The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Marvel Classics) [Hardcover]

Eric Shanower (Author), L. Frank Baum (Author), Skottie Young (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 2, 2009

The premiere American fantasy adventure gets the Merry Marvel treatment! Eisner Award-winning writer/artist Eric Shanower (Age of Bronze) teams up with fan-favorite artist Skottie Young (New X-Men) to bring L. Frank Baum's beloved classic to life! When Kansas farm girl Dorothy flies away to the magical Land of Oz, she fatally flattens a Wicked Witch, liberates a living Scarecrow and is hailed by the Munchkin people as a great sorceress...but all she really wants to know is: how does she get home?

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Eric Shanower, the award-winning and New York Times bestselling cartoonist, author, and illustrator. His work has been widely published--from Marvel Comics to Random House, from Nickelodeon Magazine to BBC television. His current comics project, Age of Bronze, tells the complete story of the Trojan War in all its dramatic detail. Age of Bronze has been published by Image Comics since 1998, garnering two Eisner Awards, a Gran Guinigi, and a slew of nominations. The second volume, Sacrifice, was selected as one of the Best Books of 2004 by the editors of Publishers Weekly. In addition to English, Age of Bronze is published in Spanish, French, Polish, Italian, Croatian, and Indonesian.

Skottie Young has been an illustrator and cartoonist for over ten years working for companies such as Marvel, Warner Bros., Image, Upper Deck, Mattel and many more --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Marvel Books; 1st edition (September 2, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0785129219
• ISBN-13: 978-0785129219
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 0.6 x 11.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #133,494 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Eric Shanower is the Eisner Award-winning and New York Times best selling cartoonist of Age of Bronze, a graphic novel retelling of the Trojan War. Age of Bronze is a work in progress. Three volumes have been published and the story is more than one-third complete. When finished, Age of Bronze will tell the entire story of the legendary war at Troy, weaving into one the many tellings and permutations of the story throughout the centuries.

As a child, Shanower fell in love with the Oz books by L. Frank Baum and their illustrations by John R. Neill. Shanower decided to write and illustrate his own Oz books someday. Goal accomplished. Shanower's long list of contributions to the world of L. Frank Baum's Oz includes Marvel Comics' Eisner Award-winning, New York Times best selling current adaptations of Baum's Oz books with cartoonist Skottie Young.

Shanower's illustrations have appeared in magazines, in childrens books, and on television. His comics have been published around the world and include such works as his Oz graphic novel series (currently collected as Adventures in Oz), An Accidental Death with writer Ed Brubaker, The Elsewhere Prince with writers Moebius and R-JM Lofficier, and the introductions to Harlan Ellison's Dream Corridor. He resides in San Diego with his partner. When he's not writing or drawing, he's often swimming, dancing, or reading, usually not all at the same time.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful for all Ages.. but not the best comic all year.. September 5, 2009

By Dusty Bottoms is Dead & Gone

Format:Hardcover

Any fan of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz will probably enjoy this. I'm happy reading this book on my own, but it also makes a great bedtime story for my niece.

Skottie Young's charming and colorful art is absolutely stunning. And Eric Shanower, who has become the authority on Baum-to-comic adaptations, embraces the subtle existentialism and philosophy from the original story. Even the social commentary and political interpretations of 'The Wizard of Oz are not forgotten. It looks and reads like the magical and epic fable it is with folklore prose and fairytale illustrations.

One thing I might criticize, is the inconsistent pace. The story begins with a rather slow narrative.. which I find highly enjoyable. You get to soak in the beautiful skill and craft and the nostalgia of childhood fantasy, but towards the end a few things seem a bit rushed. However, it's all still fantastic, and I am pleased with the entire adaptation.

Overall, this book is a great buy, and I recommend it to anyone who likes Wizard of Oz or Comics.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A completely new vision of an old classic October 6, 2009

By Jersey Girl

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

As a long time Oz fan and a bit of a purist, my vision of L. Frank Baum's Oz is tied to the illustrations of W. W. Denslow, John R. Neill, and Eric Shanower, whose style honors the content of the original Oz illustrators yet manages to feel fresh and contemporary at the same time. Frankly, I could not have imagined a different Oz aesthetic that would satisfy as much as the original or a faithful adaptation thereof, like Shanower's Adventures in Oz. This collaboration between Shanower and Young, however, blew me away.

Quite simply, this book is gorgeous and although it breaks the mold, it is a completely convincing new vision of Oz. The script by Eric Shanower does a beautiful job of distilling Baum's prose into the economical form needed for the comic book/graphic novel genre. Yet episodes and details unique to Baum's original text - crossing a river on a raft, meetings with the stork, the Kalidahs, the Hammerheads, the China Country, the Witch's golden cap, are all there. Most importantly Baum's tone, humor, and kindly philosophy shine through.

