpretation from that story, the "booger" one is weirdly less disturbing (considering you have children licking wallpaper intended for nursery walls. Pedophilia, anyone?).

Wonka's business is about to go under.

The Oompa-Loompas are on a contract that is about to be filled but Wonka has decided not to pay up. Instead he will hand over the company to Charlie, who will therefore take on the debt. Before that he creates a massive demand for his products (which he sells at exorbitant prices), so he can pocket all the cash, before disappearing again from public sight; leaving Charlie and his legal guardians responsible for paying the Oompa-Loompas and countering the lawsuits from the children's families concerning the industrial accidents that befell them. It was all there in the small print.

• Charlie would also be the target for the lawsuits and/or protests and boycotts that employing secret invisible mythical creatures over local union workers would probably attract, not to mention a fall guy if hiring little orange men without citizenship or legal identity turns out to be just as illegal as hiring unlawful aliens.
• Alternatively, since this movie came out the year OSHA was established, the debt that Wonka is trying to dodge is millions, possibly billions, of dollars in OSHA violation fines.

The children never saw the factory.

Wonka is an eccentric, and has an image to maintain. Real factories have lots of noisy machinery and a dull environment, and are not something that would grab the interest of children. Plus, he wouldn't want any children with their poor impulse-control around the delicate machinery. Instead, he showed them a glorified sound-stage which he billed as his 'factory'. Lots of special effects present that would give the children a neat experience that they would be talking about for years, but not put them in any real danger. The "Oompa-Loopas" are probably dwarf actors under an NDA that he hired for the day. At the end, everything was torn down and disposed of. If any government officials showed up later to investigate, they wouldn't find anything.

• Something tells me that whoever came up with this theory is a fan of the Disney Animated Canon, as it reminds me of Bolt's soundstage logic. If the studio behind Bolt's TV show was able to create an entire fake city inside (multiple?) soundstages, it wouldn't surprise me if Wonka decided to create a "fake factory" inside his own one solely to test the young ticket holders.

Crossovers

The SNL sketch where Al Gore Plays Willy Wonka's Brother is Canon.

In addition to making more sense as the ending than the whole glass elevator part, having Willy Wonka's square brother Glenn who is in charge of the paper work behind the factory pointing out the stupidity of giving a factory over to a child and that Willy Wonka is insane makes it brilliant.

Also explains that the Oompa Loompas need their green cards, a kid drowned in the chocolate river, and that all of the toilets in the factory are made of graham crackers.

Wonka is Sweet

Or becomes Sweet. Think about it. Anyone in the city he's in spontaneously bursts into well-written songs. The Oompa Loompas are his puppets before they got cursed.

Wilder's Willy Wonka is actually Heath Ledger's Joker

Let's look at the facts:

• Both wear long purple coats.
• Both have crazy hair.
• Both of their pasts are unknown.
• Both have an assortment of henchmen with weird faces.
• Both like to test people's morality.
• Both are utterly unpredictable.
• Both of them kill a lot of people.
• And, of course, both scare the living hell out of their movies' viewers.

His chocolate factory is actually another way to test people; to see if they'll willingly eat loads of a food that makes them fat, damages their teeth and puts them further towards diabetes. And the real reason he wanted Charlie to run his business after showing his true goodness. Because that goodness will make him more fun to corrupt.

The Candy Shop Owner is secretly the 22nd Century Controller, and the candy store is a Dalek outpost.

Goodbye, free sweets; hello, Dalek servitude. He absolutely despises this aspect of this job, but knows he has no choice. In the 22nd Century, he probably sends them all back home immediately after taking them there. In fact, the involvement of children is what drives him to rebel against his masters...the Third Doctor provided a way to finally do it. "Who knows? ''I'' may have helped to exterminate ''you''!"

Augustus Gloop was so traumatized he changed his name and decided to live away from chocolate

In The Simpsons episode "The Scorpion's Tale", the owner of the featured pharmaceutical company claimed to be Augustus Gloop and that the tube changed him. That gives a new perspective about that episode with a scene where Lisa tells Artie Ziff about Homer's failed attempt to locate the factory.

The Scary Boat Tunnel is actually traveling through the Warp

• You've got a boat which travels what appears to be a vast distance without actually moving (judging from the utter stillness when the visions fade) and horribly nightmarish images. What else could it be?
  • There is no evidence of Gellar fields being used, and it's doubtful the generators would fit on a boat. And without Gellar fields, your life span in the Warp is horribly shortened.

