Home Again, Home Again
- They get to the Emerald City only to find the Wizard waffling on his promises. Having vanquished the scariest woman in the whole wide world, they're now unimpressed by the Wizard's theatrics.
- Toto starts nosing around a nearby curtain and pulls it back to reveal a frightened little man running an elaborate machine.
- The man, it seems, is the Wizard. And he has no powers at all. The gang gets a serious mad on, and we can't say we blame them.
- The Wizard buys them off with a few trinkets proclaiming that they now possess the very qualities they thought they were lacking: brains heart, courage.
- Dorothy, unfortunately, can't make it home with just a medal or a diploma. So the Wizard agrees to take her back home in a balloon. The Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion will run the show in Oz in his absence.
- Just before the balloon leaves, Toto goes chasing after a cat. (The cat-chasing thing really seems to get him in trouble…)
- Dorothy jumps out of the balloon's basket to get him, and the Wizard and balloon float up without her.
- Dorothy despairs at ever going home, despite the fact that she's surrounded by people who would cheerfully give their lives to protect her and let her live in their sweet emerald city.
- Glinda arrives to set things right. She reveals that the ruby slippers could have taken Dorothy home at any time. She only had to learn those important lessons about believing in yourself and facing down scary things and almost be murdered by an evil sorceress before she could do that.
- With three taps of her heels and reciting a well-known catch phrase, Dorothy and Toto are sent back to gray old Kansas.
- Everyone's waiting for her there, even though they think she's just had a dream. Stupid grown-ups.
- Anyway, repeat after Shmoop: There's no place like home.