I’ve been turning this over in my head for days . The audacity, the heart, the sheer ambition of Wicked: For Good, and after reading Jon M. Chu’s full interview via Deadline on how this breathtaking sequel took flight, I can’t help but feel like I just watched a miracle being built.
This isn’t just another follow-up. It’s a reinvention, a deepening, a reckoning. Chu wasn’t content to simply replicate the first film’s magic. He doubled down on risk, on emotional truth, and on carving new space for these characters to grow, particularly for Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and Glinda (Ariana Grande).
One of the boldest moves in Wicked: For Good is the insertion of two brand-new songs, rather than just rehashing or reordering the existing catalog. Chu explained that the storytelling demanded them. Elphaba’s song: “No Place Like Home” (co-written with Erivo) and Glinda’s song: “The Girl in the Bubble”. These aren’t decorative. Chu frames them as existential probes: What is home? What happens when you realise the place you came to defend never really wanted you?
Cynthia Erivo has teased just how emotional “No Place Like Home” is to the extent that when she and the crew recorded it, there were tears on set. Her responsibility was enormous. To take a phrase that already carries weight in Oz lore (“there’s no place like home”), make it hers, but more than that, make it resonate with her Elphaba’s journey.
On the other side, Grande’s “Girl in the Bubble” is a turning point for Glinda. Shedding the illusion, letting go of privilege, owning her role in changing Oz. Chu makes clear that Glinda ultimately has to “pop her own bubble.” By refusing to let the sequel skate by on nostalgia, Chu and his team signal that Wicked: For Good is stronger when it reaches higher.
One of the juiciest revelations in the interview is when, Chu quietly called Erivo and Grande back to London for reshoots of the film’s ending. He says the original grand finale surrounded by sweeping Oz vistas and big set pieces, never felt emotionally grounded. So they stripped it back. “Let them drive,” he says. In other words, the spectacle had to give way to intimacy. In one version, they had cranes and wide shots. But in its final form, the ending leans on the emotional gravity between the two leads. That choice, in itself, is a statement. The story is no longer about Oz’s fantasy, it’s about the fractures, the betrayals, the longing and then, the reconciliation. And if you think that’s all, Chu also reportedly slipped in a secret guest star cameo as the Cowardly Lion. (Yes, the Cowardly Lion.) That bit of fun doesn’t undercut the weight, but it adds a wink to fans.
If I had to sum up what Chu is doing here, I’d say, he’s daring Wicked: For Good to be more than a musical sequel. He’s bending it toward mythology. He’s asking us to feel, to question, to wrestle with the darker undercurrents of power, belonging, and identity. We’ll see Elphaba pushed to reckon with whether she belongs in the land she’s vowed to save. We’ll watch Glinda confront the limits of her privilege and what it really means to earn goodness. And we’ll get a chance to feel new emotional arcs not just through familiar songs, but freshly forged ones.
When November 21 rolls around, I want audiences to walk out changed. I want them to hum “No Place Like Home” on the drive home. I want them to look at each other, and say: “Yeah… that landed.”
