History Fridge / CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory

*** Though, at least in the second movie adaption, Augustus is fine when he exits the factory. Violet is permanently blue (but in said movie she thinks that [[CursedWithAwesome being elastic is awesome]]), Mike is streched thin. Veruca hasn't learned the lesson... but her father ''did'', and he's evidently going to be stricter with her daughter.

* The vehicles slowly get smaller as the film goes on. This means that [[spoiler: Wonka not only knew which rooms would take out which kids, but he also knew how many people they would lose per room]]]

* Over at the Headscratchers page, it's been asked why, in all versions, Mr. Wonka chose to close his factory and sack his workforce when he discovered his recipes were being stolen when he might have instituted tighter security measures, etc. instead. This version, without stating it outright, actually provides an interesting explanation if one thinks things through: This Wonka became a confectioner ForHappiness, believes in DoingItForTheArt, and is terribly sensitive about his work (as artists tend to be). Realizing that rivals were stealing/ripping off the wonderful confections he poured his imagination and heart into -- out of envy and greed, seeing it only as a commodity -- would have been absolutely soul-crushing for him, perhaps serving as a CynicismCatalyst. His emotional distress, in conjunction with his established eccentricity, might well have driven him to the extreme measure of closing the factory and only reopening it once he'd found a way to (via the self-contained Oompa-Loompa workforce as it turned out) make his factory virtually self-sufficient, that he might continue to make that outside world a happier place with his creations yet NeverBeHurtAgain by those who would find ways to exploit his gifts.

** Making chocolate bars smaller. Pointed out in a ''SaturdayNightLive'' [[CharlieAndTheChocolateParody parody]] with Al Gore:

* In the end of 2005 film, Charlie doesn't seem to be fooled in the slightest by Wonka's literal PaperThinDisguise when he's polishing his shoes. It helps that said shoes have his logo on the sole, as we just saw in the previous scene.

* Also at first it surprized me that Wonka's chocolate has such a primitive, cheap-looking package. But then it occured to me: his chocolate is marketed primarily at children, so bright, simple package is actually fitting.

* Veruca's parents are the only ones who get the same treatment as their child. It's common to blame the parents for their childrens' problems, and ''the Salts are participating in the same poor behavior as their daughter''. Veruca asks for a squirrel, and her father tries to bargain with Wonka. Since the whole family had the self-entitlement issue, they all went down the chute, and preumably all learned their lesson.

* Over at the Headscratchers page, it's been asked why, in all versions, Mr. Wonka chose to close his factory and sack his workforce when he discovered his recipes were being stolen when he might have instituted tighter security measures, etc. instead. This version, without stating it outright, actually provides an interesting explanation if one thinks things through: This Wonka became a confectioner ForHappiness, believes in DoingItForTheArt, and is terribly sensitive about his work (as artists tend to be). Realizing that rivals were stealing/ripping off the wonderful confections he poured his imagination and heart into -- out of envy and greed, seeing it only as a commodity -- would have been absolutely soul-crushing for him, perhaps serving as a CynicismCatalyst. His emotional distress, in conjunction with his established eccentricity, might well have driven him to the extreme measure of closing the factory and only reopening it when he was absolutely sure his work would not run the risk of being corrupted by others again.

* Charlie's paper airplane/letter to Willy Wonka flying over the audience and up to the balcony early in Act One is a sweet enough moment as it is...Then one realizes the image has an echo near the end of the show that shows just how far his dreams have come: the Great Glass Elevator, carrying Charlie and Willy Wonka, flies up into the night sky and over the first few rows of the audience.

* To get her ticket, Veruca Salt forced her father's workers, who are usually opening nuts, to search for it. Fittingly, it is another hard-working crew of nut-shellers that give her her comeuppance.
** And with regards to how they react to her, they probably weren't too happy to see someone in a ''fur coat'' approaching them!

* Also, and this applies to the book too, the Oompa Loompahs all know, and sing in unison, the songs sung at the children's punishments. Unless they have some kind of group telepathy that I missed, this means that these songs were rehearsed. They, and by extension, Wonka as well, knew EXACTLY how the children were going to mess things up for themselves. The implication being that Wonka did a bit of research on these kids' fatal flaws, and deliberately set up rooms to ensnare them until only Charlie remained.

* The logic behind the kids' "punishments" was always kind of interesting to me. While all four are spoiled, it's only Veruca's parents who are punished alongside her. This is apparently because, as the song says, they share the blame for her character flaw. With the others, however, this is apparently not so. While the text does make it clear that the Gloops, Beauregardes, and Teavees either encourage or turn a blind eye to their childrens' flaws, the blame does eventually fall soley on the kids themselves- it is Augustus who is sucked painfully up the pipe, it is Violet who is permanently blue, and it is Mike who is now a Slender-Man-esque freak of nature, while the parents only look on with dismay. Augustus's song especially makes it clear that he's just a loathsome human being (though we don't get too much evidence of that in his behavior besides, you know, his gluttony). But why do their parents, unlike Veruca's, get off scot-free?

