The next four posts will feature my version of the original Oz Squad. I’ve made some adjustments to the designs to fit my own style but I’ve tried not to go to far.

The look of Oz Squad was established in the first issue of the comic, published toward the end of 1991. Andrew Murphy penciled that issue and, while I imagine that Steve had a lot of input, designed the look of the characters. Unlike many versions of Dorothy that have appeared in other takes on Oz in the years since, the Dorothy in that first issue is a good example of the sort of woman the Dorothy of the books might have grown up to be. She dresses fashionably and practically. As one of Oz’s representatives on Earth her style is somewhat formal and businesslike – appropriate for interacting with ambassadors and bureaucrats.

I’ve made Dorothy a blond. In the original books Dorothy is illustrated as blond so I’m sticking with that.

I don’t know if Andrew is still making art. If he is I haven’t been able to find any examples of recent work online. 

Spot illustration #2 for the Oz-Squad.com and Skookworks.com header designs.

Dorothy Gale, in all of the original Oz books, always struck me as a practical sort of girl. She grew up on a farm. She faced down lions and witches and worse when most grown men would have been peeing their pants.

So when it came time for me to design my version of the adult Dorothy for Oz Squad I kept the short haircut from the final issues of the comic, gave her shoes she could walk in and clothes that wouldn’t slow her down. No doubt she dresses up for state occasions but I’ll worry about what Dorothy in drag would wear at some other date.

The next many posts are going to feature small illustrations. I’m designing headers for Oz-Squad.com and Skookworks.com, and, at least for the first round, including four spot illustrations as part of each design. I’ll be posting the individual illustrations here. Please go to the sites themselves to see how they look in context.

Right now I’ve got two headers designed for the Oz Squad site. The first shows the characters as they appear “today”. The second shows the characters in their early days. The headers are set to show up at random so if you want to see them both just reload the page a couple of times and the image should change.

L. Frank Baum doesn’t say how old Dorothy was when she first came to Oz. In the illustration by W.W. Denslow she appears to be somewhere between 5 and, maybe, 8 years old. I don’t remember if Steve Ahlquist has specified her age in any of the Oz Squad comics or the novel. Most likely she was around six or seven. That’s the age we (that is, scientific professionals who study human behavior) currently think children develop their sense of empathy.