Wicked: For Good

A movie review

My husband and I, with Vlad and Teengirl, saw Part 2 of the Wicked movie the day after Thanksgiving. The 4:45 p.m. showing was lightly attended, but not lightly enough: four teenage girls sat in front of us. One sang along with the songs softly but definitely audibly, while another got bored at intervals and played a game on her bright-screen phone.

If you’re not very interested in this review, the TL;DR from Vlad the Critic is, “I liked it, but the lighting was too dim.” Vlad also remarked on the lack of dance numbers and thought there were too few songs; to be fair, he observed, that must be a weakness of the source material, not just of the movie.

I thought the interior design was excellent, and I didn’t think it was too dim. You can’t expect a ruined castle at night to be well lit. I especially liked Elphaba’s tree root house. It would be cool (and damp and musty) living there.

The costumes in this movie were not as good as in the previous one. Michelle Yeoh was all in green and looked silly. Prince Fiyero wore a dumb green uniform and kept brandishing – off-balance with his shoulder weirdly overextended – a “firearm” that looked like a green, steampunk stapler. And he looked scruffy and depressed, but maybe that was a plot point.

I enjoyed the movie, but, as I think about it, I’m struggling to think of parts that were really good. Was the central conflict, “The dictatorship is being mean to talking animals,” or was it, “Two girls try to maintain their friendship as they fight over a man”? The latter, I think. The hinge moment was Elphaba’s spending an intimate night with Prince Fiyero, and that fell rather flat, but the talking animals’ lack of individual agency made that plotline even flatter. I mean, you’re glad they got released from cages, but … yeah, glad … and the flying monkeys got some plot.

The movie (and presumably the stage musical) makes a big deal out of the concept of Good vs. Wicked – so much that it’s too obvious while at the same time being rather muddled. I suppose we could say that the moral is that declaring yourself to be Good, or on the Good Side, is easy, but real “goodness” requires nuance and engagement with the complications of reality, and it is difficult.

The singing was good. The acting was good. Cynthia Erivo looked great most of the time. Ariana Grande looked like an alien cartoon character.

Nessarose the sister and Boq the Munchkin remained underdeveloped characters with shallow motives. “To be fair,” there are all sorts of people in the real world with underdeveloped characters and shallow motives. And it ended without a real conclusion. I know there are more books in the series, although I haven’t read any. Maybe someone in the movie business imagines more movies.

In conclusion, it wasn’t a bad movie at all, just okay.