In a post on ScreenCraft, Alyssa Miller examines the powerful worldbuilding in the film version of Wicked. “From Oz to Hogwarts or something as close to reality as a film noir version of Los Angeles, world-building is how screenwriters can set the tone, rules, and character arcs in the first minutes to help suspend the audiences’ disbelief,” she writes.
The film reintroduces familiar places, such as the Wicked Witch’s tower, the yellow brick road, and Emerald City. However, it also shows more of Oz that audiences saw in 1939’s The Wizard of Oz, which mainly kept to the yellow brick road. This hints that there is much more to the fantasy land to explore. When Glinda appears, she floats down in a massive pink bubble, which establishes her power and the world’s technology. In just the first few minutes, the audience already knows a lot about the setting.
In flashback, as Elphaba explores her magic powers, she helps the audience understand how magic works in this world. “As we explore the world alongside Elphaba—shunned by some and accepted by others—we uncover the powerful reconstruction of the narrative surrounding this misunderstood villain,” Miller writes. This allows the details to spill out when they become necessary for the audience to know. “You don’t have to dump everything about the world into the first few moments,” Miller says. “Instead, let the world expand and breathe as we explore it with the protagonist.”
Background characters who mock or reject Elphaba tells us more about the storyworld, such as who fits in and who doesn’t, and why. “We grasp her place in this world through the reactions of other characters, who reveal that her greenness defies the world’s traditional acceptance,” Miller notes. The same is true of Oz’s animals, who can talk, teach, and perform human tasks, but hide from humans to avoid losing their autonomy. While the audience may dislike this part of the story, these elements are important to understanding the story world.
