(Of course there’s also the issue of the Wicked Witch of the West never having actually had possession of said slippers)
(And yes, just to save everybody the effort, they were indeed silver in the book)
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Comics I Don't Understand 
Is that Grimm, turned into a frog? Otherwise I have no idea what’s going on here.
Yes, it’s Grimm turned into a frog and I guess because dogs like to chew “mess” with slippers the witch turned him to a frog and I guess if I think about it that’s actually enough for some strips but really doesn’t seem like enough here. .
Maybe because it isn’t clear it is Grimm and it seems like the fly should have something to do with it and because we don’t see what “mess with slippers” means and we expect that the image off the fly should have something to do with what happened to the slippers.
This is one of those strips where even after you figure it out it doesn’t feel complete but: Grimm chewed on the WWof W Slippers. Grimm got turned to a frog; looks gobsmacked. The end.
“And yes, just to save everybody the effort, they were indeed silver in the book”
But Grimm and Atilla weren’t in the book so why should the strip be about the book rather than the movie? They were ruby in the movie.
My pet-peeves: In the book had an umbrella instead of a broomstick and had one eye. (She also was a minor character only in one chapter and she wasn’t sister to the WW of E. And of course she was not green.)
The easiest way to fix that dialog bubble would be to delete the four words “of the west” and “ruby”. Everyone would still understand it, but the nitpickers wouldn’t have anything to chew over.
“but the nitpickers wouldn’t have anything to chew over.”
It’s not nitpicking. It’s distracting so that the joke becomes opaque. If it were “I warned you not to mess with the witch’s slippers” it becomes clear that the witch retaliated by turning Grimm into a frog.
You’re right. That *would* be better.
But if it’s the wicked witch of the west and ruby slippers we are distracted as to what the wicked witch of the west and the ruby have to do with anything. The wicked witch of the west didn’t transform people and, as Bill points out, was never the owner of the ruby slippers anyway, and had no penchant or fondness for frogs (in fact she hated all things wet). If it were the WW of W specifically, I’d expect her to deal with her in a WW of W manner… which would involve flying monkeys (or setting things on fire or writing Surrender Grim in the sky).
Yeah, woozy, but somebody would have mentioned it, so I figured we might as well cut to the chase.
“But Grimm and Atilla weren’t in the book so why should the strip be about the book rather than the movie? They were ruby in the movie.”
Grimm and Attilla weren’t in the movie, either. And neither silver NOR ruby make sense as a material for slippers.
@ woozy – I’ll concede the point about nitpicking vs. clarity, but on the subject of “writing Surrender Grim in the sky“, there are simpler alternatives. The “Surrender Dorothy” bridge on the Washington Beltway just happens to have exactly the right number of steel panels, so that the letters can be painted large (one per panel). It’s risky, but probably simpler than dealing with an army of flying monkeys.
Brings up the old question, is it:
“Dorothy, surrender”
or
“Give me Dorothy”
I always assumed it was “Dorothy, surrender” but “Give me Dorothy” makes a *lot* more sense. Now that you’ve mentioned it, I’m inclined to believe the screenwriters intended the latter.
The difference between “Dorothy, you should give up” and “people who aren’t Dorothy, give her to me” is a comma. One is “Surrender, Dorothy” and the other one is “Surrender Dorothy”.
Seriously, though… is Dorothy going to turn herself over to the Witch simply because the Witch wrote her a message telling her to?
No, but I read it as telling the city to turn her in. They might think it’s better to appease a powerful neighbor than protect a girl.
Me too: “I demand that you turn over the ‘other’ in your midst.”
You know, if you want to over-think this… that’s a pretty sinister concept for 1939…
@ Bill – The underlying information would probably have been available for those who were paying attention. Just a year later, Chaplin was in a brown uniform (as “Hynkel”), juggling the globe around his office.
Very available, Kilby: my family didn’t come here in 1939 so they could see Yankee games, after all.
Whether this was on the producers’ minds when they were filming the scene, on the other hand…
And Fun Fact: The Three Stooges beat Chaplin by almost a year:
That was fascinating . . . passing along to Hubby who reads and watches anything having to do with WWI and WWII . . . thanks!
“The difference between “Dorothy, you should give up” and “people who aren’t Dorothy, give her to me” is a comma. One is “Surrender, Dorothy” and the other one is “Surrender Dorothy”.
True, of course, but are you implying that the Wicked Witch was an English major and was picky about those points? As a former English major and sometime EnglishT.A., I’m not sure we’d want to brag about the WW as a credit to the field. (Maybe her magical powers included automatic spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc. checking, or maybe one of the Winged Monkeys happened to be an experienced proofreader and checked her work for her before publishing.)
“You know, if you want to over-think this… that’s a pretty sinister concept for 1939…”
Movies of that time were a lot more topical and political than we tend to give them credit for. The more I think about it the more this interpretation makes sense.
“are you implying that the Wicked Witch was an English major and was picky about those points?”
I’ve never been an English major, and I know the difference.
I’m about as far from the prescriptivist picky-about-these-points as it’s possible to be.
Of course, the Ozian reaction was a combination of, “Who’s Dororthy?” and “Let’s ask the Wizard”.
True, of course, but are you implying that the Wicked Witch was an English major and was picky about those points?
Plus, she wasn’t penning a note on her green stationery. She was skywriting. So a comma might have been worth the effort.