Latest / CinemaHounds - A Lorehounds Podcast / Wicked: For Good (2025) – w/ musical & book differences
Transcript
- 0:16[SPEAKER_04]: Hello, and welcome to the Lower Hounds.
- 0:18[SPEAKER_04]: We are absolutely honored to have you.
- 0:22[SPEAKER_04]: I'm Alicia, one of your guides to the weird wicked world.
- 0:26[SPEAKER_03]: And I'm Marilyn, and I'm so looking forward to discussing part two of the wicked movie musical wicked for good, with both of you.
- 0:35[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm Nicole, I'm excited to be conversicating with the two of you again about Glinda, Afaba, and Jonathan Bailey, oh my.
- 0:43[SPEAKER_02]: Listeners, look for the link to our part one breakdown in the show notes if you haven't listened yet.
- 0:48[SPEAKER_04]: So, yeah, glad to get the band back together from our, yeah, yeah, heart one discussion.
- 0:55[SPEAKER_04]: We are going to assume that people listening who are interested in this movie have either seen them first movie or just don't care about being spoiler.
- 1:04[SPEAKER_04]: So, we will keep our spoiler free chat shorts, but again, check out that link in the show and it's for part one if you're just wondering about this world in general.
- 1:11[SPEAKER_04]: And in that first part, we also talked more about the,
- 1:15[SPEAKER_04]: show and book differences.
- 1:18[SPEAKER_04]: We will shout out some of them today.
- 1:20[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to save a special book spoiler end of the first book spoiler section for after the outro.
- 1:28[SPEAKER_04]: I think Marilyn and I are going to be talking through that.
- 1:31[SPEAKER_04]: For those of you who want to go on read the book the second half of the book wildly different from the movie, so we don't want to spoil it for you.
- 1:39[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:40[SPEAKER_04]: And just for the spoiler free part, question for both of you, do you like this film?
- 1:48[SPEAKER_04]: Better, less or the same as part one, but do you think Marilyn?
- 1:53[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, I like part two much better.
- 1:55[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:55[SPEAKER_03]: I'm really, really glad because they were setting up the tracks in the first film.
- 2:02[SPEAKER_03]: And just there was a lot of glitz and glamour and, you know, all these kinds of
- 2:07[SPEAKER_03]: But part two, I think really gets into character arcs and development back around and understanding more.
- 2:14[SPEAKER_03]: And then, as I know, we'll talk about they actually wrote two new films, excuse me, two new songs, to go with the film version that never appeared in the on Broadway show, and wow, do they ever make a difference?
- 2:29[SPEAKER_04]: I can't imagine that two without those two songs now, so, yeah, both likely to get Oscar nominations, we'll say, fingers crossed, yeah, what do you think, Nicole, better
- 2:43[SPEAKER_02]: I liked them both a lot but for different reasons.
- 2:46[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think.
- 2:47[SPEAKER_02]: I liked the first one.
- 2:49[SPEAKER_02]: I'll say I liked it a little bit more just because the visual spectacle was something that I hadn't seen for a long time.
- 2:56[SPEAKER_02]: It was just so immersive that it I was just in awe of it.
- 3:01[SPEAKER_02]: And then we already have that expectation set up for like a great visual movie going into the second part and really leaned into the characters which I really enjoyed that character development piece and like origin story stuff.
- 3:14[SPEAKER_02]: I just I get into that about how people develop over time.
- 3:18[SPEAKER_02]: So
- 3:19[SPEAKER_02]: I, I think I enjoyed seeing the first one more in the theater and I think I'll enjoy the second one more at home when I can kind of sit with it my own space because it was a little bit it felt more intimate to me the first one.
- 3:34[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, okay.
- 3:35[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you.
- 3:36[SPEAKER_04]: Um, yeah, I mean, I suppose I know people, they say about the, the musical all the time that it has a quote unquote second act problem, you know, where the first act ends on defying gravity and, um, and then the second act doesn't have as good of music.
- 3:54[SPEAKER_04]: My favorite song though is I always for good the subtitle of this and it's just never makes fails to make me cry every single time.
- 4:01[SPEAKER_04]: And so I do like the emotional payoff of the second act, but I think it is one, it pays off because you have the first act.
- 4:13[SPEAKER_04]: So, I know Marilyn, you said that you know someone who just watched for good without watching part 1.
- 4:21[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, not just someone I vaguely knew and we both happened to be in that the same time and we were walking out afterwards.
- 4:30[SPEAKER_03]: And she said, well, you know, I just, I never saw the first one, but I was, I was a bit confused.
- 4:37[SPEAKER_03]: I was like, no kidding.
- 4:42[SPEAKER_03]: So might want to go back now and watch the first one and some more things will make sense.
- 4:47[SPEAKER_04]: So this boiler free zone, the recommendation is if you have not seen the first one, start there.
- 4:53[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, absolutely.
- 4:54[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, absolutely.
- 4:56[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, I think you can follow what's going on, especially if you just have a vague awareness of the Wizard of Oz story because this is the part that's more deeply linked to the original book in terms of what.
- 5:07[SPEAKER_04]: But yeah, you're missing.
- 5:09[SPEAKER_04]: It's a payoff.
- 5:10[SPEAKER_03]: It's a payoff movie.
- 5:16[SPEAKER_03]: are not as complex as we see in the second film.
- 5:21[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, we see what their choices and what they're doing and so forth.
- 5:26[SPEAKER_03]: But as I was watching the second film, it's like, I went from two dimensions to three.
- 5:30[SPEAKER_03]: So we get motivations that we didn't have before.
- 5:34[SPEAKER_03]: Other than, oh well, this is the beggar or this is the one who was always tossed out of her society and so, you know, those kinds of things, but I love that it's it's never as simple as that, whatever story we may tell ourselves.
- 5:48[SPEAKER_02]: It's always good to get the actual story from the people who are reliving it in the first film the characters were facing really superficial complex Exactly and in the second film They're more like moral complex and ethical compromise, which is just richer to explore and just deeper drives war Like literally one of the main songs from the first part is popular, right?
- 6:11[SPEAKER_03]: Right, which is harming and excellent and a wonderful vehicle for the actor
- 6:17[SPEAKER_03]: and, um, fast-style.
- 6:19[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, surface level.
- 6:21[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, yeah, and this is, yeah, I've changed for good.
- 6:24[SPEAKER_04]: So, Nicole, I know you must not love the song as much as me because you haven't mentioned anything about never mind the music coverage, but this one like to find gravity.
- 6:32[SPEAKER_04]: Oh!
- 6:33[SPEAKER_02]: Well, you know, admittedly, I think we got some societal pressure to cover to find gravity in the animal and to mark and said we have to do it.
- 6:41[SPEAKER_02]: Now's the time and he got sparked on an idea of how to like analyze it.
- 6:47[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if he's seen for good.
- 6:49[SPEAKER_02]: We're recording a next batch of Nevermind in the music episodes this week.
- 6:54[SPEAKER_02]: So I'll check him with him and see if I can convince him.
- 6:56[SPEAKER_02]: He's kind of the mastermind and I'm happy to give him a roll.
- 7:01[SPEAKER_02]: But I'm into it.
- 7:02[SPEAKER_02]: You know me.
- 7:02[SPEAKER_02]: I'm happy to be able to talk to you with you guys.
- 7:05[SPEAKER_04]: Well, we're glad you can make it and we are going to rip off the spoiler bandade now.
- 7:10[SPEAKER_04]: So this is the official spoilers spoilers.
- 7:14[SPEAKER_04]: Warning.
- 7:14[SPEAKER_06]: Hi.
- 7:16[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to go listen to part one.
- 7:17[SPEAKER_04]: Watch part one.
- 7:20[SPEAKER_04]: Okay, just to set the premise.
- 7:22[SPEAKER_04]: An angry mob rises against the wicked witch, Glinda, and Elphaba will need to come together one final time.
- 7:29[SPEAKER_04]: With their singular friendship now, the folk room of their futures, they will need to truly see each other with honesty and empathy if they are to change themselves and all of us for good.
- 7:41[SPEAKER_04]: So Marilyn, what are your overall thoughts,
- 7:48[SPEAKER_03]: Well, as I said already, the couple points I've already made, but I, there was one thing I really had to fun trying to keep track of all the isms and the interesting phrases and the portment toe with the one that stuck with me the most because they use it the most was a clock tick, right, instead of a moment.
- 8:07[SPEAKER_03]: And I just really like that.
- 8:09[SPEAKER_03]: and rejoice if I, that's another one, that hung along.
- 8:13[SPEAKER_03]: And they have cultural logic behind this is, this is ASEAN and what this means, and so on, it's on.
- 8:19[SPEAKER_03]: But to my mind, Trace is back to what I said before, the Park Mantow word, where you create a new word by putting two words together.
- 8:26[SPEAKER_03]: And,
- 8:28[SPEAKER_03]: The, the, the, the jabber walkie is something is for that, you know, it was brilliant in the slithy toes, digger, and gimbal in the wave.
- 8:37[SPEAKER_03]: You know, there's been whole papers and books written on which words was he pushing together and why, so that attracted me a lot.
- 8:45[SPEAKER_03]: It just, yeah, that the stakes were higher as Nicole sense of beautifully.
- 8:49[SPEAKER_03]: And to me, that drew me in more.
- 8:51[SPEAKER_03]: It took me well with the first one to really
- 8:54[SPEAKER_03]: get into the whole musical is movie thing.
- 8:58[SPEAKER_03]: I went to musicals as a kid in my first one with age 6 or 7 and it was Broadway because we lived outside New York City and so I had that whole experience.
- 9:08[SPEAKER_03]: in the back of my mind, it just felt odd to have be having it in a film.
- 9:12[SPEAKER_03]: But of course, the absolute stunning one in the library, the circular lab, you know, right?
- 9:18[SPEAKER_03]: That was unbelievably, visually spectacular.
- 9:23[SPEAKER_03]: And you know, I enjoyed it.
- 9:24[SPEAKER_03]: I enjoyed it.
- 9:26[SPEAKER_03]: But this one really did speak to those emotional issues and the very high stakes.
- 9:34[SPEAKER_03]: that we're going on.
- 9:35[SPEAKER_03]: And I really can't think of any time, well, no, there was one point, but I'll wait until we're starting to go through section by section to talk about that.
- 9:44[SPEAKER_03]: There was about only one thing that I really, I think they kind of skimmed it a little bit.
- 9:51[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, it's a good way to put it in.
- 9:52[SPEAKER_03]: But we'll talk about it when we get there.
- 9:54[SPEAKER_03]: Would you want to tease us?
- 9:56[SPEAKER_04]: Or would section this?
- 9:57[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, it has a few characters from the book and from the movie.
- 10:03[SPEAKER_03]: Okay, okay, and how they're what what are what we are told about them.
- 10:08[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, okay.
- 10:09[SPEAKER_02]: All right, it's just saying Yeah, I loved it.
- 10:12[SPEAKER_02]: I loved it.
- 10:14[SPEAKER_02]: I did I did I loved how the end brought us back to the beginning and I was watching it I was watching it with my daughter
- 10:23[SPEAKER_02]: And she goes, is it, are we watching the whole thing again?
- 10:28[SPEAKER_02]: She thought it was all starting up again.
- 10:30[SPEAKER_02]: I wish, like I could sit here all day.
- 10:33[SPEAKER_02]: I'm very into musicals and as movies.
- 10:37[SPEAKER_02]: I'll watch a movie musical all day every day.
- 10:39[SPEAKER_02]: I love it so much.
- 10:41[SPEAKER_02]: But so many people didn't light this that I talked to.
- 10:45[SPEAKER_02]: I thought I didn't like the plot.
- 10:48[SPEAKER_02]: I thought it was so dark.
- 10:49[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't expect it to go there.
- 10:51[SPEAKER_02]: And I was just kind of thinking, where have you been?
- 10:53[SPEAKER_02]: Like that you don't know, because I'm so into musicals that you don't know the second half of looking.
- 10:58[SPEAKER_02]: What do you expect?
- 11:00[SPEAKER_02]: We know this was going to happen.
- 11:01[SPEAKER_02]: I will say I did see it in the theater with my daughter and her friend, they're young.
- 11:06[SPEAKER_02]: I was very happy to have a heads up about the quote, sex card again scene.
- 11:15[SPEAKER_02]: your kids to the bathroom.
- 11:17[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm glad I did because it kind of skimmed us past some maybe inappropriate content.
- 11:23[SPEAKER_02]: I still have yet to see it personally, so I'm gonna need you girl.
- 11:26[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, what is it then?
- 11:28[SPEAKER_04]: It was just when Elfa and Fiero were making out?
- 11:31[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it was just making out.
- 11:33[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 11:34[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 11:35[SPEAKER_02]: Well, that's fine.
- 11:35[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 11:35[SPEAKER_02]: I guess we really need to miss it.
- 11:38[SPEAKER_04]: I guess they did tone down.
- 11:40[SPEAKER_04]: Maybe they make it a bit more explicit in the stage show and they turned it down slightly for the movie.
- 11:46[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, okay.
- 11:47[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I was given some bad...
- 11:48[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I show my kid strange or things, I don't think it's...
- 11:52[SPEAKER_02]: No, it's not where it's in that, yeah, in different ways, but I, I loved it and I'm sad that it's over.
- 12:00[SPEAKER_02]: I've lots of follow-up questions about scarecrow anatomy, but I'll keep that for my girlfriend's and the different
- 12:11[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, no, I was thinking the same thing too.
- 12:13[SPEAKER_04]: I've to say about the scarecrow thing.
- 12:15[SPEAKER_04]: The one thing I noticed during the promotion is they actually showed pictures of what was clearly elf of his hand because it was green Holding the scarecrow hand and then another picture from behind scene of the two of them crudling together.
- 12:27[SPEAKER_04]: I'm like they're just showing people the end of the movie before it releases like are they assuming people know or are they assuming people won't figure out what's going on here
- 12:37[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I'm interested that people were questioning you about that scene because I usually, there's a, you know, a certain point at which I do become uncomfortable and I never did.
- 12:47[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, well, now I just, I feel it was very beautifully done.
- 12:52[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like I didn't get my money's worth then.
- 12:54[SPEAKER_02]: I should go back and check out, obviously, watch it a million more times, but it was just like a convenient break to like,
- 13:06[SPEAKER_03]: Bladderbrace are really crucial at certain ages.
- 13:09[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah.
- 13:10[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, no, I'm, I'm now, but I'm at the point where I try not to drink before a movie.
- 13:16[SPEAKER_04]: I just wait to laugh.
- 13:20[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 13:20[SPEAKER_04]: Anyway, yeah, I also love to the movie.
- 13:24[SPEAKER_04]: I think that the second film I agree, it has more depth.
- 13:29[SPEAKER_04]: and I have been noticing a lot of people pushing back on things that have that sort of realistic depth and I understand it, but for me it's so important.
- 13:39[SPEAKER_04]: It's so important to me to help me sort
- 13:44[SPEAKER_04]: What I'm experiencing as a person alive on this planet, you know, what I'm seeing to try to think about how people are coping with that by, you know, these proxy characters who I fall in love with in their situations.
- 14:00[SPEAKER_04]: And just the beautiful nuance, just I feel like when we learn to appreciate nuance more, we can also appreciate more the bright spots
- 14:14[SPEAKER_04]: Where we see that yes, something sad is happening.
- 14:19[SPEAKER_04]: My best friend is dying as far as I know, but she's left something behind in me that will change me forever.
- 14:29[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
- 14:30[SPEAKER_04]: And I think that's, I mean, not to say, hope punk again, but.
- 14:35[SPEAKER_03]: Well, and that's the thing.
- 14:36[SPEAKER_03]: I think a lot depends on what you go to the movies for.
- 14:39[SPEAKER_03]: And it could be that the first film actually set up those expectations in some people that they were getting again another lighthearted romp and yes the good people would be good the bad people would be bad and oh we have a surprise reveal that the good person is actually not so great in vice versa.
- 14:56[SPEAKER_03]: But this gets into it, as you were saying, at least this is real world stuff.
- 15:02[SPEAKER_02]: And I think we have a tendency to want to protect each other from bad things happening.
- 15:10[SPEAKER_02]: And this reminds us that we can't, and shouldn't for some reason, because those bad things that happened to us make a stronger and build resilience, it build grit and build complexity.
- 15:22[SPEAKER_02]: And that character complexity is what really
- 15:26[SPEAKER_04]: Yes, exactly.
- 15:27[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and I also love that anytime when these movies come out I pick up the books again and I just love reading the book so much Yeah, it books.
- 15:37[SPEAKER_04]: They didn't have as many because they go so further off the story in the second half They didn't have as many expansions from the books.
- 15:43[SPEAKER_04]: They did have expansions we'll talk about But I appreciated though that they had that flashback those flashback picnic inserts with the group of friends it shes
- 15:52[SPEAKER_04]: because that's something that in the books you do get to spend time with these friends and there's a few more.
- 15:59[SPEAKER_04]: And you know this is first movie expanded the play but didn't have obviously time for that so it's nice to be reminded that there is this grounding that these hazy days of youth that they still all have in their back pockets even when bad things have it.
- 16:22[SPEAKER_03]: that led a lot of people.
- 16:23[SPEAKER_03]: No, that led a lot of people to expect.
- 16:27[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, essentially.
- 16:28[SPEAKER_03]: This is also going to be a comfort one.
- 16:30[SPEAKER_03]: You know.
- 16:30[SPEAKER_04]: Harry Potter gets darker toward the end, too.
- 16:32[SPEAKER_03]: Of course it does.
- 16:33[SPEAKER_04]: Of course it does.
- 16:36[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I mean, I like that this one, it is they, like I said, it seems they have honed it down a bit of kids, but it is still about grappling with adulthood.
- 16:46[SPEAKER_04]: It is more for our adults, I would say, like, I think it was a new rock star's video that pointed out that the wizard and I from Act One is Elphabas, I want song, which is kind of musical concept.
- 16:58[SPEAKER_04]: Nicole, what would you describe an I want song?
- 17:01[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, it's just setting out the character's intention and setting out the direction of their story.
- 17:06[SPEAKER_02]: That's how I would describe it.
- 17:09[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 17:09[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, talking about motivation.
- 17:10[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, so her I want is I want to meet the wizard and he's going to turn me green and stuff and a lot of stories, you know, you set out the I want and then the rest of the story is about getting what you want right and this is not that kind of story.
- 17:26[SPEAKER_04]: This is a story about learning that what you thought you wanted is not actually what you need and learning to recognize what's more important than youthful desires.
- 17:40[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I think of the common phrase, be careful what you asked for, because you just might get it.
- 17:47[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 17:47[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 17:48[SPEAKER_04]: That's true.
- 17:50[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 17:51[SPEAKER_04]: Anyway, production notes, this was directed again by John M. Chu, like part one we talked more about him in the part one episode, screenplay again by Winning Holtzman and Dana Fox based on Wicked the Musical by Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holtzman, which is based on Wicked the Wicked Years series of novels by Gregory O'Guire, which is based on the Wizard of Oz series of novels from El Frank Bomb and the 1939 film adaptation.
- 18:17[SPEAKER_04]: For example, they use some movie details like the fact that Glinda, the Good Witch is the Good Witch from the North, whereas in the original novel, she's from the South.
- 18:30[SPEAKER_04]: And starring Ariana Grande, Cynthia Arrivo, Jonathan Bailey, Ethan Slater, Bowen Yang, Shal Yo and Jeff Goldblum.
- 18:38[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, what we'll talk about more of these performances and the technical aspects in deaf during Oscar season, but also during this episode.
- 18:46[SPEAKER_04]: Nicole, you were talking about the mixed receptions.
- 18:50[SPEAKER_04]: Are you, do you want to shout out to the, uh, the, Great show.
- 18:55[SPEAKER_04]: And what do you think of them?
- 18:58[SPEAKER_02]: Well, the Rotten Tomatoes score was a 68, um, which is pretty low, right?
- 19:04[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not too familiar.
- 19:06[SPEAKER_02]: You guys are much better at movie rankings than me, but it was like pretty low ranked.
- 19:11[SPEAKER_04]: But that's yeah, for for critics.
- 19:14[SPEAKER_04]: And then for the audience,
- 19:16[SPEAKER_02]: people didn't really it was 93%.
- 19:18[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, that's so interesting that the critics didn't like it that much, but the audience loved it.
- 19:24[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, that's really common in my experience with the very few ones that I look up the ratings for.