** The pipes work in the same way that the taffy-puller can restore Mike Teavee to human height if not human proportions; the juicing room can 'fix' blueberrification; and the Television Chocolate device somehow renders TV screens insubstantial as a side effect of its teleportation power - [i]they shouldn't.[/i] This is one of those 'sense of childlike wonder' things that Wonka's 'fairyland' expects you to accept. Tubular Augustus still got off lightly.

** Then again, like Veruca's, it's impermanent but ''very'' terrifying: He nearly DROWNS, then is forcefully sucked up a pipe which is way too small for him, must nearly suffocate, and is then (presumably painfully based on how thin he becomes) blasted off to the Fudge Room, where there's the threat of being killed and made into his favorite food! Plus, Dahl seemed to have a thing with [[FatBastard fat kids]]...

* To get her ticket, Veruca Salt forced her father's workers, who are usually opening nuts, to search for it. Fittingly, she gets her comeuppance by the squirrels, whose work is also cracking nuts.

* Related to the above, how were things arranged for Charlie and his family so quickly? By the time Charlie and Willy Wonka's jaunt in the Great Glass Elevator is through, the rest of his family has arrived and been briefed on the boy's triumph and the west wing of the factory has been aside for them to live and work in. Possible answer: [[spoiler: Much as he rigged his own contest for the boy's sake, Wonka's hunch that Charlie would be the winner was so strong that he arranged this ahead of time. So when he takes Grandpa Joe aside to talk legal matters, it not only allows the final test to take place but lets him spill the beans on what's actually going on and to put the final steps of the plan into action, as some Oompa-Loompas are dispatched to collect the rest of the family]].

* How does the media track down Charlie so quickly when he finds his Golden Ticket? In the novel and other adaptations, Charlie has quite a few witnesses to his opening that fateful Wonka Bar because he's at/near a sweetshop, so word obviously spread quickly, but in this version he buys the candy from a passing vendor and only one other person is around to see him open it. Answer: [[spoiler: Said other person is ''a disguised Willy Wonka'', who promptly and anonymously contacts the media once he knows his plan worked!]]
* It may not have been intentional, but Mike Teavee's fate in this version is especially blackly funny for those familiar with Creator/RoaldDahl's adult short story "William and Mary". In both, [[spoiler: a woman (Mary/Doris Teavee) finds herself confronted with the transformation of a nasty male (William/Mike) into a near-helpless, dependent state...like a baby. Both men thought participating in a technological experiment would be awesome, but realize too late that they're now subject to the whims of women they've dominated and mistreated -- for the rest of their days]].
* Initially, it's confusing as to why the hidden challenge of the final room requires [[spoiler: an order of Wonka's to be ''disobeyed'']], since most every version of this story prizes [[spoiler: following the rules as a virtue]]. But giving TheReveal some thought is a starting point to unlocking what's going on. [[spoiler: Willy Wonka knows Charlie is a nice kid, having observed him in the dump; he doesn't have to test his morals. He just needs to make sure that Charlie's creativity is ''simply second nature'' to him.]]

** It hearkens back to the contract-writing scene, too. "[[{{Foreshadowing}} Do as I do, not as I say.]]" Wonka doesn't drink from the chocolate river, he doesn't chew experimental gum, he doesn't attempt to kidnap his nut-cracking squirrels, he doesn't go on jaunts through the television chocolate machine, [[spoiler: but he does write in his idea book.]]
* Charlie's paper airplane/letter to Willy Wonka flying over the audience and up to the balcony early in Act One is a sweet enough moment as it is...then one realizes the image has an echo near the end of the show that shows just how far his dreams have come: the Great Glass Elevator, carrying Charlie and Willy Wonka, flies up into the night sky and over the first few rows of the audience.

* It may not have been intentional, but Mike Teavee's fate in this version is especially blackly funny for those familiar with Creator/RoaldDahl's adult short story "William and Mary". In both, [[spoiler: a woman (Mary/Doris Teavee) finds herself confronted with the transformation of a nasty male (William/Mike) into a near-helpless, dependent state...like a baby. Both men thought participating in a technological experiment would be awesome, but realize too late that they're now subject to the whims of women they've dominated and mistreated -- for the rest of their days]].

* It may not have been intentional, but Mike Teavee's fate in this version is especially blackly funny for those familiar with Creator/RoaldDahl's adult short story "William and Mary". In both, [[spoiler: a woman (Mary/Doris Teavee) finds herself confronted with the transformation of a nasty male (William/Mike) into a near-helpless, dependent state...as if he were no more than a baby. Both men thought that participating in a technological experiment would be awesome, but realize too late that they're now subject to the whims of women they've dominated and mistreated -- for the rest of their days]].

** It hearkens back to the contract-writing scene, too. "[[Foreshadowing Do as I do, not as I say.]]" Wonka doesn't drink from the chocolate river, he doesn't chew experimental gum, he doesn't attempt to kidnap his nut-cracking squirrels, he doesn't go on jaunts through the television chocolate machine, [[spoiler: but he does write in his idea book.]]