Wicked For Good Reviewed

Oz looks brighter than ever—and yet the shadows feel longer. We pick up after a year-long wait and dive into Wicked For Good with fresh eyes, weighing how Elphaba’s defiance and Glinda’s sainthood collide in a finale that favors consequence over comfort. From the opening notes, the film signals a tonal pivot: fewer winks, more stakes; less glitter, more grit. That shift unlocks richer character work, with Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande delivering focused, emotionally tuned performances that carry the score without sacrificing story. Jeff Goldblum brings sly charm and menace to the Wizard, while Ethan Slater’s Boq and Nessa step into arcs that matter more in this half, rounding out a world that feels bruised but alive.

We get honest about what works and what grates. The vocals soar, choreography pops, and the adaptation keeps enough stage DNA to satisfy theater fans. But the new song No Place Like Home plants a very present-day political flag, trading allegory for lecture at a moment the narrative already makes its point. We unpack why that choice pulled some viewers out of Oz, and how it intersects with broader questions about art, message, and timing. We also address the much-talked-about love scene—brief, implied, and more suggestive than explicit—and share practical guidance for parents navigating the film’s darker tone, heightened peril, and whether a theatrical viewing is the right call.

Finally, we step back to rate the film and compare it to Part 1’s brighter pace and buoyant charm. Our verdict lands at 3.5 out of 5: a strong, well-acted conclusion with meaningful emotional beats, dulled slightly by a heavy-handed new number and occasional pacing drag. If Part 1 made you believe, this chapter asks what belief costs—and that question lingers after the credits. If you enjoy thoughtful film reviews, subscribe, share this episode with a friend, and leave a quick review to help more listeners find the show. What did you rate Wicked For Good? We want to hear it.

Follow us:

Facebook - Couch Critic Podcast

Instagram - @thecouchcriticpod

Chapters

• 0:00 Theme And Episode Setup
• 0:50 Plot Recap And Cast Highlights
• 2:24 First Impressions And Offscreen Drama
• 4:13 Performances And The New Political Song
• 7:00 Tone Shift, Content Concerns, And Kids
• 10:50 Final Verdict And Upcoming Plans
• 12:05 Listener Invite And Contact Info
• 12:21 Outro And Sign Off

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:09

Press play, it's a brand new day. We're diving deep in the films all the way. From classics to the ones you miss. Grab your stacks, you get the gist. It's cinema sunday off the couch, critics show. Where the story shine and the opinions flow. It's cinema sundae. Let the critics roll.