- 19:31[SPEAKER_04]: Usually I agree with the critics this time I agree with the audience.
- 19:35[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I think this was kind of pandering to the audience and the critics probably had a very,
- 19:45[SPEAKER_02]: those rankings is if you like wicked you're going to like this.
- 19:48[SPEAKER_02]: Like if you want liking the first movie you're going to like this because it's the same characters in the same world and you're just getting more in depth with them and there was such a fandom and there is such a fandom around wicked that this movie isn't going to change your mind.
- 20:04[SPEAKER_02]: You're not going to go in as a wicked fan and then denounce the franchise after seeing this.
- 20:09[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, yeah, honestly, the people I've heard talking negatively about this, even talking negatively about the second movie before it even came out.
- 20:17[SPEAKER_04]: It's like they, you know, it felt like a backlash.
- 20:21[SPEAKER_02]: Gia, wonder why?
- 20:23[SPEAKER_02]: Why, why do you think, Marilyn?
- 20:26[SPEAKER_02]: I wonder why.
- 20:27[SPEAKER_03]: I think because of one of the two main characters is why.
- 20:33[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, I mean, I think there's, there's a, um, for the people that I'm thinking of, I would don't think that would be the case, but I could definitely for some B.
- 20:40[SPEAKER_04]: I think that there's a backlash against just changing the musical and anyway, which I'm sorry at the end of the day.
- 20:49[SPEAKER_04]: I do think that this is the best version of the musical, the movie.
- 20:53[SPEAKER_04]: It's just they have the money and the time and I do really, really do it and ideal casting.
- 21:00[SPEAKER_04]: And then I don't know, I guess there's also a sort of backlash against the financial and critical success of the first one.
- 21:09[SPEAKER_03]: and picked up on that at all.
- 21:12[SPEAKER_03]: I wonder if there was also a backlash from the people who read and loved the books.
- 21:18[SPEAKER_03]: But of course, if that were the case, as you said earlier, earlier, you see a prison where they would have already known and they would have bothered to show up for the second.
- 21:25[SPEAKER_04]: I think book readers already knew what to expect based on the stage musical, so I think we've been more happy to just see kind of more of the complexity from the books slightly.
- 21:38[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, there's not enough room.
- 21:41[SPEAKER_04]: They need to do an entire television series if they're ever going to do.
- 21:44[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah.
- 21:45[SPEAKER_04]: I haven't thought it's comi.
- 21:48[SPEAKER_03]: How many books are there in this series?
- 21:50[SPEAKER_04]: Um, in the original series.
- 21:53[SPEAKER_04]: Wait, let's see.
- 21:53[SPEAKER_04]: So there is a four, a quadrilogy, a four.
- 21:57[SPEAKER_04]: And then there was another
- 22:01[SPEAKER_04]: sequel trilogy, which I have not read the sequel trilogy, and then there was a prequel released last year, which is a prequel with stories from Elphobas Youth, and now next year, they're releasing a prequel that's stories from Glindas Youth.
- 22:19[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, interesting.
- 22:20[SPEAKER_03]: Is that, I remember, I think I remember reading somewhere that people were puzzled by the
- 22:27[SPEAKER_04]: What we talked about is, in the first episode that Nanny's a human in the books and Nanny does not exist in the stage play, so this was kind of an in between, but we talked about how it's like a shortcut to establish why Elfaba is defensive of animals.
- 22:45[SPEAKER_03]: I thought that the prequel had mentioned her in some fashion more than Nanny, more in the book
- 22:56[SPEAKER_02]: I loved her as a bear in this for good because it gave Elphaba a character to talk to to get back story about what the animals motivations were that felt really personal and intimate and I thought that was just a really great convention.
- 23:13[SPEAKER_02]: So it's a I think it's a great iteration from the book character.
- 23:16[SPEAKER_02]: It helped advance the plot quite a bit in both Wicked and Wicked for Good from my perspective.
- 23:21[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 23:22[SPEAKER_03]: Well, and also it generates
- 23:26[SPEAKER_03]: about no good deed goes unpunished.
- 23:30[SPEAKER_03]: Because it's the animals with whom she had the closest relationships, which are now in a sense rejecting her.
- 23:40[SPEAKER_03]: And she's all she can see is the negative consequences of her actions.
- 23:45[SPEAKER_03]: And yeah, that's that's pretty devastating.
- 23:49[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 23:49[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 23:51[SPEAKER_04]: Well, so far, this is Ignore, the usual, like, Doom saying headlines about Bucks' piss, like every week.
- 24:01[SPEAKER_04]: It's like this movie, Hollywood is breaking before our eyes.
- 24:05[SPEAKER_04]: But it's so far, it's earned $441 million worldwide after three weekends out.
- 24:11[SPEAKER_04]: We're recording on Tuesday, December 9th.
- 24:13[SPEAKER_04]: So it's doing fine.
- 24:15[SPEAKER_03]: The printing quest for eyeballs.
- 24:18[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 24:18[SPEAKER_04]: And then the reported budget was $140 million.
- 24:22[SPEAKER_04]: Now that's always a bit under what it actually is once you've factory marketing costs and all that.
- 24:26[SPEAKER_04]: But it's doing absolutely fine.
- 24:30[SPEAKER_04]: Well, this is a good spot to take a quick break and when we get back, we're going to dig into the pot itself.
- 24:36[SPEAKER_04]: See you in a sec.
- 24:48[SPEAKER_04]: All right, let's check in on the state of Oz Elfaba.
- 24:52[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, and thank you, by the way, to Rotten Tomato for saving me time and writing this plot.
- 24:57[SPEAKER_03]: So this is, we're wondering who our T was.
- 24:59[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you.
- 25:00[SPEAKER_04]: We're going to split this into just three parts for the sake of discussion and to set up the first part.
- 25:06[SPEAKER_04]: Elfaba, played by Cynthia Arrivo, now demonized as the wicked witch of the West, lives in exile hidden within the Azean forest, while continuing her fight for the freedom of Aze's silenced animals with a capital A, and desperately trying to expose a truth she knows about the wizard, Jeff Goldblum.
- 25:24[SPEAKER_04]: Glinda meanwhile has become the glamorous symbol of goodness for all of us, living at the palace in Emerald City and reveling in the perks of fame and popularity.
- 25:34[SPEAKER_04]: Under the instruction of Madame Morrible, Michelle Yeau, Glinda is deployed to serve as an effervescent comfort to us reassuring the masses that all is well under the rule of the wizard.
- 25:46[SPEAKER_04]: So, what did you think Nicole about this opening section overall?
- 25:51[SPEAKER_02]: I enjoyed how we're kind of reframing Glanda, you know, we left her and she seemed to be holding power right and now we're seeing she.
- 26:02[SPEAKER_02]: We're clear in the understanding that she has no power.
- 26:05[SPEAKER_02]: She's a figurehead and being exploited.
- 26:07[SPEAKER_02]: And she's starting, for my perception, starting to feel exploited too.
- 26:13[SPEAKER_02]: Starting to kind of resent the role that she's placed in, but also feeling kind of trapped in it.
- 26:19[SPEAKER_02]: Like you see her losing herself.
- 26:22[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that that's just a very interesting place.
- 26:24[SPEAKER_02]: And Ariana Grande's acting is very strong towards that concept
- 26:30[SPEAKER_02]: It's subtle, and she's following the rules, and she's doing as she's told, but she has questions, and this doesn't feel like her.
- 26:38[SPEAKER_02]: For my perspective, that's my interpretation of her role right now.
- 26:45[SPEAKER_02]: And I just thought it was great to be brought into the spectacle, again, great to be brought into this world.
- 26:52[SPEAKER_02]: I enjoyed seeing the yellow brick road being laid down.
- 26:56[SPEAKER_02]: I thought it was fun to watch that brick painting machines everywhere.
- 27:02[SPEAKER_02]: I just thought it was really visually really striking to be brought into this world again.
- 27:06[SPEAKER_04]: How much time do you think has passed since the end of the last movie?
- 27:11[SPEAKER_02]: Probably a few years because she's well established in Oz now.
- 27:15[SPEAKER_02]: She's got so many outfits and whole infrastructure around her I'm looking at beadwork But they've made progress on the road and yeah
- 27:28[SPEAKER_02]: The rhinoceros is dragging the bricks around there moving pretty slow.
- 27:32[SPEAKER_02]: So it's it's not of rhinoceros I think it's it's a book.
- 27:36[SPEAKER_04]: They talk I sorry an animal.
- 27:37[SPEAKER_04]: They talk about in the book called a skark, which is kind of like a Yeah, kind of thing I think Jayson a rhinoceros of jigsaw rhinoceros.
- 27:45[SPEAKER_03]: I call her rhinoceros too
- 27:52[SPEAKER_02]: Um, but how do we know how much actual time has passed?
- 27:56[SPEAKER_04]: They don't say, I'll say it's less than passes in the books for sure, um, but they don't really, they didn't give us like an on-screen.
- 28:03[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 28:04[SPEAKER_04]: Three years later.
- 28:05[SPEAKER_03]: Nicole, I really like the way you talk about her slow realization that she's being used.
- 28:19[SPEAKER_03]: I think Elfabus, the one who, if not entirely, is largely responsible, is certainly one of the reasons why Glenda just can't completely give herself over to what's going on.
- 28:33[SPEAKER_03]: And I think so, this kind of niggling feeling.
- 28:35[SPEAKER_02]: that she's more like, they're more like than they are different.
- 28:39[SPEAKER_02]: And they've always felt that way, but now it's, it's so apparent that they are both being promoted and they're piece of, they're both pieces of propaganda, but towards different goals and different serving different functions.
- 28:53[SPEAKER_02]: So it's really interesting to see that right from the start of this film.
- 28:57[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, but for Elfaba, she is at least making her own choices.
- 29:04[SPEAKER_03]: doing her own work, trying to find different ways to solve what's most important to her.
- 29:10[SPEAKER_03]: And Glinda is just floating along.
- 29:13[SPEAKER_03]: you know, she's not really, I don't see her as having the kind of agency that they'll write, even though both are being used in different ways.
- 29:23[SPEAKER_04]: Well, yeah, I would put it even more direly for Glenda, like not floating in a pleasant way, but being like pulled by the current outside her will, think she's not happy about the way things are going, but she doesn't at this
- 29:42[SPEAKER_02]: She's pretty deep for sure.
- 29:46[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you for going deeper into my water analogy.
- 29:51[SPEAKER_04]: I should keep it going.
- 29:53[SPEAKER_02]: Because it is relevant for the arc of the whole movie.
- 29:56[SPEAKER_02]: Right?
- 29:56[SPEAKER_02]: Water piece.
- 29:58[SPEAKER_02]: Water is life.
- 30:00[SPEAKER_02]: Or death.
- 30:01[SPEAKER_02]: Depends on it.
- 30:03[SPEAKER_04]: But yeah, you brought up Nicole, the the whole building scenario with the road, and I loved that that is an added thing not in the stage show because I don't know what's written wrote.
- 30:16[SPEAKER_04]: And I also would be tough to have others animals, but I think it was to me it was an important addition.
- 30:22[SPEAKER_04]: It is something that's in the books.
- 30:24[SPEAKER_04]: There's more attention to the whole political aspect of building the road, which is something that.
- 30:31[SPEAKER_04]: Gregory McGuire took from the Franco bomb books where that's also a whole political thing about the construction of the yellow brick road.
- 30:38[SPEAKER_04]: So it was nice to see that go full circle and bring that back in.
- 30:44[SPEAKER_03]: Well, road construction is certainly in many different aspects, of course, the intensity of different meanings.
- 30:53[SPEAKER_03]: But when I hear road building the first thing I think is Roman Empire.
- 30:57[SPEAKER_03]: And this is the ASEAN way of establishing imperial authority and connecting to the far-reaching aspects of ASEAN.
- 31:10[SPEAKER_03]: All the other things that go along with that.
- 31:13[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and for the original book, it is for the soldiers to mark down.
- 31:19[SPEAKER_03]: Right, which is exactly why the Romans built their roads, which some people still drive on to this day and don't even know it.
- 31:28[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, it was nice by the way.
- 31:29[SPEAKER_04]: We got a cameo from the lion, the cowardly lion, Burr, he's called in the book.
- 31:34[SPEAKER_04]: And he was actually voiced by Coleman Domingo, like, love him.
- 31:38[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, love him too.
- 31:39[SPEAKER_04]: Such a, I didn't even realize until afterwards, such a small part, but important.
- 31:43[SPEAKER_04]: I'll say in the book series, there's an entire book from his perspective, the third book.
- 31:48[SPEAKER_04]: Uh, yeah, but what did you guys think about seeing, what did you think about the lion's accusations for Alphabet about that he took her away from the only home he had known.
- 32:01[SPEAKER_04]: I eat a cage.
- 32:03[SPEAKER_02]: I was so mad about it.
- 32:05[SPEAKER_02]: I, I, this is a hot take.
- 32:07[SPEAKER_02]: I kind of, I wanted that line to shut up.
- 32:09[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't like it.
- 32:11[SPEAKER_02]: So I just leave her alone.
- 32:12[SPEAKER_02]: She's trying to help you like, stop, I don't know, something about the lion really bothered me.
- 32:18[SPEAKER_02]: There's a couple of things.
- 32:19[SPEAKER_02]: I know exactly what they are.
- 32:20[SPEAKER_02]: I wish it wasn't CGI, I wish it was cool to make it go in a lion suit.
- 32:24[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's not a little better.
- 32:25[SPEAKER_01]: They have the cost to watch it.
- 32:27[SPEAKER_02]: Kind of but like better, but something.
- 32:30[SPEAKER_02]: I think that it just took me out of it a little bit, having it not like tangible for some reason.
- 32:36[SPEAKER_02]: And then, you know, she sacrificed a lot to save him and to get him to safety.
- 32:41[SPEAKER_02]: And he's just been swept up in the propaganda.
- 32:46[SPEAKER_02]: And I thought that's pretty, well, what I'm about to say allowed is going to be pretty shocking.
- 32:51[SPEAKER_02]: It was pretty cowardly of that line.
- 32:54[SPEAKER_02]: to fall into it.
- 32:56[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I'm mad that he was so cowardly, which is so silly because that's like the point of his role, but those are my feelings.
- 33:03[SPEAKER_02]: I have strong feelings about the lion.
- 33:05[SPEAKER_03]: That's really interesting, Nicole, because I thought it made perfect sense because of how young he was when the intervention first happened.
- 33:17[SPEAKER_03]: And it would have been one thing if he could have gone with a bunch of other,
- 33:22[SPEAKER_03]: talking lines who were out there and free and something whatever.
- 33:26[SPEAKER_03]: But at that youth will stage to have such so many things happen so quickly and animals dying around in middle of us.
- 33:33[SPEAKER_03]: I can't remember all the details I'm afraid.
- 33:35[SPEAKER_03]: But I just, when he said that, I thought, okay, that that makes some kind of sense because for some of this, are we need our security?
- 33:46[SPEAKER_03]: Because no, but there's no outside thing that you can think of that's going to offer that to you if that's all you've ever known.
- 33:55[SPEAKER_03]: So it was, it was, it was a very abrupt transition.
- 34:00[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's a powerful perspective.
- 34:02[SPEAKER_02]: I should be more empathetic as a psychologist.
- 34:04[SPEAKER_03]: Nation, you're not a child of a child of a child.
- 34:07[SPEAKER_03]: That's really entitled to your view.
- 34:10[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, but that's exactly why I'm so glad that you guys have different views on this because that is exactly why I like this second half, just the those questions that are raised.
- 34:22[SPEAKER_04]: Is this understandable behavior or is this?
- 34:26[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, it's understandable and cowardly at the same time.
- 34:29[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 34:30[SPEAKER_03]: And to be perfectly honest, it reminded me of something I've been thinking about a lot lately, which is when approaching somebody and saying, I'm going to help you, are you doing that for their sake or for yours?
- 34:44[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
- 34:44[SPEAKER_03]: Have you even asked them if they want help?
- 34:48[SPEAKER_03]: Have you even asked them what would be most helpful to you?
- 34:51[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 34:53[SPEAKER_03]: And I think it was a good way of showing, you know,
- 34:57[SPEAKER_03]: best intentions in the world no guarantee if you haven't thought it out to step two and three and four.
- 35:04[SPEAKER_03]: And, you know, just the massive assumption that I know it's better for you than you do.
- 35:10[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
- 35:11[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, this is not a pleurbist podcast, but I know nothing about pleurbist, but that's one of the Carol who's trying to hold her own in a very strange world.
- 35:21[SPEAKER_04]: But the plurbs, they think that they want to help, yeah, this is the new word somebody came up with.
- 35:27[SPEAKER_04]: I like it.
- 35:30[SPEAKER_04]: They think that they want to help Carol by making her one of them and she does not think that sounds very helpful.
- 35:37[SPEAKER_02]: and there's a lot of research in social science about altruism and altruism self-serving like are we kind so people see our kindness and label us as a kind person and then we feel validation because we are quote a kind person.
- 35:54[SPEAKER_02]: are we really acting kindness to help others or to help ourselves and what I tell my students as it good gut check for this is if you hold the door for somebody and they don't say thank you how do you feel after do you've got mad or do you it doesn't not bother you remember I think that in this moment with the cowardly lion
- 36:15[SPEAKER_02]: I was mad that he didn't say thank you for literally holding the door of the cage open for her.
- 36:21[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
- 36:22[SPEAKER_02]: But I understand that counterpoint and pulling him out of it.
- 36:25[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, for sure.
- 36:27[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 36:27[SPEAKER_04]: And I mean, and she, it was also kind of her first date with Biera.
- 36:31[SPEAKER_04]: So it's not like, obviously she was doing it for the right reasons, but um, there's yeah, we are all complex beings.
- 36:39[SPEAKER_03]: I was
- 36:44[SPEAKER_03]: If we start from an assumption of, I know the right thing to do right now.
- 36:50[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, so the other thing that surprised me in this scene, well, there's a prize me, more perhaps, was Nanny Dolce Bear, and so as I said, Nanny, not in the stage show major character in the books, human would never leave Elfaba, so even when Elfaba gets awful.
- 37:10[SPEAKER_04]: So I was surprised that Nanny Dolce Bear here, you know, is almost
- 37:15[SPEAKER_04]: She wanted to believe Elfaba, all of the animals wanted to believe Elfaba, and Elfaba sang her song and almost convinced them.
- 37:23[SPEAKER_04]: But then at the end of the day, the smallest thing, the cowardly lie, and makes them not trust her anymore, and they just all would rather leave than give a chance.
- 37:39[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I, I wasn't surprised because I, to say that they would rather leave than give her a chance.
- 37:46[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think they wanted to leave.
- 37:47[SPEAKER_02]: I think that they just were scared and realized that they were better off taking their chances with an enemy.
- 37:54[SPEAKER_02]: They don't know than the enemy that's right in front of them.
- 37:58[SPEAKER_02]: I felt that Dolce Bear would have stayed if it was just her choice, but I think she was getting swept up in the current of like this migration of all the animals towards some perceived safety.
- 38:11[SPEAKER_02]: It is better to stick together, mm-hmm.
- 38:16[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, Marilyn, what do you think?
- 38:18[SPEAKER_03]: Well, I mean, external propaganda is very powerful, isn't it?
- 38:23[SPEAKER_03]: And even though she raised this person
- 38:29[SPEAKER_03]: people change over time, they've been separated.
- 38:33[SPEAKER_03]: I think all of those kinds of things would interfere with her ability to say, I know you're a good person and I'm going to trust you.
- 38:43[SPEAKER_03]: And I think it was also from a plot perspective, extremely important because it increased the depth of alpha of his own anguish and led to that
- 38:59[SPEAKER_03]: Um, no good deed goes unpunished.
- 39:02[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 39:03[SPEAKER_02]: It brought her to a further point of solitude.
- 39:06[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 39:07[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 39:08[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 39:08[SPEAKER_03]: And again, the poignancy, too, of, you know, there's no place like, oh, that was brilliant.
- 39:14[SPEAKER_03]: Mm-hmm.
- 39:14[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely brilliant to take that famous, famous line and completely twisted on its head.
- 39:21[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like when I saw it, no one, it's used a kid's term.
- 39:25[SPEAKER_02]: Like no one clocked that.
- 39:27[SPEAKER_02]: I like gasped what you said.
- 39:28[SPEAKER_02]: Really?
