"In the Land of Wonderful Dreams" dated March 31, 1912:
Transcript of Tweets by @LittleNemo1905 (MAY 10, 2021):
Oh, man… Flip… you better settle yourself down here. Beating up on Doctor Pill is one thing… but threatening the God of Sleep and the King of Slumberland is probably not going to work out well for you… - 1/15
Flip's bravado has reached a new time high as a result of this magic wand that he's acquir… I mean, stolen. He sure has been able to do some interesting things with it. - 2/15
Notice the architecture in panels 3 and 4 and the colonnades start to topple and the dome comes off it's base at the far end of the panel content… Flip is relishes his new power. - 3/15
Of most interest to me in the top tier, is Nemo's declaration that he is reaching a boiling point with Flip, as well. It seems as though Nemo has the most patience of everyone and yet even he is becoming tired of the games. - 4/15
The second tier continues the demonstration of just how adept Flip has become with the wand since the last time we saw him; he is now able to not only transform people into animals and lift buildings, but contort people at will, too! - 5/15
The King, in panel 6, simply has no idea what is going on… apparently, he has yet to be filled in on the situation with Flip (though the Princess remedies that easily enough). What's worse, he seems floored and seemingly has no way to stop it. - 6/15
This is very likely used to set up a bit of tension and possible danger when Flip calls him out near the end of the strip… young readers might see his earlier reaction and feel as though Flip actually has a chance at defeating the God. - 7/15
Personally, I doubt it. I think it is a fairly acceptable way to heighten the stakes for young readers, but I'm not buying that the King can't simply squash Flip's attempted coup if he so chose. - 8/15
That said, calling himself King and basically challenging Morpheus outright at the end of the strip is really… well… ballsy. It might be the single greatest act of defiance we've seen from Flip so far. - 9/15
For all it's bright colours and wacky, surreal fun, there is an element of real suspense here… even panel 10, depicting Pill-the-turtle slowly climbing up the building face, increases the tension for me. - 10/15
It feels almost like an early 20th-century action movie… the moment where it *looks* like the bad guy might win before being inevitably defeated by the forces of good. - 11/15
Maybe a little extreme (I wouldn't go so far as to say that Flip is *evil* by any means--though his actions go a bit far today), but I couldn't shake the feeling. - 12/15
There is something to be said about the symbolism in the penultimate panel. Flip and Impie are on eagles, sitting on blue balls adorned with stars… there is serious American imagery about that. - 13/15
I'll also note that there was another week's gap in between this and the last strip (the NY American skipped 3.24.12). I really do wish I could find more about why this was the case… was it planned? Were there production problems? - 14/15
This is my reading of "In the Land of Wonderful Dreams" #330. What's yours? - 15/15
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