canât stop thinking about the girl in the bubble like i understand if you Do Not like it but as a lifelong glinda stan it is sooo personal #me like having glinda canonically and explicitly acknowledge that she has spent her whole life persistently devaluing her own personhood in favor of survival through performance killed me.
it starts with âlook, thereâs that beautiful girl!â and i feel like the choice of having her sing in third person implies she herself views her public persona as basically another person, separate from her true self, the one she had to bury to keep safe.
âall thatâs required / to live in a dream / is endlessly closing your eyesâ shows that she knows that in order for her comfort to feelâŚwell, comfortable, she has to turn away to the harsh reality that sheâs actively participating in. sheâs living the life she always dreamed ofâ revered, admired, powerfulâ but it requires her to turn a blind eye to the injustice happening around herâ and she does. sheâs admitting her comfort is the product of sacrificing others and she makes the choice anyway.
âshe spins such beautiful stories / to sing her to sleep / full of magic and glory and loveâ is an admission of using manipulation tactics not just on others, but on herself. she believes if her narrative can frame her as good, loved, adored, then she can avoid her complicity in the system.
âsheâs the girl in the bubble / the bright shiny bubble / blissfully floating alongâ reimagines the bubble image entirely. glindaâs bubble is often a symbol of her power, goodness, and privilege, but the language here prove itâs also a byproduct of her actionsâ her distance from herself and others, her her disconnection from reality, and the consequences of her complicity. the bubble is âblindingly floating alongâ which keeps her untouched and unharmed while every one else suffers.
âbut the truth has a way / of seeping on in / beneath the surface and sheenâ acknowledges that no matter how much she wants to continue her facade and deny that her involvement with the wizard and morrible is dangerous, the truth of the situation is that she canât hide from the truth forever and ignorance can only happen for so long.
âand as blind as you try to be / eventually / itâs hard to unsee what youâve seenâ this is such a powerful, irreversible realization that glinda has. sheâs finally seen and understood the impact the wizardâs fascism has, not just on Oz but on elphaba and herself, and she canât un-realize that. this is the death of her own ignorance and her finally seeing how she was never innocent.
this, of course, spikes an identity crisis among herself. now she must ask, âif she comes down from the sky / gives the real world a try / who in the world is she now?â her entire life has been built on public perception and social acceptance, but if she denounces the system sheâs been upholding, she risks losing her âgoodnessâ (because her being good was entirely relational to the perception from the ozians), her comfort/security, and even herself. itâs terrifying for her.
she acknowledges that this is an incredibly difficult decision. âand though so much of her wishes / she could float on / and the beautiful lies never stopâ part of her wants to continue on with the facade and deception, not because sheâs a bad person but because itâs the only safety and form of protection she knows. however, she also wants to know how it feels to be authentic and moral and truly âgood.â
âisnât it high time / for her bubble to popâ her wanting to be held accountable for everything even if sheâs unsure of what it means going forward.
the song is such a love letter to glindaâs old self and almost a goodbye song to her old self aswell, and i just love it so much. i understand a lot of people donât like GITB but for me i just think every lyric is meaningful and so juicy and perfect for glindaâs arc in act 2
