Line #8 Fanon/LandOfOz


1	There are [[LongRunner dozens]] of official ''Literature/LandOfOz'' books written by various writers who [[DependingOnTheWriter often vary on details]]. Since continuity and backstory are inconsistent and contradictory, many fans have attempted to make it more coherent. Sometimes an attempt is good enough to be considered as good as canon by fans. As a result, the series has a lot of {{fanon}}, with much making itself into adaptations and derivatives.
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4	* In canon, Lurline is a fairy queen who turned Oz into a fairy-land using her magic. She's described as having god-like powers and she's a mystical being more powerful than Glinda or Ozma. Fanon has taken her to outright be a goddess that the residents of Oz worship. This has been used in several derivative works such as ''Literature/TheWickedYears''.
5	* Which books can be considered canon can vary from fan to fan. There are Baum purists who won’t even consider anything past the first 14 books as canon, and at the other extreme there are fans who consider any Oz story from Baum’s lifetime to the present day that sticks to the original continuity as canon. Publisher Reilly and Lee came up with “The Famous Forty” to describe the 40 official books published by their company. However there are further books that could be considered as canon, including Baum’s Trot and Cap’n Bill series and other fantasies he wrote (which crossover with Oz), a book of short Oz stories also by Baum, and Oz books by later authors in the series that did not get published by Reilly and Lee for various reasons, some of which would eventually be published by Books of Wonder (who rereleased the Oz books in the 1980’s and 90’s) and the International Wizard of Oz Club. There are about 75 books (including the Famous Forty) that fall into this more objectively canon category. With modern pastiches by authors unconnected to the original series, it depends on who you ask.
6	* According to the second book, Ozma has "ruddy blonde" hair. Almost all fan-works and adaptations portray her with wavy brown (or black) hair. This issue is due to most [[UnreliableIllustrator official illustrations]] portraying her with brown hair starting with the third book. It doesn't help that even a few adaptations overseen by Baum himself, such as ''Film/ThePatchworkGirlOfOz'', have Ozma as having brown hair, which might mean Ozma being a ruddy blonde is an EarlyInstallmentCharacterDesignDifference. Several non-Baum books in the Famous Forty explicitly call her [[InconsistentColoring either]] black or brown haired.
7	* Ozma's age is [[VagueAge ambiguous in canon]]. Illustrations pin her as anywhere from Dorothy's age to looking like a young woman, while Baum stated she looked no older than 16. According to one book, she looks between 14 and 15. Adaptations and derivative works usually have her as girl between 10 and 15.
8	* Many contemporary writers and fans alike don't buy into Ozma [[SecondLawOfGenderBending instantly being fine with the change]] after living as [[RaisedAsTheOppositeGender Tip]] her entire life. There was either a period between the second and third book that involved Ozma learning to accept the change or Ozma is [[StepfordSmiler simply pretending to be "Princess Ozma"]] and is [[BeneathTheMask hiding her true self]]. Ozma is also often presented as a GirlyGirlWithATomboyStreak (or even a TomboyPrincess) who likes wearing trousers. Both 1985's ''Literature/TheMysteriousChroniclesOfOz'' and 1995's ''Literature/TheSevenBlueMountainsOfOz'' trilogy portray Ozma as [[GenderBenderAngst uncomfortable with the change]]. Others, like the 1986 anime ''Anime/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz'', portray Ozma as an outright TomboyPrincess. It's also not uncommon to even find fan stories where Ozma goes back to being Tip or they are somehow written as different characters.
9	** Of course, there's also the modern streak of presenting Ozma as [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything trans]], especially since ''Oz'' has a fairly large LGBTFanbase. However, fans differ in the interpretation. Some see her as a trans girl metaphor, forcibly RaisedAsTheOppositeGender but "really" a girl, in which case you retcon some [[TransTribulations gender dysphoria]] into "Tip's" early years. Others see her as a trans boy, due to how comfortable she seemed as Tip and how s/he didn't want to become a girl. Others [[TakeAThirdOption see her as nonbinary]].
10	* Ozma's personality is completely different from Tip's. Tip is a boisterous, fun-loving boy with a [[TheTrickster trickster]] side who acts nothing like the prim and proper GirlyGirl Ozma. To coincide Ozma's personality, it's usually viewed that this change is a conscious choice of Ozma's. She [[BeneathTheMask hides her personality]] behind [[ToughLeaderFacade a regal mask]] but occasionally it slips (such as when she [[DeadpanSnarker says the occasional quip]]).
