Inciting Incident (Thank Goodness)
One of the most popular songs in Wicked is sung by Galinda, and centres around the idea that the society she lives in is corrupt and that she is the only one who knows how it really works. But is she right about that? Does she actually know as much as she thinks?
I think the answer is complicated, and that's the fun of it. I think that Glinda has intellectually grasped that the system is flawed, but I don't think she's emotionally wrapped her head around it. Case and point, the complete and utter cognitive dissonance that is Thank Goodness.
Let me explain.
SPOILERS AHEAD: (Wicked, The Trekkie's Tale)
Thank Goodness is actually two songs. Thank Goodness itself, and a reprise of No-one Mourns The Wicked. So, it's a rehashing of the first act, opening with Glinda conversing with the crowd, the difference is whether or not she is appearing to agree with it.
In the first Glinda tries to argue for Elphaba's morality, and it frames the entire story. But now, Glinda stands idly by and goes along with all that the chorus says while they get more and more worked up by lies that she knows to be untrue.
You would think that the two segments of the song being in agreement would mean that they go well together, but they really don't. Thank Goodness and No-one Mourns The Wicked do not fit with each other at all, in my opinion.
So, what does this mean?
I think that this song shows Glinda lying to herself, and finally starting to crack and realise what is happening.
Glinda spends this song deflecting from the problem, instead of confronting it head on. She relies on popularity and giving the people what they want to distract them.
My ex-girlfriend is being hunted by the masses for something she didn't do, but look over here, I'm getting married!
"Like some terrible green blizzard
Throughout the land she flies
Defaming our poor Wizard
With her calumnies and lies!"
The obvious thing here is the tense. This is happening now, as opposed to something the characters have lived through and made it out the other side of. It is more immediate.
But the other thing that I want to point out is the wall that the Ozians are putting up. The reason Elphaba can't get through to anyone is because they think she is lying, because who are you more likely to believe, someone who you trust implicitly, or someone who everyone around you says is dangerous?
The song is broken into four sections. The introduction, Glinda's two reflections, and Madame Morrible's story, which prompts her to change her mind a bit.
"When you bowed before his throne
He decreed you'd hence be known
As Glinda the Good, officially!"
The following is an excerpt from The Trekkie's Tale, a Star Trek fanfic first published in 1974.
"Gee, golly, gosh, gloriosky," thought Mary Sue as she stepped on the bridge of the Enterprise. "Here I am, the youngest lieutenant in the fleet - only fifteen and a half years old." Captain Kirk came up to her...
"Here, take over the ship for a minute while I go get some coffee for us."
This is the archetypal Mary Sue story, a format where the protagonist gets all that they want and more. The world revolves around Mary Sue, and as a result, it isn't particularly compelling. She wins everything, then she saves the day and dies, and everyone mourns her.
Nobody online seems to be able to agree on whether this story was a satire of general fanfiction trends or not, a fact that I find rather funny.
But compare that to the story Madame Morrible is telling about Glinda. Allegedly, the wizard gave her the title for... not much actually. In Morrible's version of events, good people get things just because, and nobody is asking any questions.
Essentially, Glinda is getting all that she wants on a silver platter, with no questions asked, no strings attached. Well, one string attached.
"Then with a jealous squeal
The Wicked Witch burst from concealment
Where she had been lurking, surrpetitially!"
I mentioned in my post on Defying Gravity (maybe go check that one out) that the central conflict that ended Elphaba and Glinda's relationship was that Elphaba was prepared to sacrifice everything, and Glinda wasn't. But Glinda did have to give up something to achieve her dream, and I don't think she quite understood that until now. To get the power she craved, Glinda had to lose Elphaba.
This song is essentially bludgeoning Glinda over the head with the fact that this tradeoff was not worth it.
That is the dissonance inherent to Glinda's entire character. She recognises the flaws in the world around her but has convinced herself that it will be worth it when she gets to power.
I don't think that Galinda would have realised this, and I am making a point of differentiating Glinda and Galinda. In my mind, Glinda is the version of this character who fell in love with and was changed by Elphaba. The two characters are incredibly similar, and one is an evolution of the other, but it is the influence of Elphaba that makes the difference.
Galinda was seeking power for the sake of it, a person who got her way because she couldn't understand anything else. But Elphaba changed that and gave her a purpose for seeking to climb the ladder. I think Glinda believed she could make a difference from within the structure of Oz, probably to help Elphaba.
Glinda has got everything she theoretically wanted, but at the behest of the reason she was doing it, and now that she is here, she can't even initiate the change she wanted to change. Glinda made the wrong choice, and is only now realising it.
"We couldn't be happier
Right, dear?
Couldn't be happier
Right here
Look what we've got
A fairy-tale plot
Our very own happy ending."
If you are wondering why I've been leaving Glinda's monologues until the end, it is because they make my case for me, and make analysis rather difficult as a result. I have been saying over and over that this musical is about dreams and reality colliding, and that is explicitly stated in these verses.