- 39:28[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
- 39:29[SPEAKER_02]: They're going to my gosh.
- 39:30[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, was it a vase?
- 39:33[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it was just eating popcorn instead.
- 39:35[SPEAKER_02]: I swear I don't know.
- 39:36[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know.
- 39:36[SPEAKER_02]: It was so good.
- 39:37[SPEAKER_02]: Right now.
- 39:39[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 39:39[SPEAKER_02]: My audience was pleasant here for it.
- 39:41[SPEAKER_03]: Was that from the musical Alicia?
- 39:44[SPEAKER_04]: I know.
- 39:44[SPEAKER_03]: That was added for the film.
- 39:45[SPEAKER_03]: That was her added song.
- 39:47[SPEAKER_03]: I thought it was.
- 39:48[SPEAKER_03]: I thought I'd make sure.
- 39:50[SPEAKER_03]: They're wanting to deepen the characters and make them much more than two-dimensional, while close to four-dimensional.
- 39:59[SPEAKER_03]: And I found it very relatable, because how often is the execution of your ideas as perfect as your concept when you first have the idea?
- 40:11[SPEAKER_03]: Almost never.
- 40:13[SPEAKER_03]: Right?
- 40:14[SPEAKER_03]: So that really being able to relate with this character,
- 40:19[SPEAKER_03]: on those levels of bewilderment and frustration.
- 40:22[SPEAKER_03]: And you know, I'm sure there's a lot of people out there now, whatever they're perspective, trying to bring about change and being frustrated again and again, because maybe they're just not stepping it back and thinking through.
- 40:39[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 40:41[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 40:42[SPEAKER_03]: Your question to call, you know, why are you doing this?
- 40:45[SPEAKER_03]: Are you doing it so you can feel good?
- 40:48[SPEAKER_05]: Right.
- 40:48[SPEAKER_03]: And a lot of times that's true.
- 40:50[SPEAKER_03]: I'm not saying that Elfaba is only doing it for that reason.
- 40:52[SPEAKER_03]: I know.
- 40:53[SPEAKER_03]: We learn by the end.
- 40:54[SPEAKER_03]: Genuine conviction.
- 40:55[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 40:56[SPEAKER_03]: Genuine conviction.
- 40:58[SPEAKER_03]: But even in the midst of that, you know, she was, she was very young, which she freed birth.
- 41:02[SPEAKER_02]: She was so young and she had this cute boy in front of her.
- 41:07[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 41:08[SPEAKER_02]: A lot to manage.
- 41:11[SPEAKER_02]: And it seemed like she was doing, she did what felt right at the time.
- 41:15[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.
- 41:16[SPEAKER_02]: as do we all right and that's just it like hindsight you can look back and say like if I did something different how we turned out or maybe I was trying to impress Fiero or you know maybe I did have it wrong but we cannot hindsight we have hindsight bias like we look back and we think that we are the heroes of our own story and everyone else is too sometimes it's not always the case right right well and we're not the people who we were when we did the deed in the first place right
- 41:45[SPEAKER_03]: we're looking back.
- 41:47[SPEAKER_04]: Oh yeah, the book does that interestingly with for instance box character because the books do end up traversing decades.
- 41:55[SPEAKER_04]: So you get to see some of the characters who survive, you get to really see develop over time.
- 42:00[SPEAKER_04]: Um, I, I liked how with with the whole, you know, the animals are obviously analogies for a lot of different social issues in our world.
- 42:11[SPEAKER_04]: Um, but I like how they emphasized in this something that's missing from the stage show is present in the books, is the idea of how.
- 42:20[SPEAKER_04]: unknown it is what is beyond us.
- 42:23[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I forget in the original Frank Elbaum books if it's the same but definitely in the Gregory McGuire books Oz is surrounded on three sides by desert and on the four side by an ocean and have the idea they even have some names in mind that there are countries beyond that but it is just in order to like people say, oh, just leave.
- 42:43[SPEAKER_04]: Um, it's just so hard to leave a place because you don't what are you going to do, you know, you're just going out into nothing and with hope arm as you're only weapon.
- 42:56[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, that comes back to Bruce choice of well, this may be crap, but at least I know it right right.
- 43:03[SPEAKER_03]: And sometimes the horrible familiar is some more comfortable choice than the unknown possibility of something better.
- 43:11[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 43:13[SPEAKER_02]: This is off top.
- 43:15[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to do it.
- 43:16[SPEAKER_02]: I've been watching Fallout.
- 43:18[SPEAKER_02]: I've been catching up on Fallout.
- 43:20[SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
- 43:21[SPEAKER_02]: It's season releasing.
- 43:23[SPEAKER_02]: really intrigued by like propaganda that people in these vaults are being told about what's outside the vaults and the vaults and the vaults there is actually a rich society out here.
- 43:34[SPEAKER_02]: So I haven't read the books.
- 43:37[SPEAKER_02]: You know, we're told that it's surrounded by desert, but maybe it's not, right?
- 43:42[SPEAKER_02]: Is there any is there ever a first person account of what happens outside of ours in this?
- 43:48[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, is it right?
- 43:49[SPEAKER_02]: Does it desert?
- 43:50[SPEAKER_04]: Um, I mean, there's, I mean, they know that there's stuff beyond it, but it's just, you know, you have to go desert to get anywhere and, you know, you don't really know what will happen.
- 44:00[SPEAKER_04]: I know, for example, I think that the, I said I haven't read the SQL trilogy, but I think that that is entirely set outside of us if I'm correct.
- 44:09[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, so they're it's but I think it's they know something exists, but it's still it's just like a hoping a prayer that they get there and what happens when they do will they even be accepted right just killed on the spot who knows and of course who's going to go out there and then come back to report right right and that's only one person and how can you trust their report right.
- 44:36[SPEAKER_04]: on a well also bittersweet note, I suppose.
- 44:39[SPEAKER_04]: One thing they added that was neither in the stage show nor the Gregory McGuire book, so though I did just say that the releasing in September 29th, 2026, there's going to be Galinda, a charmed childhood about the youngest daughter of four children in a high-born family down on their luck.
- 44:58[SPEAKER_04]: Galinda is both pampered and ignored, which, holy.
- 45:02[SPEAKER_04]: What?
- 45:02[SPEAKER_04]: That sounds great, right?
- 45:04[SPEAKER_04]: But, um, but this whole flashback we got in the movie, that's new.
- 45:09[SPEAKER_04]: What did you think of that?
- 45:11[SPEAKER_02]: I hated it.
- 45:13[SPEAKER_01]: No way.
- 45:15[SPEAKER_02]: Why?
- 45:16[SPEAKER_02]: I'm so sorry.
- 45:17[SPEAKER_02]: I just was like, what are we doing?
- 45:19[SPEAKER_02]: Like, what do we...
- 45:21[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't feel like it added anything for me.
- 45:24[SPEAKER_02]: I understood it.
- 45:26[SPEAKER_02]: I just didn't...
- 45:27[SPEAKER_02]: I felt out of place for me.
- 45:30[SPEAKER_03]: Well, if it makes you feel any better Nicole, I can't.
- 45:32[SPEAKER_03]: He's remembered that.
- 45:33[SPEAKER_03]: Okay, well then.
- 45:37[SPEAKER_03]: or at least it was unremorable in my brain.
- 45:41[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, it was about her wedding.
- 45:43[SPEAKER_04]: She has always been popular but never had the inner power that she wanted the magical power so she fakes making a rainbow.
- 45:50[SPEAKER_02]: Right, and now I'm so like suspicious of capitalism.
- 45:54[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm like, was it there just so we're like, I want to, what, what her child had was like, I wish someone wrote a book about it and like, oh, I have the book.
- 46:03[SPEAKER_04]: No, well, so no, it's more in terms of the fact that Gregory McGuire's been releasing more books, it's more of a, I think, him trying to reclaim the IP situation.
- 46:15[SPEAKER_02]: or music.
- 46:16[SPEAKER_04]: I'm glad that this musical thing has taken off, but he did, he did out right say when he released the Elfie book.
- 46:23[SPEAKER_04]: He said, I just, you know, I want still want my version to be the definitive version because the musical is so widely different.
- 46:31[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I felt like it was cut.
- 46:33[SPEAKER_02]: Now that I know that there's going to be a forthcoming book with that's content, I'm suspicious of that scene because it didn't make sense to me at the time.
- 46:43[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know how much they had him as a consultant on this movie.
- 46:47[SPEAKER_04]: I don't, he's definitely not a producer or maybe he was just because of, uh, it's his book that it's originally based on, but this was more, um, yeah.
- 46:56[SPEAKER_04]: This, I think it's more a case of, of him being like, remember, I created this world, hey, well, you see, we're talking about an adaptation of an adaptation
- 47:13[SPEAKER_03]: I think anybody who insists that they can claim the definitive version.
- 47:18[SPEAKER_04]: No, I know, but I wasn't Frank Yelbaum, they're kidding themselves.
- 47:22[SPEAKER_04]: But I don't think he's trying to say he claims a definitive version, but he did create this world and it is wildly different.
- 47:31[SPEAKER_04]: And I would also like to remind people there's a book series that we could make a television show about.
- 47:37[SPEAKER_04]: I'm just going to keep mentioning the television show.
- 47:40[SPEAKER_04]: If you want, I can do a scene breakdown, not to say it.
- 47:43[SPEAKER_03]: Well, I mean, he's in the same position talking
- 47:48[SPEAKER_03]: You know, when he first saw scripts for the adaptations of whatever he was, he was just appalled and full of fun.
- 47:55[SPEAKER_03]: So, I think on the whole McAfee is probably better off in some respects, but I also understand the creator's desire to be acknowledged for their creation.
- 48:09[SPEAKER_03]: And particularly when major changes are made to it, and you know, because you know what
- 48:16[SPEAKER_03]: that the movies are going to be better remembered and probably better remembered than the theater productions, too.
- 48:24[SPEAKER_03]: Sure.
- 48:24[SPEAKER_03]: Because what percentage of the population are going to go to the theater?
- 48:27[SPEAKER_03]: My theater.
- 48:28[SPEAKER_02]: Well, wait till they see the young adult animated series coming to Netflix in Fall 2020, 7.
- 48:35[SPEAKER_02]: Because it's a true fall over again.
- 48:40[SPEAKER_04]: We do think it's going to be, do you think that they are going to do a series spin off of these movie musicals?
- 48:50[SPEAKER_02]: I do because of the marketing's there like the money's to be made get little kids are so obsessed with this like they want these characters and they want them produced quickly and animations a way to do that you know so we're all running on the table for that we're already on the second iteration of the rehabilitation of Harry Potter right
- 49:18[SPEAKER_03]: Let us remember is, I think it's not even 30 years old yet.
- 49:24[SPEAKER_03]: So this is this is the age in which I live.
- 49:27[SPEAKER_04]: Well, it's also because fantastic beasts and where to find them didn't do phenomenally well, but that's because they were not phenomenally good movies.
- 49:34[SPEAKER_04]: They had great castes.
- 49:35[SPEAKER_04]: They kind of wasted them in the writing department.
- 49:38[SPEAKER_03]: I enjoyed the first one tremendously.
- 49:40[SPEAKER_03]: I enjoyed the artistic piece.
- 49:42[SPEAKER_03]: I think they did a good job.
- 49:44[SPEAKER_03]: The second one.
- 49:46[SPEAKER_03]: It was little too much the Johnny Depp show and I'm sure that that wasn't what most of the mother than Johnny Depp wanted.
- 49:54[SPEAKER_03]: And then of course, he blotted his copybook so notably that they said, right, recast.
- 50:03[SPEAKER_03]: But by that time, I think the energy had really gone out of it.
- 50:06[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, yeah, it's interesting they do it with him and not other people.
- 50:08[SPEAKER_04]: But let's move on before I make people mad.
- 50:12[SPEAKER_03]: It's on my point.
- 50:12[SPEAKER_03]: The problem here is just that the interpretation of the character by an actor is going to be different from what the author interpreted character to be.
- 50:26[SPEAKER_03]: And I don't think that's ever going to change.
- 50:28[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 50:28[SPEAKER_03]: If you're going to have a world of adaptation and not enough people inventing their own stuff,
- 50:33[SPEAKER_04]: Um, can I ask you, Marilyn, you, what were your thoughts on how Madame Morobow was handled in this film, Michelle Yosemite character?
- 50:41[SPEAKER_03]: I, she is probably the most, well, until the end.
- 50:46[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, you know in one sense from the beginning that she's, she's, she's not good.
- 50:51[SPEAKER_03]: But she is depicted in the most mutable kinds of ways.
- 50:57[SPEAKER_03]: And she's the source of information and yet,
- 51:00[SPEAKER_03]: unless you're the brilliant, well, you can be the brilliant student who has the ability to use the book, but so much better to have the one who is visually stunning.
- 51:10[SPEAKER_03]: And, you know, from moreable perspective, kind of stupid, to promise them, yes, I can give you your dreams and make you what you want and sort of use it that way.
- 51:21[SPEAKER_03]: So I mean,
- 51:23[SPEAKER_03]: I think she is the greatest source of evil than then the wizard himself.
- 51:29[SPEAKER_03]: Just so I'm degree.
- 51:30[SPEAKER_03]: I think she was manipulating him all along.
- 51:32[SPEAKER_03]: I found it fascinating visually in this second act.
- 51:37[SPEAKER_03]: She were green a lot of times.
- 51:40[SPEAKER_03]: Emerald City.
- 51:41[SPEAKER_03]: I know, and the wickedness of green.
- 51:44[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, it's this fascinating dialogue about is a good, is it bad,
- 51:52[SPEAKER_03]: So, you know, I guess it's a green skinned person that's bad and every other kind of green is good because, as you say, animal city.
- 51:59[SPEAKER_03]: But she does switch to black at one point and I'm wondering if that's supposed to, you know, remind audiences, which I don't think we need reminding you at this point.
- 52:09[SPEAKER_03]: I just, I, I found that whole color scheme usage, interesting, and wondered, okay, so are they giving a sort of a gentle hit that she's the liquid rich of the south?
- 52:19[SPEAKER_04]: Uh, but the south is, well I'll say, in the original books, the south is a good witch.
- 52:25[SPEAKER_04]: 1939 movie, no, South, which mentioned South and in the Gregory McGuire books, this so the South is quaddling country like in the originals, but they go a lot more into the culture and everything of it.
- 52:39[SPEAKER_04]: I would say maybe there's a sort of which you would think of as a medicine woman that could qualify as the good witch of South in many people's lives.
- 52:49[SPEAKER_03]: For sure.
- 52:49[SPEAKER_03]: but they just seem to want to have that they know all four points of the compass representation in some fashion.
- 52:55[SPEAKER_03]: I don't know.
- 52:55[SPEAKER_03]: We're just letting us speculate.
- 52:57[SPEAKER_03]: I also wanted to back up a minute and say I just loved all the comedy of, you know, freeing that what was it?
- 53:03[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, but we before you say that, can I just say on the matter more of a point that in the book there she had a plot where she won, she actually wanted to install Glinda, Elfaba, and Nessa Rose as her sort of her and the wizard sort of witch links in the different directions.
- 53:22[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I want to she was going to send Nessa Rose to the south
- 53:28[SPEAKER_04]: Thanks.
- 53:28[SPEAKER_02]: I found more of those like intentions where I understood her intentions, but they just I wish they were fleshed out more a little bit.
- 53:35[SPEAKER_02]: I know that she was a lackey of the wizard or also the mastermind behind y'all.
- 53:41[SPEAKER_02]: I just I wanted I think I I guess maybe I didn't like the second one so much because every comment I wanted more.
- 53:49[SPEAKER_02]: But I will be more from her.
- 53:51[SPEAKER_02]: I want a more depth and character to see what her back story or motivation.
- 53:56[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, it was the lack.
- 53:57[SPEAKER_02]: I knew what she wanted, but I didn't know why she wanted it.
- 54:00[SPEAKER_02]: And I, I'm so curious to that.
- 54:03[SPEAKER_03]: She was the least complex of character.
- 54:06[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and have the most power to a lot of right for her a lot of reasons.
- 54:10[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, it felt like a matter of just not having enough time, and it's funny because books have so many more characters, and like, well, I guess I understand why they cut back.
- 54:24[SPEAKER_03]: Well, and how many of them had their own songs and how long this song's last?
- 54:28[SPEAKER_03]: There's something to tell for the play.
- 54:31[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
- 54:33[SPEAKER_04]: But Marilyn, what were your other thoughts about this opening section?
- 54:36[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I loved the bricklaying scene and, you know, it's such a satisfying, super hero moment, right?
- 54:44[SPEAKER_03]: Super hero comes literally flying in and manages to completely wreck this genius plot to take over the world.
- 54:51[SPEAKER_03]: And one of the bricklayers actually getting coded with his own yellow paint.
- 54:54[SPEAKER_03]: I thought that was really funny.
- 54:56[SPEAKER_03]: And then we come back to this again.
- 54:58[SPEAKER_03]: in gold blims, Joe Stupper song when he's got a little pile of yellow bricks right there.
- 55:05[SPEAKER_03]: And you think, oh yeah, bricks heavy, whatever.
- 55:08[SPEAKER_03]: And many picks went up and it's so they, okay, it's fake.
- 55:11[SPEAKER_03]: Just like he is.
- 55:12[SPEAKER_03]: You know, I just, I really love that moment.
- 55:15[SPEAKER_03]: I just, I left that lap.
- 55:18[SPEAKER_03]: I also very much appreciated throughout the film, the references to the facts and the truth.
- 55:24[SPEAKER_03]: and people believing things because they wanted to rather than doing the challenging work of the value it.
- 55:31[SPEAKER_03]: And this could come back to, you know, what we were talking about earlier about why did the animals all choose to leave.
- 55:37[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 55:38[SPEAKER_03]: You know, but how do you determine what is factual?
- 55:43[SPEAKER_03]: How do you determine what is true?
- 55:46[SPEAKER_03]: And different people are going to have different answers.
- 55:50[SPEAKER_03]: You just said her name and I'm liking on the younger sister's name.
- 55:55[SPEAKER_03]: I think Nessero suffers in that awful lot and her inability to either listen to a different point of view.
- 56:03[SPEAKER_03]: Of course she's I think felt so powerless all her life and suddenly she's in, you know, the the mayor's seat or the governor's seat would have whichever one it is, governor yeah.
- 56:12[SPEAKER_03]: And still inside.
- 56:14[SPEAKER_03]: must wonder why in the world she's sitting there and on top of the grief of the death of her father and the loss of her older sister and seeming betrayal and all those very complex things.
- 56:26[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, he would have helped her syndrome for sure from necessarily.
- 56:29[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely.
- 56:30[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely.
- 56:32[SPEAKER_03]: And I got really excited when that one moment when, you know, the shoe started to clow red and then finally their rubies numbers didn't dime as slippers and what were you people thinking?
- 56:41[SPEAKER_03]: Well, you know, yeah, and the devastation that comes from all of that.
- 56:45[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 56:46[SPEAKER_04]: Um, but you know why they did root diamond instead of Ruby.
- 56:51[SPEAKER_04]: Um, be probably copyright.
- 56:53[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, because I mean, so in the books, they are, they're silver slippers.
- 56:58[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, that's right.
- 56:58[SPEAKER_04]: You said that.
- 56:59[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 57:00[SPEAKER_04]: And so they made them red slippers for the 1939 movie Pops on screen.
- 57:05[SPEAKER_04]: They're quite nice.
- 57:06[SPEAKER_04]: But yeah.
- 57:08[UNKNOWN]: Um,
- 57:08[SPEAKER_04]: who currently owns the copyrights.
- 57:10[SPEAKER_04]: It's quite litigious about it.
- 57:12[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and I finally understand I read somewhere that this is why we never actually see Dorothy's face.
- 57:18[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 57:19[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, that's in the news here.
- 57:20[SPEAKER_03]: To allow that.
- 57:21[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 57:22[SPEAKER_04]: Well, there's it's not that they refuse to allow that.
- 57:24[SPEAKER_04]: We'll talk about that more in the next section.
- 57:25[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, let me get there.
- 57:26[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, let me get there.
- 57:28[SPEAKER_04]: Yep.
- 57:29[SPEAKER_04]: I wanted to do a shout out just the lovely details that went into everything.
- 57:34[SPEAKER_04]: I've been listening to the official podcast coverage to where a lot of it is just like the marketing philosophy would expect, like, oh, it was such a lovely experience.
