From Variety Magazine:

Warner Bros. and Village Roadshow Pictures are teaming on "Oz," a revisionist take on the L. Frank Baum books that hatched "The Wizard of Oz."
Project was acquired based on an idea by Todd McFarlane that was fleshed out and pitched by Josh Olson ("A History of Violence").

Olson will write and McFarlane will produce with Thunder Road’s Basil Iwanyk. Rick Benattar ("Shoot ’Em Up") is exec producer.

Conversations with McFarlane and Olson make it clear that they are still working out the tone of the film. They have plenty to work with. WB has owned the rights to the original "The Wizard of Oz" since buying Ted Turner’s empire, whose assets included the film and other plum titles in the MGM library.

McFarlane has a vision of Oz that is a dark, edgy and muscular PG-13, without a singing Munchkin in sight. That was clear with a toy line he launched several years ago that featured a buxom Dorothy and Toto reimagined as an oversized snarling warthog. Olson has something a little tamer, and PG, in mind.

"I saw those toys, and Dorothy as some bondage queen isn’t something I want to do," Olson told Daily Variety. "The appealing thing about the Baum books to me is how wildly imaginative they are. There are crazy characters from amazing places. I want this to be ‘Harry Potter’ dark, not ‘Seven’ dark."

Both McFarlane and Olson are on the same page when it comes to the promise of marrying the Baum story with benefits of visual effects advancements.

"My pitch was ‘How do we get people who went to ‘Lord of the Rings’ to embrace this?’ " McFarlane said. "I want to create an interpretation that has a 2007 wow factor. You’ve still got Dorothy trapped in an odd place, but she’s much closer to the Ripley from ‘Alien’ than a helpless singing girl."

Olson was keeping plot specifics to himself but said the film will be closer to a sequel than a remake.

"We still want to take advantage of the first film, which might be the most beloved of all time, and rely on its place in your cultural memory to bubble beneath the surface," Olson said. "A lot of the plot is mine, but the characters are all Baum."

Sounds like it could be good, since it's not a direct remake. It seems it will be more like the Willy Wonka and Charlie and the chocolate factory movies.

Ought to be interesting. I know the 'purists' will freak out but who cares. I think I'd rather see "Wicked" in film form but to be honest, I loved Todd's freaky Wizard of Oz figures.

Also, wouldn't this be the 2nd sequel?

Dorothy:


Toto:


Lion:


Scarecrow:


Tin Man:



I might have been excited for this when I was 14.

You forgot the wizard.

Any way a dark version of the wizard of oz could be good. All they really would need to do is make is follow the book to make it darker. You should read how the tinman became the tinman. Heck The Wiz was a darker version of the wizard of oz and it was great movie.

The Alice in Wonderland movie with SMG sounds like it is going to better though.

And the good news is ..... there is nothing anyone can do that will diminish our appreciation of the 1939 classic.

God, give this OZ revisionsim a rest already. It has been WAY overdone. Starting with that Philip Jose Farmer book maybe? I think it was called Barnstomer Of OZ or something like that. And we have one coming from Sci Fi channel. (ugh)

What I think would be nice is a straight non musical adaptation of the original books which I really enjoyed as a kid.

Thanks for my first out-loud laugh of the morning. I may have a new signature with that one, LOL.

i get it. Wait a minute...

Sounds like an Oscar winner.

I can’t wait until this film is actually made; the reviews are going to provide a lot of comedy.

All I know is if Dorothy looks anything like that figure, then, I'm sold.

As much as I enjoyed the figures, they still grace the shelves in my home theater, I have little interest in the movie. Each figures came with part of the story. I found it to be pretty boring.

Some remakes ought to be illegal.

I wouldn't consider this a remake. More like an exploitation.

Todd McFarlane needs to stick to buying baseballs and stay out of the movie business.

Boy, did I call it or did I call it? I know my "purists" well.

Meh. I'm not a purist (hell, I don't even like Oz), but I can't see this being anything but complete shit. Not everything needs a dark counterpart to it.

Then again, I think Todd McFarlane is one of the worst things to ever happen to comics, so I might be a teeny bit biased.

Please for love god stop remaking all these great film (Halloween,Wizard of OZ,Escape From NY).When will it end? what's next Gone With The Wind!

Sam Jackson as Rett Butler: "I don't fuckin' give a damn...bitch." Atlanta is nuked instead of burned. & Scarlet is a hooker/drug addict (overdoses at one point). P Diddy does the hip hop theme song.

Hey, if they can do something interesting with it, I'm all for it. Just give me the original in HD and they can do whatever they want with a remake. Funny how with all this talk of a darker Oz, no one has mentioned Return to Oz, which I consider to be a really cool little movie.

You are so right Suprmallet-Return to Oz is "great little flim" that was a little to dark for it's time.
It was two baum books in one making RT-OZ truer to the stories than the 1939 classic!

Return to Oz was pretty disturbing.

I wouldn't mind seeing a darker take, but those figures aren't what I would want it to look like.

Sorry, But McFarlane is a worthless hack and his Twisted Land of Oz series was a waste of smelly plastic molded into statue poses.

I liked Return to Oz. I liked American McGee's Alice. I like dark things. I do not like McFarlane's idea of dark though. It's just not good at all.

Shit, read the stories that came along with the toys and it sounds like terrible circle jerk fan fiction you'll find in the ranks of other terrible fan fiction written on the internet about any subject.
http://home.casema.nl/dr_dark/Twiste...hapter%200.htm

Lets put it this way, I'm not a 1939's purist. I just wish that in all this talk about remakes and all the oz projects such as Sci-Fi's Tinman and even the comic book dorothy that they would at least go back to the classic books.

What kills me the most is that they're making this movie and yet no one seems interested in making a movie that's actually remotely faithful to the book.

I'd watch that!

Just so you know, the classic 1939 version of TWoO was also a remake.

I thought that was being developed into something. TV or movie I'm not sure. There are so many good candidates that would fit the role:

Mena Suvari
Thora Birch
Christina Ricci