the great work begins...

Blueberries in Sunlight - Vincent Giarrano , 2024.

American , b. 1960 -

(left: November 2008; right: March 2019)

when i try to explain why Katie's Glinda is so special my default words tend to be "weird," or "alien," or "fucking look at her. just fucking--why is she LIKE this." of course i stand by all that, but if i were to doff my facile and irreverent hat at last i'd probably say something like: Katie's Glinda, to me, represents a kind of artistic transgression which can never be fully captured by the institution of Wicked. she might as well be Frank fucking Abagnale given how hard the show has tried, alternately banning or legitimizing what she's done; this kind of granular approach, though, is never going to work. like--yes, it was the individual gestures and line reads which got her in trouble (according to her. it's possible Joe Mantello did a frown in her direction once), but in isolation those things mean very little. the whole of Katie's performance, which drives and always exceeds the sum of its parts, comes down to how Glinda is simultaneously the woman behind the curtain, and the curtain itself. Glinda is shallow artifice at the same time Glinda is complex depth. it's all truth; it's all real.

(it's all lies; it's all pretend. how could it not be? she's the one telling the story. she's the only one here.)

over and over Katie's Glinda feels sharply and just as sharply rejects the feeling; papers over it, squares it away. the Wizard's chamber scene in 2008 is one of her starkest approaches to this. Glinda knows exactly what is happening. what's more--Glinda knows better. (Katie has never allowed Glinda the grace of not knowing, or not knowing better.) she has a strong enough moral compass to react to the Wizard's offer with revulsion and horror, almost as if she were...oh, eighteen years old and intimately discovering she lives in a fascist regime built on a mountain of subaltern corpses. but she only shows it once the Wizard has finally turned away from her and even then, only for an instant. once she catches sight of Elphaba she wrenches herself into damage control mode, and the most important thing, the ONLY important thing, becomes getting them both out of here no matter the collateral.

Glinda in the same scene in 2019 is...pretty different! any disgust or moral conflict is completely wiped, and if Glinda has any feelings pertaining to what just happened it's relief and delight that they can get back on track after all that unpleasantness. even the reach for Elphaba at the end has changed in tone: now she's more authoritative--maybe even a little impatient--for Elphie to get with the program.

on the one hand it's like: okay, well, Katie's Glinda is normal now. she's the MOST normal Broadway Glinda during this period, and this is the typical way for Glindas to behave during this scene. even weirder, more conscientious Glindas aren't as bold about showing their moral quandaries as Katie's Glinda was in 2008, so we can read this as part of 2019 Glinda's overall deal, which is that she is very normal and her actress is very thankful she was invited back to make Wicked levels of money.

on the other: said actress is 👏🏼KATIE👏🏼ROSE👏🏼CLARKE, who has taken to straight up telling her directors she's never going to do the same thing night-to-night. so obviously she couldn't even swan through her (hopefully lucrative) Wicked victory lap without turning yet again into some bizarre outlier. part of this was done by digging Normal Galinda up from her shallow grave, but the other, larger part comes from what has stayed the same. because Katie's Glinda in 2019 remains, at her core, Katie's Glinda. she's the same person from 2008. still sensitive, still trusting, still smart in a way which only brings her grief, because once again Katie is not interested in letting Glinda off that particular hook. still autistic and gay as hell. 2019 Glinda is better at masking; maybe because she learned earlier that her preternatural charisma can only get her so far, and sometimes you HAVE to conform. 2019 Glinda comes from a more cynical world, even before she came to Shiz, which makes her more suited to accept the cynicism to come.

but not more suited to actually live in it, because the significant adjustments to 2019 Galinda's behavior become kinda irrelevant right around the time she changes her name. technically this is something we already know: from the moment she descends in the bubble in NOMTW, 2019 Glinda is just as miserable as she had been in 2008. (Act Two demonstrates that if anything 2019 Glinda might be even MORE miserable, but we'll get there when we get there.) and she's not even really better at hiding it! if Normal Glinda is emotionally devastated in the exact same way as Space Alien Glinda at the end of it all, then why change so much of the lead up? what does it even matter?

