Wait, how am I only now realising the dark foreshadowing of Wicked’s boppiest song?

I’ve seen the stage musical, watched the film, and I’ve got another showing booked in – so why am I only now realising that Jonathan Bailey’s take on Dancing Through Life is draped in some serious foreshadowing of his character’s arc in Wicked: Part Two?

Wicked is not just a film with dazzling reviews but also one of those projects where you continue to learn new details weeks after its release. Just recently, some realised that a guy on Twitter had accurately predicted the casting years before the announcement.

Now, I too have kicked myself for missing what was staring me in the face the whole time.

Fiyero’s future in Wicked is a grim one

It’s nice to see Jonathan Bailey getting even more notoriety after stealing the show in practically every project he’s been a part of. Unfortunately, his smooth moves and expressionate eyebrows distracted me from the glaringly obvious nod to his character Fiyero’s future.

Turn back now if you want to avoid spoilers about Wicked: Part Two.

In the second act of the stage musical, Elphaba attempts to save Fiyero’s life by reading a spell from the Grimmerie spellbook while failing to read the fine print.

She sings in No Good Deed: “Let his flesh not be torn. Let his blood leave no stain. Though they beat him, let him feel no pain. Let his bones never break, and however they try to destroy him let him never die, let him never die.”

Though the spell does just that, preventing him from being harmed, it turns her love into the Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz. As we know, much of the Scarecrow’s story revolves around him not having a brain, singing “If I Only Had a Brain.”

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But wait, how does the song hint at that future?

Wicked’s Dancing Through Life is a jaunty upbeat tune that initially reads as Fiyero being a bad role model and insisting that his fellow Shiz students abandon their studies for a night of Debauchery. Turns out its meaning is a lot darker and the lyrics actually point to his straw-bound fate.

In the tune, Fiyero sings lines like “life’s more painless, for the brainless” and “life is fraughtless, when you’re thoughtless” as he dances across the library. In another portion of the song, he further alludes to his future life as Scarecrow by singing “swaying and sweeping” in a clear nod to his later style of walking.

Of course, the song ends with Jonathan Bailey matching the pose of original Scarecrow actor Ray Bolger in The Wizard of Oz.

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