Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol tells the tale of a woke Scrooge who is given a vision of his future. Woke Scrooge is horrified by the neurotic, demonic depiction of his future self by Johnny Depp, and is relieved to wake up in the body of either Gene Wilder or Shane MacGowan, depending on which version of the story he is watching. The story ends with woke Scrooge renouncing his miserly woke legalism, and dancing down the streets in a state of exhilaration and repentance. He is relieved beyond words that the Tim Burton remake of his life was only a dream. He is happy to be buying geese for poor people and singing traditional Irish punk songs in Wonkaland, where he belongs.
There are many things they never teach you in school. By far the most important is that Willy Wonka and Shane MacGowan have been alternating the roles between the Ghost of Christmas Past and Present in a live-action version of A Christmas Carol for decades, and the Ghost of Christmas Future scenes are playing out in real time every day, and have been for several years. In fact, the joyless, neurotic depiction of the Ghost of Christmas Future by Johnny Depp is almost 20 years old.
That's how close we are to the end.
There's really no comparison. The ghost of Christmas Past or Present as portrayed by Gene Wilder is an eccentric, fun-loving genius who is in complete control of not only Wonkaland, but the outside world as well. When the Wonkavator crashes through the glass ceiling of his estate at the end of the film, there is no indication that the RAF is aware of this sudden, unexplained intrusion on British airspace, or that they feel the need to scramble any jets to intercept it. Wonka floats above the city in a module of pure imagination, completely unfazed by the "real world" around him. Unlike Depp's misanthropic, insecure Ghost of Christmas Future, Wilder's Wonka is completely unbothered by the selfishness and greed of the people on his tour. He rolls his eyes and dispatches Oompa Loompas to save the doomed rejects from the furnace with the air of a man who forgot to pack his toothbrush, and is asking his valet to please return to his room and fetch the forgotten, unimportant item. When confronted with the lack of imagination of the woke legalists on the tour, Wonka responds with boredom, and with poetry.
The ghost of Christmas past, indeed.
Shane MacGowan is remembered as a songwriter and singer for The Pogues, but most people don't know that he was an understudy for Gene Wilder for performances of A Christmas Carol in the basement of an Irish pub on the North Pole, where the elves used to unwind after a long day of making toys for children all around the world. Shane MacGowan knew Wilder's part so well that Wilder would often assume other roles, so that he would become the Ghost of Christmas Present, and MacGowan would play the Ghost of Christmas Past. Sometimes they would step on each other's lines, and the elves couldn't tell who was who. Is it Wilder playing the Ghost of Christmas Past tonight, or MacGowan? The elves argued, and sometimes, if the egg nog was flowing a little too freely, the discussions would devolve into fisticuffs, mid-scene. Gene Wilder would be giving a wistful monologue about Christmas past, and suddenly a brawl would break out. Balls of tangled elves would go flying across the room in a cloud of pugilistic fury, and Wilder and MacGowan would be forced to break it up. To keep the peace, the tall, gangly duo often abandoned the play entirely, and performed a set of traditional Irish punk songs instead. The egg-nog-fueled Bacchanalia and improvised, spontaneous compositions of Irish Wonka punk would continue well into the morning, and many an elf was seen the next day working on the factory line, painting toys in a state of obvious inebriation. Santa never asked any questions, as long as the work got done.
Shane MacGowan wrote "Boys From The County Hell" about Santa's elves, while he was an understudy for Gene Wilder on the North Pole in the winter of 1972. When asked about it later in life, he often dodged the question, or pretended it was about Ireland. But the song was inspired by Santa's elves. Who are, of course, the Oompa Loompas. There is no "County Hell" in Ireland.
"County Hell" is the North Pole.
Now you know.
When Gene Wilder became an international candy mogul and invented an elevator with stealth capabilities by which he could give tours of the city to his heirs, he hired some of his elf friends from his "County Hell" days to work in his factory. He disguised them with orangeface and smuggled them through a subatomic railroad from the North Pole to Wonkaland, a sovereign, moving territory that exists in various parts of the UK. Much like Vatican City. Except without a flag.
Or a script.
Where is fancy bread, exactly?
In the heart, or in the head?
Once you realize that the world is a live-action version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, and that Gene Wilder and Shane MacGowan, the interchangeable ghosts of Christmas past and present, are both deceased,
Once you realize that the Oompa Loompas have been scattered from their Arctic homeland and wander the earth in search of their true Wonka heritage,
And that the ghost of Christmas future is a woke, misanthropic dentist with daddy issues who has been drowning the part in humorless faux-neuroses for almost 20 years, the world will make a lot more sense. When asked about Johnny Depp's Ghost of Christmas Future, the Ghost of Christmas Past/Present said that he "didn't want to see the film," and that it was "an insult."
The apocalyptic implications of Willy Wonka's statements in this interview are clear. Take the hint, and take it now.
Repent.