- 57:43[SPEAKER_04]: Well, work so hard, but there are interesting production design details in there, like the fact that Alphabet's Treehouse is covered with poisonous flowers, specifically, and that she, it's in the
- 57:57[SPEAKER_04]: pick the broomstick design and they picked mangrove as the wood because they have their roots that connect and speak to each other underground.
- 58:09[SPEAKER_04]: So I love that attention to detail.
- 58:12[SPEAKER_03]: And visually they can even look a little bit like a piece of you know because we think of brooms as straws, but a lot of brooms in their
- 58:22[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 58:23[SPEAKER_03]: So I didn't know that detail on that.
- 58:24[SPEAKER_03]: That's that's really cool.
- 58:26[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 58:27[SPEAKER_04]: And Nicole.
- 58:28[SPEAKER_04]: What are your thoughts on Fanny play by Bowen Yang and Shenzhen play by Bronwyn James?
- 58:32[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I'm a huge Bowen Yang fan for sure.
- 58:36[SPEAKER_02]: Like almost everything.
- 58:37[SPEAKER_02]: They touch.
- 58:37[SPEAKER_02]: I'm very too.
- 58:39[SPEAKER_02]: I love them in this role, I'm sound like a broken record, I'm so sorry, I wanted more, I wanted more, I wanted more change and but there just wasn't enough time in this despite being a long move for really deep character development.
- 58:54[SPEAKER_03]: I thought they yeah.
- 58:55[SPEAKER_02]: They added value.
- 58:56[SPEAKER_02]: They were kind of like a Greek chorus version.
- 59:00[SPEAKER_02]: And I know that that's the function of these characters that they are.
- 59:03[SPEAKER_02]: From what I understand, a real assimilation of a lot of different voices from the books just represented in these two characters.
- 59:10[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, there's my god.
- 59:11[SPEAKER_04]: Those two names are two specific characters, but there's more, and they kind of narrowed it down and said, yeah, these two, and then obviously they have less time to say things.
- 59:24[SPEAKER_04]: And I think I have to wonder, because they filmed these two films at the same time.
- 59:28[SPEAKER_02]: And I have to wonder right if they knew how warmly people were going to respond to Bowen Yang in particular if they would have expanded his role in this I think that that's what it was I was like I can't wait to see Bowen I've been listening to his podcast now I'm like so I'm more of a fan of Bowen Yang's now than I was when I saw the first movie and I'm like, oh, I can't wait to see what he does next But then yeah, it's a good reminder that they filmed it all before that kind of cultural swell
- 59:57[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, that's how I feel.
- 59:59[SPEAKER_02]: I do like them as a function of like a voice of the masses, a Greek chorus type of amateur.
- 1:00:05[SPEAKER_02]: And that's going to cool place.
- 1:00:07[SPEAKER_02]: What did you think of those two characters?
- 1:00:10[SPEAKER_04]: I think, I mean, I think they were well translated from, because they represent basically
- 1:00:18[SPEAKER_04]: what Glinda thought she wanted because this is also about Glinda getting what she wants.
- 1:00:22[SPEAKER_04]: In this case, she does get what she wants, but realizes it doesn't actually make her happy and it doesn't make her feel good.
- 1:00:29[SPEAKER_04]: And so they represent that what she thought she wants.
- 1:00:33[SPEAKER_04]: I love, I also love Bowen Yang and, uh, Bronwyn James who plays Shen Shen said that, uh, they were encouraged like they could add the blinds and she's like, I didn't dare, but he'd every single time
- 1:00:47[SPEAKER_02]: He's so funny.
- 1:00:48[SPEAKER_02]: He's so funny.
- 1:00:50[SPEAKER_03]: So Nicole, do what you say that those characters felt a bit like past issues?
- 1:00:55[SPEAKER_02]: You know what, Marilyn, you are much smarter than me.
- 1:00:58[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what that word means.
- 1:00:59[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm sorry.
- 1:01:01[SPEAKER_03]: A past issue is a niche match, a combination of lots of different.
- 1:01:04[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:01:05[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, not having read the books.
- 1:01:08[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like they're needed to be characters that spoke for all of the characters that were missing from what I understand, right?
- 1:01:16[SPEAKER_02]: That there were a lot of voices that got lost in this, uh, this treatment, and it
- 1:01:23[SPEAKER_04]: If they didn't it would be a missed opportunity if they didn't like advocate for all the missing voices because that sure opinions matter I mean yeah, these they're specifically honestly They're the two most memorable names of like Glinda runs around with the gaggle of people and then kind of right moves away from them And moves more toward you know alpha button Fiero and Barker and Nessoros and all and moreable
- 1:01:49[SPEAKER_04]: and more time.
- 1:01:52[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, in the books she is not obsessed with being tutored by moreable.
- 1:01:57[SPEAKER_04]: But she bit the moreable is all up in her and Alphaba and Nessa Rose's business, as I said.
- 1:02:03[SPEAKER_04]: Sure.
- 1:02:03[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, sure.
- 1:02:04[SPEAKER_04]: Marilyn, do you want to set up the next section many kinds of love?
- 1:02:08[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, I will be happy too.
- 1:02:11[SPEAKER_03]: As Glinda's start-up expands, and she prepares to marry Prince Furio, Jonathan Bailey.
- 1:02:18[SPEAKER_03]: In a spectacular ASEAN wedding, she is haunted by her separation from Elphaba.
- 1:02:24[SPEAKER_03]: She attempts to broker a conciliation between Elphaba and the wizard, but those efforts will fail, driving Elphaba and Glinda only further apart.
- 1:02:39[SPEAKER_02]: There's a lot that happened in this section that bothered me.
- 1:02:43[SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
- 1:02:45[SPEAKER_02]: So sorry.
- 1:02:47[SPEAKER_02]: Mainly about Fiero.
- 1:02:48[SPEAKER_02]: I feel really protective of him and I feel like he's a good human and has a good spirit and I feel like he's been being swept up in this propaganda machine that obviously he doesn't want to part of.
- 1:03:02[SPEAKER_02]: And to announce a wedding to him, in front of everybody, it felt so disrespectful towards a character that's garnered so much respect in my eyes.
- 1:03:13[SPEAKER_02]: I know that it was designed to be that way, so I felt a certain affinity like I understand.
- 1:03:18[SPEAKER_02]: Um, but that really stood out to me when I think of this, this section of movie is, is of, of course, he's going to run away.
- 1:03:27[SPEAKER_02]: Like, of course, it was never there 100% to begin with.
- 1:03:32[SPEAKER_02]: It was really interesting to watch him, um, find some bravery.
- 1:03:37[SPEAKER_02]: And to stand up for what he believed in, I thought that that was really powerful and a great metaphor for a lot of things I really support, it's like overcoming investors.
- 1:03:47[SPEAKER_04]: So that's something that really stood out to me in this many kinds of love segment that we're working here.
- 1:04:05[SPEAKER_04]: I, I, Glinda definitely knew the whole time you could see in the emptiness in her eyes.
- 1:04:09[SPEAKER_04]: She knew that he did not love her the way she wanted him to, but she didn't yet know how to stop lying to herself about it.
- 1:04:17[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's sad.
- 1:04:19[SPEAKER_03]: I found it a fascinating reversal of the typical fairy tale trope.
- 1:04:25[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:04:26[SPEAKER_03]: where it's the prince who is offering his hand and marriages a prize to the goose girl, or the commoner, or whatever.
- 1:04:35[SPEAKER_03]: And so now here we have a prince, but we also have this woman who is being used as a pawn by the most powerful kingdom in the land, and it was just really interesting to see a man being put in that position, because you don't see that very often.
- 1:04:54[SPEAKER_03]: not wanting to hurt her because of course not, you know, he likes her to some degree and was brought up to be polite to women.
- 1:05:03[SPEAKER_03]: I'm assuming, and this is again, the fairytale trope of the prince, you know, he had some incurdious and all the rest of it.
- 1:05:11[SPEAKER_03]: And also, this was amazing acting moment for her because you could see
- 1:05:22[SPEAKER_03]: that she knew everything, the thing that she was saying was only making him feel worse, right?
- 1:05:28[SPEAKER_03]: And she knew what she was doing.
- 1:05:30[SPEAKER_03]: She knew she was overpowering him.
- 1:05:32[SPEAKER_03]: She knew that she was trying to, you know, she knew the whole time.
- 1:05:36[SPEAKER_03]: And she desperately hoped that some kind of spark of response would come from him.
- 1:05:42[SPEAKER_03]: And it just couldn't because he was too honest.
- 1:05:45[SPEAKER_03]: And he did have to work up the courage to finally break away.
- 1:05:50[SPEAKER_03]: and you know more power to him.
- 1:05:52[SPEAKER_03]: And I think that was his most important character arc.
- 1:05:55[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 1:05:56[SPEAKER_03]: But lovely to have that gender reversal.
- 1:05:58[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 1:05:59[SPEAKER_03]: I really, I really enjoyed that.
- 1:06:02[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, can I ask, do you think to quote Alphaba?
- 1:06:06[SPEAKER_04]: Do you think she is wicked for quote-unquote taking
- 1:06:12[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know, I struggle with the idea of he's not an object to be taken.
- 1:06:19[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, like if we, if we reverse the genders here and said that did Fiero take Glenda or take Alphabelle, we'd have, I think, right about, would have a big problem with that language, right?
- 1:06:33[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe I'm projecting, but to flip it the other way, no Fiero has free will and he's exhibiting that free will.
- 1:06:40[SPEAKER_02]: But is she being a bad friend to, um, to Glinda?
- 1:06:46[SPEAKER_02]: No, because she's being honest with herself, and their friendship is rooted in a fundamental understanding and a fundamental knowing, I think she would be a bad friend if she let her go through with a wedding that she knew wasn't pure.
- 1:07:04[SPEAKER_03]: And okay, maybe I'm forgetting a huge chunk of this because I always thought once and it's been quite a while ago I'm sorry.
- 1:07:10[SPEAKER_03]: It seemed to me that Althabo was not really in this equation of who gets to pick She she had other priorities.
- 1:07:18[SPEAKER_03]: She was doing her the things we knew that she loved him and Wish that he were there with her, but she also knew that Linda loved him and he was a prince and she was the
- 1:07:29[SPEAKER_03]: Ozzie and Princess and that was gonna be their happy ever after because that's how the stories go, right?
- 1:07:34[SPEAKER_03]: So I think it was Fiero who was the only one who really had the agency in this, but it took him a while and I'm not surprised it did.
- 1:07:43[SPEAKER_03]: I have every sympathy for him.
- 1:07:45[SPEAKER_03]: He real has he had to act.
- 1:07:47[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:07:48[SPEAKER_03]: And as you said, Nicole, he wasn't an object.
- 1:07:51[SPEAKER_03]: There was no sense of, oh, you're stealing my man.
- 1:07:54[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, it's like you, you know, you move my cheese.
- 1:07:59[SPEAKER_03]: He's not an object.
- 1:08:01[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
- 1:08:01[SPEAKER_02]: No, if he didn't act, it's almost like he had to come to terms with the fetic action towards following his heart, which is such a
- 1:08:10[SPEAKER_02]: an angel trope, right?
- 1:08:12[SPEAKER_02]: That he would surrender a lot of other stuff and he would kind of sacrifice his social standing to live a life that felt more pure to him and more true to him.
- 1:08:23[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that for a man with his upbringing, that sacrifice is one of the biggest ones you can make.
- 1:08:31[SPEAKER_02]: To, yes, grow your social status away to be with the one you love.
- 1:08:36[SPEAKER_02]: Even if it means you have to live your life as a spoiler scarecrow.
- 1:08:40[SPEAKER_02]: She, you know, he did happily, I think.
- 1:08:44[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, no, for sure.
- 1:08:45[SPEAKER_03]: I want to give him credit for not wanting to marry somebody and not love them.
- 1:08:55[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
- 1:08:56[SPEAKER_03]: I don't think he wanted that for Glanda, because he knew
- 1:09:01[SPEAKER_03]: It just wasn't going to work and you could never come up to her expectation and how frustrating and sad and to be honest, I'm not really sure how much Glenda really loved him right.
- 1:09:14[SPEAKER_03]: as she was attracted to him, who wouldn't be.
- 1:09:16[SPEAKER_03]: So the John of the Bailey.
- 1:09:17[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, no.
- 1:09:18[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm like, I know.
- 1:09:20[SPEAKER_03]: But I think it was part of her mental script that she was still stuck in.
- 1:09:24[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to push back there and disagree.
- 1:09:27[SPEAKER_04]: I do think for Glinda really loved him.
- 1:09:29[SPEAKER_04]: And I said this in the first part that this love triangle is an invention of the book.
- 1:09:34[SPEAKER_04]: Again, again, Fiero's character in the, sorry, it's an invention of the musical.
- 1:09:42[SPEAKER_04]: Of course.
- 1:09:43[SPEAKER_04]: Fierre's character in the book is very, very different.
- 1:09:47[SPEAKER_04]: He actually lives in Kiomoko that castle, it's not his second home, and they have this other character in the book called Averick, and who's more the superficial upper class guy, and so they kind of layered Averick over Fierre to create the musical version of Fierre.
- 1:10:06[SPEAKER_04]: So yeah, so they added this whole love triangle thing, but I think rather than normally it'd be like, oh, you added a love triangle name, but actually they did something really interesting here because I do think that Glinda loves just I just think of that moment in part one where she realizes like, oh my god, like wondering how he, you know, worrying about him can actually hurt me and that was a new sensation for her.
- 1:10:32[SPEAKER_04]: I don't think she's loved someone
- 1:10:36[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, we'll say, maybe Elvalba in the books aside, but I don't think she's felt that way about any one before, and so I have to give Glynda a lot of credit for the fact that, of course, she's heart broke it when Fioro leaves her for her best friend, and now she's lost them both and they're together, and they've chosen each other over her, and she's stuck in this situation where she feels shitty about herself, and you know, and she knows she's doing the wrong things,
- 1:11:02[SPEAKER_04]: doesn't really know how to get out of this situation.
- 1:11:05[SPEAKER_04]: And is also afraid to give up everything.
- 1:11:09[SPEAKER_04]: But she somehow, it takes a really rare person to experience all that hurt.
- 1:11:17[SPEAKER_04]: And to have valid reasons, like she could just be like, Elfable, you stole my man.
- 1:11:22[SPEAKER_04]: I hate you now.
- 1:11:24[SPEAKER_04]: But she gets over it because she loves Elfable more than she is heartbroken.
- 1:11:32[SPEAKER_03]: And that is genuine love.
- 1:11:35[SPEAKER_03]: And you said, you know, it was romantic love.
- 1:11:38[SPEAKER_03]: For fear.
- 1:11:39[SPEAKER_03]: If she genuinely love fear, or the way she loved Elfaba, I truly don't think that she could have just bring this whole thing on him.
- 1:11:47[SPEAKER_03]: Because she would know how unhappy it would make him.
- 1:11:50[SPEAKER_03]: And if she genuinely loved him, call me, you know, altruistic way, I don't think you like.
- 1:11:53[SPEAKER_03]: But if she genuinely loved him, she would not want him to be caged.
- 1:11:59[SPEAKER_03]: In a relationship that was less
- 1:12:01[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, her love in Bera was a fatuist love, like one of just like maybe physical connection and obsession, like, you know, a Romeo and Juliet type of love, but her love for her but is more of a consummate love that involves commitment and intimacy and all of those things that feels more genuine and that's why it's valuable to me that she would surrender for you to make alpha-happy even though she's not hers just to give up right.
- 1:12:29[SPEAKER_03]: And I'm not saying that, you know, Elfaba, I bet, Glenda wasn't hurt by all this.
- 1:12:36[SPEAKER_03]: Absolutely.
- 1:12:37[SPEAKER_03]: It's very painful.
- 1:12:40[SPEAKER_03]: There's no doubt about that.
- 1:12:42[SPEAKER_03]: And yet, I think, as she grew in self-knowledge and in honesty, that's Nicole was saying, she came to the realization of, well, I genuinely love Elfaba because, well, with nothing else, I've known her longer.
- 1:12:54[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
- 1:12:55[SPEAKER_03]: We have shared how many hundreds of more intimate moments with her that I ever have with his friends.
- 1:13:02[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:13:03[SPEAKER_03]: So, it was a hard self-realization for her, right?
- 1:13:07[SPEAKER_03]: And yeah, it was sad, because we all want to be loved and yet, you know, she came there eventually, right?
- 1:13:15[SPEAKER_04]: Well, speaking of Glinda, a lot of people say that the first movie is the alphabet movie and the second movie is the Glinda movie.
- 1:13:24[SPEAKER_04]: Do you agree, Nicole?
- 1:13:27[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, I do.
- 1:13:31[SPEAKER_02]: I'm thinking of it now, but I do agree, because in the first movie Glenda was so superficial, and now we're seeing more growth, and I do think there was a lot of growth with Elfaba in the second movie, but she,
- 1:13:47[SPEAKER_02]: If she was kind of locked into her personality by the end of the first movie, Sarasal, we saw motivation and the second film she was acting on those motivations.
- 1:13:55[SPEAKER_02]: And in this second film we're seeing Galinda have an arc that defines new motivations and she's starting to act on them and starting to be guided by her moral compass.
- 1:14:05[SPEAKER_02]: And that's why for me when the second movie ends and we go back to the beginning of the first movie in that scene in Munchkinland.
- 1:14:11[SPEAKER_02]: I love that they brought us back there because now we're seeing it with such a different lens and such a different context.
- 1:14:19[SPEAKER_02]: And that context is rooted in glindous character development more than else was character development.
- 1:14:26[SPEAKER_04]: Right, yeah.
- 1:14:26[SPEAKER_02]: Great sense.
- 1:14:28[SPEAKER_03]: I agree totally.
- 1:14:29[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think L. Elphabas, the one who really had to, she was forced into growing in the first movie, and now Glinda's the one who has to grow up.
- 1:14:39[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and they did do more to emphasize her in this movie.
- 1:14:43[SPEAKER_04]: I think also with Ariana Grande of it all, but for example, in wonderful, it's in the stage show, it's just Elphabas and the wizard, and here they worked Glinda into it, which to me makes a lot of sense because I think
- 1:14:57[SPEAKER_04]: if you're trying to sell this fantasy to Elfaba of, you know, let's all live happily together.
- 1:15:02[SPEAKER_04]: It helps a lot more of glinders there with the smiling face of your best friend.
- 1:15:07[SPEAKER_04]: And, you know, you just, for second in the movie, I'm like, Elfaba, you are giving into this way too easily.
- 1:15:14[SPEAKER_04]: But I can understand it, too, that like it would just,
- 1:15:17[SPEAKER_04]: Wouldn't it just be so much easier if this were the right thing to do?
- 1:15:24[SPEAKER_04]: But yeah, ultimately she finds the cages and she finds Dr. Dillman now voiceless, which, which is a small aside much better outcome for him than in the novels.
- 1:15:37[SPEAKER_03]: Oh man, but still heartbreaking, still absolutely heartbreaking.
- 1:15:42[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and they do come back to that at the very end.
- 1:15:45[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, it's a little smidgen of hosts.
- 1:15:47[SPEAKER_02]: I loved that at the end.
- 1:15:49[SPEAKER_02]: I love that at the end.
- 1:15:50[SPEAKER_02]: Well, just as a teacher, it's like, I'll give him a chalkboard back.
- 1:15:56[SPEAKER_02]: The soap box.
- 1:15:57[SPEAKER_02]: See, there's so many important things to say.
- 1:15:59[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know.
- 1:15:59[SPEAKER_02]: It was really heartbreaking when you couldn't speak for someone that had such strong thoughts and strong voice.
- 1:16:05[SPEAKER_02]: It's obviously a big metaphor.
- 1:16:07[SPEAKER_02]: But yeah.
- 1:16:08[SPEAKER_02]: and it was his life.
- 1:16:10[SPEAKER_02]: This is life.
- 1:16:10[SPEAKER_02]: It's passion.
- 1:16:11[SPEAKER_02]: And I relate to that.
- 1:16:13[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, be out me too.
- 1:16:15[SPEAKER_04]: And I think that this, I think though this is a turning point for Glynda too, the fact that she's there witnessing this and she's, you know, and in her mind, she's like, oh, it's so, and this is why to be honest, she grows a lot more in the musical than she does in the book.
- 1:16:30[SPEAKER_04]: Interesting.