well. it's Glinda, so (appropriately) it matters because it's the way you're viewed. while we're inside the Wizard's chamber it matters, which is why even 2008 Glinda tries very hard to at least pretend she's onboard with all the scandalacious villainy. and outside of the Wizard's chamber--in Glinda's present, as she tells the story to her real and fictional audience--it matters, because it tells us how to feel about Glinda, and how Glinda feels about Glinda.

in 2008 Glinda beseeches empathy. the visceral sharpness of her body language and facial expression feels like an implicit interjection from Glinda the narrator: she was so scared. what else could she have done? what could you have done, had you been this scared? but in 2019 the same moment--with almost entirely the same Glinda, doing almost entirely the same motions--is treated so unsparingly it borders on self-abuse. Glinda in 2019, looking back on what happened, recounting it; alternately framing, hiding, and exposing her past self; within and between texts, says: who cares what she felt? who cares what she believed? this is what she DID. and look how good she is at it! if she had been pretending she's only getting what she wanted. this is what everyone saw. this is the only truth anyone should know. how in Oz can her feelings matter in the face of all she has done? all the harm she's dealt? all the people she's abandoned? all the bodies left in her wake?

MOMENT 2: "Frustrating!" Fiyero declares to Morrible's question, catching Glinda's eye as he keeps talking. Glinda nods in affirmation before an exasperated Morrible derails him by announcing the engagement. Glinda responds with ecstatic shock, while Fiyero does a "haha big joke" laugh before double taking at the congratulotions banner.

this point kind of feeds into the first by highlighting that PR has been Fiyero's job (at least part-time) for the past five years, too. Ryan does a good job of showing that it has been five years; you expect Glinda to be polished no matter what, but FIYERO being this well trained is something else. the sulky little face he makes right after Morrible interrupts him is just like...he's used to this. this is typical Madame. (Nancy's fed up look right after "frustrating!" implies she's used to him too.) it's a pretty rare take on Fiyero in TG, and i don't think it's mandatory--most Fiyeros unknowingly or knowingly contrast with Glinda and Morrible on the podium by being less smooth and practiced, and i've liked many of them.

this version does feel pretty special though, because it subtly underscores what Glinda and Fiyero's relationship has been like during the act break. Fiyero had been instinctively attuned to Galinda's feelings as early as the Ozdust, and now that's matured into them...well. working in tandem. he's clearly been doing enough of this stuff with her to know the workings; he checks in as she moves aside so he can take over, and she trusts him enough to back him even though his comment was clearly not scripted. they're a team.

MOMENT 3: Morrible's first verse. Fiyero reorients himself back to playing supportive spouse. Glinda watches Morrible like a hawk, only relaxing when it seems they'll stick to the script after all. Fiyero catches the heavy editorializing halfway through but, seeing Glinda's non-reaction, settles for a sotto voce protest after Morrible pauses for breath.

i remember being caught off guard when i first watched this. Ryan's Fiyero is such an obstinate fuckboy when things don't go his way; he is among the least impressed and most angry Fiyeros during the "surprised?" "yes!" exchange right before this. but he pulls himself back together remarkably quickly, to the point he's returned to nodding "yes Glinda is the greatest actually" as Morrible launches into her speech.

which is the part that stands out most: every Fiyero has to calm down because the script says so, but most Fiyeros play it either like they've gone back to factory neutral or like they're barely restraining themselves from throwing a confused tantrum. in both cases the implication is they're still too floored by the engagement to support Glinda anymore, and i expected Ryan's Fiyero to similarly hold a grudge. he has perfectly legitimate reasons to do so--what happened was a SERIOUS breech of trust--but he...doesn't. his calming down process doesn't involve getting some space from Glinda but going right back to Glinda-and-Fiyero, the perfect team.

and like. obviously this is because Glinda called him "handsome" and he's so chuffed that being mad at her is impossible, but damn if it doesn't give me feelings anyway. he was so upset when the engagement was sprung on him, but he has enough faith in Glinda that he's willing to wait and hear her out, and in the meantime he's going to keep taking her cue in their united front against Morrible. this degree of instinctual trust speaks volumes about how much comfortable intimacy they have with each other, and how fraught their lives have been in the past five years. Glinda and Fiyero have each other's backs because they know and love each other; Glinda and Fiyero have each other's backs because they know they can't rely on anybody else.

