DVDizzy Forum

As a prequel of "Wizard of Oz" (as in general), which story do you prefer?
Please do not vote unless you watched both of them.

Oz: The Great & Powerful.

Wicked felt gimmicky to me. The character of Glinda is poorly written. I don't sympathize with her because to me, there's no visible moment of change. She was a bitch and she stayed one in my opinion. And I didn't care about the love story either.

But the worst violation of Wicked was the music (yes, bite me). With the notable and obvious exception of the gloriously amazing 'Defying Gravity', every song in Wicked is completely unmemorable. I've seen the show and listened to the soundtrack a few times, and none of the songs stick with me. I just forget them instantly. And considering how beautiful and iconic the 1939 film's music is, this is a difficult flaw to overlook. Even the abominable 'The Wiz' managed to crank out a few good tunes. And that thing was truly stupid.

While Oz: The Great and Powerful was far from perfect, it was the best Oz adaptation since 1939. And considering the competition, that's not very impressive.

I actually like both, but to me Wicked is just a little bit better. This is mostly because I like the character development of the Wicked Witch in Wicked, Elphaba, more. I also like the idea that Glinda and the Wicked Witch were once friends and the overall message of the show more.

Also, unlike PatrickvD, I love the music. I can see, however, why one might not like it.

Oz: the Great and Powerful, to me, was a really good adventure movie, but I found there was almost no character development, except for the wizard. I found it made no sense for Theodora to turn so evil.

Wicked for me. Oz The Great and Powerful was simply awful.

I like Oz, but I haven' t seen Wicked because the musical isn't near me. I would see a Wicked movie if it came to theatres

There is no comparison. Wicked is the better prequel. For one thing, it has time to develop and tell a wider scope of story and character development. The main character, Elphaba the Witch of the West, goes on a long journey from being a smart, quirky girl who becomes confused and conflicted about love, power, and her own dreams and goals, and has to learn how to deal with all of them and then decides to take a role of wickedness cast on her to accept fate and save people she loves. While Theodora falls in chemsitry-less love in a day and gets heartbroken the next, then takes an easy way out to get over it. At least Elphaba took time to fall in love!

Then more character development comes in the form of Glinda in Wicked who starts out not as an outright bitch but a girl who truly thinks she's doing some good for people while trying to always get what she wants. Then she feels badly about seeing "the good" she did hurting someone so she stands by that person as their friend and tries to teach what she thinks is good help her friend. She later becomes conflicted about the right thing to do when it comes to ruling a land and living her dream and when she gets what she wants she's still saddened as she realizes that doesn't always make everything good. In the end she resolves to try and be a better person like she thought her friend was. The Glinda in Oz the Great and Powerful...was wise and fell in love with a guy. And was a good battler.

Then of course in Wicked there's Fiyero who goes from thinking and teaching nothing matters to thinking life does matter and tries to be smarter and more of a good person, Boq who goes from loving a girl and serving someone else out of his love to becoming a witch hunter, Nessarose who goes from loving a man who doesn't want her to becoming wicked in casting a spell to serve her own self, and the Wizard sings a song about how he thinks what he's doing is right. James Franco does become a better person and has character development but his acting sucked so that knocks that down some points.

Wicked just has a bigger, longer, more serious and layered story, too. The tale of a girl disdained from birth who met a girl who at first hated her but then became her friend as she grew from an inquisitive young woman to a powerful, fighting liberator who makes good even when people think she is evil while her friend goes from being fakely good to truly good.

I'll admit the music of Wicked I didn't find memorable until I listened to it more, but now that I have listened to it many times I find almost every song in it to be great to amazing and beautiful. Not all music has to be instantly memorable to be good.

And what PatrickvD, makes The Wiz "truly stupid"?

I haven't seen Oz the Great and Powerful, so I guess my vote goes to Wicked. It was a decent musical from what I remember (it was a touring cast).

Disney Duster wrote:There is no comparison. Wicked is the better prequel.

Agreed.

Disney Duster wrote:At least Elphaba took time to fall in love!

Absolutely. I love the character of Elphaba. I don't care about Theodora in the slightest.

I found Wicked to be very bad fanfiction. The characters of Glinda and Elphaba were hurt in it. As for the musical, I found the songs to be horrible. I find Defying Gravity to be like nails on a chalkboard. IMO, it's a bad melody with over the top vocals.

Even with Oz's flaws it has it all over Wicked.

The_Iceflash wrote:I find Defying Gravity to be like nails on a chalkboard.

I know we're discussing opinions here, but yours is wrong

Can I vote for Return to Oz instead?

Avaitor wrote:Can I vote for Return to Oz instead?

Sorry, not a prequel.

Wicked's a better story, but Oz Great and Powerful seems like a more legitimate prequel to the books versus how grimdark Maguire's take on Oz is.

FigmentJedi wrote:Wicked's a better story, but Oz Great and Powerful seems like a more legitimate prequel to the books versus how grimdark Maguire's take on Oz is.

Yeah I completely agree with you.

FigmentJedi wrote:Wicked's a better story, but Oz Great and Powerful seems like a more legitimate prequel to the books versus how grimdark Maguire's take on Oz is.

It's Gregory Maguire and his book and the musical would be more "legitimate" because he actually follows Baum's original novels more as in Emerald City and the yellow brick road were built by the Wizard but Oz the Great and Powerful messes that fact up and I'm sure there's other examples like that.

Wicked is based on a complex, well thought-out book. I'm not a HUGE fan of either (and the musical itself is a completely different entity), but I would definitely choose Wicked over Oz any day.

Wicked, mostly for Stephen Schwartz's wonderful songs. Though I will admit that I'm probably one of the few people who actually liked Oz: The Great and Powerful, even though James Franco was miscast.

You guys unfairly criticize. I mean, really? Wicked is a bad fanfiction? Because it's LIGHTYEARS better than Twilight or that shitty Harry Potter fanfiction, My Immortal.

Anyhow, I think of Wicked as AU from the Oz stories. So... My vote goes for Oz: The Great and Powerful.

No one here is EVER satisfied with any of Disney's live action works, unless it's Mary Poppins.

Disney Duster wrote:And what PatrickvD, makes The Wiz "truly stupid"?

The short answer:

Wicked Book > Wicked Musical >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Oz the Great and Powerful.