SPEAKER_00: 0:45

Hello everyone, and welcome to another cinema Sunday episode of The Couch Critics. I'm your host, Nathan, and on today's episode, I'm talking about Wicked for Good. This is the second part of the Wicked movie. I saw the first one last year, and then they did a year-long, I guess, intermission, and they brought back the second part. Before I can talk about my likes and dislikes of this movie, I have to go over the synopsis. After challenging the wizard's totalitarian regime in Oz, Elphaba must grapple with her identity as the Wicked Witch of the West. Meanwhile, the Wizard has given Glinda the title Glinda the Good and a public status as the nation's defender against Elphaba. The two witches must make decisions that seal their fates in this second musical installment. Wicked for Good stars once again Cynthia Irivo, Ariana Grande, Jeff Goldblum, Michelle Yao, Jonathan Bailey, Ethan Slater, Marissa Bode, and Coleman Domingo as the Cowardly Lion. I remember when they were teasing that, they said that once it was revealed who was going to be voicing the cowardly lion, that people would go crazy. And then they released that it was Coleman Domingo, and no one went crazy. Now I love Coleman Domingo. I think he's a fantastic actor. Sing Sing still to this day is one of my favorite movies of all time. But yeah, I wasn't going crazy when I found out that he was voicing the cowardly lion. So let's get right into my thoughts of this movie. I saw the first part, like I said, a year ago. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I'm a theater person. I thought they did a very good job at adapting the musical into a movie. I thought they did a great job. Then this part comes out, and we have to relive the really weird relationship between Cynthia and Ariana Grande, and you know, their tour or their their press tour. And they just come off as really weird people. And I don't know if it's because you know they Cynthia apparently admits that she considers herself a witch, like in real life, and you know, there's some talk about why that's kind of the weirdness between them and how Cynthia seems very controlling over Ariana Grande when you see them on videos and stuff. And so just their persona off-screen kind of made me almost not want to see this movie. And I told multiple people that. I thought the singing was phenomenal. I thought the performances were really good. I thought the the line delivery just the stakes were there. You cared about these characters, you've been invested in them for about a year now because you had to wait a year to see the second part of the story. And so I thought the performances were really, really well done. That being said, there were a few misses, and one of those big misses to me was the new song that they put in this movie called No Place Like Home. Obviously, this is a callback to The Wizard of Oz, where there's no place like home. But the song itself was obviously, and this was later confirmed by the original songwriter of Wicked, Steven Schwartz. He wrote this new song to basically talk about the political climate nowadays in America. And the lines leading up to this song were very obvious that they were talking about America and how there's still a hope for America, even though things are so dark right now and there's just no place like home, and we should fight for our home, even when people are just taking control and just ruining everything. And I gotta admit, I I rolled my eyes big time during this whole song. It was a big miss to me. It was very much, you know, them wanting to make a political statement. And and to me, I'm not saying that that theater isn't a place where you can make statements and messages. Obviously, that's done all the time, and movies do the same thing, but sometimes you just want to just watch a movie and be entertained. And there's already hitting context and agendas throughout the whole movie itself already. They didn't need to put a song in there that is blatantly political in the movie. That's just my opinion. And I wish my friend Mitch, I talked to Mitch about possibly recording this episode with me because he apparently had seen it two times. And that's the thing for me is I saw the the live theater production, I saw that two times, and to me, that's worth it to see it in the theater. But for these movies, they're kind of one and done for me, especially since I've already seen the show itself. That being said, as well, a lot of people's big complaint is that this second half of the show is a lot darker, and yes, it is. That's the whole point. This is when Alphaba fully embraces the wicked witch persona and does things that are wicked. And I think you have to know the show to understand why it's not as uh be lively and fun and cute and all this stuff as the first part. That's been a big complaint about people. Another big complaint is that there's a quote unquote love scene between Alphabet and Fiero. And apparently there's been people who have walked out because of this scene. Now, I will be the first to admit that if you know your kids and you don't you don't want your kids to see certain things, obviously, number one, do your research before you buy a ticket, before you go see a movie, and don't take your kid to the movie. I would not recommend the second half of Wicked to Kids anyway, because it is a match darker. It it has very somewhat scary elements to it. And so for that alone, I would say maybe just wait till you can watch it with them in the con comforts of your own home, and you're not in a theater with a surround sound system and bright lights and everything. Stay stay away from it if you know your kids and you know what your kids can handle. Okay. That being said, I guess that's my common phrase this episode. That being said, that being said, I don't think there was so much in there that it would justify walking out of out of the movie. I think they kiss a little bit, they don't there's nothing really sexual going on except you know, they show, I guess, the next day and they're laying in the bed together, but you don't see anything. I mean, I guess it suggested something happened, but other than that, but again, if you know your kids and you don't want your kids seeing anything, even hinting at something, then obviously, you know, you you make that judgment yourself. But I always am the person who will say, do your research about a movie before you go see it. That's why my wife and I are planning to eventually go to see Zootopia 2, which I've heard is fantastic. It's done well in the box office. But nowadays, we really want to do a better job at making sure that it's something our kids can eventually watch when it gets released somewhere else. And you just gotta be careful nowadays with what you would let your kids watch. And that's what I would say about this movie Wicked for Good. But yeah, I thought I thought the performances were great. I thought, yeah, just every single person was allowed to shine in this movie, which I thought was really cool. And yeah, it was just a it was it was a good time still. I still had a good time with it. I still think I like the first part better, which is the basic, you know, idea of most theater people. They like the first half of Wicked a lot better, the pacing is better, the character. I mean, even though I think Bach, the Ethan Slater who plays Bach, I thought his arc was really good in this movie, especially from the first one to this one. I think Nessa's character arc was good as well. And yeah, I just thought, again, I thought everyone was able to shine in this movie, which was fun to see. Jeff Goldblum is just, I think he's just a fun guy. And yeah, I just thought it was good. I thought it was a good movie. It wasn't great, it wasn't as it wasn't as good as the first part, but it was still a pretty solid movie. So I would give Wicked for Good a 3.5 out of five stars. It was a good movie, it wasn't as good as Wicked Part 1, but still, it made me have the same feeling that I would seeing in a live theater. So those are my thoughts on Wicked for Good. Next cinema Sunday. I'm trying to be good about watching the movies and theaters that I can, but my my schedule is just crazy busy. So I may be doing Zootopia 2. I may not, we'll see, but that is the goal. And then this Thursday on The Couch Critics, I'm doing Edward Scissor Hands because it was Thanksgiving last week, and I wasn't able to do it. And I'm also going to be reviewing Babes in Toyland. If you're listening to this and you want to join an episode, maybe you hear what I'm about to watch and you want to, you know, give your two cents, reach out to me on our email or on our social media. We have we're on Facebook, we're on Instagram, we're on TikTok, the Couch Critics Podcast. Just search that, you'll find it. And our email, I believe, is theCouchCritic at gmail.com, or it may be something completely different, like this, the CouchCritic25 at gmail.com. That is the email that you can reach out and I will respond if you want to join us on an episode. That'd be awesome because we're always looking for new couch critics on the couch critics podcast, where every movie gets its close up.

SPEAKER_01: 12:21

It's a sunday with a beginning. The couch critics who's got that. It's a sunday, it's been line and smart.