Wicked: For Good is now in theaters and while the film is an adaptation of the beloved Broadway musical Wicked, the epic two-part film still managed to throw in some surprises for fans. Jon M. Chu’s film delivered some new songs and some new details, expanding on the stage production in rich and colorful new ways. One of the biggest changes, however, is the film’s conclusion. While Glinda (Ariana Grande) spends the majority of both Wicked and Wicked: For Good without any magical abilities — something that is noted in specifically a few times in the second film — at the end, the Grimmerie opens up for her. Now, fans have solved the mystery of what exactly the Grimmerie reveals and it changes absolutely everything.
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Spoilers for Wicked: For Good beyond this point! At the end of Wicked: For Good, Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) gives Glinda the Grimmerie, telling her everything is going to be alright before facing Dorothy and being “melted” as a hidden Glinda watches in horror. Elphaba, who is not actually dead, later departs Oz with Fiyero, though as she crosses the Deadly Desert, she turns back to look at Oz one last time. At the same time, Glinda takes the Grimmerie and goes to the tower where things really truly began for her and Elphaba. As she sings the reprise of “For Good” the Grimmerie suddenly opens and glows for her, landing on a very specific spell featuring two golden hands.
What Does the Grimmerie’s Spell Mean?
The Grimmerie opening for Glinda was already a powerful moment to end the movie on. Glinda had no magical powers in the film and the Grimmerie had previously only worked for Elphaba so the moment left things open to interpretation — perhaps Glinda had finally earned her magic and had truly become “good” or perhaps Elphaba had somehow gifted magic to her. However, it turns out that there is real meaning to the spell that the book opens to and it’s something that fans have figured out, thanks to a combination of the AMC popcorn bucket for Wicked: For Good and the translation key provided by Universal.
A user on X (via Entertainment Weekly) discovered that the AMC popcorn tin for Wicked: For Good, which is of the Grimmerie, features the same pages that are shown in the movie. If you apply the translation key from the Universal website (which you can find here) to the pages, you get a spell that is geared towards mending pain and soothing fear. The left page reads: “Heal, mend, sinew and skin. Heal, mend and hasten. Feel the wound, cover the bone. Heal mend and revive. Pan and fear allayed when true magic applied.” The right page reads: “Heal. Revive. Nature so willing be soothing, powers conspire from me. Mend. Mending deftly to the wound. Easing quickly soon ensures. Fear and pain now set aside.”
There are a wide range of ways that spell can be taken, and they all have major impact on the ending of Wicked: For Good. As viewers now, while the movie has a somewhat happy ending — Elphaba is able to leave with Fiyero, Glinda restores the animals, the Wizard and Madame Morrible are defeated — there is still a lot of hurt and damage left behind. The Grimmerie opening to this page for Glinda implies that she now has the tools to help heal and repair Oz and help bring it to a true state of glory and peace. There’s also a deeper meaning one can infer, something a bit more personal. For Glinda, she has been on a journey of self. Her whole life has been one of her trying to find meaning. The flashback we get of her as a child reveals that all she has ever wanted is to be a witch and perform magic, but she’s never had the ability. Instead, she’s covered up for that lacking with beauty and superficial things and it’s only through her journey with Elphaba that she’s come into a deeper self. She’s also just lost her best friend, the first and only person who really saw and understood her. She is now embarking on her most challenging chapter utterly alone. The Grimmerie opening to that specific spell is, in a sense, Elphaba giving her friend one last gift: the gift of peace and healing and hope as she starts out her new life. She finally gets a chance to be truly good.
Wicked: For Good is in theaters now.
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