The fact that there are two of these mirrors the two sides of Glinda's character. The first is the side that craves the attention and has got everything that she wants, then the song reminds her of Elphaba, and she tries again with a more nuanced perspective.
"Though it is, I admit
The tiniest bit
Unlike I anticipated
But I couldn't be happier
Simply couldn't be happier
Well - not simply
'Cause getting your dreams
It's strange, but it seems
A little, well, complicated"
This is literally what I've been saying. She's got what she wanted, but not in the way she wants. It's complicated, and that facade of hers is finally cracking.
That duality is mirrored by the time signature, which is maddening. The song oscillates between a ton of different signatures, and if someone with more musical knowledge understands anything more about this than me, please give me a hand.
From my, admittedly limited, understanding, this feels like a lack of surety. Glinda doesn't know what she wants or thinks anymore, so she can't decide what she is singing.
It also gives an incredibly informal tone, as the lack of structure matches how a person speaks, almost. There have been two characters who have distinct speech patterns in this musical, Madam Morrible, and Glinda. The script of both of whom is written in recurring patterns and rhythms, making up words to match the metre of their sentence. It's pompous and pseudointellectual.
This is most obvious in how smooth the start of Defying Gravity is. There, Glinda doesn't have to change how she talks to match the song, because she is already speaking in the right rhythm.
Cynthia Erivo's rendition of this song in PBS's Wicked In Concert is phenomenal and I highly recommend you check it out, not least of all because removing the crowd gives the song a completely different vibe.
But here, halfway through a song, she gives up with artfulness and just speaks her mind. It's still a song, so you still get the rhythms and melodies, but that is breaking down, and is gone in the script from this point forwards. That's partially why I say Glinda and Galinda are different people, they sound different to each other.
There are a few almost exceptions to this rule, and I say almost exceptions because they come really close to breaking the mould, but don't.
In this exception, Glinda is trying to convince herself that she is happy. The song is limited to one thought, the idea that Glinda should be happy, and there can't be anything wrong. She has got everything she wanted, and that would make her happy, right? Happy is what happens when all of your dreams... That's the word that throws her off, dreams.
This is no longer Glinda's dream.
This song is a microcosm of Glinda's entire arc in the musical. She follows the story laid out for her, but is changed by the journey until it no longer fits. She has changed, and now she can't do anything about it.
Ironically, Glinda has gained all the authority she could dream of, but she is more powerless and has less agency than she started with, and all of that happened without her notice.
"There's a kind of a sort of, cost
There's a couple of things get, lost
There are bridges you cross
You didn't know you crossed
Until you've crossed."
Final Thoughts
Genuinely, my favourite trope in a story is a character undergoing character development and not realising. For example, the "nobody's that heartless" line in The Emperor's New Groove.
But Glinda is my favourite example of this because of the way in which she reaches her conclusions. She is smart, possibly the most intelligent character in the entire musical, but her biases cause her to make some serious leaps of logic and ignore several things that would change her worldview until she runs headfirst into them.
Also, the stagecraft of this song is simple in order to not distract from Glinda's thoughts, but that means a lot of these photos are remarkably similar. I apologise for that.
Next week, I will be looking at Wonderful, and how it forms a neat little mirror of Sentimental Man, so stick around if that interests you.
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GOOD OMENS SEASON TWO SPOILERS
Ok I’m gonna be deeply ranting and analyzing the kiss scene (mostly just the kiss itself) because OH MY GOSH THERES SO MUCH TOO IT
First of all here’s a gif of it:
And also I don't have a gif of it but when Crowley releases Aziraphale, what struck me was that he didn’t make them burst apart he gently and almost sadly just stepped back. And then watched.
Now. One of the biggest things I’ve been thinking about in this (because I’ve been obsessively watching it over and over) is how Crowley is kissing him. It’s a long kiss. It’s not sensual. It’s not eating each others faces. It’s intimate and very romantic. Crowley missed Aziraphales lips by a hair and is slightly kissing his chin. Crowley holds him there as they sway back and forth slightly. I can’t see if his eyes are open or not. But the thing that strikes me about this is how much all of Crowley’s body language and everything just scream about how much he doesn’t want to move. He finally kissed his angel and he wants to stay pressed up against him, finally locked in the embrace he didn’t realize he needed for so long. He just stays there. He doesn’t kiss deeper. He just stays pressed against him, not wanting to deal with how Aziraphale will look at him afterwards.
then he has to break apart. He does it gently, but suddenly. Like he had to force himself but doesn’t want to . He wanted to stay, but he knows he can’t. So he steps back with his heart breaking more than he thought possible.
now onto Aziraphale.
Aziraphale is shocked. His eyes go from open to closed to open to closed. He leans back so slightly you almost can’t see it. He doesn’t seem to know how to feel.