The night before, Gwi-Ma had completely broken him - The freedom he thought he could finally attain after so long? Gone. The monster that Jinu saw himself for 400 long years? That's all he could see more so now than ever before.

But more importantly, he lost the one person that Jinu finally found solace in - the one person who truly understood him - Rumi.

Everything gone because Gwi-Ma had tormented him beyond repair - threatening a further eternal life with those intrusive thoughts louder than he could possibly handle.

He was already at wits end as it was.

Now Gwi-Ma had him. Clutched his fiery claws into him. Jinu was once again the good little solider that Gwi-Ma needed.

Not even Derpy, Jinu's most loyal companion and best friend, could get through to him. Jinu had always cuddled Derpy, but now, Jinu simply stared ahead, lost in depressive thoughts. Completely broken.

For context, this is Jinu and Derpy before Jinu was tormented:

Jinu's little smile after he finishes petting Derpy lives rent free in my head:

Anyway, so Jinu is doing everything he is supposed to do for the Demon King after Gwi-Ma had tormented him (The Idol Awards, Your Idol etc) and victory looks all but guaranteed.

One small detail you might already know as quite a few people have pointed this out already but after the Your Idol sequence, Jinu is the only Saja Boy with his eyes open (well with Mystery we assume his are closed behind his hair alongside the other Saja Boys but its very likely considering the symbolism).

Jinu looks absolutely terrified. He is scared. He doesn't want to do this, but given the circumstances, he feels he has no choice.

So anyway, a wild Rumi appears from the shadows after jamming to Your Idol (lets be real, she could have entered the arena at any point but she chose the end of the song because its a banger) and suddenly, a showdown between Huntrix, Gwi-Ma and his demons occurs. (I phrase it like this because the demons are slaves to Gwi-Ma, its basically a hivemind.)

One thing to note is patterns can be used for Gwi-Ma to control his demons like puppets - we literally see this at the start of the film.

The flight attendant demon is forcibly tugged up to Gwi-Ma against her will using her patterns. Beforehand she is apprehensive to go to the demon king - she is scared. But he forcibly pulls her up before yelling at her for her so called failings before incinerating her.

This is not the only time we see this.

Whenever Jinu is pulled down to the underworld, his patterns rise quickly before he's tugged down.

Gwi-Ma can control demons through their patterns.

This is very important information going forward.

So the battle rages on and Rumi is dead set on saving Jinu - Jinu who has not moved to fight her even though that is what he was meant to do.

But Gwi-Ma is also aware that Jinu is powerless - he's still broken - standing before Gwi-Ma as if protecting him. (You can vaguely see his shadow in this screenshot.)

Jinu is completely helpless.

Not only had Gwi-Ma threatened to make his life a living hell, worse than it already was for the rest of eternity if he didn't comply, but he can literally use Jinu like a puppet through his patterns - Jinu couldn't help Rumi even if he wanted to.

Plus, Gwi-Ma is at his most powerful. Even as it stood, there was no way the girls could defeat Gwi-Ma in this state.

Jinu is mostly powerless - broken - but he also couldn't stand and watch as the woman he loved got killed by the devil he despised.

So while he was powerless - while he couldn't fight alongside her like he wanted to - he helped her the one way he could:

"Dive in the fire and I'll be right here by your side."

He might have been broken - powerless - but he was always going to defend Rumi.

Gwi-Ma was defeated at his own game.