Emilyh1983 - Em’s Trash Bin

Okay I want to talk about this moment between Morrible and Glinda for a sec because it adds such a wonderfully sinister layer to a scene that is otherwise a triumphant defining moment for Elphaba, and it sets up the dynamics for Part 2 so perfectly.

At this point, we are in the thick of “Defying Gravity.” Everyone’s attention is on Elphaba - and rightfully so, she’s up there declaring war on the Wizard, displaying incredible feats of magic, of course everyone’s attention is on her.

…Everyone, except Morrible.

Morrible has realized that Plan A was a bust, but rather than panicking, she’s already worked over Plans B through Z in her head and has realized that Glinda, not Elphaba, is actually the key figure here. Glinda is actually the best thing that could have happened to them.

Mind you, Morrible hates Glinda. She thinks Glinda is vapid and attention-seeking and completely without talent. It would be extremely easy for her to brand Glinda as an accomplice to Elphaba, have the guards drag her off, imprison her, never have to deal with her again, nice and neat.

Instead, while everyone else is focused on Elphaba, Morrible only has eyes for Glinda. She zeroes in on her, releases her, and comforts her, because she understands what no one else understands, which is that yes, that’s great that the Wizard now has an enemy to unify his people against, but they also need a symbol of hope, something that is the exact antithesis to Elphaba, something to keep everyone at extremes. 

The Wizard himself can’t really be a symbol of hope, because the key to his success is that he remains shrouded in mystery, and yes people think he’s wonderful, but there’s a level of uncertainty and intimidation to him. He is Oz the Great and Terrible, and everyone’s preeeeeetty sure he’s a good guy, but if you have someone like Elphaba out there - who Morrible knows from experience is very smart, very articulate, and has her own sort of magnetism - there’s a potential that she could turn at least enough people against the Wizard to make things very inconvenient.

So what they need, now that they have an enemy, is to have an equally magnetic figurehead representing the Wizard who embodies all these one-dimensional ideas of goodness, someone for the public to adore and fawn over so the association between Wizard and Goodness is crystal clear.

And by bringing Glinda along, Elphaba has unknowingly served that figurehead up on a platter.

Glinda is everything Elphaba isn’t, from personality, to appearance - Morrible has already set Elphaba up by calling her green skin an “outward manifestorium of her twisted nature,” which paves the way for Glinda, who is the perfect conventional beauty, to be an “outward manifestorium” of pure goodness. 

Morrible realizes they need these two lightning rods of Absolute Evil and Absolute Good in order to manipulate people - fear alone isn’t enough; the only way to effectively radicalize the populace is to make sure there is no gray area whatsoever, no room for question: you're either good, or you’re evil. And the Wizard alone isn’t a strong enough representation of “goodness” when by virtue of existing, he has to remain in the shadows. Glinda on the other hand? With her looks and her charm and her openness and her ability to expertly win over a crowd? Perfect for the role.

Now the tricky part for Morrible is taking into consideration that Glinda and Elphaba love each other. But we also know from earlier scenes that Morrible is a master at manipulating emotions. Right from the start when Elphaba is having trouble with her magic, Morrible casually brings up the “Animals should be seen and not heard” disturbance from class, spoon-feeding her just enough to get Elphaba upset, triggering her magic, after which Morrible makes sure to give her assurance and praise to keep Elphaba optimistic about her power.

She’s also aware that Glinda does have quite a bit of influence over Elphaba, because when Elphaba flees, Morrible immediately tasks her with winning her over, rather than simply relying on the guards or even going after Elphaba herself. She knows if anyone has a chance at roping Elphaba back in, it's Glinda.

Obviously, Glinda isn’t successful in getting her back, but while this puts a dent in Morrible’s plans to get control of Elphaba, it does give her an extra weak spot to exploit in Glinda.

So now, at the height of “Defying Gravity” when Elphaba has officially taken her stand against them, Morrible sees Glinda, and Glinda is at her most vulnerable, her most emotionally fragile. Not only is she heartbroken and in shock, she’s also just witnessed in real time exactly how easy it is to turn an entire nation against someone. She’s scared, she’s powerless. She’s just lost the love of her life her only friend, she has no one to turn to - Morrible has definitely picked up on the fact that even though Glinda has countless people who fawn over her, none of them can be considered a true friend except for Elphaba, which means Glinda is completely isolated. Glinda also has a very limited understanding of the bigger picture of what the Wizard is trying to accomplish, and because she’s never been a victim of the system the way Elphaba has, she is still desperately clinging to the idea that everything will be okay as long as she plays by the rules of the people in power.

She has been perfectly primed for Morrible to begin manipulating, not through violence or intimidation, but by offering her comfort when no one else would - when not even Glinda’s only friend would - when no one else is even paying attention to Glinda, because they have the very real and present threat of Elphaba quite literally hanging over them. In this moment, Morrible chooses Glinda, which Glinda has been striving for since the beginning. Elphaba has chosen her principles, the Wizard has chosen his enemy, but Morrible has chosen Glinda, and in this moment of being so alone and so afraid and so betrayed, that makes all the difference.

We also get kind of a parallel shot too - Elphaba really sealed her fate the second her hand closed around the broom. But here, Glinda seals her fate when she gives in and reciprocates Morrible’s hold on her.

