I think one of my favorite parts of the new wicked movie is how "dancing through life" shows the problem I have with pride as a concept.
When Fiyero is singing it, he's not being proud. He's just living his life! Being happy! Having fun! He's just some guy, he gets to dance through life, doesn't he? Nobody would have a PROBLEM with him dancing through life, it's just how he's supposed to do it! He doesn't have to defy anything, he doesn't need to stand his ground. He gets to just be a person.
But Elphaba doesn't.
She doesn't get to just be happy, or just be deserving of respect, or, for that matter, just BE. So she needs to try, over and over. And over. She needs to approach people every single time, see if this time, they'll let her be a person. And the night before the club, she just had Glinda show her two gestures of friendship- with Nessa and the hat. So she got to think, will I get to be one of them for once? And she came to the club, to dance, just like everyone- but nope, still not a human. They laugh at the freak, the green freak with the pointy hat. So she has to be proud. She'll put her hat down on the floor and make up a dance for it. She'll put the most upsetting parts of herself on full display as an act of defiance, she'll spin for all those people like a preformence because that's what they turned her onto. Might as well make the best out of it, might as well be everything they hate her for, might as well dance in the ten-feet circle of repellency that her essence seems to project and let them watch, if her dancing at the club is something to gawk at, then let them gawk! If that's what they make her into, then that is what she'll be! She's not gonna cry, or run, or stutter, she'll dance! This is her war.
But then Glinda comes and dances with her, and you can see her pride melting away. As she finally gets a friend, finally gets to put down her guard, finally gets to be accepted. She doesn't have to be proud. If she can be accepted, if she can be safe, then she won't have to fight anymore. She, too, can dance through life.
And in a way, that's true. You can see how throughout the movie, she stops directing her anger at everyone who looks at her wrong, because she comes to terms with the fact that she CAN find people who love her. It doesn't need to BE about her. Society has fundamental problems that need to be fixed. Cruelty and pain are symptoms, not the essence of the problem. She needs to defy the very gravity keeping her down.
The specific word choice in the refrain being "as long as you're mine" works so well because you really can feel that these are two characters who have been forced apart for years finally getting to be together and express their emotions verbally and physically.
You can feel Elphaba's joy and relief that, after all the heartbreak and rejection she's been through, she is able to say that the person she loves is hers and have him say that she's his. To have him make it clear that that's all he wants too. That they finally get to belong to each other, not in terms of ownership or control, but I'm terms of finally being at a place where they can give and recieve love freely and take care of each other as seen when they both end up saving the other's life later.
CYNTHIA ERIVO AS ELPHABA THROPP WICKED: PART ONE (2024) dir. John M. Chu
HER BEST AND ONLY FRIEND HAS JUST DIED
— Ariana Grande, on Glinda the Good
Jonathan Bailey as Fiyero in 'Wicked: Meet Fiyero' Featurette [x]
i think the wicked fandom as a whole discounts fiyeraba far too much in favor of gelphie.
this isn’t to hate on gelphie at all, i personally don’t ship them and i hc glinda as aromantic, but i respect the ship and i see where people are coming from. however, said people (from what i’ve seen) tend to ignore all of what makes fiyeraba so good and ship gelphie instead.
fiyero, the prince, chose elphaba over everything. his status, glinda, etc., all for this green-skinned girl who the wizard and everyone else is framing as a villain. who he never looked at any differently because of her skin color, who he never saw as anything but who she was.
glinda does love elphaba, but she would never sacrifice all that fiyero did. glinda cares too much about how other people see her to be able to choose elphaba, which is why they never would have worked. their priorities are far too different, but fiyero fits with elphaba perfectly.
Wicked: Part One (2024) dir. Jon M. Chu
excalibur :)
I hope you are thinking pure thoughts, considering we are returning to our family home. I am simply enjoying the view of my ravishing wife and soon-to-be mother of my child.
this scene was a standout for me and unexpectedly very moving. Nasha fiercely recognised Mickey’s humanity. Something that he’d been alienated from by his role as an ‘expendable’. After every death and reprinting Mickey was met with either cold indifference or the type of curiosity afforded to a lab rat. Mickey’s deaths were played as flippant and humorous till we saw how horrific and torturous they’d been. He would die and be reprinted repeatedly but she knew he held the memories of every death. Even though there was nothing she could do to stop this death, she did what you do when someone you love is dying, she comforted him. She got right in there with him to witness it so he didn’t have to die and remember this one alone
JONATHAN BAILEY as FIYERO in WICKED (2024) dir. Jon M. Chu