Wicked: For Good (2025, PG)

*Premise spoilers (which include spoilers for Part 1)*

It’s here!!! You’d best believe I’ve been flailing and hand-flapping every time I’ve watched the trailer. I had too much other stuff going on to get to this movie opening weekend, but I was able to run out and catch it this week, and it was absolutely lovely.

Five years after the events of Wicked: Part 1, Elphaba fights to liberate oppressed Animals by day and lives in hiding by night. She’s searching for a way to expose the Wizard as a fraud. However, Glinda is helping to prop up that fraud—now known as Glinda the Good Witch (despite having no real power herself,) she’s the Wizard’s right-hand woman, reeling at the anti-Elphaba propaganda she’s made to spout. She’s engaged to Fiyero and on the verge of getting everything she’s supposed to want, but things aren’t over yet between the two old friends.

Personally, while I loved the film, I think it’s a little weaker than Part 1, if only because the first act of the musical is stronger than the second. The plot meanders at times, there are moments that get a little too silly, and although I enjoy both the brand-new songs in the movie (one written for Elphaba, the other for Glinda,) neither of them have completely grabbed me yet—we’ll see if the new songs win me over on repeat listens. Like the first film, this one is pretty beholden to the source material but also expands on it in interesting ways. Here, I like some added interactions between Elphaba and Glinda, I enjoy the role that Animals play in the story, and the climactic sequence leading to “For Good” is simply gorgeous.

As with the first film, the costumes are a delight and the score is exquisite—not just the singing performances, which we’ll get to in a moment, but the orchestral score and the way various musical themes are woven in where you may not expect them. It’s so nice to return to this world, and it’s interesting to see how, five years along, the police-state aspects of Oz are much more out in the open, with press secretary Madame Morrible printing propaganda posters to maintain the fear of Elphaba and Animal refugees attempting to flee from Oz.

The cast remains exquisite. While Jeff Goldblum and Michelle Yeoh are still the weakest singers in the group, they’re both stellar as the Wizard and Madame Morrible. Marissa Bode and Ethan Slater continue to turn in fine work as Nessarose and Boq, with their story coming to a head. As the plot of The Wizard of Oz gets folded into the film, those characters are kept largely out-of-focus for various reasons, but I enjoyed Colman Domingo’s brief appearance as the Cowardly Lion. Jonathan Bailey is just so damn good as Fiyero—his acting and singing are both excellent, and he’s consistently great in scenes with Glinda and Elphaba alike.

But of course, in the end, it’s all about the witches. Ariana Grande-Butera gives such a beautiful performance as Glinda, who’s getting everything she wants at the cost of what she really needs. Even as Glinda makes stunningly bad choices—out of ambition, desperation, or hurt/anger—she remains comprehensible. I’ve always loved Glinda’s part in “Thank Goodness,” and she doesn’t disappoint. And Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba…my god! She’s just a knockout: fierce, flawed, and principled. “No Good Deed” near about blew the roof off the theater! Because they’re on opposite sides of the Wizard’s fascist regime, we don’t see Elphaba and Glinda together as often in this film, but whenever Erivo and Grande-Butera share the screen, it’s simply electric.

Warnings

Thematic elements, violence, and mild sexual content.

Neurodivergent (Headcanon) Alley: Fiyero Tigelaar (Wicked)

*Fiyero-related spoilers.*

This is the last of my Wicked-related Neurodivergent Alley posts. For me, Fiyero’s neurodivergent coding is more vibes-based than anything else, but if you take an ND reading of the character (ADHD in this case,) it opens his portrayal up in interesting ways, and it’s a big part of the reason why Fiyero works so much better for me in the movie than in the stage show. (Book Fiyero, by the way, is so different that he’s effectively a separate character, so I won’t be drawing from the book at all.)

