Stop your journey down the yellow brick road if you don’t know the full story of “Wicked” yet – there are spoilers ahead!

When we first meet Galinda Upland – played by pop star and actress Ariana Grande-Butera – in Jon M. Chu’s epic musical adaptation “Wicked: Part One,” she is a new student at the University of Shiz who is desperate to prove herself, especially to the students at school. Doyenne of witchcraft Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh). There’s just one problem: Galinda doesn’t have a particularly strong natural penchant for witchcraft or witchcraft, and to make matters worse, her new roommate, green-skinned Elphaba Thropp (Cynthia Erivo), do possess an innate affinity for the magical arts.

So what’s the problem here? Why Galinda, who eventually changed her name to Glinda (in honor of Peter Dinklage’s Professor Shiz, Doctor Dillamond), a goat who has problems with the “uh” sound and is ousted when Oz cruelly cracks down on animals in the society), a naturally talented witch – and at this point, how does someone who seemingly can’t do magic become known as Glinda the Good Witch? (At the beginning of “Wicked: Part One,” we see the very end of the entire story, where Glinda presides over a group of Ozians celebrating the apparent death of Elphaba, the “Wicked Witch of the West”. Is Glinda really learning to do magic or is it just a clever illusion? Here’s why Glinda has trouble performing spells in the musical “Wicked” and its film adaptations, and whether or not that changes. (The answer, simply put, is “maybe.”)

Early on in “Wicked: Part One”, we see Glinda – in the role of the Good Witch later in the timeline – “performing” some magic in “No One Mourns the Wicked”, but based on her stay at Shiz University, a young Galinda definitely has no affinity for witchcraft. Elphaba constantly casts spells and enchantments without meaning to, making it clear to Madame Morrible that she is an extremely talented witch… but Galinda is stuck. begging the doyenne of witchcraft for a place in one of his classes (boasting about his article on wands and whether or not they “are right” to try to force their way into the seminary, this which is certainly very funny). In gratitude for “helping” Elphaba’s younger sister, Nessarose (Marissa Bode), pursue Boq Woodsman (Ethan Slater), Elphaba convinces Madame Morrible to allow Galinda to study with them…and when Galinda realizes this, she stops trying to humiliate Elphaba in public. , and the two quickly become friends.

The most telling moment in “Wicked: Part One,” regarding Galinda’s inherent magical abilities, occurs just before Ariana Grande-Butera’s show-stopping number “Popular,” when Galinda informs Elphaba that she will be using her wand to change the face of the green witch. “frock coat” or “coat” (which Galinda then calls “froat”) in a different garment. Galinda’s attempts to cast spells are played for laughs, but this sequence also betrays a simple truth: Galinda doesn’t seem to be capable of magic.

So is there some sort of explanation as to Why Galinda doesn’t seem to have any natural magical powers? Yes, but it’s in a deleted scene! During the digital release of “Wicked,” fans got to see a whole bunch of deleted scenes, including one that explains Galinda’s close friendship with Pfannee (Bowen Yang) and ShenShen (Bronwyn James) and another in which Elphaba and Boq have a little heart. -heart about unrequited love (Boq carries the torch for Galinda, while Elphaba is in love with Galinda’s boyfriend, Prince Fiyero Tigelaar, played by Jonathan Bailey). But the one we focus on, This is the one where Elphaba explains to Galinda why she probably doesn’t have an innate way to control magic..

After Elphaba and Fiyero save a lion cub from becoming a test subject for horrible experiments in Shiz, Elphaba returns to her room to find Galinda trying to perform a basic flotation spell, only for Galinda to ask why the magic is so hard for her. Elphaba shares a theory that Galinda’s life of privilege has been easy…which makes it harder for her to access her potential magical powers. After that, Galinda told her friend that she would have helped with the lion cub in Fiyero’s place, thus strengthening their friendship. And Galinda’s kind, caring side… and Elphaba tells her friend, “I won’t leave you behind again.” (Unfortunately, that’s not true, but Elphaba doesn’t really know that yet.)

At the end of “Wicked: Part One” — which ends with Elphaba’s power ballad “Defying Gravity,” marking the same ending point of the musical’s first act — Elphaba do leaving Glinda (without the “uh”) behind, largely because Madame Morrible and the Wizard of Oz (a perfectly irreverent Jeff Goldblum) are hot on their heels after Elphaba makes several disturbing discoveries about the wizard. (In no particular order, these discoveries include that the wizard is a fraud who cannot read the magical book known as Grimmerie, that he wants to use Elphaba to do nefarious magic, and that he believes in subjugation talking animals.) Elphaba creates a flying broom and escapes Madame Morrible and the wizard, leaving Glinda to fend for herself; as we see in “Nobody Mourns for Bad Guys”, Glinda becomes the spokesperson for the wizard’s evil regime, “celebrating” her friend’s death (although Ariana Grande-Butera’s performance includes some excellent moments where we see flashes of his inner conflict).

So does all this mean that in “Wicked: For Good” — the second “Wicked” film, named after the emotional duo of Elphaba and Galinda — we will see Glinda do real magic? This remains to be determined; Glinda will spend the second half of the narrative largely “at odds” with Elphaba for political reasons before diving into her seemingly magical pink bubble to save the day at the very end (assuming “For Good” follows the musical ” Wicked” (as did “Part One”) and arresting Madame Morrible and the Wizard for being huge assholes. Wait, let’s talk about that pink bubble for a second.

The Sorcerer’s Case in “Wicked” And the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz” boils down to the fact that, in all versions of this familiar story, he is a giant imposter. He is not an all-powerful, all-seeing magical being; he’s just a dude from Nebraska who doesn’t know how to do magic. (By the way, that’s no offense to Nebraska; he’s just lying about it while he’s also lying about his ability to do magic.) With that in mind, think of Glinda’s “magical” floating pink bubble, which serves as her primary means of transportation. Is this really magic created by his big, flashy magic wand or is it a ruse?

It could very well be that this is the last solution. When Glinda arrives in Munchkinland as news spreads that the Wicked Witch of the West is no more, she repeatedly “bursts” and “undoes” her (apparently soundproof?) bubble so she can speak to the Munchkin. However, given that the wizard – while decidedly non-magical – is a very astute inventor, he certainly could have designed a mechanically operated flying bubble for Glinda to use. It is also seems as if she were pressing a button to “pop” and “undo” the thing, which might be another clue that neither the wizard nor Glinda are actually magical, and that the citizens of Oz should pay more attention to the man behind the curtain… or the woman in the bubble, so to speak.

“Wicked: Part One,” in which Glinda doesn’t do any real magic that we know of, is now available to rent or buy on major streaming platforms. “Wicked: For Good” is currently scheduled to hit theaters on November 21, 2025.