Skottie Young's artwork is extraordinary. I especially like his Dorothy. Denslow's Dorothy always seemed a bit pudgy and humorless. Neill's is too often insipid and girly. This Dorothy is cute as a button with lots of spunk and emotional range - wonder, awe, fear and rage as appropriate, it's all there. She practically leaps off the page. And she is so winsome that it's easy to imagine why her companions take to her and become her devoted friends. The Tin Woodman has a wonderful mustache reminiscent of either W. W. Denslow or Baum himself. The Scarecrow has a vaguely zombie aesthetic, especially after he gets his pins and needles brains. The Lion looks like a cuddly stuffed toy - until he roars and then watch out!... The good witch of the North is a delightful bubble head and the Wicked Witch of the West is truly terrifying. The Wizard looks a simultaneously malevolent and mischievous grandpa with his too short trousers belted high over the bulge of his belly and his glasses that are unfashionably large. Relatively minor characters like the Munchkin with the injured leg and the field mice get a fresh new spin.

The color palette is also a delight to the eye. Baum's color scheme as Dorothy moves through the different regions of Oz is retained but in a subtle way.

If you have any affection for Oz at all, run to your nearest bookseller and buy this book. You will not be disappointed. I'd give it six stars if I could.

I am eagerly awaiting the sequel, The Marvelous Land of Oz, by this talented team. Read more ›

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars L. Frank Baum would approve! June 24, 2010

By Scott Martin Gavin VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

What can I say about OZ that hasn't been said before. I must admit that I am one of a generation that grew up with the MGM movie "The Wizard of Oz" being our only exposure to L. Frank Baum's stories. Until the original stories saw paperback reprints in the late 1970's, the OZ stories were unavailable for nearly 50 years except to collectors who could afford to spend ungodly sums to buy battered copies of the original Cupples and Leon hardback volumes. In the 1980s, with the start of the independent comic publisher movement, Eric Shanower began a series of Oz based graphic novels which I did not appreciate because of my lack of exposure to L. Frank Baum's original works. Quite frankly, I was amazed to learn that Marvel comics was producing a new Oz series and dreaded what the company which gave us the "Marvel Zombies" series of dreck would do to Oz. I am happy to say the end result is probably the best thing to come out of Marvel in twenty years! And what's more, I believe that if L. Frank Baum were alive today, he would probably approve of this adaptation. In his life, Baum embraced just about every medium available to him to get OZ before the public, even producing primitive OZ movies on his own. It's kind of hard to fathom, but comic books didn't exist during Baum's lifetime. If they had, I'd be willing to bet he'd have produced something similar to Shanower and Young's wonderful adaptation. The script, by Shanower, is faithful to the original text, restoring Baum's original horrible puns (i.e...., "Bran" for the scarecrow's "Brains" mixed with pins and needles to "keep him sharp" and also restore the rather dark humor of the original that was stamped out by MGM's technicolor treatment - Dorothy's presumed mental illness and shock treatments (just as horrible to contemplate today as when Baum wrote of them) were replaced in the movie by a simple bump on the head. But as wonderful and faithful as Shanower's script treatment is, Scottie Young's art is the selling factor here. For the first time ever, an artist has gotten Dorothy right! Even W.W. Denslow, working hand in glove with L. Frank Baum himself, got it wrong. Though Dorothy's age is never mentioned in the text of the stories, she would have had to have been about seven or eight years old to be able to do the things she does in the stories. Denslow drew her as a toddler of about three, far too young to be able to wander about a magical world without any grown-up aid. And what can I say about Judy Garland? As much as I like the MGM classic, I'm sorry, but at 16 she is far too old, too tall, and too buxom to be playing Dorothy. Scottie Young got it right. The only flaw with his art is his inability in keeping track of whether or not Dorothy was wearing her bonnet in a scene, but that's just nitpicking on my part. I wasn't prepared to like his interpretation of the other characters, his scarecrow and lion and tinman being completely different from anything we've seen before. But they work, and after a few panels I forgot all about the differences from his art and my mental picture of how they "should" have looked. This is the best OZ interpretation to come along since the original, and I am looking forward to when Shanower & Young's "Marvelous Land of Oz" is released! Read more ›

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Review of Shanower's Wizard of Oz May 20, 2010

By Ryan S. Mease

Format:Hardcover

Wonderful! Shanower again impresses me. I cannot say how accurate the adaption is, but I must insist that this is a grossly entertaining comic, with very sympathetic characters. Also of interest are the drawing at the back, which outline the process of the artist as he decided precisely how to illustrate the characters.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great graphic novel October 17, 2011

By Alvaro

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz graphic novel is a great one. From the entertaining retelling of the classic tale to the amazing art of Skottie Young. I highly recommend this graphic novel to those who love the Wonderful Wizard of Oz.