To me, Fiyero reads as ADHD—after the film, I discovered that Jonathan Bailey has ADHD as well, so I’m totally taking that as confirmation. And to be sure, a lot of my interpretation comes from Bailey’s performance. There’s less to specifically put my finger on compared to Elphaba or Galinda. It’s a total vibe, slightly ineffable but definitely there. It’s in the way he carries himself, the way he moves and interacts with other characters onscreen.

So if we start from the premise that Fiyero is ADHD, his textual portrayal resonates differently. Like Galinda, he’s a skilled masker—when the two of them flirt with each other, it feels like you're watching a play, two master performers "yes and-ing" their way through a relationship that looks good on paper. But while Galinda’s very deliberate mask feels like an artificial version of neurotypicality, Fiyero’s looks different. It’s not as brittly maintained, for one thing. And for another, it’s less about hiding ADHD traits and more about presenting them in an “acceptable” package. Plenty of ADHDers do this by taking on the mantle of the “class clown.” For Fiyero, he’s the fun-loving party prince whose job is to make everybody happy.

And it is kind of a job for him. When Fiyero arrives at Shiz, he puts on a whole-ass performance, declaring, “Once again, the responsibility to corrupt my fellow students falls to me.” In the past, “Dancing Through Life” has struck me as a shallow, rather self-absorbed song, the bored prince seeking pleasure and creating fun for his own enjoyment. But in the movie, the song is so outward-facing. It’s Fiyero putting on a show for his new classmates, teaching them about his philosophy and creating fun for their enjoyment. It’s much more of an act, and he does it for them. As he stirs up chaos in the library, dancing on books and flirting his way through the student body, he’s giving the people what they want.

Part of that act, specifically, is about playing dumb. And again, when you view it through an ADHD lens, that resonates differently. It hits harder when Fiyero mentions that he’s been kicked out of multiple schools, when he calls himself “brainless” and “thoughtless.” We don’t see much of him actually in class, but if academics are hard for him, it might feel easier to lower people’s expectations out of the gate, to play the part of the careless himbo rather than admit to any struggles.

In truth, though, Fiyero isn’t dumb. He’s quick-witted, someone who has a response to nearly everything—we can tell when Elphaba starts to get under his skin, because it’s in conversations with her that he loses his well-practiced composure. He’s observant too, a shrewd judge of character. Not long after he meets Galinda, there’s a “game recognize game” moment where he acknowledges her skill as a performer. And he has Elphaba’s number pretty immediately after meeting her as well, noting how she starts out on the defensive to push people away. I can definitely buy him as a guy whose wheels are always turning, even though he pretends he’s not.

Elphaba is the one who clocks him—the heart of all these relationships is basically the characters recognizing the parts that the others hide from everyone else. She sees, not just that Fiyero is putting on an act, but that it makes him unhappy.

Like Galinda, Fiyero has created his mask so effectively that he’s gotten trapped in it. But another important difference between them is that I think Fiyero is much more aware of it than Galinda is. As hard as Galinda works to maintain the image she projects, I'm not sure if she entirely realizes that it isn't the real her. Fiyero definitely knows it, which fuels his depression. Even in “Dancing Through Life,” his fun, breezy performance distracts from the deeper thoughts he's revealing in the lyrics: “Why think too hard when it’s so soothing / Dancing through life?” “Woes are fleeting, blows are glancing / When you’re dancing through life.”

This brings me to a final difference between them. Both are drawn to Elphaba, and she makes both of them want to show her more of their true selves. But while Glinda is still stuck in her performance, retreating when Elphaba offers her a chance to break out of it, Fiyero is more ready to cast aside the persona that’s kept him safe. Although he hasn’t fully escaped it yet, the threads holding him back are a lot more tenuous.

Top Five Songs: Wicked: Part 1

When I posted my review of the movie, I checked my blog to see what else I’d written about Wicked and was surprised to find only one other post, a review of the book. I really haven’t written about the show at all! I suppose I was long past my teenage Wicked years by the time I started this blog, but I still hadn’t expected that. It’s all right, though—it just means I can write all kinds of stuff about the movie without doubling up from old posts! It turns out one good reason that Wicked was split into two movies is that now I’ll be able to do two different Top Five Songs write-ups.