11	* The Nomes are an all-male race. The Nome King does mention maids at one point, presumably implying female Nomes do exist, but the context could imply he's talking about potential slaves from Oz. One of the stage shows gives them a female counterpart in the Metal Imps.
12	* The continent that Oz and its surrouding countries are on doesn't have an official name. The most common fanon name is Nonestica, taken from the fact that the surrounding ocean is called the "Nonestic Ocean". Other names are Supernumquam, the Continent of Imagination, or just the [[PlanetEngland Continent of Oz]].
13	* Dorothy is blonde. Her hair color is never mentioned in the text but John R. Niell portrayed her with a blonde TwentiesBobHaircut starting with ''Literature/OzmaOfOz''. This has caught on because it both [[HairContrastDuo contrasts with Ozma]] and [[HairOfGoldHeartOfGold it fits stereotypes associated with blondes]]. She's also often short haired to also contrast with Ozma. Of course there's always the people who prefer the brunette Dorothy in W.W.Denslow's illustrations for the original book and the [[Film/TheWizardOfOz MGM film]]. Creator/{{Marvel\|Comics}}'s [[ComicBook/OzMarvelComics comic adaptation]] splits the difference and [[TakeAThirdOption has her hair as dirty blonde.]]
14	* Due to AdaptationDisplacement with ''Film/TheWizardOfOz'', the Wicked Witches of the West and East are sisters.
15	* You'll find it hard to meet someone in the online fandom who doesn't [[HoYay ship Dorothy/Ozma]] to some degree. Due to ValuesDissonance, their [[PseudoRomanticFriendship heavily fluffy friendship]] comes off as lesbian rather than platonic. And given the franchise's history with the UsefulNotes/LGBTCommunity (namely Friends of Dorothy) and Ozma's gender-bending backstory, it's almost treated as fact that Dorothy and Ozma are a romantic couple. This is likewise true of fans who preferred Ozma stayed as Tip.
16	* Fan-works usually age up Dorothy just bit. Eventually she [[NotGrowingUpSucks gets bored of being prepubescent]] and decides to age up to 15-20. Naturally, Ozma ages up with her.
17	* The Wicked Witches and Good Witches have a history together. What this means varies from fan to fan, Some depict them as former friends, others as sisters, and others as always having been enemies.
18	* The maps of Oz left later writers of the Famous Forty as well as fans with a huge mess to clean up. To explain, in the first book, as most well know, Munchkin Country was in the east, and Winkie Country was in the west, as the Wicked Witches of each respective direction resided in these countries. However, Baum's map in ''Literature/TikTokOfOz'' has the directions reversed with west on the right and east on the left, and this reversal occurs in the text as well occasionally. This was repeated in another map a few years later included with ''Literature/TheLostPrincessOfOz'', so with plenty of opportunities to “correct” the directions either by Baum himself or his editors, it is unlikely that Baum did this by mistake. Thing is nobody knows why Baum switched the directions. Baum's successor, Ruth Plumly Thompson, stated in her books that Munchkin Country was in the west and Winkie Country in the east because of this. The International Wizard of Oz Club members James E. Haff and Dick Martin created [[https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/ozwikia/images/d/d3/Club_map.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20181225193658 an updated and corrected map]] in 1960, featuring locales not only from Thompson's books but from those of later "Royal Historians" too. This map corrects the positioning of the Munchkin and Winkie Countries, however doing so creates its own inconsistencies with earlier maps (for instance, the Blue Forest and Ojo's home went from being in southern Munchkin Country near the border with Quadling Country to northern Munchkin Country bordering Gillikin Country, contradicting the books). Haff and Martin's accompanying map of "The Magical Countries surrounding Oz" shows the entire region of Nonestica and the Nonestic Ocean; again the correcting of the directions violates a detail from ''Literature/OzmaOfOz'' in which Ozma's party crosses the Deadly Desert from Ev into Munchkin Country, now on the opposite side of the continent in the updated map. But of course, you're unlikely to find a fan these days who regards the original flipped direction map as canon (unless they’re a total Baum purist), and most follow the updated fan-made map as basically the most accurate map one could possibly create, given the ContinuitySnarl.

Context Fanon / LandOfOz