← The Fr. Mike Schmitz Catholic Podcast
The Fr. Mike Schmitz Catholic Podcast
Fr. Mike Schmitz Reviews "Wicked"
00:06:22
Spoiler: Fr. Mike thinks the music is great. But other than that... there are some major problems here.
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Wicked. Very popular musical. Insanely popular musical. You're gonna say, like, wait, why are you doing movie reviews now? Answer is not really. Let's get started. Hi, my name's father, Mike Schmitz, and this is Ascension Presents. One of the reasons why I have this hot take is because I really like L. Frank Baum's original the Wonderful wizard of Oz. I love the origin story of how he came up with these stories. I love his dedication, who he dedicated the books to. I love how he wrote about how the tin woodsman to be the tin woodsman. He actually was originally a normal man, a woodcutter, and he was in love with a munchkin maiden. And this witch cursed his axe, and he just. This whole story, it's always moves me, touches my heart in a deep way. When Wicked came out, I was like, wait a second, I have some issues here. Now. What's Wicked? Wicked is basically a retelling of the origin story of the Wicked Witch of the west and of the good Witch Glinda, and basically goes back and says, here's the real story of Glenda. Here's the real story of the Wicked Witch of the west, who was named Elphaba in the book Wicked. What do I like about the musical? I really like the music. If you go see the movie, I think the music is great. Some of the lyrics are very, very clever and really creative. I. I loved it. The voices of the singers of the actresses, especially in the musical, are insane. The visualization, awesome. Here's my movie review right here. I'm the expert. Also, I want to say this. I want to say that you go back and you say, here's why Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the west, was who she was. This is how she got to be the Wicked Witch of the West. So the understanding is that Elphaba is not really wicked. She just has experienced a life of rejection. And not only that, but she's seeing oppression and she's seeing injustice. And because she wants to do something about oppression, because she wants to do something about injustice, she's being pushed to the margins more and more and more. And so she's not actually wicked. She's just misunderstood. She's not actually wicked. She's just been rejected so long, she's not actually wicked. She's actually truly, in truth in the story, rebelling against the tyrant. And in doing so, they just start calling her Wicked. It's a sign of maturity to recognize that everyone's on their journey. It's a sign of maturity to recognize that everyone has a story and to be curious and kind about that story is. Is so, so very good. So that is the positive stuff about Wicked that I think is true, and I think it's true about our own lives. On the other hand, I think there's a difference between explaining and explaining away. It makes sense. We all have a story, right? We all have our journey, and there's reasons why we do what we do. There's something powerful and wise about trying to understand our story. These are the reasons. But there's also things that are like, oh, these are my excuses. There's such a thing as, wow, I really have a short temper. And I have it for these reasons. I just, you know, sometimes X, Y and Z versus I have a short temper. And you know why? Because people picked on me when I was younger or because I'm Irish or because whatever the thing is, that's how I'm built. One is a reason, and I understand that I can maybe actually get better. The other is an excuse that means I don't have to get better. There's a difference between explaining and explaining away. Ultimately, in this story and many stories like it, because it's not just this one, right? Many stories like it post a lot of postmodern stories. It's not like, let me understand what's going on here. It's, oh, if you only understood. You realize that it's not so bad. And that's the next piece, that ultimately in the story, Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the west isn't actually wicked. She's just misunderstood. It's her only perspective. And actually the good witch Glinda isn't actually good. She's just popular. And again, I would say that there's a degree to which we need to be aware of that. The more mature we are, the more we realize that just because someone's misunderstood doesn't mean they're wrong or bad. Just because someone is popular and people like them or famous doesn't mean that they're good. That totally makes sense. But in this, they're telling a story where we're erasing the difference between good and evil and saying it's all a matter of perspective. Bad is just actually misunderstood and. And good is just popular. Then you realize that there's no good and no evil. And yet L. Frank Baum's Wonderful wizard of Oz is a story of people good and evil, of vice and virtue, of, like, there's a real right and there's a real wrong to rewrite a story where that's not the case, I think is. I think. I think is wrong. But maybe one of the things that just bothers me the most about the whole. The whole thing. And the reason that I had avoided this for so long, again, as I said, like, the lyrics, like the music, like the voices of the actresses, they're incredible. It's because of a thing called retconning. Take someone's character, take someone's story, and you rewrite it, either to fill a plot hole or because, like, you're saying, but what if it's actually this? And that's what the author of Wicked did with the wizard of Oz. You take these characters where the wonderful wizard of Oz, the wizard himself, isn't a tyrant. He's not a wizard, he's not evil. He's just kind of foolish in some ways. He's deceptive, yes, but that deception gets called out. But he's not. He's not a dictator. Wicked is. But what if he is? And same kind of thing as here's. Here's the Wicked Witch of the West. Well, what if they're all cheering that she's dead for the wrong reasons? Here's Glenda the good witch. What if she's actually not good? My problem with this is you can do that if you invented the characters. You can do that if it's your story. But to take someone else's characters, someone else's story, and say, what if I think it's unjust because now people say, no, no, this is actually Elphaba's backstory. No, no, it's not Elphaba's backstory. Some other person stole someone else's idea and put their own twist on it. That's wrong. It's really annoying. And you might have just said, you know what else is annoying? Father Mike listening to you for the last 12 minutes or however long it's been, but I gotta tell you, this is what's on my heart, on my mind. What do you think? Put it down in the comments below. If you disagree with me, that's completely fine. Why? Because we're just talking about a story. We're just talking about a musical. It's not life and death. But at the same time, I don't like erasing good and evil for just misunderstood or popular. I think there's something we lose when we do that. Put your thoughts down below if you want to argue about it. Please be nice. Want to take a shot at me? Please be nice. Very thin skin over here. Probably serious as it presents. Somebody who's by the way, God bless. Actually don't have thin skin. It's fine. It's normal. Normal thickness of skin. But just so you know, it's fine. Okay. It's fine. Let me know your thoughts like and share. Subscribe God Bless. Popular.