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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nPreviously, in \u201cWicked\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Aspiring witches, green-skinned outcast Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and pink-and-popular Glinda (Ariana Grande), started off as enemies at school, but then became friends. They decided to go their separate ways after discovering a plan by the nefarious Wizard (Jeff Goldblum) to blame and punish animals for problems in the Land of Oz. The Wizard and henchwoman Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh) tried to have Elphaba captured and silenced because she learned that The Wizard had no real magical power. Fortunately, Elphaba did have magical powers and escaped the Emerald City on a broomstick, though The Wizard and Morrible quickly spread rumors throughout Oz that she was a Wicked Witch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When we rejoin \u201cWicked,\u201d Elphaba is still on the run, helping out animals when she can and trying to think of a way to expose The Wizard as a fraud. Her disabled sister Nessarose (Marissa Bode) is now governor of Munchkinland, with reluctant boyfriend Boq (Ethan Slater) as her favorite servant. Love interest Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey, recently named PEOPLE\u2019s Sexiest Man Alive) is captain of The Wizard\u2019s guards, tasked with hunting down Elphaba, but secretly determined to assist his old flame. As for Glinda, she\u2019s been made a \u201cGood Witch\u201d by The Wizard and Morrible, a sort of magical superhero to balance out the Wickedness of Elphaba, at least in the public\u2019s eyes. She isn\u2019t exactly Wicked herself, but she has been seduced into complicity by the perks and popularity that come with the position. She even unwittingly gives Morrible the idea to do the most Wicked deed of all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If last year\u2019s \u201cWicked\u201d served as a sort of prequel to \u201cThe Wizard of Oz,\u201d then \u201cWicked: For Good\u201d serves as a sort of parallel piece. It\u2019s not an even split \u2013 there\u2019s plenty of prequel-y stuff here too, but a never-fully-seen Dorothy shows up at about the halfway mark, and we see what was happening offscreen while that literary and cinematic classic unfolded. It all leads up to a devastating splash from a bucket of water that ties into the Munchkinland celebration from the beginning of the first movie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Frankly, all the \u201crunning parallel to \u2018The Wizard of Oz\u2019\u201d stuff is a huge detriment to both the stage and screen versions of \u201cWicked.\u201d Characters\u2019 attitudes, motivations, and loyalties turn on a dime just to accommodate the way those characters behaved in the more familiar story. Then there\u2019s the huge plot hole of characters interacting in these movies despite ostensibly meeting one another for the first time during Dorothy\u2019s walk down the Yellow Brick Road (a certain brainless wonder should have received more recognition than he was ever given). The whole practice makes the story a mess, though the movie is only following the stage musical\u2019s lead, while admirably tightening up a detail or two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another area where the new film tries to fix a deficiency with the stage show is with its musical numbers. The stage version is so front-loaded with memorable songs that disappointingly little is saved for the second half. The film knows that audiences won\u2019t stand for such a dull second installment, so it has added two new songs: Elphaba\u2019s attempt to rally her animal friends with the familiar adage that \u201cThere\u2019s No Place Like Home,\u201d and Glinda taking a long hard look in the mirror (or rather, somewhat-reflective sphere) in \u201cThe Girl in the Bubble.\u201d They\u2019re admirable efforts, but neither is as memorable as the stage show\u2019s \u201cNo Good Deed\u201d or the titular \u201cFor Good,\u201d themselves paling in comparison to the best songs from the first movie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWicked: For Good\u201d is a relative step down from \u201cWicked,\u201d but it justifies its existence better than fans feared it would when it was first announced that the adaptation would be split into two movies. And it\u2019s still a grand, ambitious, passionately-performed spectacle. I can say that the underwhelming second half of the stage musical has been changed for the better, and because it\u2019s been shown some much-needed love, it has been changed \u201cFor Good.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grade: B-<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWicked: For Good\u201d is rated PG for action\/violence, some suggestive material and thematic material. Its running time is 137 minutes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Bob Garver Previously, in \u201cWicked\u201d Aspiring witches, green-skinned outcast Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and pink-and-popular Glinda (Ariana Grande), started off as enemies at school, but then became friends. They… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":59413,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"13","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMTFcL2ltYWdlLTIwMjUtMTEtMjRUMjExNTI1LjI3OS53ZWJwP2ZpdD02NDclMkMxMDI0JnNzbD0xIiwidHh0IjoiTW92aWUgUmV2aWV3ICYjODIxMTsgV2lja2VkIEZvciBHb29kIiwidGVtcGxhdGUiOiJoaWdod2F5IiwiZm9udCI6IiIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.2UDbt2yNJBxskuwJcCYGp-WNJhXSSv8_7ycBVP8saeAMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":59413,"url":"http:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/image-2025-11-24T211525.279.webp","type":"image\/png"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[13],"tags":[12700],"class_list":["post-59412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-movie-review-wicked-for-good"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59412"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59414,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59412\/revisions\/59414"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}