Normally I hate revisionism, but this looks like it just might work:
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." . . .
[Said writer Josh Olson,] "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." . . . "A lot of the plot is mine, but the characters are all Baum."
—from Variety
The film’s prospective director, Todd McFarlane, wants it to appeal to the same audiences that enjoyed the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy. If the authors continue to respect the source material, the film could conceivably serve, as they say they intend, as an effective sequel to the original, rather than a remake. We’ll see.
The picture looks to me like, “The Cowardly Lion is back, and this time he’s mad!”