I’m sure my negative review will not be popular. But, to quote Galinda, “Don’t be offended by my frank analysis.” Odie Henderson, Boston Globe, regarding Wicked
Why would I write a post focusing on the only the most wicked reviews of the new film Wicked, adapted from the Broadway musical? Because, of course, my own sentiments align with the mere 5% of critics on Rotten Tomatoes who couldn’t muster much of a complimentary writeup. Even the 5%, though, do acknowledge that the top stars, Cynthia Erivo (the green-born Elphaba) and Ariana Grande (narcissistic “Galinda,” later Glinda), along with other actors and some other film elements, yada yada, are indeed praise-worthy.
Even among the 95% positive reviews, though, fault is to be found. A few examples:
Aparita Bhandari, Globe and Mail: “…both a sumptuous and somewhat soulless film adaptation of the beloved musical.”
Adam Graham, Detroit News: “…feels exhaustingly dragged out for reasons tied explicitly to profit and greed.”
Manohla Dargis, New York Times: “…splashy, largely diverting, tonally discordant and unconscionably long…”
Lonnngggg…Two hours and forty minutes. Amy Nicholson, NPR Los Angeles: “Drags, and drags, and drags. I was just staring at the costumes and saying ‘Can this end?’
Co-highlighted by Johnny Oleksinski, New York Post: “Who can say if ‘Wicked’ has been changed for the better? I do believe it has been changed for the longer.” A takeoff on the lyrics of “For Good,” the song I most wanted to hear but which isn’t included.
You know why? This is just Part One! A whole year from now is Part Two. Interestingly, that not-soon-upcoming movie will be titled Wicked: For Good.
(Oh, and oddly enough, I will no doubt see it. Some kind of dark curiosity? Or, just for that song? Because I crave completion? Who knows.)
(One-second update, 11/21/25: I will not see it after all. I’ve heard the song. That’s enough. “Good” enough. The overall first reviews are not.)
On to the plot. As Stephanie Zacharek, Time, reports, Wicked, a prequel to The Wizard of Oz, has its basis in a 1995 novel, Gregory Maguire‘s Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, “built around the idea that Elphaba wasn’t born bad, but was merely forced into making decisions that set her on a path different from that of the insufferable goody-two-shoes Glinda, her enemy turned frenemy turned friend. The story’s subtext—or, rather, its glaring bold type—is that we’re all shaped by our choices, which are at least partly determined by our response to how others treat us.”
Zacharek finds, however, that the movie is “so manic in its insistence that it’s OK to be different, that it practically mows you down.”
Another critic who agrees is Justin Chang, New Yorker: “As a parable of political radicalization…the movie soon turns lumbering and obvious. Oz is in the grip of creeping totalitarianism, and the more Elphaba grasps the stakes, the more pointed the hats she has to wear become: she’s a feminist crusader, an animal-welfare activist, and, in time, a full-blown resistance leader, with the not so wonderful Wizard of Oz (a well-cast Jeff Goldblum) as her target.”
Nicholas Barber, BBC, who prefers the movie prequel Oz the Great and Powerful (see previous post) to this Wicked, even disliked “Defying Gravity,” the closing Big Song. And “…it’s only fair to say that that’s precisely what Wicked doesn’t manage to achieve. It doesn’t take flight. It doesn’t have the terrific jokes, the startling twists or the stunning dance routines that might have cast a spell on you, and it’s weighed down by under-developed subplots and under-used supporting characters (who presumably have their moment in Part Two), as well as by its own sense of self-importance.”
Robbie Collin, Telegraph: “Considering its signature number is called Defying Gravity, it’s unfortunate that Wicked has all the buoyancy of a grand piano being heaved off the roof of St Paul’s Cathedral.”
Boom.
