Director: Jon M. Chu
Cast: Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Jonathan Bailey, Ethan Slater, Bowen Yang, Marissa Bode, Colman Domingo, Michelle Yeoh, Jeff Goldblum
Screenplay: Winnie Holzman, Dana Fox
137 mins. Rated PG for action/violence, some suggestive material and thematic material.

The Wicked phenomenon and success certainly surprised me last year. While I was aware of the popularity of the novel and stage musical, I also recognize that the box office is not what it once was, and movie fans in particular have seemed hesitant to embrace the musical form with several great films under-performing in recent years. Oftentimes, it can be difficult to judge the strength of the first half of any story without fully knowing how the end plays out, but I think Wicked: For Good makes for an excellent back half of the story, elevating the first film and hitting a satisfying conclusion along the way.

Picking up after the events of the first film, Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo, Bad Times at the El Royale), who has embraced her role as the Wicked Witch in opposition to the deceitful con man, the supposedly Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Jeff Goldblum, The Grand Budapest Hotel). The public has chosen a side, defended the Wizard and hoped for the death of Elphaba. Caught in the middle, Glinda (Ariana Grande, Don’t Look Up) and Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey, Jurassic World: Rebirth), forced to play heroes of the Wizard while looking and worrying for their missing friend.

One of my main critiques of the first film was the bloated length, but For Good doesn’t have that problem. At just over two hours, this is all-killer/no-filler, focusing on the darker and more serious ramifications of the character choices made in the first film. Playing off the five-act structure used so frequently by Shakespeare, Wicked’s big climactic moment happens in the first film, where Elphaba decides that this is the monster everyone wants her to be, and everything that happens in For Good is a result of that, so it’s hard to see this outside the context of the first film, but it was never meant to stand on its own, and I feel as though there is enough in the final two acts of this story to end on a quite satisfying note that has more than a few twists and turns I hadn’t quite expected.

There was hubbub when it was announced that new songs would be crafted for the sequel, and oftentimes it’s easy to spot the new ones, but I personally couldn’t tell the new songs apart from the old ones. Of course, viewers of the musical will know the difference, but as a new fan of Wicked, this is all new to me, and the new songs slide in quite nicely. That being said, this film doesn’t have a “Defying Gravity”-level song in its pocket, but I quite liked “Wonderful,” in which a proposal is laid forth for the Wizard and Elphaba to find common ground. Goldblum’s whimsical performance adds a lot to the Wizard, and he gets more to do for the sequel.

Hey, we’re all here for the strong performances, and Erivo and Grande don’t disappoint as leads. They are just as strong as the first film (which makes sense, as they were filmed back-to-back), and the film relies more heavily on them than on the surrounding cast for this closing chapter. While the rest of the cast is solid, this is Erivo and Grande leading the charge, and Grande in particular gets more time to shine in For Good, as she’s the conflicted character of the back half of this story. Erivo’s Elphaba has already made her choices, now it comes to Glinda’s internal and external push-and-pull. They are both great and the film is all the better for it.

From the opening sequence to the shocking conclusion, I was all in on Wicked: For Good. I’ll be the guy who states that I liked this one even more than the first. There’s been some criticism that this back-half hinges too heavily on Wizard of Oz nostalgia, but I’d argue it’s not nostalgia if it has an importance to the story, which much of it does here. Not only is Wicked: For Good a great finale, it actively improves my thoughts on its predecessor, and I can’t wait to see them back-to-back for the complete experience. Fans of the musical, book, or just the world of Oz should all these this Wonderful, magical movie.

4/5
-Kyle A. Goethe