THIS is the moment that sets us up for Part 2, with Elphaba and Glinda as our lightning rods for Absolute Evil and Absolute Good, but more to the point, it makes it clear that they’ve BOTH been used, they’ve BOTH played right into these respective roles Morrible and the Wizard need in order to be successful - even if it wasn’t how Morrible originally planned for things to go.

I just love it, because “Defying Gravity” is Elphaba’s song - it’s triumphant, and it’s heartbreaking, and it’s everything a defining moment should be for a character. But by injecting this little moment between Morrible and Glinda into the scene, we also get an underlying current of dread because we know we’re about to see the consequences of Elphaba’s defiance versus Glinda’s compliance and how both serve to benefit the Wizard/Morrible’s propaganda.

TL;DR - when I said "I want to talk about this scene between Morrible and Glinda for a sec" I clearly meant "I'm gonna write a whole essay. Like a nerd."

cecilsweep has me feeling downright patriotic i didnt care AT ALL about the previous polls on here or twitter but. seeing the disrespectful people say "who the fuck is cecil he's nobody" had me ready to throw HANDS cecil gershwin palmer was out here slaying and being canonically gay at a time queerbaiting was the only ""representation"" on any of the tumblr popular shows and u have the GALL to come here and say he doesn't matter. hes everything to this website and hes behind 90% of all quirky funnyman text posts know your roots come on

ok im bored so if anyone was curious about smp fandom stats on ao3 as of september 2023

there are currently 36 recognized smp fandoms on ao3!

Dream SMP (81035 works)

Hermitcraft SMP (17404 works)

3rd Life | Last Life SMP Series (7875 works)

Empires SMP (5655 works)

QSMP | Quackity SMP (4081 works)

Origins SMP (1484 works)

Lifesteal SMP (1227 works)

Fable SMP (789 works)

Karmaland SMP (778 works)

Evolution SMP (552 works)

Afterlife SMP (382 works)

Outsiders SMP (321 works)

SMPLive (282 works)

SMPEarth (273 works)

Rats SMP (208 works)

WitchCraft SMP (164 works)

House Builder Gang SMP | HBG SMP (134 works)

New Life SMP (131 works)

Pirates SMP (117 works)

Tortillaland SMP (114 works)

Mer SMP (75 works)

Area Unknown SMP (72 works)

SadSMP (68 works)

Bear SMP (58 works)

Kaboodle SMP (56 works)

100 Hours Hardcore SMP (53 works)

X Life SMP / Shady Oaks SMP (45 works)

Art of Survival SMP / Dominion SMP (32 works)

Epic SMP (30 works)

Cogchamp SMP (29 works)

Legacy SMP (28 works)

30 Day SMP | Free Trial SMP (27 works)

iDots SMP (14 works)

The Cube SMP (8 works)

Day 1- Missing

Find Bailey

what are your head cannons for why each boatem member is immortal???

WELL IM GLAD YOU ASKEDD!! (<- has been wanting to talk abt it)

So okay alright the boatem guys have known each other for thousands of years at this point (idk for how long) but this is based on like, first ever meeting

Mumbo - vampire

Very original i know but i love it, he's like a recently turned vampire who's still trying to come terms with recent changes and stuff- and therefor isnt really aware of a lot of things

Pearl and Grian - godly twins

I adore sky siblings and the sun/moon theme, so theyre 2 gods who live among mortals to keep things in check, there are also some other gods (in form of the EVO crew) theyre aware of each other

Impulse - cursed dwarf

Impulse was just some guy untill he god mixed up with some crazy lunatic scientist (cough zedaph) got mixed up with some other wordly magic and cursed to live and wander forever- while it wasnt like mumbo he's still fairly new to being immortal

Goodtimeswithscar - fae

Scar is such a wildcard, while he is aware that mortals dont live forever so he should probably be more careful about what he says or does- he just doesnt care, fae are immortal and he makes full on use of this by moving town to town scamming people until getting banned and moving on (till everyone is dead and he does it all over again)

Because theyre all like so caught up in their own things and basicly also forgetting whats normal for humans to do, they excuse a lot of random shit the others do (like mumbo drinking blood and scar asking for some)

Not gonna lie, I think the lack of fandom consensus over the symbol of Martyn’s victory makes a lot of sense in-universe.

Martyn won by being independent. He lied, betrayed, killed, and prioritised himself. He knows this is a death game, is fed up of it, and goes for it.

This isn’t some sappy poetic end in which love and friendship win. We don’t get a coherent continued narrative of the sun, the moon, the stars because Martyn took that narrative thread and chopped it. He wanted to win. He just wanted it to end.

Martyn is the sea, everchanging and salty. He’s also the woods, fresh and green and lively. He’s Mars, a warrior for his red planet. He’s a meteor, crashing and burning. He’s everything all at once, like how he goes everywhere and meets up with everyone. He’s everything, but at the same time, he’s the void. Space. He’s nothing.

But then again, he doesn’t fit in. There’s no poetic end that everyone can instantly agree on. It’s divisive. Martyn caused that.

*SPOILER ALERT*

You know what the best part of Watching and Dreaming for me was? The fact that it opens SO MANY doors for fans to discuss or make content. There's Hunter's new palisman, the University of Wild Magic, the political state of the Boiling Isles, and so much more. We're not going to run out of TOH content anytime soon.

actually i experience “body horror” every day. because. um. i have one

"Stop saying 15 year olds with weird interests are cringe, they're 15" this is true however you should also stop saying adults with weird interests are cringe because who gives a shit