Miranda (Wizard of Oz)



Miranda  is a one-time heroine in the 1990 animated cartoon  The Wizard of Oz. She is a robotic milkmaid from the Oz city of Mechanica and the  Tin Man's  love interest. She is voiced by Tress MacNeille.

The Marvelous Milkmaid of Mechanica
Sometime after Dorothy originally saved Oz from the Wicked Witch of the West, she and her friends are chasing the Wizard in an attempt to save him from the evil Western Wind, a magical spell the Wicked Witch of the West (who was resurrected) to keep the Wizard away from the Emerald City. They eventually reached the city of Mechanica, a city where the Tin Man lived many years earlier before meeting Dorothy and his friends. There, after they manage to tether the Wizard to a large arm in the sea using the ruby slipper's magic, they come across Miranda after a dilemma that nearly resulted in everyone falling into the river below when the bridge raised. There, she angrily greets the Tin Man and his friends and says (rather sarcastically) that "he picked a fine time to return to Mechanica". The Tin Man tries to talk to her, but she walks away before he gets a chance to. Dorothy, who thinks that she might be the key to rescuing the Wizard, runs off and tries to talk to her. Miranda however abruptly stops her and hides her in a nearby corner, as a swarm of mechanical bees begin attacking citizens in the town.

Dorothy is horrified by what is going on, and asks Miranda what the bees are doing. Miranda then reveals that the bees are being sent by the Clockmaker and that they are stealing keys from the citizens so that the Clockmaker can give them to the Wicked Witch of the West and imprison everyone in the city so that he can rule the city. After the bees stop capturing citizens for the time being, Dorothy asks why the Clockmaker hasn't stolen Miranda's key, she responds by stating the the Clockmaker is "fond of her" but that she prefers the Tin Man, "until he stopped writing". Soon afterwards, the Clockmaker sends his trash can-shaped minions to capture Dorothy.

Meanwhile, Tin Man breaks down in tears after Miranda's angry confrontation with him. The Scarecrow asks why she was upset with him, and the Tin Man reveals that one day he stopped receiving letters from her years earlier for unknown reasons. He attempts to go and apologize, but they overhear Dorothy screaming, and instead locate and try to rescue her.

Unfortunately, Dorothy is captured by the Clockmaker's minions and taken to his fortress. There, she comes across Miranda again, Clockmaker when threatens to harm Toto and Dorothy's friends unless she hands over the ruby slippers.

Eventually, Dorothy's finds infiltrate the fortress, but Clockmaker (who is aware that the Tin Man is in love with Miranda) swindles Miranda's key, and theatens to smash it if he makes another step. He then captures him, along with the Scarecrow and the Cowardly Lion. Before he has a chance to dispose of them, they distract the Clockmaker long enough for Dorothy and Miranda to gather water from the river just outside the fortress using Miranda's pigtails. Just before the Clockmaker kills the captured trio, Dorothy and Miranda splash the bucket of water on the Clockmaker, causing him to spontaneously rust and drop Miranda's key.

The key however falls into a set of gears and is destroyed. But Miranda tells Dorothy and her friends not to worry about her, instead they concentrate on reversing the direction of the whirlygig, a device the Clockmaker used earlier to blow the Wizard away from Mechanica so that they can draw him back into the city and rescue him once more. Once the Wizard gets close enough to the building, the Scarecrow tells Miranda to shut off the whirlygig, but before she is able to preform the action, she suddenly shuts down, and to make matters worse, the Wicked Witch begins to approach the fortress. The group makes the decision to drive the Witch away from city by setting the whirligig to blow in the opposite direction (but also blowing away the Wizard as well). The plan works, and although they fail to rescue the Wizard, he manages to throw them a skeleton-shaped key.

Meanwhile, the Tin Man mourns the lost of Miranda, as "without her key, she's as good as dead". But the Scarecrow manages to revive her when he discovers that the key that the Wizard handed to Dorothy before he left is in fact a skeleton key. Miranda is then brought back to life, but after learning that the Wizard is safe, she then questions the Tin Man for the reason why he stopped writing her letters. The Tin Man then claims that is was her that stopped writing. While the two former lovers refused to talk until one admits that they stop writing, Dorothy uses the skeleton key to revive all the citizens, one of which was a postman, who then proceeds to deliver the Tin Man and Miranda the missing letters, realizing that they still love each other after so long. Miranda then asks the Tin Man if he will now stay in Mechanica, but the Tin Man reluctantly declines for the time being, stating that he will return once the Wicked Witch is vanquished and the Wizard is saved. Nevertheless, he promises that once he and his friends succeed, he will "have a heart to give her".