Rushdie’s look at the Wizard of Oz offered many ideas about the film that I hadn’t thought of before, but among the most interesting of these were the ideas of power and powerlessness as driving forces in the narrative. Rushdie points out Dorothy’s lack of power in Kansas, discussing her fear of Miss Gulch and what she will do to Dorothy’s dog Toto. Furthermore, Dorothy feels powerless in regard to her aunt and uncle who refuse to protect her, something that we have come to know as a reasonable function of adults. Even aunt Em and Uncle Henry seem powerless against outside forces and dismissive of Dorothy. Although I may have recognized the way that Aunt Em treated Dorothy with little respect or concern for her situation upon earlier viewings, I did not grasp Dorothy’s escape into a world where she is in fact powerful and a leader. One of Rushdie’s most interesting points is that this story is somewhat of a coming of age transitioning from a weaker Dorothy who runs away to a much stronger version of herself who is able to confront the wicked witch. Rushdie even analyzes power within the text from a feminist angle showing that the most powerful characters in the story are all women and that the only male character who shows great power turns out to be somewhat of a fraud. If this was the original intention of the filmmakers, it was progressive for the time.