- 1:16:31[SPEAKER_04]: And I think that it's also because she's, she sees, you know, um, she tries to be in on selling out Elphaba on the fantasy.
- 1:16:40[SPEAKER_04]: She's like, come live in this fantasy bubble with me, literal bubble.
- 1:16:43[SPEAKER_04]: Um, and, and she sees that Elphaba is morally stronger.
- 1:16:48[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:16:50[SPEAKER_04]: That she, yeah, that this is, um, there are more important things than your immediate comforts.
- 1:16:56[SPEAKER_04]: And I think that inspires Glenda and the end.
- 1:16:59[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that Elf was would rather be lonely and morally sound, then with company and doing something she didn't believe in.
- 1:17:09[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that that's where we see Glinda grow in this film is that she realizes that she can be okay in her own company.
- 1:17:16[SPEAKER_02]: Well, hope she's trying to be okay in her own company.
- 1:17:19[SPEAKER_02]: As long as it needs following her beliefs, right?
- 1:17:23[SPEAKER_03]: And I think it comes back to what you're saying earlier, Nicole,
- 1:17:27[SPEAKER_03]: I think the loss of Pharaoh is really the first serious time that glindance, everything she wanted is always come to her, except magic, but she's accepted the glitz and glamour in place of magic and the technology of the bubble and so forth.
- 1:17:46[SPEAKER_03]: But it isn't really until she has that heartbreak moment, I think, to the extent that it is for her heartbreak moment.
- 1:17:55[SPEAKER_03]: that she does start to become three-dimensional instead of just two.
- 1:18:00[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.
- 1:18:01[SPEAKER_04]: Yep.
- 1:18:01[SPEAKER_04]: And uh, but she, she frees Chistory, the head winged monkey and the rest of the monkeys and they become her allies slash army.
- 1:18:10[SPEAKER_04]: And I just want to shout out that Chistory is voiced by, I didn't realize this until I looked at the credits voiced by Dee Bradley Baker.
- 1:18:18[SPEAKER_04]: And um, I don't know if either of you recognize that name.
- 1:18:22[SPEAKER_04]: I know Marilyn you were at least definitely familiar with Dee Bradley Baker's work.
- 1:18:26[SPEAKER_04]: Um, he's probably most famous for
- 1:18:30[SPEAKER_04]: for Avatar the Last Air Bender and for Star Wars, where he, for example, plays all of the clones in the Badbatch.
- 1:18:37[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, okay.
- 1:18:40[SPEAKER_04]: Good on him.
- 1:18:40[SPEAKER_04]: Well, he's very talented.
- 1:18:41[SPEAKER_04]: He's very talented.
- 1:18:42[SPEAKER_04]: And he's very good with animal voices.
- 1:18:44[SPEAKER_04]: He plays all the animals in every time the last day of Bender.
- 1:18:46[SPEAKER_04]: And he plays just through here.
- 1:18:48[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:18:49[SPEAKER_02]: Do you think that it was just like a convention to get him and Coleman to Mingo, right, just to get him on the red carpet?
- 1:18:57[SPEAKER_02]: They just wanted him on the red carpet because, you know, I think that they had value.
- 1:19:02[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm floating that out there.
- 1:19:04[SPEAKER_04]: I'm glad that, um,
- 1:19:08[SPEAKER_04]: Like I think I'm glad that they kept I suppose the winged monkeys are so iconic from the movie and that's one reason why they've turned up in every version of the story But it is interesting that they've almost they've grown more Interesting in the story.
- 1:19:21[SPEAKER_04]: I think then the original Frank el bomb book was they were kind of like genies and there's this golden cap That you could basically ask them for three wishes three tasks
- 1:19:34[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah and so the witch had them for three wishes and then you know Dorothy took the cap after she killed her and then Dorothy set them free and so they were um but in the book
- 1:19:45[SPEAKER_04]: in the, in the Gregory McGuire books, it's a really intimate and heartbreaking physical transformation of Alphabet's experiments and teaching them to talk and like, oh, anyway, it's a whole long thing.
- 1:19:59[SPEAKER_02]: I remember you mentioning that before, and that's really stood out to me watching the second film as how physically uncomfortable they must be, as one of these with folks.
- 1:20:10[SPEAKER_02]: So I thank you for sharing that with me.
- 1:20:12[SPEAKER_02]: previously because I really did inform how I looked at the most characters.
- 1:20:18[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, yeah, I again, I wish there were, this is, you know, this is why I harp on the book so much, I think, just because there's so you spend so much time with the characters and in a movie it's just not possible.
- 1:20:31[SPEAKER_04]: Give us a chance.
- 1:20:31[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, sure.
- 1:20:34[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, Mary, I landed you of any final thoughts about the love triangle wedding attempted reconciliation with the wizard
- 1:20:43[SPEAKER_03]: Well, again, the way that they do the glamour and the glitz and everything is quite stunning and the typical fairy tale happily ever after ending, which I think if you haven't picked up by now that this is not your typical fairy tale story, you know, this will forever lift those particular veils from your audience, especially in the next segment of scenes when we see their transformations,
- 1:21:12[SPEAKER_04]: especially the box transformation was violent really was that's a good tease in a good time to take a quick break and when we come back We're gonna talk about the climax and conclusion of wicked for good
- 1:21:42[SPEAKER_04]: And we are back from what ended up being a longer break than expected, we ended up taking a few days break on our ends because of scheduling and all that.
- 1:21:52[SPEAKER_04]: But the three of us have re-gathered again to talk you through the end of this movie.
- 1:21:57[SPEAKER_04]: So Nicole, set us up, please.
- 1:22:00[SPEAKER_02]: Our next chunk of this movie, the final third, we're calling death by Dorothy.
- 1:22:05[SPEAKER_02]: So in this section of the movie, the aftershocks are transforming
- 1:22:11[SPEAKER_02]: and Fierro forever and threaten the safety of Elfobus-Sisterness arose.
- 1:22:15[SPEAKER_02]: When a girl from Kansas comes crashing into all of their lives, as an angry mob rises against the wicked witch, Glinda and Elfobo will need to come together one final time.
- 1:22:25[SPEAKER_02]: With their singular friendship now the full crew of their futures, they will need to truly see each other with honesty and empathy if they are to change themselves in all of Oz for good.
- 1:22:37[SPEAKER_04]: So, what did you think about this, the end, how the movie, this whole story ends?
- 1:22:43[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I love, or does it, I loved the transformations in that they were like,
- 1:22:51[SPEAKER_02]: horrific, and violent, and I think, you know, pickled me in a way, and appropriate.
- 1:22:58[SPEAKER_02]: Like we think of the Wizard of Oz is like, this like skipped down the elaborate road, but then we see this darker backstory of these characters.
- 1:23:07[SPEAKER_02]: I especially like box transformation because he has such,
- 1:23:11[SPEAKER_02]: character development between the first movie and this for good.
- 1:23:15[SPEAKER_02]: He was so resentful and you could see it growing in the first movie this resent for his like social status, but it really was obtuse in the second film.
- 1:23:28[SPEAKER_02]: And you could like see the anger swell on him and it kind of erupted in this violent transformation scene that I was my favorite scene and probably all of the wicked franchise of this play.
- 1:23:39[SPEAKER_02]: I loved it so much.
- 1:23:41[SPEAKER_04]: Did you notice by the way for that transformation scene that his tin menness incorporated objects from around the room?
- 1:23:48[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I loved it.
- 1:23:50[SPEAKER_02]: And like I could see it.
- 1:23:51[SPEAKER_02]: It was like foreshadowed cinematographically in an interesting way.
- 1:23:55[SPEAKER_02]: Like you could see the T set on the table.
- 1:23:57[SPEAKER_02]: And I was like, that's going to merge with him.
- 1:24:00[SPEAKER_02]: Like that's what's going to happen.
- 1:24:02[SPEAKER_02]: And it wasn't so, um, they didn't spell it out for us.
- 1:24:08[SPEAKER_02]: Like, and now he's the Tin Man.
- 1:24:10[SPEAKER_02]: And now for sure.
- 1:24:10[SPEAKER_02]: It was the square crow.
- 1:24:12[SPEAKER_02]: Like it was,
- 1:24:13[SPEAKER_02]: Vailed enough that you had to use your intelligence to put it together, which I love using my intelligence if I have the chance.
- 1:24:21[SPEAKER_02]: So I really enjoyed that.
- 1:24:24[SPEAKER_02]: I really enjoyed, like,
- 1:24:26[SPEAKER_02]: Linda Elfaba exchanges in this end of this film, the lines blurred a lot for me between the characters and the actresses playing the characters because I've grown kinda connected to the truth them as a duo and I love their vibe.
- 1:24:43[SPEAKER_02]: Hmm, so you can kind of see it on their faces that, you know, where does the character end and the actress again, but I was interested in that too.
- 1:24:53[SPEAKER_02]: So, great, lots of great imagery, lots of great metaphors here.
- 1:24:57[SPEAKER_02]: I'm eager to hear what you both think.
- 1:25:00[SPEAKER_04]: to pick up on what you're saying about where one ends and the other begins is interesting to hear up the official podcast, which has been giving, you know, sharing some production details that final scene where Elphopus Shubs Glinda in a closet, apparently they did not warn the actress that that's what was going to happen.
- 1:25:20[SPEAKER_04]: They just told Cynthia Rivo, the Elphop actress, you know, just get her in the closet.
- 1:25:26[SPEAKER_04]: And so her reaction there, she's like,
- 1:25:28[SPEAKER_04]: on like that was a genuine reaction.
- 1:25:31[SPEAKER_04]: And I love your line was improved.
- 1:25:34[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, sure.
- 1:25:35[SPEAKER_02]: It's really smooth.
- 1:25:36[SPEAKER_02]: Like their interactions are very genuine in a way that I, I'll stop myself before I say wish all humans interact with that level of vulnerability and intimacy I think would actually be
- 1:25:47[SPEAKER_02]: quite overwhelming, but, you know, it's a little bit too much for me, but it's inspiring to see on such a moment scale that people can appear so different, but be so connected.
- 1:25:59[SPEAKER_02]: And I just really think that that's cool.
- 1:26:02[SPEAKER_02]: And I love her getting shoved into the closet.
- 1:26:04[SPEAKER_02]: There's so many metaphors here.
- 1:26:06[SPEAKER_02]: We can't even scratch the surface of, but
- 1:26:12[SPEAKER_02]: the fact that it was because she needed plausible deniability wrong and that's a gift to give someone to shield them from seeing something violent or that will scar them.
- 1:26:23[SPEAKER_02]: It's a gift that we give each other to protect each other.
- 1:26:27[SPEAKER_02]: So, oh, all great, all great stuff.
- 1:26:31[SPEAKER_02]: I want more.
- 1:26:32[SPEAKER_04]: What would you want more to be?
- 1:26:36[SPEAKER_04]: What form would you want?
- 1:26:37[SPEAKER_02]: I want to see what happens.
- 1:26:40[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we're spoiling, right?
- 1:26:42[SPEAKER_02]: Like they run off together.
- 1:26:43[SPEAKER_02]: They, she faced the death of a female.
- 1:26:45[SPEAKER_02]: We all know.
- 1:26:46[SPEAKER_02]: We know what happens.
- 1:26:47[SPEAKER_02]: Like she faked her death.
- 1:26:49[SPEAKER_02]: Fiero comes to find her and they love each other in their new true forms and go off, come what may.
- 1:26:57[SPEAKER_02]: And I want
- 1:26:59[SPEAKER_02]: to see their life.
- 1:27:00[SPEAKER_02]: I want to see the hovel they build for themselves.
- 1:27:02[SPEAKER_02]: And I need to know more about scarecrow intimacy.
- 1:27:07[SPEAKER_02]: There's a lot of questions.
- 1:27:09[SPEAKER_02]: So I want to see like how it all I want to see their love story.
- 1:27:12[SPEAKER_03]: I would love to see Elfaba reunite with Gerr and her nanny.
- 1:27:20[SPEAKER_04]: May.
- 1:27:20[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:27:21[SPEAKER_04]: Burr yeah.
- 1:27:22[SPEAKER_03]: Burr.
- 1:27:23[SPEAKER_04]: What did you think Marilyn about the end of the climax and Dana Wong's movie?
- 1:27:30[SPEAKER_03]: Well, I was glad that they both got their happy endings more or less.
- 1:27:35[SPEAKER_03]: You know, however, bittersweet endings were, and that Glenda had finally justified her epithet, the good.
- 1:27:45[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 1:27:45[SPEAKER_03]: I thought that was a really wonderful journey.
- 1:27:50[SPEAKER_03]: because let's face it, she was just pretty much a spoiled brat when she first got there and all but clueless about human interactions and so bought into her own idea of, you know, I'm popular, which is what every, you know, young teenager.
- 1:28:13[SPEAKER_03]: aspires to be on some level, and just taking that over the top, right?
- 1:28:18[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, it really was over the top, and it was a lot of that first, the first movie, but seeing her step by step, figuring it out, and realizing, okay, maybe I shouldn't have decided to stick here and, you know, do my best to make change and, you know, I'm sure there's good and am kind of feeling.
- 1:28:40[SPEAKER_03]: and then her incredible solo with that amazing cinematography, the girl in the bubble.
- 1:28:47[SPEAKER_03]: when she finally is trying to look herself in the mirror literally and can try to figure out who am I who am I who am I really and she's looking at one mirror after another and the way they filmed something I didn't know which was the mirror image in which was the actual image and every time I thought okay this is the actual note it's another mirror you know it's just stunning chef's kiss it was absolutely brilliant
- 1:29:13[SPEAKER_03]: And of course, I also loved the change to the song change for good.
- 1:29:17[SPEAKER_03]: I thought it was really well done.
- 1:29:19[SPEAKER_03]: I actually was very proud of myself that I figured out that Bach was going to transform into the tin man.
- 1:29:26[SPEAKER_03]: And I also realized as soon as I said, put him on a pole, I said, oh, that's the future's care crow, I'm right there.
- 1:29:34[SPEAKER_03]: But I didn't really get a connection with Fiero being brainless.
- 1:29:38[SPEAKER_04]: seemed to me he had a fear of bit of intelligence so I thought they kind of slipped a bit on being faithful to that the original bound well so I have to say this is a change also with the with the book and and and the musical itself the stage musical is that I I mentioned this already before but fero and is a combination of two book characters fero and average and average it's not that
- 1:30:09[SPEAKER_04]: mindless, like he just doesn't really, he's listless, you know, just doesn't really, not a thinker, not a thinker.
- 1:30:16[SPEAKER_04]: Whereas I would say bookfiero is very much a thinker in an activist, and that's why he and Elfaba Bond.
- 1:30:24[SPEAKER_04]: So, but they do, I just want to shout out, they give a shout out to Averick in the stage play.
- 1:30:30[SPEAKER_04]: It's who drops Fierro off at school, and then in the, because yeah,
- 1:30:39[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, anyway.
- 1:30:40[SPEAKER_04]: And in the movie, they had the other servant that was serving Nessa Rose.
- 1:30:46[SPEAKER_04]: They called Everick, which was a shout-out.
- 1:30:49[SPEAKER_04]: So it was Bond's friend, just like he was besties with Buck in the book.
- 1:30:52[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
- 1:30:53[SPEAKER_02]: There was a line that Elfoba says when she's casting the spell to turn Fierro into the scarecrow that I interpreted.
- 1:31:01[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, the brainless piece I didn't really
- 1:31:07[SPEAKER_02]: make it so he can't feel any pain make it so his bones can't break.
- 1:31:11[SPEAKER_02]: So that that line is how I I got to stuff him with Sean, hey.
- 1:31:16[SPEAKER_03]: Sure.
- 1:31:16[SPEAKER_02]: So, but I agree I wish it was a little bit more on the nose.
- 1:31:20[SPEAKER_02]: And I think when we meet Fierre at first, he reads it's kind of a superficial character and then we we see him once, but that's still a stretch to get that we need to go.
- 1:31:29[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:31:30[SPEAKER_03]: No, I got there too and thought, all right, we'll way back in the day.
- 1:31:34[SPEAKER_03]: I could say he was kind of
- 1:31:36[SPEAKER_03]: You know, brainless or fluffy mind or whatever.
- 1:31:38[SPEAKER_03]: But it that did last very long.
- 1:31:41[SPEAKER_02]: I know and thank goodness, because his carries about and was so wretched and musely and so nuanced.
- 1:31:46[SPEAKER_03]: So I think one of, or the other of you already mentioned this, but as I was watching the movie unfold and Elfaba goes to the castle and one of, all right, was this the castle that Fira had mentioned that belonged to his family that they could go to, kind of thing.
- 1:32:00[SPEAKER_04]: Yes, yes, I was Guillermo Coe in the book that is that is his only castle in the book, but they are like a his people are in a magic tribe So they spend part of like the winters there and then the story moving around But yeah, in Averick who is the other character combined into him obviously has his own estate Sure sure, so that yeah, that's why he has two in the yeah
- 1:32:24[SPEAKER_02]: kind of drafty for winter castle.
- 1:32:26[SPEAKER_03]: Really.
- 1:32:28[SPEAKER_03]: We're expecting them all.
- 1:32:29[SPEAKER_03]: A lot of the finishings that's probably disappeared over time.
- 1:32:33[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:32:33[SPEAKER_03]: It's been deserted for a while.
- 1:32:35[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, it's not deserted in the book.
- 1:32:37[SPEAKER_03]: No.
- 1:32:38[SPEAKER_03]: I was very, very glad that both Glendette and Elfaba finally got their happy endings.
- 1:32:44[SPEAKER_03]: Although they were both bittersweet.
- 1:32:46[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:32:47[SPEAKER_02]: I think they're happy ending really would have been with each other like back in, you know, when you then they the last scene is when they're in that picnic fields like that's they're happy to say sure and they'll never get back there.
- 1:32:58[SPEAKER_03]: No, but just like all of us right there may be other ways to come together in the future right just don't know.
- 1:33:06[SPEAKER_02]: And like we'll always be there in our hearts.
- 1:33:08[SPEAKER_02]: That's nice.
- 1:33:08[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I guess.
- 1:33:11[SPEAKER_03]: Glenda isn't going to live forever.
- 1:33:13[SPEAKER_03]: Or is she, I don't know.
- 1:33:16[SPEAKER_03]: I don't get that stuff out of her character.
- 1:33:19[SPEAKER_03]: They may come a time when she announces, I mean, I couldn't really tell specifically what sorts of plans she has for the future, going into the pause of the wizard is gone and we're making sure that Madame Horrible is taking care of.
- 1:33:31[SPEAKER_03]: So is that leaf her solely?
- 1:33:33[SPEAKER_03]: I wish you really going to stick in that role.
- 1:33:36[SPEAKER_03]: I'm not sure that's true.
- 1:33:37[SPEAKER_03]: I hope with her newfound wisdom.
- 1:33:39[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I can tell you what happened to the boat, but I won't.
- 1:33:42[SPEAKER_03]: No, no, that's fine.
- 1:33:43[SPEAKER_03]: That's fine.
- 1:33:45[SPEAKER_04]: Yes, so that you called out though.
- 1:33:47[SPEAKER_04]: I just wanted to piggyback on what you're saying about the production design.
- 1:33:51[SPEAKER_04]: The mirrors you were talking about, you notice they're all circular mirrors that she looks in because she's the girl in the bubble.
- 1:33:57[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 1:33:58[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, wow.
- 1:33:59[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:33:59[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
- 1:34:00[SPEAKER_04]: In the girl in the bubble, and no place like home were the two new songs for this film, both up for Oscars, Cynthia Arrivo helped write no place like home.
- 1:34:10[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:34:10[SPEAKER_03]: I've been recruiting that somewhere.
- 1:34:12[SPEAKER_03]: That's really, really lovely.
- 1:34:14[SPEAKER_03]: I hope she wins all of it.
- 1:34:16[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:34:17[SPEAKER_03]: That's all.
- 1:34:18[SPEAKER_03]: And I see somebody in here is, I think it's probably you, Lisa, has a note saying that
- 1:34:26[SPEAKER_03]: was a new scene for the movie, and I really thought that this was a very small but significant nod to what's currently happening.
- 1:34:37[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, absolutely.
- 1:34:38[SPEAKER_03]: Politically, in terms of who's permitted to travel and who isn't in.