And then his hands go around Crowley. It almost seems like it’s an unconscious motion, given how he looks after they break apart. It looks like for a split second, he lets himself melt into Crowley, as his hand wraps around his back and slides across it. But then he hesitates again abd takes his hands away. He thinks he can’t melt into Crowley. But there was the one moment where he broke.
after they break apart, Aziraphale looks shocked, upset, desperate, and to me, even a little disgusted. Probably because he doesn’t know how to deal with it. He licks his lips and moves his mouth around abd seems uncomfortable. But then after Crowley leaves he presses a hand to his mouth. He holds it for a second and starts crying. He realized he liked how it felt. He realizes everything he’s been missing. He loved the feeling of Crowley’s lips on his. Most importantly, he loves crowley.
on the topic of people hating on Aziraphale and saying the metatron did something to him, I disagree. This seems completely in character fir Aziraphale. He’s not an arsehole, he’s in conflict. He thinks he’s not allowed to love Crowley. I get him.
ok Thanks for coming to my Ted talk hehe bye
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Idk personally I think if your profits are so high in every category that the only way to make them higher is start subtracting from how much you pay workers and ending things like shared accounts accounts just to falsely Create new users then it's time to admit you did it.
That there's nothing left. Everything has been capitalized as much as it can be. You won capitalism.
Was it not enough?
Having more money than most of us can even imagine, more security and food, more access to healthcare and much higher quality healthcare at that? Being able to spit on the people beneath you or have the cops show up on demand when you call. All the power. Knowing you can buy politicians and set up your own fucked up chess game.
Having all that and asking for more. Trying to bleed what's already run dry.
How is it possible that these people are trying to find MORE to take?
How is it that everything is not enough?
What is their long game you know? Like there are people making those decisions at Amazon and Unilever and Nestle. To just die rich? Is that it? Have capitalists considered what happens when they reach the end of capitalist potential?
All this suffering just so they can die with some extra zeros in their account? A man made currency put in a digital space? Like let's be real her for a second: it's fucking fake. Money isn't anymore real than the tooth fairy.
And this is the best way for society to function? The earth?
Leeching off one another like parasites for made up currency until we kill each other over it?
None of us are even happy. People who like capitalism will never even be happy with it. Nothing will ever be enough.
How is this worth it? Why aren't we punching every rich asshole in the face?
Why do oil execs still feel comfortable leaving their houses? Jeff Bezos should be afraid of the public. The Waltons should exist strictly as recluses who then die in a fire. I want to see rich people desperately trying to give away their money because someone keeps spray painting "Rich Cunts Are Still Hollow" across their houses. I want the Kardashians and Carters to need a bodyguard detail taking the kids to school.
You know?
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Pretty much everybody on Tumblr seems to look at Garrus and be like, "Hm, yes, the optimal love interest." And that's fair! Garrus is great. Date him if you want.
But goddamn, have I just always had brainrot for Shepard and Garrus platonically. Their dynamic is just so flawless. I have never believed a game more when it has told me "These two people are best friends." They are the most found family siblings I've ever seen.
Every party member in Mass Effect 1 (who lives) goes on to achieve greatness above and beyond pretty much any party member introduced in subsequent games (except that I do specifically think the human party members are outstripped by Mordin), but you get to watch it happen with Garrus and Tali because they never leave you. Garrus starts off as "That loose cannon cop who signed on to help get Saren." After Shepard dies, he decides he's just going to casually end organized crime and is alarmingly successful. When Shepard shows up again, Garrus' reaction is to fucking shoot them and then joke about it when they finally make it to him. Shepard deflects Garrus' near death experience by calling him ugly. During his loyalty mission, you have the opportunity to have some absolutely raw conversations with him about ethics and morality that you don't really ever see with another companion except Jack, and she basically completely ignores everything you say until you see her in 3. With Garrus, he'll resist what you're saying, but you can see him trying to find the line between justice and revenge, law and chaos. If you put him in charge of the second team during the suicide mission, you can see how much he's grown with you as he effortlessly coordinates his team with yours. And all that is just in Mass Effect 2.
Once you get to 3, you really start seeing it. Garrus has made his way up in the Hierarchy and is leading their efforts against the Reapers, just like Shepard. When you ask him about it, he immediately starts talking about it as the shared work you've had since the first game. No other companion identifies themselves with you through this struggle. Sure, other companions will mention the previous games and what you did with them, but there's always something else. Liara is the Shadow Broker now. Tali has the Geth to worry about. The Virmire Survivor is bound up in the Alliance and becoming a Spectre. Wrex has the Krogan. But Garrus? Garrus is here with you. He's standing right next to you, giving the Reapers his full attention. And as you go throughout the game, he's consistently the one there for you. When you're struggling to get the Council Races to work together, he's there. When things go tits up on Thessia, he's there. Even you're going into the final run, he's there. When the two of you die, if Turian heaven is the same as human heaven, he'll meet you at the bar.
There is no Vakarian without Shepard. There is no Shepard without Vakarian. These two soldiers are bound together with blood, sweat, and the sheer Terminator-grade determination to save the galaxy, no matter how much it kicks and screams. There is no fire they won't jump into for the other one, and they'll make fun of each other the whole way. There's no other relationship like it.
I'm Glory of Dawn, and this is my favorite platonic ship on the Citadel.
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