Hamish Steele

DOROTHY - Dorothy Gale Fabien Mense Designs Part 1

Added 2025-12-01 14:28:25 +0000 UTC

SO, let's chat about my Oz show again.

Recently, I posted designs done by Dani Diez which was where the show was at the time of its cancellation. However, that was all part of the big second attempt to get the show off the ground. I'm gonna take us all the way back to the first attempt, as these are the designs we were using during the vast majority of the development time.

Fabien Mense is one of the all-time top-tier gods of character design. You've almost definitely watched a show or movie where he was brought on at some stage to get the design work moving. Oddly, his designs rarely seem to be used in the final, final product. I think he might be someone that artists and designers LOVE but that tv executives and focus groups are a little weirded out by. I don't really get it, but I was adamant we started with him.

This was the first round of sketches he did for us and I loved so much of it right out of the gate. The Scarecrow barely changed throughout our development in fact. I was also a huge fan of the clothes on the Lion but alas, the execs at the partner company weren't. Trying to make something NEW but still recognisably "The Wizard of Oz" was always the challenge on this show.

Tomorrow I will post Part 2 of this design work, showing you where he got to after our notes.