Soo Lee To Adapt ‘The Wizard Of Oz’ As An Official Film Adaptation Graphic Novel At Dynamite

by Erik Amaya

Soo Lee is headed down the yellow brick road.

Dynamite announced Thursday that the writer/artist is taking the creative lead on The Wizard of Oz Official Film Adaptation Graphic Novel. As the title suggests, the comic adapts the 1939 MGM production of The Wizard of Oz directed by Victor Fleming (with some scenes filmed by other MGM directors). It tells the tale of Dorothy Gale. While attempting to save her dog from a local busy-body, she gets caught in twister and arrives in Oz, a magical, colorful world of wizards, witches, Munchkins, talking lions, and more. But the whimsy is short-lived as the Wicked Witch of the West blames Dorothy for the death of her sister, the Wicked Witch of the East. To stop the witch, Dorothy must meet with the Wonderful Wizard of Oz in the Emerald City.

The film itself is based on the 1900 novel by L. Frank Baum, who would go on to write a many more Oz novels and even direct his own silent films set in the magical land. His take on Oz, naturally enough, differed from that of MGM’s filmmakers and technicians.

Lee, meanwhile, takes her cues from the film, but brings her own spin on it — even going back to the screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf for some added dimension.

“I’m not reinventing the wheel, but I’m adding my interpretation to the history of this legendary story,” Lee said in a statement. “I was allowed more pages to indulge in and take my time on certain scenes, so I took advantage of the comics medium. I wanted to really shine light on Dorothy and her friends’ relationships and emotions.” The end result: a 128 graphic novel that recreates Oz as only Lee can. Check out the preview pages below to see for yourself.