The Land Beyond Oz: What Happens After the Ending of Wicked: For Good

Wicked: For Good is finally in theaters, delivering to viewers the final half of Hollywood’s adaptation of the beloved musical, Wicked, that they’ve eagerly been waiting for. The movie wraps up the story of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West and stays true to the musical in how it closes out the epic tale, but with Elphaba’s story told, fans have plenty of questions about what comes next. Fortunately, we can answer those questions — both from the perspective of L. Frank Baum’s original Oz books and Gregory Maguire’s novels as well.

Warning: Spoilers for Wicked: For Good beyond this point.

In Wicked: For Good, Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) decides to embrace her wicked reputation, capturing Dorothy over the matter of Nessarose’s shoes much like what happens in The Wizard of Oz. However, Glinda (Ariana Grande), having finally come to realize that she needs to do what is right, stops Elphaba, warning her that a mob is coming to kill her. Seeing the situation clearly, Elphaba decides to surrender. After an emotional goodbye, Glinda watches from a hiding place as Dorothy throws a bucket of water on Elphaba, melting her.

However, while it appears that Elphaba is dead, that is actually not the case. While Glinda, believing her friend is dead, sets out to deal with the Wizard, it’s revealed that Elphaba actually faked her own death. She’s found by Fiyero, who has been turned into a scarecrow, and the pair leave Oz together, crossing into a desert in the Land Beyond Oz.

What’s Next For Elphaba and Oz After Wicked: For Good?

While Elphaba and Fiyero heading out on a journey beyond Oz is how Wicked the musical and Wicked: For Good ends, unfortunately that is not how Elphaba’s story actually ends in Maguire’s novel, Wicked. The novel actually tells a lot more of Elphaba’s story. It is also much darker. In Wicked, Fiyero and Elphaba do not get a happy ending. Elphaba and a married Fiyero actually have an affair, which results in Elphaba having his son, Liir. Fiyero and Elphaba are never reunited after he’s captured by the Wizard’s secret police. It’s also not Glinda who warns Elphaba of an impending mob. Instead, Dorothy arrives at Kiamo Ko castle and tells Elphaba she was sent by the Wizard but wants to apologize for having killed Nessarose. Infuriated, Elphaba accidentally sets her skirt on fire and Dorothy, trying to save her from burning to death, throws water on her. Unfortunately, in the book Elphaba actually is allergic to water and she melts away, dying.

If Wicked: For Good followed Maguire’s book, there would be no “what’s next” for Elphaba, but Oz’s story is far from over. While Elphaba dies, Dorothy is the one who goes to the Wizard with the green bottle that causes him to recognize that Elphaba was his daughter. The Wizard ends up fleeing the Emerald City before a coup can overthrow him and as the novel ends, Oz is in chaos thanks to how things transpired. To put it bluntly, there is no happy ending or even a hopeful one.

What About The Land Beyond Oz?

One thing that Wicked: For Good does that is interesting is that it depicts The Land Beyond Oz and specifically gives us a look at something called the Deadly Desert. Functionally, the Deadly Desert is a simple literary device that explains why Oz is cut off from the world and other countries in its lore and for the first two books in Baum’s series, it’s mostly just a place that exists. However, the third book, Ozma of Oz, fleshes out the Deadly Desert as a place with noxious fumes and life-destroying sands, making it very much a no-man’s land that is so dangerous that even powerful magic cannot be used to cross it. That said, children from the “real world” like Dorothy have made it across (thanks to the magic Silver Shoes), the Wizard crossed it in his hot air balloon, the evil Nome King managed it by digging a tunnel, and even Princess Ozma, child ruler of Oz, made it across to the neighboring Land of Ev by using an infinitely unrolling carpet made by Glinda for that purpose.

There Is No Easy “What’s Next?” After Wicked: For Good

Because Wicked: For Good is an adaptation of the musical and that musical deviates greatly from Maguire’s Wicked novel and because Baum’s original Wizard of Oz books are their own stories entirely, there really isn’t an easy answer for what happens next. While there is certainly opportunity to create a new story that would explore Glinda’s efforts in Oz and what a life beyond looks like for Elphaba and Fiyero, it’s something that would need to be created fresh, perhaps taking some inspiration from Maguire’s sequel to Wicked, Son of a Witch, that follows Elphaba and Fiyero’s son’s story. That story in particular gets into the political upheaval and social change Oz undergoes after the Wizard’s abdication. It is in turn followed by a book telling the story from the perspective of the Lion, and then, one told about Elphaba’s granddaughter, Rain, all of them that dig into the civil war and depression that befalls the Land of Oz after the events of Wicked.

Given that Maguire’s novels are much darker than the musical — and that Wicked definitively ends with Elphaba’s death — the ending of Wicked: For Good may be better left to stand exactly as it is, giving fans a chance to decide for themselves what happens in the land beyond Oz.

Wicked: For Good is in theaters now.

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