 

“No One Mourns the Wicked” – Strong opening number. Ariana Grande is just instantly Glinda from head to toe, her singing lovely and her acting fantastic. I love the needle she threads as Glinda moves through the celebrating crowd, especially when she sees the giant effigy the Munchkinlanders have built of Elphaba.

Best lyric: “Yes, goodness knows the wicked’s lives are lonely. / Goodness knows the wicked cry alone. / Nothing grows for the wicked, they reap only / What they’ve sown.”

 

“What Is This Feeling?” – This is a really entertaining number, Elphaba and Galinda going toe-to-toe in song while their roommate squabbles escalate onscreen. Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande sound terrific together, and I like how their feud about Galinda’s trunks taking over the room carries into the dining hall and their classrooms. The choreography toward the end is a lot of fun!

Best lyric: “Though I do admit it came on fast, / Still I do believe that it can last. / And I will be loathing, / Loathing you / My whole life long!”

 

“Dancing Through Life” – Love! I enjoyed this song in the Broadway cast recording, but I adore it in the movie. In terms of staging and choreography, it’s one of the best set pieces in the film—those revolving circular bookcases, my god! It’s easy to see everyone falling in love with Fiyero throughout the number, and Jonathan Bailey plays the role to a tee. The more story-driven second half of the song comes off really well too, flowing from location to location, with the music weaving in and out between the dialogue.

Best lyric: “Dancing through life down at the Ozdust / If only because dust is what we come to. / Nothing matters but knowing nothing matters, / It’s just life, / So keep dancing through.”

 

“Popular” – It might be an obvious crowd-pleaser, but for good reason! It’s an utter delight to watch Galinda attempt to make Elphaba over while espousing her philosophy—she’s so gloriously extra and kooky! I also like that, even though Elphaba is overwhelmed and apprehensive about this whole thing, we do see her getting into the spirit of it at different points.

Best lyric: “It’s all about popular. / It’s not about aptitude— / It’s the way you’re viewed. / So it’s very shrewd to be / Very, very popular / Like me!”

 

“Defying Gravity” – If I was going purely off the soundtrack, there’d definitely be more Elphaba on this list—Cynthia Erivo’s voice, my god! But I’m looking at the numbers as a whole within the film, and as much as I love “The Wizard and I” and “I’m Not that Girl,” the visuals on those songs don’t pull me in as strongly as the others on this list do. If there’s a quintessential showcase for Elphaba, though, it’s obviously “Defying Gravity.” And wow, does she stun! Some fans have complained about how protracted the larger scene is, but I like the way the song swells in and out, with bits of action and dialogue interspersed within it. Erivo is at the absolute top of her game—she and Grande are both heartbreaking in the quieter parts, and Erivo blows the roof off the big finish. This whole scene was a moment, and a breathtaking way to end the film.

Best lyric: “Too long I’ve been afraid of / Losing love, I guess I’ve lost. / Well, if that’s love, if comes at much too high a cost.”

Neurodivergent (Headcanon) Alley: Galinda Upland (Wicked)

*Galinda-related spoilers.*

*Note: I’ll use both “Galinda” and “Glinda” to refer to this character, depending on when in the film I’m looking at.*

It’s not much of a stretch to look at Elphaba and potentially see an autistic-coded character, even if I feel the movie really leans into those aspects of her. Galinda was much more of a surprise me, but I see it all over the film. With stories like this, it’s easy to view things from a lens of “autistic outcast and their neurotypical nemesis-turned-bestie,” but the way the movie portrays the characters, my interpretation of their nemesis-turned-bestie relationship is one of unmasked autism vs. high-masking AuDHD.

