“Can I call you Elphie?”

This is what I mean. This is like the first article that comes up when you search “ariana grande races” but I think it’s interesting that it’s an article by a white woman but everyone was doing that. But she doesn’t naturally look like that either. There’s already a significant amount of alteration to her hair color and texture and brows and possibly her hairline to get her from this

#and they were just roommates

and i know #some people like to pretend that galinda's comments during popular are proof that she's a horrible toxic friend but ultimately "you're beautiful" and "you can do anything" had much more of an impact on elphaba than offhand song lyrics that clearly don't bother her. elphaba also makes it clear from their first meeting that she's not going to tolerate glinda's bs or accept scraps of performative goodness. i'm sure they both still have their insecurities and issues with the other person post-ozdust, but this isn't like jackieshauna where their insecurities and repressed homosexual lust are eroding both of them and their relationship even before being thrown into the canadian wilderness. had everything with the wizard not happened they probably would've figured things out and gotten together and been a happy loving couple

and i don't even think act ii/post-canon gelphie really falls into toxic yuri category even though glinda gets elphaba's sister killed by a house. cuz you can imagine a rhaenicent kind of situation where it's like "i will always long the past when things were simple between us but the sheer amount of pain and hurt you've caused me and my family is too much for me to move past" but gelphie literally have a whole song where they forgive each other and the fascist government is defeated with the power of their love and by them coming together. the resolution of the story requires them uniting, and even though they have to part the story makes clear their love for each other is still there, tethering them. and ig you could call that toxic codependency and it probably is but that kind of ignores framing and the wider themes the story is trying to impart

obviously there's conflict because there needs to be conflict in a story and they severely hurt each other, but ultimately gelphie's relationship is about forgiveness, understanding, unconditional love, and how the people around you can change your life forever and make you better. calling gelphie toxic yuri doesn't work in my mind because by the end most of their negative traits/insecurities are resolved because of their love for each other. once the dust of the story has settled it's hard to imagine them having a relationship that's more corrosive and harmful than uplifting and beneficial, which differentiates them from what i would consider true toxic yuri. calling it toxic yuri would be like calling pride and prejudice a toxic relationship because darcy is a dick to elizabeth and dissuades bingley from marrying jane and miss the part where he specifically gets better cuz of his love for elizabeth

yeah ig i see why some people think gelphie is one-sided or that glinda loves elphaba more than elphaba loves glinda but i personally don't agree and rebuke that energy

this is the elphaba who threatened to drop out of college for galinda before they even really became friends. the elphaba who looked at galinda like this when she called her beautiful

movie elphaba saw the "i hope you get your heart's desire" note and immediately asked glinda to come with her to the emerald city. she kept that note for all the intermission and was borderline hallucinating her and glinda in that poppy field. the same elphaba who couldn't resist flying to glinda's balcony on the night of her wedding just because she missed her so much, who was ready to give up all of her morals for the chance to be with her again

i think most of the "gelphie is one-sided" takes come from the fact that elphaba didn't tell glinda she was alive, but personally i see this as her greatest act of love. a lot of people interpret it as her "choosing" fiyero, which i find really dumb and male-centered because she would've made the same choice whether or not straw boy was in the picture

like by the time of kiamo ko elphaba has just watched most of her loved ones die horribly and has crippling guilt over that because she believes it's her fault. and here comes glinda offering to throw herself in front of a mob for elphie. and elphaba's can't bear the thought of glinda getting hurt because of her

elphaba knows atp glinda won't let the lies and demonization continue and would do anything in her power to try and save elphaba. but after losing most everyone else, elphaba can't let that happen to glinda, and she can't bear the thought of glinda ruining her life on her behalf. so she fakes her death so that glinda can't make that choice, and so that glinda can live a happy life in oz doing the good that elphaba couldn't

she also gave her bf glinda's eyes cuz fiyero's eyes are blue until the scarecrow transformation, where they turn brown. and he's talking about "seeing through different eyes" and later elphaba tells glinda "look at me. not with your eyes--with theirs" implying glinda's eyes are the eyes that see her as beautiful