Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for February 21, 2020

The yellow brick road is an allegory about gold vs. silver as currency, as the shoes were silver in the original book, but were changed to ruby, to show up better in technicolor for the 1939 film.

♫ We could finish all the wandrin’, Our clothes we could be laundrin’ ♫

♫ And brushing off the sand. ♫

♫ I could read from the Torah in the light of a menorah ♫

♫ If I found the Promised Land! ♫

Mose: “I knew I should have taken that left turn at Albuquerque !”

He’s only twenty years in with those tablets, long way to go.

Moses is a guy. Would he ask for directions?

Wonder if Wiley has ever done one based on an old idea I think Steve Allen came up with: go to Norway and get some lemmings, and bring ’em back to southern California and turn them loose on the beach just when a grunion run is due. Find out what happens when the two migrating waves collide!

(And make sure to film it for Animal Planet.)

The promised land; only place in middle east without oil!

“Both books”? Apparently he is unaware just how MANY Oz books there are!

You got a yellow brick road and you need directions?

It is very well known in my weird state of Kansas that the reason the brick road was yellow was that that damn little dawg kept taking pit stops….yep.

Prequel mashup involves a tornado and an ark.

“Pay no attention to the deity behind the curtain!…”

Hey, one book of fiction is just as good as the other!

When two works of fiction meet

Ha. Now if they could both turn and see the Fellowship of the Rings looking confusedly at a map. “Not all who wander are lost”, but some are.

There should be a wall of water on either side of the yellow brick road.

Ah yes, but was it also an allegory on the presidential election of 1896? Wicked Witch of the East for Wall Street, Wicked Witch of the West for Leland Stanford and the ‘Big Four’, the Good Witch of the North for the Northern Alliance, the Good Witch of the South for the Southern Alliance, Tin Man for the American worker, Scarecrow for the American farmer, the Cowardly Lion for William Jennings Bryan, the ‘Wizard’ for William McKinley, etc., etc.,

This explains a lot.

Is that the two houses of congress?

Well, one was a fantasy about flying monkeys and one is the word of God and historical fact. Wiley, try not to to denigrate the Bible so.

If they had only taken a right turn instead of a left, the Jews would have the oil and the Arabs would have the dessert.

All this scene needs to be complete is Sean Connery in a mankini.

Both great works of literary fiction

Apparently the promised land is the West Bank.

Who is that with the map?

(believes this cartoon could be interpreted in various ways due to its vagueness)

So, the Wizard is God!?!

“When are you gonna come down? / When are you going to land? /I Should have stayed on the farm / I should have listened to my old man” Elton John and Bernie Taupin Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

If the Exodus actually took place during the Egyptian New Kingdom, 16 to 12 centuries bce, the Hebrews would never have left Egypt. The territory controlled by the New Kingdom extended to the border of present nation of Turkey, well past any part of present Israel.

Well, obviously Dorothy misheard Glenda, who actually told her to follow the yellow sick toad.

Dorothy searching for Toto and Palestine in the new century.

Best Movie Mash-Up Ever!

So upset that our newspaper has banned NS because of the faux pas Wiley made a few months ago. You’d think they’d at least put him on parole

They both had perfectly good guides – the Yellow Brick Road, for Dorothy and her companions, and Moses following God’s strictures in leading his people to the Promised Land. Come to think of it, they both could be allegories of each other – The city of Oz was the promised land Dorothy et al were seeking.

Because they’re both fiction. ;-)

Dorothy was told to “Follow the Yellow Brick Road”.

But, those instructions failed to include Which Direction they were supposed to follow it in.

If she’d gone the other way, Kansas was only half an hour away. With no obstacles.

Who knew it was so difficult to get out of Missouri?

It took them forty years to reach the emerald city.

I always thought The Mary Tyler Moore Show was an allegory for The Wizard of Oz. Mary was Dorothy (provincial girl thrown into strange surroundings with strange companions); Lou was the Tin Man (gruff outward manner but actually had a big heart); Murray was the Scarecrow (more brains than he realized); Ted was the Cowardly Lion (egotistical bluster hiding inner fears but possessing infrequently-seen inner strength), Georgette was Glinda, the good witch, Sue Ann was the Wicked Witch of the West, Phyllis was a Munchkin, and Rhoda was Toto — NO, NO, NO, I AM NOT SUGGESTING SHE WASN’T ATTRACTIVE (SHE WAS), but because she was Mary’s faithful friend and companion.

“I don’t think we’re in Egypt any more…”