The epic finale to Wicked is here. Wicked: For Good hit theaters on Nov. 21, and it finally told the remaining story of fans’ favorite characters in Oz. But Wicked is definitely not an original story — it’s based on the Broadway musical of the same name, which is also based on a book by Gregory Maguire called Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. Considering there’s a good bit of source material that Wicked: For Good is based on, let’s take a look at the differences between For Good and Act 2 of the Broadway show.
As fans already know, the first Wicked movie followed Elphaba, Glinda, Fiyero, Nessa, Boq, and the other characters of Oz in essentially the same order as Act 1 of the Broadway show. (The movie ended with Elphaba escaping the Emerald City while singing “Defying Gravity,” and so did the first act of the musical.) Now, Wicked: For Good picks up a few years after the events in Wicked, just like the Broadway show picks up after the intermission. While a lot of what happens in Wicked: For Good is reflected in Act 2 of the show, there are a few major differences that adapt the story to the big screen. Here are some of the biggest differences between the two. Spoiler alert: Spoilers for Wicked: For Good and Act 2 of the Wicked musical on Broadway follow.
- TheWicked: For Good Opening Scene
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In the Broadway musical, fans immediately see Act 2 open with the scene in Munchkinland where Glinda addresses the people of Oz and sings “Thank Goodness.” That isn’t how the movie version opens. Instead, we see animals in captivity, forced to finish the creation of the Yellow Brick Road. We see Elphaba intervene, breaking the chains of the animals pulling the machines.
- Dulcibear Returns
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As Elphaba finds the animals of Oz leaving the land and tries to stop them from abandoning their homes, she comes across a familiar face: Dulcibear. The bear helped raise Elphaba after her mother died and her father refused. In the Broadway musical, there is no real role of Dulcibear, so this is a big difference in the movie in its entirety. Presumably, Dulcibear was created as a vehicle to bring a bit more humanity to the role Elphaba plays in fighting for animal rights in Oz.
- Glinda’s Bubble
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While Glinda has a bubble in both For Good and the Wicked musical, the movie gives more backstory to the bubble. In the movie, viewers learn that it was created by the Wizard to help Glinda keep up appearances — namely, that she has magical powers, when that really isn’t the case.
- Nessa Doesn’t Walk In For Good
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This was an update in the movie that I personally loved. In the Broadway musical, Nessa sings in “The Wicked Witch of the East” about how she longs to be able to walk. In the movie, the song is adapted so that Nessa no longer wants to be able-bodied — she wants to feel like she is “floating on air” the night that she met Boq. Instead of giving her the ability to walk, Elphaba actually helps Nessa float in the air before coming back down into her wheelchair. Marissa Bode, who plays Nessarose, said that director Jon M. Chu told her, “Hey, we changed this part in this way, just so that it feels less like a fixing moment.” Instead, they kept the focus “on the magic in general and the magic of the story.”
- New Music
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This was a big difference from the movie that fans knew before For Good hit theaters. The original composer of Wicked, Stephen Schwartz, wrote two brand new songs for the second Wicked movie that don’t exist in the Broadway version of the story. Elphaba sings “No Place Like Home” — pleading the animals of Oz to stay as she sings “When you feel it’s not worth fighting for / Compel yourself / Because there’s no place like home” — and Glinda sings “Girl In The Bubble” — a song about her younger self and trying to avoid facing the truth about her own shortcomings. (“There’s that beautiful girl / With the beautiful life / Such a beautiful life / Built on lies.”)
- Young Galinda
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Related to “Girl In The Bubble,” viewers get a flashback to a young Galinda, who receives a magic wand for her birthday. She fails to cast a spell in front of all of her friends, but miraculously, a rainbow appears outside, which she takes credit for creating. The moment seems to show that Glinda’s been “building the lies” of her life since she was a young child.
- Glinda Sings In “Wonderful”
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“Wonderful,” sung by the Wizard and Elphaba in the Broadway show, gets an update in For Good. In the movie, Glinda is aware that Elphaba is in Oz, so she joins her in visiting the Wizard. All three of them sing the song together, as Glinda and the Wizard try to get Elphaba to agree to work with them. In the play, it’s just the Wizard and Elphaba. In both, though, Elphaba comes to her senses and stops the music.
- Glinda & Fiyero’s Wedding
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Glinda and Fiyero get engaged in the Broadway show just like they do in the movie, but viewers never get to see the actual wedding. In For Good, though, we get a glimpse of Glinda’s beautiful wedding dress, and watch her walk down the aisle to Fiyero while a slow version of “Popular” plays in the background. That wedding never comes to fruition, though, as the animals that Elphaba has released end up stampeding through it.
- The Lion Speaks
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Viewers saw the lion in the first Wicked movie, when Elphaba and Fiyero rescue him from his cage in Dr. Dillamond’s classroom and release him back into the wild. The lion returns in For Good, but instead of thanking Elphaba, he says that he lost the only home he’d ever known because of her. (Yes, he’s talking about the cage.) The Cowardly Lion is played by the one and only Colman Domingo. In the Broadway play, viewers only get to see a lion’s tale — it’s not a role that’s actually played by any actor.
- The Ending
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Many parts of the original Broadway ending were replicated in For Good. Glinda found Elphaba and promised not to clear her name, Glinda found out Elphaba’s dad was the Wizard and sent him out of Emerald City, and Elphaba faked her death and left Oz with Fiyero, now a scarecrow. But there was one big difference in For Good that the musical didn’t show: Glinda now has the Grimmerie, and at the end of the movie, the book opens for her, revealing its golden pages. Does this mean Glinda can now read the Grimmerie? I don’t know about you, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a Wicked 3.