wicked is bad bad bad and heres why:

Look, i get that this point isn't so much a criticism of the musical itself as it is of the story, so, idk blame the original book (but they still made this musical when hey didn't have to so also blame the musical). It r-u-i-n-s the premise of Wizard of Oz completely. Now I don’t mind a spinoff. I don't even mind a prequel spinoff. But it HAS to add to & develop what is already established, rather than just tearing the whole thing down!!! Ya know how in the Wizard of Oz it’s left unclear if the whole thing was a dream or of it was real? well, guess we dont need to wonder about that, since Wicked’s very existence means it HAS to have been real. You know how the villain in Wizard of Oz was the wicked witch? well, it turns out she wasn’t REALLY a villain at all. In fact, the REAL villain is..... is...... uh... the wizard?? but... I mean yeah he was a fraud, but, he was also really fucking pathetic, and that was the whole POINT. The big reveal about him isn’t JUST that he isn’t a wizard. It’s that he’s just a relatively weak man who found himself caught up in a lie. But according to Wicked he’s some criminal mastermind who is full of nefarious schemes. The Wizard of Oz is about blind idolisation of a mysterious figure for no real reason. But in Wicked, the wizard has been running a master operation to try to have complete and utter power over the whole of Oz. He’s not just some man behind a mask, he’s a ruthless dictator hell-bent on absolute power. And he never really faces any consequences for that??? Wicked ends with elpheba and fiyero heading off together leaving glinda to look after Oz. The Wizard of Oz ends with dorothy tapping her shoes together and waking up back in Kansas. But at the end of Wicked, Glinda just says.... “Yo wizard ya SUCK get out of here!” and off he goes I guess, but he’s still just??? out there?? free to go somewhere else and do the exact same thing there??? what??? so now you have The Wizard of Oz with a villain who isn’t even really a villain and who gets to walk off into the sunset with her boyf at the end, and you have Wicked where the ACTUAL villain is just free to go, apparently. So now there os ZERO justice in EITHER story. The Wizard of Oz is now.... a pretty pointless story since it’s big plot point twist has been nullified, and there’s no ambiguous ending anymore so the ending is now just.... bad??? And Wicked is a story about friendship and acceptance and good overcoming evil, except the evil faces NO REAL REPERCUSSIONS. So its kinda just.... a bunch of ppl who only care about saving themselves but don't care at all about the risks they put other people at??? 

Also, ok, ok, let’s talk about the music. It is... bad. i get that this is a controversial opinion but honestly i Do Not like Idina Menzel in this role. I love her, i think she’s great, i don't think she's AS great as everyone thinks she is, and I don't think she's that good at belting. she is killing her voice. she’s completely wreck her vocal chords if she doesn't stop forcing herself to do those long, sustained belts. Listen to her voice in past shows, and then listen to her voice in recent concerts. It is SO much less healthy now that it was pre-wicked and pre-frozen. But putting my concerns for her vocal health aside - there are.. no actually ‘new’ songs in the show at all. It’s all the same shit we’ve heard a million times before, but in this strange key and with a very anxiety-inducing intense/desperate vibe to them. And there isn't really much variation sonically from start to finish. Sure you have songs like Popular and A Sentimental Man thrown in there, but there isn’t a musical arc. It starts one way, it ends the same way. Which is DOUBLY bad since there is *apparently* this huuugeee character arc going on. The music should reflect that, but??? it doesn't?? and that leads me nicely on to..

Elphaba is a shit lead character. I don't CARE how many times she sings loudly about going after what she wants, she’s 2D the whole way through. She starts off misunderstood. She finds TWO people who accept her, but the rest of Oz is still after her with torches and pitchforks, and then she gets framed for crimes she didn’t commit, and then... she leaves Oz?? but what changes about HER? Sure, she gets more confident, that's great, we’re off to a good start here, and sure, she realises her own power, great, great, and... what else. What else... oh, oh thats... thats it?? thats.. that’s her whole arc?? well, uhh. ok. Glinda, on the other hand, has a HUGE arc that would be a super interesting thing to see and that HASN’T been done a million times before (Seriously guys, the underdog-learning-they-had-the-power-inside-them-all-along story has had its day). Give me a show about the girl who had everything, who was popular and pretty and rich, but who struggled with morality and had to face the realisation that she’d actually been pretty cruel to the people she didn’t understand. Give me a show about a girl who tries so hard to become the good, kind person she wants to be, and who has to acknowledge her privilege and her flaws in order to do so. Give me a show about a girl who chooses not to fight because she’s scared, and then has to deal with the guilt she feels from that. Give me a show about a girl who spends her whole life seeking fame, but who ends up serving others rather than herself because she knows it’s the right thing to do. Give me the girl who accepts that the man she is in love with loves someone else, and who let’s him go because they both deserve to find peace and happiness.  I cannot stress enough how important it is to choose the right protagonist, and Elphaba just... isn't it. 

for the top 5 ask game: top 5 friendsim routes (and why :eyes but fast as i initiate infodump: )!!

