#wicked ramblings

[polyarmy]

Tbh the only ways I see Act I of Wicked possibly ending differently, if we assume the Wizard will always manipulate Elphaba into magically maiming the Monkey guards, is if A) Fiyero goes with the girls or B) Glinda doesn’t go with Elphaba to begin with (oh the irony).

If Fiyero goes with them he will probably leap for the opportunity to go with Elphaba, and will serve as an extra coercive element that Glinda will likely have a much harder time turning down. And three people on the run (one of whom is a PRINCE WITH A CONVENIENTLY EMPTY FAMILY CASTLE) have a much better chance at surviving than just two.

If Glinda doesn’t go, she (and Fiyero) will wonder How The Hell things at the Emerald City turned out so that Elphaba became public enemy #1 overnight. They would want to know her side of the story and more actively seek her out immediately, and Glinda wouldn’t be tied up with being an immediate stealth political hostage by the Wizard and Morrible by virtue of not having been there as a witness.

[polyarmy]

Do any of you ever think about how it is *A Choice* for them to have Glinda screaming Fiyero’s name bleeding into Elphaba screaming Fiyero’s name at the start of No Good Deed

[polyarmy]

*tapping desk* still waiting for someone to write the wicked fic where practically everything is the same except a significant chunk of Act I is rewritten to be more of an angle of Glinda and Fiyero knew they were in love with Elphaba and them navigating that and bonding over it and the train scene is also them asking her to be their third

Cuz uh

Even in the musical that’s often what it looks like

[polyarmy]

My eternal struggle is I think fiyeraba without gelphie is kind of uninteresting and gelphie without fiyeraba is also kind of uninteresting so I constantly sit clawing at my enclosure for the content that fit my requirements

I am eternally grateful for the content that does

[polyarmy]

The Wicked movie did so many fantastic things but the one that I keep thinking about is one of the smallest and insignificant things.

The 1939 Universal Pictures logo remaster and the Wizard of Oz styled logo in the movie - completely forgoing the modern Wicked marketing logo. its one of the things that matters the least, since they don't impact the story at all. The movie could be exactly the same without the logo motifs. But I don't know. There's something about their extremely deliberate decision to make Wicked evoke memories of the MGM Wizard of Oz - along with decisions like making Glinda's initial bubble dress pink instead of blue, and making sure that the Wizard's giant face lightshow had pulsing pyrotechnics - that I find so dang charming. It's one of those things that they could only do for movie too, because like the MGM Wizard of Oz, this version of Wicked is a movie. They really want you to feel like this is a prequel/alternate retelling, in every way.

[polyarmy]

Thinking about Glinda and the Steven Universe song ‘it’s over isn’t it’ and how Pearl at least got to have a moment of closure with Greg regarding Rose, and Glinda doesn’t even have that luxury because both Elphaba and Fiyero are *gone*, and the last she saw of either of them they were screaming in pain, and how the fuck is she supposed to ever ‘move on’ from that.

Also thinking about how Rebecca Sugar entertained in her personal sketches Pearl and Greg having emotionally messy foreplay/sex to work through their collective grief for Rose and boy do I have thoughts along those lines regarding Glinda and Fiyero regarding Elphaba during the intermission years

[polyarmy]

So I’d heard about this, and I’m probably late to the party but I finally checked this out and indeed, the Shiz Gazette for the Wicked movie, as seen in Dr. Dillamond's classroom on the website, shows they’ve lifted parts of Book canon Fiyero to create the background of his movie counterpart. He is Prince Fiyero of the Arjikis, son of Marilott and Baxiana.

Mixed feelings about the fact the movie itself only ever uses the term ‘Winkie’, when in the novels it was established Winkie country should be called the Vinkus, and the fact of course that they cast a white actor for Fiyero (tho Jonathan Bailey is purely on acting terms, an extremely likable Fiyero which I’m grateful for).

However I’m actually really interested and intrigued to know that beyond restoring Fiyero’s association with the color blue, his basic general background from the books was transplanted too. I say this because I ultimately like seeing how much the movie staff tried to pull together more references from each of Wicked’s source materials, whether it’s the original Oz books, the MGM film, or the Wicked novel series, while keeping the Wicked musical itself intact.

Especially since it opens up more discussion of how Movie!Fiyero exists in the world. He likely still was raised culturally distinct from the rest of Oz, and so how does that inform what we’ve seen of his values and worldview?

Just things to think about.

As a side note tho, imo it also vindicates every fanfic writer’s attempt at a booksical Fiyero, when the movie itself did its own level of canon welding. Tbh just seeing acknowledgment of the term ‘Arjiki’ in an official musical based context is wild to me.

[polyarmy]

The Wicked mania bug bit me so hard i tore my place apart looking for the laptop I had during my last Wicked mania phase, when I had downloaded a bunch of boots. The laptop is in horrible condition - loose hinge, broken trackpad, sticky keyboard - and I'm really relieved that I'm taking these files off of it and making sure I save them for posterity.

I was appalled to find out that Past Me didn't label anything, and right now it seems I've definitely accidentally Lost Some Files. But if nothing else, I still have a recording of the cast I saw on Broadway that started everything for me: Julia, Kendra, and Sebastian you three still have my heart as my fave thropple. No one else has ever done it like them for me. Julia Murney always stands out for me as a 'witchy' Elphaba, one of the few Elphabas who actually has a facial profile similar to Margaret Hamilton and gave off strong vibes that 'oh yes I can really believe she grows into being the MGM witch'. I loved that Julia leaned into it too by often making her performance very snarky and cackly. Kendra is also such an adorably bouncy and giggly Glinda, it is impossible to stop myself from smiling during her Popular. Meanwhile Sebastian hands down is my favorite stage Fiyero not only because he's literally married to one of his Elphabas, but he also had hair long enough to actually do Glinda's 'toss toss' with his hair and he *would*, and I was so delighted by that. The three of them had so much good chemistry and are definitely a big part of why I'm such a huge Gliyeraba truther because I believed in how much they cared about each other.

I also still have a complete show with Alli Mauzey Glinda and I'm so grateful cuz she really was one of the great Glindas. Tons of spunk, and she was fondly remembered for being one of the crazier Glindas who made the audience burst into laughter. Arianna's movie Glinda isn't all that much like Alli's but I definitely think she drew some comedic inspiration from Alli (flopping on the bed to pout during Popular). She was also a fairly tall Glinda! I had forgotten that. It catches me off guard since Alli has such a sweet, doe-eyed face, but she makes so many of her Elphies look like angry little girls lol. Her Elphaba in this show was Donna Vivino and Donna is a fantastic Elphaba - very solid and one I would recommend people watch and listen to in the role. I have a near-complete show with Willemijn Verkaik as Elphaba which I'm grateful for. I'm missing the very end, but most of the show is there and at least there's that. I respect her immensely since she's played Elphaba in multiple languages and sounds great in every one. She also has a 'witchier' face profile and I consider her to be one of the greatest stage Elphabas of all time because of her history in the role. As an aside I love that she was also Elsa in Frozen, not only as her movie dub voice but *got to play her onstage* and that is amazing to me;

I am sadly missing a huge chunk of a show with Derrick Williams as Fiyero. He had a fantastic personality as Fiyero (which is saying something because very few Fiyeros stand out to me) and was always notable for being not only an early Fiyero, but a black Fiyero. I actually do have *most* of the show, but the biggest shame about this file is that it had Megan Hilty as Glinda and she was also famous for being a crazy Glinda. I wish I could have a full file with both of these actors.

if anyone wants to talk to me about favorite Wicked casts please message me I would love to