Willy Wonka is a Timelord/the Final Regeneration of The Doctor

Let's examine, shall we?

• First, His personality:-
  • He is an eccentric, super-genius
  • He has a very child-like sense of wonder, excitement and curiosity
  • This however seems to cover a darkness within him and a profound loneliness
  • Loves exploration, danger and adventure
  • Charges headlong into most situations
  • Able to remain calm and level headed, even in the most dire of predicaments
  • Does not suffer fools easily
  • Wonka Lies
  • Seeks out companions
• Next his factory and Elevator
  • The Elevator sas the ability to fly
  • Can travel through space
  • The factory's layout makes no sense and defies the laws of physics
  • The sheer size of the factory is too big for its outward appearance... it is bigger on the inside.

Willy Wonka is either the Doctor's final form or, just as likely, a Time Lord who avoided the Time War and now lives his life on Earth. He has selected Charlie to run the factory while he regenerates and goes on a new adventure.

Willy Wonka is a renegade Wizard

The fellow was probably sorted Slytherin, but had little use for Ministry of Magic politics or blood purity ideals (he's possibly "mudblood" or from a family that isn't held in high esteem, meaning he had to be even more cunning and devious than your average Slytherin), and figured he would use his ambition on the fringes of the Wizard world to try and work on breaking a Masquerade that he believes holds the Wizarding world back and endangers the Muggles needlessly. He has a little too much contact with Muggles to be acceptable by Wizard society, likely following the letter of any Muggle contact law, while abusing any and all loopholes he can find just to piss his fellow Wizards off. His factory is a fusion of Wizarding spells and Muggle technology, putting his philosophy into practice. As such, his tickets were sent to young kids with magical talents before Hogwarts (or other schools) would have conscripted them into the hidebound path he was glad to sneak away from.

• Wonka is George Weasley. Both redheads who create magical candy with strange side-effects (candy that turns the eater into a blueberry could have come straight from Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes), and particularly love giving it to those who deserve a little Laser-Guided Karma. The Oompa Loompas are house elves. The half-room is a reference to George's deceased twin brother Fred, without whom George is not complete. Wonka also claims to be "a trifle deaf" in one ear; George suffered an ear injury in Deathly Hallows.

Willy Wonka is a Volunteer

Talks in codes and literary references? Check. A known eccentric and intensely secretive? Check. Weirdly okay with child endangerment? Check.

Willy Wonka is a Genius.

• Catalyst could either be Staunnen or Hoffnung, depending on whether you want to see his ruling passion as wonder at the possiblities he has glimpsed or a determination to create the wonderland in which he wishes to live. As for foundation, he is very possibly an Artificer, since they are the ones who are most likely to create for the sheer joy of creation.
• He has a higher-than-normally possible variant of Assembly Line that lets him create enormous numbers of Wonders in Pill Form (his various candies). Being in Pill Form, his candy wonders don't trigger Havoc unless someone tries to analyze how they work.
• His factory is a kind of artficial bardo, something like a cross between a regular Bardo and an Unamada field, which is full of manes of all levels of sapience.
• Loompaland is a bardo full of all the Darkest Africa tall tales that was created when Africa was actually explored and mapped. The Oompa-Loompas moved to Wonka's factory because it provides them with a place which is safe from Havoc and with ample mania, but where they are also safe from the more dangerous Loompaland Manes.
• Charlie was a pre-Breakthrough Genius. The other kids were not, so as they fiddled with things inside the factory it set off Havoc and triggered their various dooms. This was the point of the whole Golden Ticket scheme.

Wonka is a changeling turned Goblin King

.

• Seeming is probably Wizened, as they are the seeming of artificers and wonder-smiths (Changelings who become Goblins retain their Seeming).
• His factory is actually a pocket realm inside the Hedge, accessible from the mortal realm through the doors. His candies are goblin fruits (which he grows in profusion), and the Oompa-Loompas are a tribe of hobgoblins sworn to his service. He has some technique that lets him harvest Glamour from the wonder that people feel when they eat his magical candies, which is how he gets the power to sustain everything.
• The Golden Ticket quest was an attempt to find a child who he could make a Goblin King in his place, allowing him to return to being a changeling (and possibly to die).