JKFDASJKLFS OH BLESS

i got this question right before i went to work and i was thinking about it the entire time

so i’m gonna do a list and then all of the why under the cut bcus I Talk Many lmao

the list!! and tbh these aren’t in any particular order bcus choosing favorites is hard enough lmao (and tbh i have several runner ups), but the five routes that i hold very close to my heart are:

Skylla

Tyzias

Daraya

Wanshi

Bronya

and as for why, (i hope this readmore works? i’m on my computer so)

(and hey if you want to know my wider friendsim opinions go watch my hiveswap friendsim let’s play “Let’s Play Hiveswap Friendsim (For The Third Time)” which i can’t link bcus idk if tumblr doesn’t like links but should show up if you type that into youtube ajkflads it’s v funny and i tell lots of good jokes)

1. Skylla

okay so admittedly my initial thought is just “i think she’s neat” jfkdlsafjkl

but in a genuine way, skylla is the first older troll you meet, and one of the few with something resembling an actual job, and i think there’s something really special about that! she’s very down to earth (alternia, technically) and she takes you in without even questioning why the fuck you’re out there just bcus she doesn’t want you to burn up!!

and then!! she kicks like?? a dozen asses??? bcus she cares about ladyy and her lusus so much??? like they have lasers and shit and she just kicks their ass bcus she can’t let them win

she’s also a cowgirl and that’s cool as hell

2. Tyzias

honestly, if you don’t love tyzias you can just leave /jk

jfdaklsdfslk but actually, i love how much she’s trying. she knows alternia is deep in its own shit, she knows that it might just be too much for one person to take on, she knows what the consequences are for getting caught, but she’s still trying!! bcus she looked at the world and instead of accepting the bullshit like so many people (mallek) do she went “actually no, why is no one doing anything about that?” and she starts trying to do something about it. and even trying to get other people to help! 

as an outside observer, it’s kind of the first act of a tragedy, bcus obv most people playing friendsim have read homestuck, you know what alternia looked like in its last throes of troll occupation, you know that, at least in the timeline of homestuck proper, that tyzias is just one in a long line of people who tried. but those people also went down in history, even if that history was almost scrubbed over fuschia. i’d like to think somewhere on alternia, maybe in secret corners of teal bookhives or in the care of a jade cloister, someone wrote about her. i want to give tyzias a hug

3. Daraya

see: my point about wanting to give her a hug jkfldsajfkdsa

she’s just! she’s just so tired! and she reminds me a lot of when i was a teen, lost in the idea that there was no such thing as a fulfilling future, bcus everyone around you tells you what’s expected of you and everything they say seems like a tragedy not worth living to see. the sensation of living in apathy bcus facing the hurt and lonely despair is too much to handle when you’re a teenager trying to get by in the world. the idea that maybe if you dress up and put on a face everyone will just leave you alone and you can find your own comforts before ultimately preparing to leave the future everyone planned for you behind in the pursuit of something else that may very well be worse for you but gives you a sense of control back

and then!!! and then she opens up to you!!! bcus you can be someone who listens to her and understands that hopelessness and says “hey, i think i can give you a sense of the control that you’re searching for” and finds her someone her own age who can help her take control of at least some part of her life and maybe, if they're lucky, even give some other jade in the future more freedom than daraya could even imagine

(and tbh if i said i’d never, in my worst years, debated burning a building down with. intentions. i’d be lying)

4. Wanshi

wwwaaannnsssshhhiiiiiii

tbh! kind of similar to daraya!! i see a lot of my younger self in wanshi, right down to the warrior cats rp and the sensation of knowing that many of the people in your life are lying to you if only bcus they think you don’t realize what they’re doing and chasing a sense of community through fanfic and cons bcus the people in your mandatory social circle aren’t willing to engage you at a level that actually makes you happy or even at all. even some of her face with death and having to come to terms with things the adults in your life wouldn’t necessarily think were appropriate for your age simply bcus of the way life takes you (granted, i was a little older than she is when i started doing con + online stuff, but you get the idea)

and just like, her route? it’s 1. fantastic 2. it’s one of the only times the reader is like... nurturing, toward one of the younger trolls, if that makes sense? they go into the entire route with wanshi’s safety and happiness in mind, and when the former has to take precedence over the latter they still try to make her happy to soften the blow, specifically by inviting her to set the rules of engagement so that it’s actually something she enjoys! and in the bad ending you literally. you know. die for her. and that's not something you get with the other younger trolls? like, amisia can both take care of herself and naturally takes command of the situation, and tirona i mostly just feel bad for more than anything, and the twins... a lot happens vis a vis the twins. karako i Also want to take care of but that’s mostly bcus he’s v small and you don’t take care of him the same way you do for wanshi in her route

5. Bronya

look............ i love bronya jkfldsaf

she’s also just!! she’s trying!! and she’s trying her best!! and it’s in a different way from tyzias but it’s just as aahhhhhh. she wants to help, in her own way, and she’s probably scoured every book, file, and teal at some point to make sure her grubs and her jades are safe! she’s not even the oldest jade in their cloister, she just wants them all to be okay and make it home and learn the ways of their role so that they don’t get culled (and aren’t jackasses, considering how she talks to lanque in his route, but his route is <_<). and tbh considering the amount of shit they give her for it, she seems to allow the other jades to sneak out more than you’d expect considering her personality in her + elwurd’s routes lmao

and the fact that she runs the nursery just has me ;u; every time i think about it. like, she’s not required and probably not even supposed to do that, and she even mentions that she does it knowing that some of the grubs may still get sick or die during their trials, but it means so much to her that they get a second chance that she’s willing to make a not-technically-illegal nursery to give them that chance bcus who else? who else will? i’d like to think that nursery was still there, was maybe even an idea that stretched across alternia, all the way to the end.

and wow uh!!! that was long jfklda these are a little more about why i like the character, but i think that’s just bcus their routes play such a big part in that!!

my runner-ups, if you were wondering, were karako, stelsa, polypa, and boldir’s lol. i also like marsti as a character but her route gives me too much second-hand embarrassment jfdklasf

thank you so much, my friend!! i hope whoever reads this likes my extremely long ramble jfkldsafkl