When Jon M. Chu first introduced that his big-screen Depraved adaptation can be cut up into two components, there was concern about whether or not the unique musical’s second act may very well be normal into a totally fleshed-out film. In comparison with the stage present’s prolonged first act, the place all of the musical’s most recognizable songs are front-loaded, the second act is shorter and strikes at a a lot quicker tempo whereas choosing up after an enormous time leap. It was straightforward to think about Depraved: Half Two (the original title) being too disorienting and frenetic to work as a standalone function. However Wicked: For Good proves that Common made the fitting name by giving this epic fantasy extra space to breathe and actually dig into what makes its characters tick.
Although it will have been comprehensible if Depraved: For Good instantly tried to fill you in on the earlier movie’s occasions, the brand new film as an alternative drops you proper again into Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and Glinda’s (Ariana Grande) story 5 years after the previous roommates’ final encounter. Because of the Wizard’s (Jeff Goldblum) newly appointed press secretary Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh), virtually everybody in Oz has been satisfied that there’s a murderous wickedness inside Elphaba that makes her a singular menace to the whole nation.
Other than Glinda and her now-fiance Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey), the Depraved Witch of the West™ propaganda is simple for individuals to imagine as a result of they’ve all seen her cackling up within the sky whereas using her broomstick and terrorizing Oz’s gun-toting troopers. However what most humanoid Ozians fail to comprehend is that, whereas Elphaba has been busy inflicting mayhem and hiding out within the woods like an evil hag, it has all been a part of her one-woman campaign to free the nation’s inhabitants of sentient Animals.
Although Depraved: For Good builds on its predecessor’s luxurious fairy-tale appears to be like, it tells a a lot darker, politically charged story about revolution and the facility of notion. Elphaba sees herself within the Animals who’ve been enslaved for being too sensible for their very own good and compelled into lives of servitude. It pains her to see them constructing the Yellow Brick Highway she helped conceptualize, however what hurts much more deeply is how lots of the Animals, like a sure cowardly lion (Colman Domingo), see her as simply one other two-legged Ozian who will solely carry them extra ache and struggling.
Although lots of Depraved: For Good’s beats are pulled from the stage present, it typically looks like screenwriters Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox are channeling the thorny power of Gregory Maguire’s Depraved novel to color an image of Oz that resembles the US in 2025. Among the film’s strongest moments concentrate on the concept petty tyrants depend on stoking concern and hatred of individuals marked as others. Scenes of humanoid troopers chasing Animals from their houses underneath the pretense of preserving Oz protected instantly evoke photographs of ICE brokers descending upon immigrant communities. The Wizard and Morrible’s bigotry is targeted on Animals for some time, nevertheless it isn’t lengthy earlier than their invective begins negatively impacting Munchkinlanders like Boq (Ethan Slater) and Elphaba’s sister Nessarose (Marissa Bode).
Depraved: For Good balances the heaviness of its political commentary with a wholesome dose of intelligent humor that comes by means of its nods to the unique Wizard of Oz’s story. A magical twister introduces a brand new model of Dorothy Gale (Bethany Weaver), however her presence in Oz is continuously performed for laughs as characters touch upon how the overseas lady all the time appears to be butting her nostril into different individuals’s enterprise. The way in which Dorothy, her little canine, and their new crew of mates are virtually all the time shot from behind or simply leaving scenes as they open are among the film’s greatest operating gags. They work as allusions to how The Wizard of Oz’s story ends, but in addition to remind you that Depraved isn’t actually about them.
As soon as once more, Erivo is a dramatic and musical power as she inhabits Elphaba with a extra dynamic power reflective of her embracing her Depraved Witch id. However in comparison with the primary movie, Depraved: For Good spends far more time with Grande’s evolving Glinda, who struggles with the information of how cursed her newfound fame because the Wizard’s most popular “witch” is.
Even when Glinda and Elphaba are locked in a ridiculous slap struggle, Grande and Erivo are electrifying collectively in a method that completely sells Depraved: For Good as a nuanced love story about two ladies who’ve reworked each other. The film brings their tales to a detailed with the pitch-perfect poetry stage musicals stay and die by — and regardless of being unfold throughout two movies, that story by no means overstays its welcome.
Depraved: For Good additionally stars Bowen Yang, Bronwyn James, Sharon D. Clarke, Dee Bradley Baker, and Scarlett Spears. The film hits theaters on November twenty first.