Yes, Galinda is fashionable and popular, and yes, she instantly acquires her own entourage of hangers-on when she arrives at Shiz. In the Elphaba/Galinda feud early in the film, pretty much the whole student body is thoroughly Team Galinda. But while Galinda is able to use and understand social cues to her advantage—in a way Elphaba really can’t—that comes with a lot of effort on her first.

So much of how Galinda presents herself is wrapped up in artifice. From her fawning remarks to Ms. Morrible to her calculated hair-tossing, she’s all about carefully controlled precision to achieve the result she wants. She’s constantly performing “personhood” for everyone around her, and even if she often manages to get her way, she does it within the confines of who she’s “supposed” to be.

Everybody else buys the performance Galinda is selling, but not Elphaba. The moment they meet, Galinda “charitably” declares her intention to study sorcery and one day use her magic to heal Elphaba of her green skin, and Elphaba sees through her self-aggrandizing vow. Being seen as a good person is crucial to Galinda's sense of self, and Elphaba isn’t afraid to challenge that.

This, I think, is at the heart of their early conflicts. It's not just that Galinda is pretty and popular and Elphaba is green and weird. It's that Elphaba has no issue pointing out that Galinda isn't what she pretends to be, and that rattles her. At the same time, it probably burns Galinda up that Elphaba refuses to give in to what other people think about her when that’s practically all Galinda cares about. Even as they bicker and jostle, is there a part of Galinda that’s jealous to see someone who’s so boldly and unapologetically herself?

Perhaps because Galinda is always pretending, she’s able to see one of the few instances where Elphaba pretends. At the Ozdust Ballroom, Galinda has let her friends goad her into playing an unkind prank on Elphaba, “gifting” her the odd black hat Galinda’s granny gave her. As everyone laughs, Elphaba dances anyway, refusing to let them drive her out, and Galinda realizes that Elphaba does care what people think about her—she just pretends not to.

This is the start of Galinda and Elphaba’s friendship/love story(?), and in my view, it’s the tentative start of Galinda’s unmasking journey. "Popular" is more than just a recompense, a genuine way to try and help Elphaba after tricking her with the hat. Even as Galinda tries to make Elphaba more like her—ultimately giving up when she realizes that Elphaba is already lovely as herself—this is Galinda at her most unmasked, which actually makes her a little more like Elphaba. She is extra as hell throughout this whole song, delightfully goofy and hyper and excited. It's in stark contrast with Elphaba, who doesn't know what to think here, but this is who Galinda is when she's not performing for everyone around her. Elphaba is always 100% herself and never lets anyone take that away from her, and in "Popular," Galinda lets Elphaba see her.

But Galinda has probably spent her whole life molding herself into what she thinks she ought to be. It’s how she’s gotten anything she’s wanted, and Galinda is an ambitious young woman who wants a lot more. This is a person who gives up her own name in “tribute” to Dr. Dillamond when she senses Fiyero pulling away from her, connecting with Elphaba over how upset they both are at his removal from the school. No matter how much she comes to care about and admire Elphaba, Glinda can’t just tear down all those many layers of protective performance.

So we come to the end of the movie, to "Defying Gravity." Elphaba immediately blows everything up with the Wizard and Madame Morrible because she knows how wrong this all is, showing her hand without a second thought. She’d rather be seen as a villain than compromise herself, and she’s instantly prepared to throw everything else away for her ideals. When everything is chaotic and messy and they’re running, Glinda’s automatic instinct is to go with Elphaba. But when she has a moment to breathe and think, Glinda retreats back into her mask. She can’t give up her sense of self, constructed by what other people think of her, and she can’t give up her goals and dreams when Elphaba doesn’t even have a concrete plan.

This is Glinda’s essential tragedy: when offered the chance to truly break free, she can’t go through with it. She turns away from her dearest friend, the woman she loves, breaking her own heart in the process. She goes back to the safety of a performance that’s so all-consuming, she’s ensnared herself in it.