The following contains spoilers for Ultimate Oz Universe: The Lost Lands Volume 1 #16, on sale now from AWA.
After the dramatic success of the film version of Wicked, people are, of course, well acquainted with the concept of doing new takes on The Wizard of Oz. However, the interesting thing about the wonderful world of Oz is that L. Frank Baum wrote over a DOZEN novels set in the world of Oz, plus a number of other short stories and comic strips based in the same setting.
Baum dramatically expanded the world of Oz waaaaaaaaaay past just the story of Dorothy Gale, the Wizard, and the Wicked Witch of the West. And the Oz books continued in “official” sequels released after Baum’s death (two of his own Oz novels were published posthumously). Therefore, with SO much continuity to wade through, the books really seem ripe for an “Ultimate” or “Absolute” take on them, and that’s precisely what Artists Writers & Artisans (also known as AWA Studios) has done with literally Ultimate Oz Universe, the first volume of which is titled The Lost Lands.
Ultimate Oz Universe: The Lost Lands Volume 1 is from writers Cullen Bunn and Larry King (King is a songwriter, and initially started this project as a possible Broadway musical, but it soon got too big for that, and so he decided to instead turn it into a graphic novel series, and Bunn was brought on board as a veteran comic book writer who could adapt it into a comic book. King worked with Oz historians Jay Duncan, Julie McNulty and Mike Bujnack for the story), artist Mike Deodato Jr., colorist Ive Svorcina, and letterer Steve Wands, and it adapts a number of Oz books into one combined story.
Ultimate Oz Universe is Basically Two Competing Comics
There are really two competing approaches in this graphic novel. You have this meticulously laid out love letter to the Oz books, both Baum’s works, but also the works of later writers (like bringing The Hungry Lion into the story), and then you have this sort of “What if Oz was a 1990s grimdark comic book?”
I’ve long been a fan of Mike Deodato’s artwork. I recently talked about how much I enjoyed his work on another AWA graphic novel, Expecting the Unexpected (written by Ronda Rousey). I think he’s an inventive storyteller who knows how to make bold choices in his work. His comics often feel like they’re jumping off of the page (this is also why he’s such an in-demand cover artist, as his covers often REALLY grip the reader).
Here, though, I think the competing influences ultimately hinder the story a bit. The sort of 1990s style design for the Tinman and the Cowardly Lion just seems so much at odds with the rest of the story. I don’t think the decision to overly-anthropomorphize the Cowardly Lion was a good one (same goes for the Hungry Tiger).
Deodato has been very public about working as a digital artist. It was why he was so much of a proponent for NFTs back in the day, because he felt that it gave digital artists like himself something that they could sell for their art that would be at least somewhat equivalent to artists who work on print drawings in terms of selling their original art.
I bring this up because Deodato has been in the news recently with some readers claiming that he used generative A.I. to aid him in the drawing of this comic. Deodato and AWA vehemently deny he used generative A.I. at all. I believe them, but if that’s the case, then that means all the inconsistencies in the artwork are Deodato’s responsibility. Artists sometimes make mistakes, even if they are using pencil, ink, and paper, so a digital artist could easily make these mistakes, as well. Still, that means that there were a number of mistakes in the comic.
Now, while I think some of the design elements were distracting towards the story, some of the pages were also absolutely STUNNING. Glinda, in particular, gets some absolutely OUTSTANDING spotlight pages in the story. Really evocative of early 20th Century artwork, that puts it squarely in line with the original Baum stories. It’s just great stuff. And, overall, Deodato does a fine job with the sequential storytelling.
How does the comic bring the stories of Oz together?
What Bunn and King do a great job with is to merge the various books together. There are so many little details that obviously Baum himself didn’t consider since he was coming up with the books as he went along, and now, over a century later, writers can look at the broader picture and put them all together into a cohesive story.
It reminds me a lot of the classic Scrooge McDuck storyline, “The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck,” where Don Rosa took all of the little references to Scrooge McDuck in old Uncle Scrooge comic book stories (where clearly Carl Barks was just throwing in details willy nilly as he saw fit) and turned them into a concrete historical story of the life of the world’s richest duck.
Those are the levels of detail we get to see in this story, which mostly centers on the return of Ozma of Oz, who was trapped by an evil witch in the body of a boy, Tip. It’s a fantastical adventure that brings in all of the familiar Oz characters, just with them given slightly updated takes.
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The story also follows Dorothy’s post-Oz life, and sets up her return to Oz, as well. I absolutely love the scene where Dorothy is bored out of her mind, and effectively she is thinking like, “Well, there’s no place like home, but Kansas sure is a lot less interesting than Oz.”
We hear the term “this is a love letter” a lot, but in this case, it very much applies, as this is definitely a love letter to Baum’s Oz novels, and if you are a fan of those novels, or want to learn more about them, this is a great graphic novel for you to read.
