This is per Vulture, which reported yesterday on how some 450 tie-in products for Wicked: For Good helped the film achieve the second-best opening of 2025. Obviously, Universal couldn’t be happier and doesn’t want this particular gravy train to run dry any time soon. “Because of Wicked’s success but also the fanship, we have almost a responsibility to figure out how we can continue in this universe,” says Michael Moses, Universal’s chief marketing officer. “Have we figured it out yet? No. But there are things underway.”
Lucky for the suits, there are literally dozens of books set in Oz, several of which are written by Gregory Maguire, who wrote the Wicked novel that serves as the basis for the stage musical. (Granted, those books do differ significantly in tone and content from both the musical and the films; for example, Wicked follow up Son Of A Witch follows Liir, the son Elphaba has while in a coma after failing to assassinate Madame Morrible; none of this made it into the musical.) But notably, Universal doesn’t own the rights to The Wizard Of Oz. The 1939 film was produced by MGM, with Warner Bros. maintaining home distribution rights, which is presumably at least part of the reason why the Wicked “universe” would be a different thing than the most famous example of Land Of Oz.
But it’s not just the executives who are mulling this. Composer Stephen Schwartz and writer Winnie Holzman have also been mulling some ideas for more Wicked, though Schwartz is “just not sure that the right idea exists,” as he told The Ankler last week. The two are “doing some work right now on ideas that aren’t a sequel to Wicked, because I think the Glinda and Elphaba story feels complete — but there are other aspects that could be explored,” he continues. “Gregory Maguire, the original Wicked novelist, has several books, for example. But there’s another idea that Winnie and I are discussing: not a sequel, but an adjunct. Let me put it that way.” However, Schwartz is quick to say that the project would need a “justification beyond simply making money,” which sounds fairly at odds with what Moses from Universal just said. Schwartz mentions the “Star Wars universe” in his interview by way of comparison, which hasn’t produced a theatrical film in nearly six years but has produced a whole slew of TV shows. Perhaps this time next year, we’ll have a Peacock limited series about Bowen Yang’s Pfannee.