- 1:34:42[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and I'll say this that didn't happen like that in the books because also Nessa Rose was an into Bach in the books like that, but it does echo the the the soul of the books for like kind of what they're about, but what did you think, Nicole, let's check in with you.
- 1:35:02[SPEAKER_04]: Would you think about Nessa Rose is downfall?
- 1:35:05[SPEAKER_01]: Um, the wicked poach of the east.
- 1:35:08[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, her downfall, you know, I'll have to say I missed a little bit of it because I was in the bathroom with my kid protecting her precious eyes.
- 1:35:16[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, the sex card again.
- 1:35:17[SPEAKER_02]: So, I need to watch it again because I missed the house falling on her.
- 1:35:23[SPEAKER_02]: I just got there and it was done.
- 1:35:24[SPEAKER_04]: So, I didn't show the actual falling of the house.
- 1:35:28[SPEAKER_04]: It was just like we found out that that had happened.
- 1:35:31[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, okay, then I didn't really miss that much.
- 1:35:33[SPEAKER_02]: I, I want,
- 1:35:35[SPEAKER_02]: to likeness a rose.
- 1:35:37[SPEAKER_02]: She was made to be unlikable in this.
- 1:35:40[SPEAKER_02]: And I think I understand why.
- 1:35:42[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't, I felt bad for her a lot.
- 1:35:48[SPEAKER_02]: I felt like she was masking and pretending to be something she felt like a leader had to be.
- 1:35:54[SPEAKER_02]: And I, and I, it wasn't her true spirit.
- 1:35:58[SPEAKER_02]: And I don't think she liked that version of herself, but she felt obligated to play it.
- 1:36:02[SPEAKER_02]: And I have empathy for people in that position.
- 1:36:05[SPEAKER_02]: I think we often find these traps and these schemas of how we think we should be.
- 1:36:09[SPEAKER_02]: And she's so young to have such power and authority and to manage all that must have been really, really gallenging.
- 1:36:16[SPEAKER_02]: And I liked seeing her and Elfaba together.
- 1:36:21[SPEAKER_02]: They softened each other in a way that felt really genuine.
- 1:36:23[SPEAKER_02]: And I enjoyed that.
- 1:36:26[SPEAKER_02]: But as far as her downfall, I mean, we knew it was coming.
- 1:36:31[SPEAKER_02]: I wasn't sad about it.
- 1:36:33[SPEAKER_02]: If that's the question, I was kind of happy to see her go and that sounds awful to say.
- 1:36:38[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm kind of interested.
- 1:36:40[SPEAKER_02]: It's like not my nature to be like, see ya, but that's how I felt when she said it up.
- 1:36:45[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, like good riddance, like that's how I felt.
- 1:36:47[SPEAKER_02]: And then I don't like that side of me just as she didn't really like the managerial side of herself, the governmental side of herself.
- 1:36:55[SPEAKER_03]: Right.
- 1:36:56[SPEAKER_03]: I was really griefed.
- 1:36:58[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:36:59[SPEAKER_03]: I was I was sad.
- 1:37:00[SPEAKER_03]: Um, I could see that they were setting her up for the wicked witch of the East role.
- 1:37:06[SPEAKER_03]: And I liked the way that whole dynamic was used to justify Elfavus wanting to choose.
- 1:37:13[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
- 1:37:15[SPEAKER_03]: It wasn't about power.
- 1:37:16[SPEAKER_03]: It wasn't about vengeance or anything.
- 1:37:39[SPEAKER_03]: But that was fine with me because, you know, wicked witch, why does she think she has right to this that, you know, clearly glind is already given to Dorothy for some purpose or other, which we don't discover film.
- 1:37:50[SPEAKER_03]: But this makes so much more sense, you know, she wants the shoes as a memento of her sister, who she loved and, you know, each of them I think did very painful and damaging things to each other.
- 1:38:06[SPEAKER_03]: There was, and the alphabet's older, too, isn't she?
- 1:38:09[SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
- 1:38:10[SPEAKER_03]: So maybe it's the, you know, the big sister little sister dynamic that I find here, because I'm the youngest of two sisters.
- 1:38:17[SPEAKER_03]: But, no, I just felt really grieved that, um, I mean, I think Nesseroes was taking refuge in the whole authority thing.
- 1:38:25[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:38:26[SPEAKER_03]: Because people were telling her, well, you have to do this now.
- 1:38:29[SPEAKER_03]: She's, oh, okay, fine.
- 1:38:30[SPEAKER_03]: Now, finally, my chance.
- 1:38:32[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I'm like the shot on the side, since the box thing totally fell apart, well maybe I can get some comfort in having power and of course if this is the only kind of power I can have because she comes from a family of power and she sees alphabet getting power to the max and you know the fact that it's interesting that they stage sure is or In addition to as a wheelchair user
- 1:38:56[SPEAKER_04]: Well, yeah, it's, I'm glad that they handled, I was wondering how they were going to handle the wheelchair using aspect because in the stage show they have gotten non wheelchair users to play the role until.
- 1:39:11[SPEAKER_04]: Once they made this casting for this movie, they cast a wheelchair user for the stage show for the first time ever as well.
- 1:39:16[SPEAKER_04]: So it's like, okay, but how are they going to handle that?
- 1:39:19[SPEAKER_04]: Because what they do in, again, in the book, she doesn't have arms.
- 1:39:22[SPEAKER_04]: That's the thing in the, in the stage show.
- 1:39:27[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, Elfaba puts her magic spell on the shoes and then after that, Nessaro's walk.
- 1:39:34[SPEAKER_04]: And I'm like, they're not going to do that.
- 1:39:36[SPEAKER_04]: That's just not going to play well.
- 1:39:38[SPEAKER_04]: So
- 1:39:39[SPEAKER_04]: what they did instead is they glow red and she can sort she can float.
- 1:39:44[SPEAKER_04]: She says I want to be floating.
- 1:39:45[SPEAKER_04]: It's sorry.
- 1:39:46[SPEAKER_04]: I'm thinking it will come to dairy now.
- 1:39:47[SPEAKER_04]: In a robbery I get it out of my head.
- 1:39:51[SPEAKER_04]: But she she can fly more or less.
- 1:39:53[SPEAKER_04]: And so obviously yes that's that's yeah I thought that was well handled.
- 1:39:59[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah the levitation.
- 1:40:01[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah you were going to say something before Nicole.
- 1:40:04[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I was thinking about Nessa Rose and power and family and obligation, and it strikes me as she was really eager to like a firm her father's life by being powerful in that role in acting on his behalf and his accord.
- 1:40:22[SPEAKER_02]: And there's a lot of pressure there, especially for younger sibling, I think.
- 1:40:27[SPEAKER_02]: So I just I kept thinking of her dad a lot in those scenes, like when I felt like she might have been psychologically grounded in what her dad would have wanted.
- 1:40:36[SPEAKER_02]: And she hadn't had time to really affirm her point of view in that role.
- 1:40:41[SPEAKER_02]: That leadership role, she was just acting on what her dad would have wanted and that a big burden.
- 1:40:47[SPEAKER_02]: Well, it is a big part into Carrie, so I had that perspective a lot going into that scene, but that's that for sure is my own stuff, like a million percent has my stuff.
- 1:40:57[SPEAKER_03]: Well, I quite agree with you, and I have similar stuff, but I think there again, the whole notion of what is power.
- 1:41:06[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
- 1:41:07[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, and if this is the only kind of pro I can get, well, I'll take it and I would feel like she wasn't a lot of fun to spend any time around.
- 1:41:15[SPEAKER_03]: And that's, you know, I definitely agree with you on that.
- 1:41:18[SPEAKER_03]: And it was a sad story.
- 1:41:20[SPEAKER_03]: It was a painful story and it ended in a horrible way.
- 1:41:23[SPEAKER_03]: But, um,
- 1:41:25[SPEAKER_03]: It had an end, and also connected back to the original story with the whole Red Slippers, Ruby Slippers, which I know when the original original bomb was silver, you tell me, I'm right instead of a rose.
- 1:41:37[SPEAKER_03]: Ruby, but silver will never pop on the screen.
- 1:41:41[SPEAKER_04]: Right, not in technical art, not in technical art.
- 1:41:43[SPEAKER_04]: In 10 more years, people can do Wizard of Oz stories with Ruby Slippers again.
- 1:41:49[SPEAKER_04]: Once once the, yeah, so basically,
- 1:41:53[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, I guess no, my brain's going in two directions, so I'll just say quickly that I think it's interesting that they added
- 1:42:01[SPEAKER_04]: the whole alphabet quote unquote killing their father with the heart attack when he finds out immorable accuses her versus in the book version he's worried about Nessa Rose and actually asks Elphaba to take in take her rightful places the eldest daughter as the eminent throp.
- 1:42:21[SPEAKER_04]: That's interesting.
- 1:42:24[SPEAKER_04]: But okay, I want to talk about the staff fight in Munchkinland.
- 1:42:28[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, okay.
- 1:42:28[SPEAKER_04]: So we have to talk about Glanda's role in Necessity and the staff fight in Munchkinland.
- 1:42:36[SPEAKER_04]: So what do we think about the fact that Glanda kind of gave moreable the idea and then the resulting fight?
- 1:42:43[SPEAKER_04]: What do you think that girl?
- 1:42:44[SPEAKER_02]: Um, I think, oh, it was not a great side of, um, uh, and, you know, you think that power leads to corruption.
- 1:42:56[SPEAKER_02]: I think that that's a really good case study in that.
- 1:42:59[SPEAKER_02]: She was mad and she directed out.
- 1:43:02[SPEAKER_02]: and it isn't great, it doesn't great.
- 1:43:06[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, right?
- 1:43:06[SPEAKER_04]: She obviously didn't realize what would happen, yeah.
- 1:43:09[SPEAKER_02]: Or she didn't realize, I think she actually hastily and she didn't realize that it would have a long lasting consequences, or she knew she didn't care but that seems uncharacteristic of her.
- 1:43:21[SPEAKER_02]: So she knew NASA rose too, so.
- 1:43:24[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and like cared for her in some way, you'd imagine, but I, it's always heavy.
- 1:43:31[SPEAKER_02]: That was a really heavy moment, and then we're left with them fighting over a staff in Munchkinland.
- 1:43:36[SPEAKER_02]: And it was, it was calm, like, their great comedic actresses.
- 1:43:41[SPEAKER_02]: And the whole time I'm thinking, like we've all seen the Wizard of Oz at this point, we're following Dorothy.
- 1:43:47[SPEAKER_02]: She's with Toto down the yellow brick road.
- 1:43:50[SPEAKER_02]: We don't know what's happening.
- 1:43:51[SPEAKER_02]: It tickled me to think, like meanwhile, still in Munchkinland.
- 1:43:55[SPEAKER_02]: They've all cleared out, and these two characters are like fighting over a staff and like bickering about it.
- 1:44:00[SPEAKER_02]: It's just, it reframes the original story in a really three-dimensional lovely way.
- 1:44:06[SPEAKER_02]: And I just support anything that does that, right?
- 1:44:11[SPEAKER_03]: Where are all the munchkins?
- 1:44:12[SPEAKER_03]: Well, they're stuff, I don't know.
- 1:44:15[SPEAKER_04]: They're like, wait, I can buy.
- 1:44:16[SPEAKER_04]: They're waiting.
- 1:44:17[SPEAKER_04]: They're like, I don't know.
- 1:44:19[SPEAKER_04]: They look out the window.
- 1:44:20[SPEAKER_04]: Then it certainly doesn't look like they're friends.
- 1:44:22[SPEAKER_03]: So they're probably hiding from alpha by like, look,
- 1:44:37[SPEAKER_03]: You know, literally from their wedding have their very dearest friend and heart sister stealing away their intended spouse, right?
- 1:44:47[SPEAKER_03]: Has got to be one of the single most painful, yeah, painful experiences that one can have.
- 1:44:53[SPEAKER_03]: And Glinda just hasn't had a lot of practice in, you know, putting yourself in someone else's place, compassion if it's any of those things.
- 1:45:04[SPEAKER_03]: I think that Fira was leaving her is probably the first significant blow to her own self-improvement.
- 1:45:13[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:45:14[SPEAKER_03]: She placed a lot of her own self-concept in that relationship.
- 1:45:16[SPEAKER_03]: She sure did to the point where she couldn't even listen to him hesitating or see the looking as eyes of feeling like he's in trapped.
- 1:45:28[SPEAKER_03]: It's a downfall of late adolescence.
- 1:45:31[SPEAKER_02]: I'm really sorry.
- 1:45:32[SPEAKER_02]: So close to everything that she shifts.
- 1:45:34[SPEAKER_02]: I've got a classic case of earlier adulthood right there.
- 1:45:38[SPEAKER_02]: And she doesn't have the skill.
- 1:45:40[SPEAKER_02]: She hasn't faced real love.
- 1:45:42[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, who's to label what real adversity you're not, but compared to others.
- 1:45:46[SPEAKER_02]: She's had a pretty blessed life from what we see.
- 1:45:48[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
- 1:45:49[SPEAKER_02]: So if this is the first bad thing that happened to her and she doesn't have skills to cope with that.
- 1:45:55[SPEAKER_02]: It makes sense that she would lash out and I don't think she understood like the long-term consequences of it.
- 1:46:01[SPEAKER_03]: And it's still very grievous because you know she loves Elf of a regardless.
- 1:46:04[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
- 1:46:04[SPEAKER_03]: You know that when she's over what she's finally through the anger and this Elf pity and the you know the real hurt she's gonna look around and say oh my gosh, what have I done and she does.
- 1:46:15[SPEAKER_02]: I think she does.
- 1:46:16[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:46:17[SPEAKER_03]: And that's part of the whole amazing song, you know the girl in the mirror.
- 1:46:21[SPEAKER_04]: I referenced this earlier, but we talked about it in the first part too about why they hid Dorothy's face, but just to talk about some of the legal stuff about so WB owns the rights to the 1939 movie and they aggressively protect them.
- 1:46:39[SPEAKER_03]: they do.
- 1:46:40[SPEAKER_04]: But they only have 10 years left.
- 1:46:42[SPEAKER_04]: They lose the copyright in 2035 and then it's open for use.
- 1:46:48[SPEAKER_02]: Don't they stand to make money on wicked?
- 1:46:52[SPEAKER_02]: Like don't you want to get, I don't I guess I mean it's a rival studio.
- 1:46:56[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, okay.
- 1:46:59[SPEAKER_03]: I think that bothers me.
- 1:47:01[SPEAKER_03]: I think they probably have two different copyrights.
- 1:47:04[SPEAKER_03]: because the book is the origin.
- 1:47:07[SPEAKER_04]: So there's no copyright.
- 1:47:09[SPEAKER_04]: That's out of copyright.
- 1:47:10[SPEAKER_04]: So that's why they can do it.
- 1:47:12[SPEAKER_03]: I mean the wicked book.
- 1:47:14[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, the wicked book.
- 1:47:15[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:47:16[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 1:47:16[SPEAKER_04]: That's, but that's not the question.
- 1:47:19[SPEAKER_04]: Dorothy is more in the wicked.
- 1:47:21[SPEAKER_04]: So she is more in this movie than she is in the stage play, but she is more in the wicked book than she is in this movie.
- 1:47:30[SPEAKER_04]: which makes sense because there's more room for it.
- 1:47:33[SPEAKER_04]: But apparently, they did have inversion where they showed the actress's face and test audiences became too distracted afterward.
- 1:47:42[SPEAKER_04]: They just wanted to know about like, well, what was Dorothy up to and probably was like, you know what Dorothy's up to?
- 1:47:47[SPEAKER_04]: That's not what the story is about.
- 1:47:49[SPEAKER_04]: So they realized that by hiding her face more that also
- 1:47:54[SPEAKER_04]: It stopped distracting people from that and so that they focus.
- 1:47:56[SPEAKER_04]: They benefited their film.
- 1:47:58[SPEAKER_02]: Did they ever say who they cast as Dorothy because there was so much speculation?
- 1:48:02[SPEAKER_02]: Who was it?
- 1:48:03[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, it's not a known person.
- 1:48:05[SPEAKER_04]: I forget her name off the top of my head, but you can see on that.
- 1:48:08[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, it's like a bell.
- 1:48:09[SPEAKER_04]: Because I know there was like, who's it going to be?
- 1:48:10[SPEAKER_02]: Is it deaf camera?
- 1:48:11[SPEAKER_02]: Is it this lady?
- 1:48:12[SPEAKER_02]: That lady?
- 1:48:13[SPEAKER_02]: No.
- 1:48:13[SPEAKER_02]: Get right.
- 1:48:14[SPEAKER_02]: I get to hyper fixate on that stuff.
- 1:48:16[SPEAKER_02]: So.
- 1:48:17[SPEAKER_04]: Well, she's a dancer because they wanted the right movements.
- 1:48:21[SPEAKER_03]: Sure.
- 1:48:21[SPEAKER_04]: Sure.
- 1:48:22[SPEAKER_03]: That's the next one example, Nicole of why they decided to have a little as possible.
- 1:48:28[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, tell me more.
- 1:48:29[SPEAKER_03]: Well, it's kind of, you know, it is a two-inch sword in that sense, because people are going to wonder either way, but I guess they figured the less distracting was to just not focus on.
- 1:48:40[SPEAKER_03]: I think it was like a smart voice.
- 1:48:43[SPEAKER_03]: I think so too.
- 1:48:44[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I think so too.
- 1:48:45[SPEAKER_04]: And the other copyright thing I wanted to shout out was about the color of Glendous Dress in the bubble.
- 1:48:52[SPEAKER_04]: So it is actually in the stage show, they changed the color of her dress in the 1939 movie's Pink.
- 1:48:59[SPEAKER_04]: They changed it to blue for the stage show because of the litigiousness about it.
- 1:49:03[SPEAKER_04]: And now they could change it back to pink and they did for her final form, but they show in the middle she has that dress that's blue and pink through each other when she first gets the bubble.
- 1:49:15[SPEAKER_04]: So I think that's a reference to all of that and just a shout out again to Paul Tazwell who won the Oscar for the
- 1:49:27[SPEAKER_02]: Once I've made, even when she was getting ready for the wedding, and she had this just very plain dress on, and then they went to sing the song with a wizard before the wedding, sorry.
- 1:49:38[SPEAKER_02]: And she put like this sheer overlay on top of it.
- 1:49:42[SPEAKER_02]: I was like, oh my, it was gorgeous.
- 1:49:44[SPEAKER_02]: It was, oh yeah, it's just structurally gorgeous.
- 1:49:48[SPEAKER_02]: I hope he wins.
- 1:49:49[SPEAKER_04]: One thing that I, it's a quibble with the stage show as well as this is like, what happens to Bach after this, right?
- 1:49:57[SPEAKER_04]: He's now just a tin man out there doing what.
- 1:50:01[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know.
- 1:50:03[SPEAKER_02]: Being cranky and rusted.
- 1:50:05[SPEAKER_02]: I was a playful, hopefully funny art.
- 1:50:09[SPEAKER_02]: We're at the same end, different.
- 1:50:12[SPEAKER_04]: What do we think of moreable is she dead now or is she just imprisoned?
- 1:50:17[SPEAKER_03]: I just felt it interesting to let that so wide open dangling.
- 1:50:21[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 1:50:21[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:50:22[SPEAKER_03]: Does it could go either way?
- 1:50:24[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 1:50:24[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, yeah.
- 1:50:25[SPEAKER_04]: I guess they don't answer that.
- 1:50:26[SPEAKER_04]: And oh, it does she die in the stage show?
- 1:50:29[SPEAKER_04]: I can't remember.
- 1:50:29[SPEAKER_04]: Somebody tell me.
- 1:50:30[SPEAKER_04]: In the book, she definitely.
- 1:50:35[SPEAKER_04]: Where are you, where either of you were surprised by the reveal that the wizard was Elf of his father?
- 1:50:41[SPEAKER_04]: No, not at all.
- 1:50:42[SPEAKER_04]: You could if not at all.
- 1:50:44[SPEAKER_02]: I was so I was more surprised that he didn't know
- 1:50:49[SPEAKER_02]: Like, it seemed real.
- 1:50:51[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, he's so funny.
- 1:50:52[SPEAKER_03]: I was.
- 1:50:53[SPEAKER_03]: I believe we bought that.
- 1:50:54[SPEAKER_03]: Why should he?
- 1:50:54[SPEAKER_03]: It was like, you know, half an hour thing.
- 1:50:57[SPEAKER_01]: I guess, but she's, she's green.
- 1:50:59[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
- 1:51:01[SPEAKER_01]: I think for me that, for me, I guess he has no other green children to share.
- 1:51:06[SPEAKER_04]: I guess, for me, there you go.
- 1:51:08[SPEAKER_02]: That he knows of.
- 1:51:09[SPEAKER_02]: The giveaways, Jim Jeff Goldblum's voice is so unique in the iconic, that in the first movie when he's singing, it's
- 1:51:16[SPEAKER_02]: It's hit on me.
- 1:51:18[SPEAKER_02]: I see it's obviously him.
- 1:51:19[SPEAKER_02]: The young CGI version of him though, kind of freaking out.
- 1:51:27[SPEAKER_02]: It was enough.
- 1:51:29[SPEAKER_02]: Could we just give you his makeup maybe?
- 1:51:31[SPEAKER_02]: Could we figure it out?
- 1:51:32[SPEAKER_02]: I always get a little bit tripped out when they do that stuff.
- 1:51:36[SPEAKER_04]: Although I guess at least for him, they do have lots of references to from, it's like put the face from the fly like
- 1:51:45[SPEAKER_04]: I think they literally do something like that.
- 1:51:47[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I don't know why I want to.
- 1:51:49[SPEAKER_04]: The one that was in their portfolio.
- 1:51:53[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, he also in the book realizes after her death that he was her father.
- 1:51:58[SPEAKER_04]: But it is like, it's so in the first act.
- 1:52:00[SPEAKER_04]: There's so much of him being like, wish I were a father.
- 1:52:02[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, buddy, buddy.
- 1:52:05[SPEAKER_04]: You are one.
- 1:52:09[SPEAKER_04]: Do you think Elphobas should have told Glanda that she and Fioro survived?
- 1:52:15[SPEAKER_04]: I think Linda assumed that they did you think I mean she must know like in in the book she elf of his really allergic to water in the movie we saw her standing in the range she's fine so Glenna must know she's not actually allergic to water they lived yeah they lived together I think
- 1:52:36[SPEAKER_02]: I'm trying to, to perspective tape and put myself in glindous position and it's probably easier to for her to move on if she believes that they're not alive because she can move on from Fierro, she can move on from Elfibre on ship.
- 1:52:54[SPEAKER_02]: I find it hard to believe that she would know that there are live out there and not seek them out.
- 1:53:01[SPEAKER_02]: And not wonder and try to find them like float around in her bubble looking for them in the outlands or whatever you're calling it here.
- 1:53:08[SPEAKER_02]: So, I don't know, that's I think it was a gift, another gift from Elfable to Glinda to let her believe that she died, so she could move on.
- 1:53:18[SPEAKER_02]: And that's I think she states that, but I'm not entirely sure.
- 1:53:23[SPEAKER_03]: I could see her being glad that they survived and deciding to move on in whatever way she could.
- 1:53:35[SPEAKER_03]: And not reach out to them.
- 1:53:37[SPEAKER_03]: If they ever reach out to her, I think she'll be overjoyed.
- 1:53:39[SPEAKER_03]: But I don't think it'll come as a surprise necessarily.
- 1:53:43[SPEAKER_03]: Partly because of all the damage that she herself had done.
- 1:53:47[SPEAKER_03]: The Glenda had done.
- 1:53:53[SPEAKER_03]: you know, if they wanted to get in touch with me, they would.
- 1:53:56[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:53:57[SPEAKER_03]: And so I will wait for them to make the first move.
- 1:54:01[SPEAKER_04]: Hmm.
- 1:54:02[SPEAKER_04]: What do you think about her asking Glynda to never try to defend her?
- 1:54:06[SPEAKER_04]: Would you keep that promise that she asked Glynda to make?
- 1:54:12[SPEAKER_04]: If I was Glynda, if you were Glynda, or if you were asked of you,
- 1:54:20[SPEAKER_02]: It would be really hard, it would be really, from my nature, if I ever found myself in a political pawn which situation.
- 1:54:31[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like it would be, I would understand the ask and I understand the reason for it and believe that that's true that people do need a figure to hate and to, as much as I hate to admit it about human nature, like we do need something to fight against together for us to be together in that fight.
- 1:54:50[SPEAKER_02]: And sometimes you have to be the villain in someone else's story, and I think that Elfaba sees that, but Glinda doesn't, and I think it's Glinda's nature to always want to protect her friend.
- 1:55:04[SPEAKER_02]: But I think I would do it.
- 1:55:06[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know, Marilyn, could you do it?
- 1:55:09[SPEAKER_02]: Do which?
- 1:55:11[SPEAKER_03]: Like, try to defend her or not defend her.
- 1:55:12[SPEAKER_02]: Not defend her.
- 1:55:13[SPEAKER_03]: Could you like keep her kindness a secret?
- 1:55:17[SPEAKER_03]: If anybody asks me a direct question about it, I would tell the truth.
- 1:55:21[SPEAKER_03]: Fair.
- 1:55:22[SPEAKER_03]: And I think I hope I would like to think Glenda would do the same.
- 1:55:26[SPEAKER_03]: But that does mean I have to, in any way, you know, quote unquote rock the boat.
- 1:55:31[SPEAKER_03]: And perhaps she also feels that right now what Oz needs more than anything else is an enemy to despise because they've just had this wizard who everybody adored and thought was the best thing in the world and suddenly that's gone.
- 1:55:47[SPEAKER_03]: They it's hard for them not to think unfortunately and in diametrically opposed terms of good and evil.
- 1:55:57[SPEAKER_03]: Um, I don't know if there's anything Linda can do to help introduce little more nuance into odds, but they are used to having a figure head.
- 1:56:06[SPEAKER_02]: They are used to having one ruler exactly.
- 1:56:09[SPEAKER_02]: So it's not changed that social structure is of is a really big change when there's so much unsettled.
- 1:56:16[SPEAKER_03]: So particularly after the realization of the fraud, right, who we're going to trust again.
- 1:56:22[SPEAKER_04]: We often have as our happy endings and stories that overthrow of a dictator, of a tyrant, but then I always find interesting the stories that look at, well then what?
- 1:56:36[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, there's a power vacuum.
- 1:56:39[SPEAKER_03]: How do you take it people that I've never been accustomed to governing themselves and teach them how to do that in three months to three years?
- 1:56:47[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 1:56:48[SPEAKER_03]: And all the disaffected people who are perfectly
- 1:56:51[SPEAKER_03]: Right, you know, are you going to kill them all or you can put them all in the institutions or you're going to do brainwash them all my gosh They're still there.
- 1:56:58[SPEAKER_03]: They're still part of the society.
- 1:57:00[SPEAKER_03]: So how do you how do you deal with that?
- 1:57:03[SPEAKER_04]: That's a little bit of a project I mean, I just I one thing I love about this story the stage show version the way it staged is, you know, when you open with that scene and the first movie the beginning of the play Where Glinda is
- 1:57:18[SPEAKER_04]: She's being, you know, she's there to be like ding-dong, the witch is dead from the original movie, but I was in tears the first time I watched the movie version of it just to see how Ariana Grande, her eyes were just welling with tears with this big smile.
- 1:57:35[SPEAKER_04]: She acted it so well and you just know the pain of like somebody else says something about Elphobon, her head kind of twitchy is like, right, but she can't say anything.
- 1:57:45[SPEAKER_04]: So she's kind of doing, you know, what we would say in the will of time, she's giving the Isoday answers where you can, Isoday cannot lie, but they will construct the truth in such a way as to mislead in whichever way they need.
- 1:58:02[SPEAKER_04]: And so I think that's what she has to do here.
- 1:58:05[SPEAKER_03]: It's good, but I'm looking at it, and I think the only series I've ever seen that directly addresses this question of the power vacuum is Andor, and the Star Wars series.
- 1:58:16[SPEAKER_03]: I'll see the books are very much about that.
- 1:58:18[SPEAKER_03]: Probably, I would imagine, never read the books, most of them.
- 1:58:22[SPEAKER_03]: But the immediate post films of the original trilogy.
- 1:58:27[SPEAKER_03]: Try to address that.
- 1:58:30[SPEAKER_03]: in some respect and you know it all falls apart to my mind remarkably quickly all the way suppose it was about 30 years anyway.
- 1:58:40[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah it's a huge question.
- 1:58:41[SPEAKER_04]: It is interesting, big change from the stage musical and definitely not in the books either after at the end of this movie, Glanda we see her admit the animals back in Dozeh in society so rather that's definitely
- 1:58:56[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to be a rocky road, if these serious animals have stops, I don't know how to speak anymore.
- 1:59:04[SPEAKER_04]: You can't just undo that in a snap of finger, but she says she's going to try to change things for the better and animals will regain their jobs and voices.
- 1:59:13[SPEAKER_03]: And then the grimmery opens for Glinda, that's surprised me.
- 1:59:23[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 1:59:24[SPEAKER_03]: Me too.
- 1:59:25[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 1:59:25[SPEAKER_04]: I surprised everyone.
- 1:59:27[SPEAKER_03]: Because...
- 1:59:28[SPEAKER_03]: I... We didn't see anything of good that resulted from this book.
- 1:59:34[SPEAKER_03]: Mm-hmm.
- 1:59:34[SPEAKER_03]: To very lengthy films.
- 1:59:36[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and the whole premise for Glinda was that she didn't have power.
- 1:59:40[SPEAKER_02]: She sought power.
- 1:59:41[SPEAKER_02]: Like magical powers she sought it.
- 1:59:44[SPEAKER_02]: She never could really get there.
- 1:59:47[SPEAKER_02]: She always felt like a fraud and imposter.
- 1:59:49[SPEAKER_02]: So this was a great like redemption moment, but how where do these where does it suddenly come from like what happened just.
- 1:59:55[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I didn't it needed to happen just to put a
- 1:59:59[SPEAKER_02]: to put a bow on the movie, I think, just to wrap it up in like a magical way, but I thought, I didn't really track for me there, so I'm with you guys.
- 2:00:11[SPEAKER_03]: I thought they were trying to hark back to her strong and potent desire to be able to do magic.
- 2:00:17[SPEAKER_03]: And so this was supposed to be like almost a consolation prize.
- 2:00:20[SPEAKER_03]: So yeah, you've lost your best friend and the love of your life as much as you have or had one.
- 2:00:24[SPEAKER_03]: So here, no, you can do magic.
- 2:00:26[SPEAKER_03]: But at the glinda that I saw at the end of the film, I don't think she would have been so thrilled by that anymore.
- 2:00:33[SPEAKER_02]: It seems like a big burden.
- 2:00:34[SPEAKER_03]: And wings on my knees and dangerous.
- 2:00:39[SPEAKER_04]: It's dangerous, weapon.
- 2:00:40[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 2:00:41[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:00:42[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:00:43[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I mean, I have mixed feelings about it.
- 2:00:45[SPEAKER_04]: It was like fun in the moment, but it does, I suppose, undermine the arc where she just accepts that she doesn't have those magical powers.
- 2:00:55[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 2:00:55[SPEAKER_04]: Because most people don't.
- 2:00:58[SPEAKER_04]: It doesn't mean that she's not special, and she can't be something more important than that.
- 2:01:03[SPEAKER_04]: So, yeah, I've mixed feelings about that.
- 2:01:05[SPEAKER_03]: Maybe they were trying to convey the notion that the book only opened to someone who was truly good.
- 2:01:12[SPEAKER_03]: regardless of magical ability, quote, unquote, whatever that is.
- 2:01:17[SPEAKER_03]: Because moreable was a more powerful magic user than either Glinda or Elf about the beginning.
- 2:01:23[SPEAKER_03]: And it wouldn't open for her.
- 2:01:24[SPEAKER_03]: That was the whole point.
- 2:01:26[SPEAKER_03]: Now, because she, and I'm interpreting that as being she was really bad.
- 2:01:30[SPEAKER_03]: So it would never open for her, but Glinda is found finally able to take on this power with responsibility because she
- 2:01:40[SPEAKER_03]: So, suddenly, where she generally wants to do good and has that capacity, so, okay, we'll open for her.
- 2:01:46[SPEAKER_03]: All right, fine, I mean, that's, that's rather my mind, something of a simplistic fairy tale ending version, which it just didn't fit with the whole tone of the rest of the films as I saw it.
- 2:01:59[SPEAKER_04]: But I like that the real last frame was recreated, the famous Broadway poster, it was, you know, Nicole, as you said, them at their picnic with their friends and college, probably was their, their happy place at their retreat to in their hard moments.
- 2:02:15[SPEAKER_04]: And that's, that's a moment where you see the change for good in middle progress, that bond happening,
- 2:02:29[SPEAKER_04]: Did you either, if you have any final thoughts about the film?
- 2:02:32[SPEAKER_02]: I enjoyed it, and the more I know last time, while I were there, first half, this one shot, I said, I liked the first movie better.
- 2:02:40[SPEAKER_02]: And as usual, on these Laura Hunt's podcast, the more I talk about it, the more I find myself thinking, maybe I was wrong.
- 2:02:51[SPEAKER_02]: I still think the visual spectacle, the first film was unparalleled, and you can't.
- 2:02:57[SPEAKER_02]: You can't recreate that just like awestruck moment of seeing these costumes, these sets and the acting and the songs and the technical aspect, it was just amazing.
- 2:03:07[SPEAKER_02]: But the psychological flexibility of the characters that came out in the second film really shine the same way for me.
- 2:03:15[SPEAKER_02]: So, I'd like to watch it again in my own home, and take my time with it, and I think that
- 2:03:27[SPEAKER_02]: But I'm changing my point that this might be the better.
- 2:03:32[SPEAKER_02]: Well, you have to let us know if you read the books.
- 2:03:34[SPEAKER_03]: And I will never forget the circular revolving library image that images for ever cemented in my mind.
- 2:03:45[SPEAKER_03]: So I absolutely agree with you that the visuals and the spectacle of it all were much stronger in the first one.
- 2:03:52[SPEAKER_03]: I like to go for the story so that's why that I like to the second one better because after wow the glitz just got over the top from from for me for my level of glitziness or whatever
- 2:04:05[SPEAKER_04]: I think that this is a lovely end to a two-part story.
- 2:04:10[SPEAKER_04]: If I, you know, to be honest, I don't know if they can extend it forward at all, because they can't adapt to the books based on where they left things, like they just, they can, I suppose, in some ways.
- 2:04:25[SPEAKER_04]: Um, I don't know, we'll talk about it on the other side of the break, but, uh,
- 2:04:30[SPEAKER_04]: I'm happy if they leave it here, and was it unicorn saying like they should make a kids cartoon about young elfy and young glinda, even though they're gonna find a way to continue this franchise to make it accessible for a young audience just to keep these characters in play and they're gonna
- 2:04:51[SPEAKER_02]: You know, the Tin Man and Scarecrow can get into some wild hijinks and turtles there too.
- 2:04:57[SPEAKER_02]: It's just going to be this serialized thing as much as that would diminish.
- 2:05:01[SPEAKER_02]: I agree.
- 2:05:02[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to ask for the money for the money.
- 2:05:05[SPEAKER_02]: Well, that's just it.
- 2:05:06[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, the money's there to be made.
- 2:05:07[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, we live in a capitalist society over here.
- 2:05:12[SPEAKER_02]: So that's what we're doing.
- 2:05:14[SPEAKER_04]: Well, anyone who is curious about the books I will talk through them after the outro and end music.
- 2:05:21[SPEAKER_04]: So stick around for that.
- 2:05:23[SPEAKER_04]: But just if you haven't read them yet, if you're up for something that's darker and more explicit and more explicitly political, then I can't recommend them enough.
- 2:05:32[SPEAKER_04]: I don't recommend them for instance to Marilyn, but Nicole, you might like them.
- 2:05:38[SPEAKER_04]: not for kids for sure and very different from the back half of the musical so we'll talk about that some more but Nicole tell us what is going on, I'll never mind the music.
- 2:05:50[SPEAKER_02]: Well Mark and I are just grinding through season two and never mind the music.
- 2:05:55[SPEAKER_02]: We just recorded today actually a new batch of episodes talking about
- 2:06:02[SPEAKER_02]: it's so weird to pivot to this.
- 2:06:04[SPEAKER_02]: Talking about the shaggy song, it wasn't me.
- 2:06:08[SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
- 2:06:09[SPEAKER_02]: And that led us into a really interesting conversation about songs.
- 2:06:13[SPEAKER_02]: This is relevant here.
- 2:06:14[SPEAKER_02]: Songs that have protagonists that are unlikable.
- 2:06:18[SPEAKER_02]: And we actually talk about
- 2:06:20[SPEAKER_02]: Ariana Grande song, uh, she has the song called Break Up Theer Boyfriend because I'm bored.
- 2:06:24[SPEAKER_02]: And I texted that and others, but how like we want to like the person that sing the song with the lyrics are just so like, no.
- 2:06:32[SPEAKER_02]: So, um, check us out, uh, hit us up on discord, uh, listen to our podcast.
- 2:06:38[SPEAKER_02]: We have a great time over there, but it's so nice to be here with you too as well.
- 2:06:42[SPEAKER_04]: Yes, absolutely.
- 2:06:43[SPEAKER_04]: And Marilyn, uh, I saw you posted the news that there's going to be some delay and rings of power season three.
- 2:06:51[SPEAKER_03]: Alas, they're currently prognosticating that February 2027.
- 2:06:57[SPEAKER_03]: is most likely to be the earliest date.
- 2:06:59[SPEAKER_03]: So, well, that gives me its Dr. Sarabran and myself more time before we need to go back and start viewing in advance and then recording.
- 2:07:08[SPEAKER_03]: But it's too bad.
- 2:07:10[SPEAKER_03]: I think a lot of people really had their hopes up.
- 2:07:13[SPEAKER_03]: And I'm not sure why.
- 2:07:14[SPEAKER_03]: I guess they implied it earlier on, but there must have been her fuffle with the actual filming and what not that they did take longer than they thought it would.
- 2:07:22[SPEAKER_04]: So, yeah, not going on behind the scenes these days over there.
- 2:07:27[SPEAKER_04]: Um, yeah, we have properly powered between seasons radio active rambling about to start a fallout coverage season 2 is about to begin on Wolfshift dust, uh, wrapping up Frankenstein and doing our annual, um, a Christmas Carol series.
- 2:07:45[SPEAKER_04]: So we've recorded almost all of those Luke and I, and the Star Wars kind of timeline podcasts.
- 2:07:49[SPEAKER_04]: I've been putting out episodes for subscribers, but I will put out a public one in the new year.
- 2:07:54[SPEAKER_04]: And you can find all of these affiliate links, including, never mind the music.
- 2:07:58[SPEAKER_04]: I'll just have straight up in the show notes.
- 2:08:00[SPEAKER_04]: The rest you can find in the link tree in the show notes.
- 2:08:03[SPEAKER_04]: And plus, link to our discord, where you can talk to all of us about all of these things, including what's going on in the Lohound's feed, which this will come out just before or after that it welcome to dairy season finale.
- 2:08:18[SPEAKER_04]: And we also have Pluribus Weekly coverage with you Nicole.
- 2:08:23[SPEAKER_04]: So it's been so fun.
- 2:08:24[SPEAKER_02]: We are really getting into it.
- 2:08:26[SPEAKER_04]: We're on, yes, and seven episodes out so far out of ten out of nine.
- 2:08:32[SPEAKER_04]: So we have to add a bit of a go.
- 2:08:34[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:08:34[SPEAKER_04]: Okay.
- 2:08:35[SPEAKER_02]: Good to know.
- 2:08:36[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so we're putting out episodes weekly.
- 2:08:40[SPEAKER_02]: Lots of activity and discord about the show.
- 2:08:43[SPEAKER_02]: Having really great conversations with our community and getting some real, like,
- 2:08:46[SPEAKER_02]: people chiming with great feedback, real expert opinions on these matters.
- 2:08:50[SPEAKER_02]: It's been really a rich conversation for sure.
- 2:08:53[SPEAKER_02]: So come check it out.
- 2:08:55[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I think that's a good conversation.
- 2:08:57[SPEAKER_04]: People on the Discord too.
- 2:08:58[SPEAKER_04]: And Marilyn, you were involved in the American Revolution series, Rafa?
- 2:09:03[SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
- 2:09:04[SPEAKER_03]: And that's out now.
- 2:09:06[SPEAKER_03]: Actually prior to this recording, right?
- 2:09:08[SPEAKER_03]: And it was a wonderful, wonderful series.
- 2:09:13[SPEAKER_03]: And again, as Deco was saying,
- 2:09:17[SPEAKER_03]: some good discussion over on the discord channel.
- 2:09:19[SPEAKER_03]: So if you haven't seen the series yet, you know, watch it.
- 2:09:23[SPEAKER_03]: And I mean, at least you can't spoil it, right?
- 2:09:26[SPEAKER_03]: If you don't what happens when you're listening to us, you can listen to us first and then decide if you want to watch the series or not.
- 2:09:33[SPEAKER_03]: Right?
- 2:09:35[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, it was fun.
- 2:09:36[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and I've been busy.
- 2:09:37[SPEAKER_04]: War season has begun to check out the top 2026 Oscar qualified shorts for lower hounds because the right around the time this episode drops, the short lists are dropping for it.
- 2:09:48[SPEAKER_04]: So we're having lots of chatter going about prepping for watching everything.
- 2:09:53[SPEAKER_04]: Any death races when a join us find us in the discord.
- 2:09:56[SPEAKER_04]: uh... we have speaking of movies predator badlands is out Frankenstein's coming out uh... lots of other stuff in the pipeline we just recorded our top ten tv episode this morning so that will be out on christmas day and then we there's a huge preview and they're also what's coming in January for the large hounds and then the next day unboxing day there will be an extra episode with uh... top three uh... of and both of you are involved in pretty sure
- 2:10:27[SPEAKER_04]: So your top threes and previews of more of what's coming up.
- 2:10:32[SPEAKER_04]: So lots of content coming leading up into the holidays.
- 2:10:37[SPEAKER_04]: And of course, if you are a super cast and patreon subscriber, you get ad free access to all of this plus the extra episodes, like the recent Robert Redford episode, this the die-hards episode this time and which you watch in, like about the jaws play and film festivals and lots of other stuff.
- 2:10:55[SPEAKER_04]: Lots going on and as we always do, we're going to end for those who don't want book spoilers with a shout out and I'm going to set it to to the skies and honor of Elfaba from the magic folder.
- 2:11:09[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you to our Discord server boosters, Erin K. Tillard the Thriller doves 71 Athena Agilea Lestu, Nancy M. Ghost of Partition, Radioactive Richard and Adrienne.
- 2:11:19[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you, especially to our highest tier of subscribers, our loremasters, this is Martian Michael G. Michelle E. SC, Peter O'H.
- 2:11:27[SPEAKER_04]: Nancy M. Doves 71, Brian 863, Frederick H. Sarah L. Garcia, Andre B. Huang Yu, Nathan T. Sub-Zero, Erin K. Dally Me.
- 2:11:36[SPEAKER_04]: Mothership 61, Nars.
- 2:11:38[SPEAKER_04]: Cathy W, Lestoo, Jeffrey B, Lestoo, you, Ben B, Scott F, Steven N, Julia F, Holly S, Ill Mario, Paul K, Rocky Zim, Jessica A, Red Zippy, the TCS, Dopa Mini, catch it, LNR, and always last Adrian, and thank you to Nicole and Marilyn for joining today!
- 2:12:01[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you, thank you all supporters!
- 2:12:04[SPEAKER_04]: Bye.
- 2:12:06[SPEAKER_00]: Bye.
- 2:12:28[SPEAKER_04]: You still here, Marilyn, you still here?
- 2:12:32[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
- 2:12:33[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
- 2:12:33[SPEAKER_04]: Lessoners, you still here because we're going to talk about full books boilers.
- 2:12:37[SPEAKER_04]: So run away if you don't know what happens in the end of the books.
- 2:12:40[SPEAKER_04]: Anyway.
- 2:12:41[SPEAKER_04]: The first book.
- 2:12:42[SPEAKER_04]: We're going to focus on the first book.
- 2:12:43[SPEAKER_04]: I'm not really going to talk about what comes after.
- 2:12:46[SPEAKER_04]: But yeah, I'll just say Marilyn, you won't be surprised.
- 2:12:51[SPEAKER_04]: And this is why I don't recommend the book to you.
- 2:12:53[SPEAKER_04]: It's that a lot of characters have slightly more horrible fates in the books than in the stage show and TV musical, for example, Dr. Dilliman.
- 2:13:02[SPEAKER_04]: He's voiceless, he becomes voiceless, and that's the horrible thing that happens to him in the show, and the books he is killed by Moreable has a TikTok servant, a robot servant, and a TikTok servant kills him, not public knowledge, but that's sort of what kicks things up for Alphava.
- 2:13:21[SPEAKER_04]: because she was a z-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y
- 2:13:37[SPEAKER_03]: Of course, that justifies it.
- 2:13:39[SPEAKER_04]: Right.
- 2:13:40[SPEAKER_03]: No.
- 2:13:41[SPEAKER_04]: The other character I said was in Fierro, Averick.
- 2:13:44[SPEAKER_04]: He becomes the Gilliken Margrave.
- 2:13:46[SPEAKER_04]: He's his own fancy pencil boy.
- 2:13:49[SPEAKER_04]: But in later books, he actually, you know, he keeps being made the man's servant in the show and the movie.
- 2:13:55[SPEAKER_04]: In later books, he becomes the man's servant of Elphaba N.S.A.
- 2:13:59[SPEAKER_04]: Rose, have a little brother who's not in this version of the story named Show.
- 2:14:04[SPEAKER_04]: and shell.
- 2:14:05[SPEAKER_04]: Okay, so this is a later book spoiler.
- 2:14:07[SPEAKER_04]: Shell, well second book spoiler, I guess.
- 2:14:10[SPEAKER_04]: Shell becomes the emperor.
- 2:14:13[SPEAKER_04]: You just end.
- 2:14:14[SPEAKER_04]: Averic becomes his men's servant.
- 2:14:17[SPEAKER_03]: Very interesting.
- 2:14:19[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:14:20[SPEAKER_03]: Of course, if Nessa Rose had held a little brother, then she couldn't have been elevated to the role of it.
- 2:14:25[SPEAKER_04]: No, in the book, in the movie.
- 2:14:27[SPEAKER_04]: In the movie.
- 2:14:28[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, yeah, yeah.
- 2:14:28[SPEAKER_04]: In the books, it's a female title.
- 2:14:32[SPEAKER_04]: So he was dubbed Tripoli out and he kind of resented a bit in the books.
- 2:14:36[SPEAKER_04]: You know, that he was not eligible for the title, but he was youngest anyway.
- 2:14:40[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:14:41[SPEAKER_04]: And Alphabet and Fierro's romance is definitely steamy here in the books.
- 2:14:47[SPEAKER_04]: They, she, after what happened to Dr. Dylan and she runs off to Emerald City and starts getting involved in some violent activism.
- 2:14:57[SPEAKER_04]: and Fiero, he's travels there every once in a while and when they meet there and they end up starting up a romance again, until one day she's out, she tries, um, she tries to kill Metamorble and she fails that time and when she comes home Fiero has been taken by the guards and he really is dead in the books.
- 2:15:20[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 2:15:21[SPEAKER_04]: Although she has a fantasy at one point that he might be the beneath the scarecrow
- 2:15:27[SPEAKER_03]: That, but the movie combined that in that particular way is fascinating.
- 2:15:32[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, yeah, and then Elfaba, after that, she's just after Fioro is taken, she is just out of it, and she kind of comes to at a mont, which is a sort of convent.
- 2:15:48[SPEAKER_04]: and she has kind of been there silent and out of it for years.
- 2:15:53[SPEAKER_04]: And we pick up with her and she's sent off with, you know, she sent off into the world with a boy, which is understood to be, and later confirmed to be her son with Fierro, named Lea.
- 2:16:06[SPEAKER_04]: but she kind of can't acknowledge that it's her son with P. Fierre, like she can't handle it, but then she ends up going to Kiyama Coe, where Fierre's wife lives and moves in with his wife's sisters.
- 2:16:20[SPEAKER_03]: You know what this is sounding like?
- 2:16:22[SPEAKER_03]: It's really sounding like a soapah.
- 2:16:25[SPEAKER_04]: I mean sure, that's that.
- 2:16:28[SPEAKER_04]: It's just really kind of interesting and refreshing in a way to see
- 2:16:33[SPEAKER_04]: that, you know, she, and Fiera's wife doesn't want to hear it.
- 2:16:38[SPEAKER_04]: She doesn't want to know about, you know, it was in a range marriage, but still, she doesn't want to hear about whatever her romance was with Elfa, but she definitely suspects.
- 2:16:45[SPEAKER_04]: She probably suspects that Lear is his son.
- 2:16:47[SPEAKER_04]: There's other children there too, and there's kind of like a half understanding that they are siblings, in fact.
- 2:16:54[SPEAKER_04]: Um, but there's something refreshing about the way that they still just like she just moves in with them and becomes a part of the family and they are this mixed weird family for years.
- 2:17:06[SPEAKER_04]: So that's that's a major part that's cut out of the shows obviously.
- 2:17:10[SPEAKER_04]: There's just years of of her in the pinkus and and on the way there.
- 2:17:16[SPEAKER_04]: Elphabon Lear rescue a monkey.
- 2:17:18[SPEAKER_04]: They also rescue a dog who's important to wolf.
- 2:17:21[SPEAKER_04]: But the monkey becomes chistory.
- 2:17:23[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, Elfaba just kind of takes over a tower, and she conducts her experiments with the Grimwar, which she finds at Kiamoko and Nanny, who is human, joins them, and he's taking care of Elfaba.
- 2:17:37[SPEAKER_04]: She's taking care of Elfaba and Lair, and she's actually one of the longest-lived characters in the course.
- 2:17:44[SPEAKER_04]: Sounds like an accomplishment.
- 2:17:46[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:17:47[SPEAKER_04]: And in the books, the tin man's not Bach either.
- 2:17:50[SPEAKER_04]: It's a random, munchkin landman who's girlfriend's mom came to Nessa Rose for help, ending his relationship with her daughter because she thought he was not good enough for me.
- 2:18:00[SPEAKER_04]: Nessa Rose cursed him to chop off his own limbs, and he kind of got oopsied into a tin man.
- 2:18:06[SPEAKER_04]: So, Grimdurk comes to us.
- 2:18:10[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and Bach, I mentioned it, if anyone listened to after the break, last time, but Bach, he just ends up marrying a bunch of canland woman and becoming kind of, you know, white-picketed fenced where he just wants things to become and normal.
- 2:18:28[SPEAKER_04]: He's no longer an activist.
- 2:18:29[SPEAKER_04]: He's, you know, wants a steady life when Alphabet comes to see him later.
- 2:18:33[SPEAKER_04]: He's, he's like, you know, I cherish our friendship, but you're on your own here, kiddo.
- 2:18:39[SPEAKER_04]: I can get that reaction.
- 2:18:41[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 2:18:42[SPEAKER_04]: I can understand it.
- 2:18:44[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:18:45[SPEAKER_04]: I'll say about the scarecrow.
- 2:18:46[SPEAKER_04]: I said that eventually Shells takes over as Emperor.
- 2:18:49[SPEAKER_04]: There is a time between on either side of Glindus Rain, that they have a scarecrow in power, originally these scarecrow.
- 2:18:59[SPEAKER_04]: And then another one later, who's drunk, but they try to pass off as the same man.
- 2:19:03[SPEAKER_04]: So it's clearly a straw man reference, they're setting up straw man.
- 2:19:06[SPEAKER_04]: Sure.
- 2:19:07[SPEAKER_04]: Sure.
- 2:19:08[SPEAKER_03]: But a bum.
- 2:19:10[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:19:12[SPEAKER_04]: And yeah, Elphobah herself actually allergic to water, so does really die when Dorothy kills her, but Dorothy kind of fills her by accident.
- 2:19:20[SPEAKER_04]: She didn't really mean to kill her.
- 2:19:23[SPEAKER_03]: Well that's consistent with certainly with the 1939 film, and I can't remember in Palm's book if it was intentional or not.
- 2:19:34[SPEAKER_03]: I think it was.
- 2:19:35[SPEAKER_03]: I think it was more intentional in Bob's book and then Hollywood stepped in and said not, has to be in the stake that she's trying to save the scarecrow who's on fire and she manages to kill the witch because she didn't even know that slap, you know, throw on water over was going to melt her.
- 2:19:52[SPEAKER_04]: Right, exactly.
- 2:19:53[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, who would think that?
- 2:19:56[SPEAKER_03]: That iconic moment has been frozen into the minds and memories.
- 2:20:01[SPEAKER_03]: So many people down to this day, you know, which is hate water.
- 2:20:06[SPEAKER_03]: But they might have also been giving a very dim acknowledgement of the commonality of this notion that water is an inhibitor for any kind of magic, particularly darker magic.
- 2:20:20[SPEAKER_03]: I'm thinking, of course, Tolkien, he struggled with the idea that the black writers didn't want to cross a river, and that's a very ancient trope, because river is boundary, and of course, the river sticks between life and death, and it just goes on and on and on, so they picked up this trope, and put it in a very appropriate way in the context, but they're still parking
- 2:20:48[SPEAKER_04]: And yet, the other thing, I'm kind of glad in the movie.
- 2:20:52[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, it makes sense that we see Elfaba grow more bitter as her life progresses in the movie that journey into darkness is cut short for the sake of, and the stage show I should say.
- 2:21:06[SPEAKER_04]: So, I, I like that this happier version ends.
- 2:21:11[SPEAKER_04]: I do have head canon that the Elfaba and Fiaro surviving is the true story behind the book's true story.
- 2:21:18[SPEAKER_04]: There is, there are people fans of the books who think that there are hints in there that she could return, although there's another character Osmo that those hints could be about, but still, there's, that's the legend that survives after her death.
- 2:21:34[SPEAKER_04]: definitely like, later, both Elfaba and Nessa are remembered to some as saints, because the books cover like 50 decades and they've first four books.
- 2:21:45[SPEAKER_04]: So you get to see the journey of how people remember someone after even there's because you know, they were witches, they were the wicked witches, but who called them that?
- 2:21:55[SPEAKER_04]: The wizard, you know?
- 2:21:57[SPEAKER_03]: Sure, sure.
- 2:21:58[SPEAKER_03]: Well, that journey from center to saint, again, is a very well-traught road as it were.
- 2:22:05[SPEAKER_03]: outside of any religious context you know bad boy does good kind of thing and I'll say Glinda I think she has a much better emotional journey in she is more of a secondary character in the books and especially after this I suppose where that's an interesting choice yeah for the films to say oh no she's going to be in the station okay so that of course
- 2:22:32[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, they made it really about their friendship, which is part of the story, but the I would say the core of the story is the is us is is the political development of us and they are two of its biggest instruments yeah I got that kind of vibe fairly early on when I did try to read the first very first book of that
- 2:22:54[SPEAKER_03]: I'm just not interested in political fiction.
- 2:22:58[SPEAKER_03]: So whatever dress you arrange it in, it's just, it just isn't, I'm interested.
- 2:23:04[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I mean, she's definitely not into Fiero in the books, maybe she likes Averick for a second because he's hot, but she's loud.
- 2:23:17[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, that's fine.
- 2:23:17[SPEAKER_04]: You know, that was where her superficial face they definitely didn't end up together, but she,
- 2:23:21[SPEAKER_04]: And I, like I said before, if she was into anyone, I would say would have been Elfava.
- 2:23:26[SPEAKER_04]: But she ends up marrying an older man named Lord Chaffrey who it just seems like she gets power from his name and she gets to be the real power behind that name.
- 2:23:38[SPEAKER_04]: But she still portrayed in the following books as a bit did see, but there's a sadness in there.
- 2:23:45[SPEAKER_04]: You know, with like a one point
- 2:23:49[SPEAKER_04]: her and he doesn't tell her a mouth of a son for various reasons at least not at this point but she just the fact that she has, he has mouth of his broom and cape and just that just opens something in her view.
- 2:24:02[SPEAKER_04]: See like that that was her whether it was romantic or not that was the greatest love of her life.
- 2:24:08[SPEAKER_05]: Mm-hmm.
- 2:24:10[SPEAKER_04]: So her story does continue a bit, but the rest of the crawdrology of books is told from the second book is from Lears Perspective of the Sun.
- 2:24:20[SPEAKER_04]: The third book is from Burr's perspective, The Lion, and it goes back also and covers back through the first book from his perspective.
- 2:24:28[SPEAKER_04]: And then the last book is from the Perspective of Lears.Rain.
- 2:24:37[SPEAKER_03]: books, it was birds, point of view.
- 2:24:40[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, he was an in the character of her that we see in the movie and play.
- 2:24:46[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I mean, he wasn't really much in the movie.
- 2:24:49[SPEAKER_04]: So like the first thing about him being freed from the cage, that's in the first book.
- 2:24:54[SPEAKER_04]: The part about him coming back and talking here, they they added, but that makes sense.
- 2:25:00[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, they didn't really.
- 2:25:02[SPEAKER_04]: talk much about that and and I say his perspective book it does go back and cover it but it also it is said like I don't know a while after the original book for the most part it's about his story after that and reckoning I suppose it's his his attitude about Alphava that we saw about you know you took me from my safe spot that's something he's reckoning within the third book
- 2:25:31[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, so Marilyn books not for you.
- 2:25:34[SPEAKER_04]: That's why you don't mind being spoiled, but I would say anyone who's listened and isn't intrigued, even though I've told you a bunch of spoilers, there is so much rich character development and storytelling left to discover.
- 2:25:47[SPEAKER_04]: This is one of those, we know this spoiler.
- 2:25:50[SPEAKER_04]: We know, you know, they tell us at the beginning of the stage show, bye-bye, Alphaba.
- 2:25:55[SPEAKER_04]: It's not about the destination.
- 2:25:58[SPEAKER_04]: It's about the journey.
- 2:26:01[SPEAKER_03]: whether or not you are on a yellow brick road, right exactly, which may or may not be well-maintained because bureaucracy.
- 2:26:10[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
- 2:26:11[SPEAKER_04]: Well, thank you, Marilyn, for sticking around to talk through the book stuff with me.
- 2:26:16[SPEAKER_04]: Are you surprised at all by it?
- 2:26:18[SPEAKER_04]: Or is it what you expected?
- 2:26:20[SPEAKER_03]: It's mostly a little overwhelming, so many names, so many bloodlines, so many different whatever, and I never read past the first Os book, right, all those years ago.
- 2:26:34[SPEAKER_03]: The bomb books so I my very best friend had read most if not all of them and there were some she particularly like like I think she liked the Osmo cycle But Osmo's a big character in this I mean a figure a big figure.
- 2:26:50[SPEAKER_03]: I should say you know all I really know very well is is the 39 film
- 2:26:57[SPEAKER_04]: Mm-hmm.
- 2:26:58[SPEAKER_03]: And I never saw the way as an our grith that I should probably see at some time.
- 2:27:02[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:27:02[SPEAKER_04]: He's okay.
- 2:27:04[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
- 2:27:04[SPEAKER_03]: I'm sure it's streaming somewhere.
- 2:27:05[SPEAKER_03]: Just stuff.
- 2:27:06[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:27:07[SPEAKER_04]: I think you might.
- 2:27:08[SPEAKER_04]: Search it out.
- 2:27:09[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:27:09[SPEAKER_04]: You can definitely find it.
- 2:27:11[SPEAKER_04]: Well, thank you again for chatting about this with me.
- 2:27:13[SPEAKER_04]: And if anyone has any thoughts about the book, so they play or the original movies or any of them stop into our discord or send us an email,
- 2:27:24[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and thanks so much for asking me to take part in this.
- 2:27:27[SPEAKER_03]: It's fun to finally bring it to a close.
- 2:27:30[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, yes.
- 2:27:31[SPEAKER_03]: What's it been a two, two, your period?
- 2:27:32[SPEAKER_03]: No, well, sort of two years, yeah.
- 2:27:35[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
- 2:27:36[SPEAKER_04]: I guess one year, because of the last, it's, it's our own way.
- 2:27:39[SPEAKER_03]: One year about what it is, a 12 month period.
- 2:27:41[SPEAKER_03]: Right, right.
- 2:27:42[SPEAKER_03]: Whatever, you've tell us what it's going to get.
- 2:27:43[SPEAKER_03]: Thanks for listening.
- 2:27:46[SPEAKER_03]: Thanks for listening.
- 2:27:48[SPEAKER_03]: Thank you.
- 2:27:48[SPEAKER_03]: Bye.