AI Search Summary
This video uses physics to argue that Elphaba’s flight in Wicked is not just a broom-riding gag but a clue about how her magic works. The torque calculation suggests that if the broom alone were lifting her, the wrist/shoulder force required would be far beyond normal human strength; the interpretation is that the broom acts more like a talisman for Elphaba’s own gravity-defying power.
- Main question: How does Elphaba’s flight in Wicked relate to physics and her character development?
- Short answer / core takeaway: The video argues that Elphaba is not simply riding a flying broom; she is using her own power to defy gravity, and the broom becomes a symbol of self-acceptance and focused magic.
- Evidence type: Movie-science analysis combining rough torque physics, wrist biomechanics, and narrative interpretation of Wicked.
- Search topics: Wicked physics, Elphaba flying broom, Defying Gravity, torque calculation, radial deviation, Grimmerie, Elphaba character arc, movie science.
Common Search Questions
Why does the video say the broom cannot simply be carrying Elphaba?
If all the upward force came from the broom while Elphaba held it away from her body, the torque on her wrist and shoulder would be enormous: about 235 Newton-meters in the rough calculation.
What is radial deviation and why does it matter?
Radial deviation is the wrist motion the creator says would have to resist the torque if the broom were lifting her. The cited comparison study measured about 1.3 Newton-meters for that direction, far below the estimated requirement.
What does the broom symbolize in this interpretation?
The broom is framed as a talisman or focusing object, not the true source of flight. It helps Elphaba trust and focus the magic that has always been hers.
Key Takeaways
- The surface-level movie explanation is that Elphaba casts a spell and rides a flying broom.
- The physics calculation suggests that a broom lifting her from below would create impossible wrist/shoulder torque.
- The video estimates the torque at roughly 235.44 Newton-meters using 50 kg body mass, gravity, and a 48 cm lever arm.
- A radial-deviation force study is cited as a contrast, with roughly 1.3 Newton-meters measured in healthy women.
- The creator uses this to argue that Elphaba herself is becoming unbound from gravity.
- The analysis connects flight to Elphaba’s emotional suppression, social rejection, and eventual self-acceptance.
- The Grimmerie is interpreted as giving focus to Elphaba’s raw power rather than creating the power itself.
Transcript
The strange physics of Elphaba’s flight
Did you catch what was strange about how Elphaba flies in the first Wicked movie?
This is not a normal witch’s broom. Not that it looks like one.
Let’s use physics to understand something incredible about how the magic actually works, which is tied to the soul of what makes this show and movie so amazing.
Yes, I just used physics and magic in the same sentence. Like a true nerd.
Warning: there will be spoilers. Let’s dive in.
The surface explanation: a flying broom
On the surface, the movie would have us believe that Elphaba casts a spell from the Grimmerie that causes the broom to fly, which she can then ride in classic witchy fashion.
But during this epic Defying Gravity scene, she manages to strike poses such as this, which looks super cool and dramatic.
But if we put our science hats on…
The torque calculation
Cynthia Erivo is 5’1”. Let’s assume 110 pounds or 50 kilograms. But don’t quote me on that.
The distance from her arm to the broom is roughly 19 inches, or 48 centimeters.
Now let’s do some very rough calculations.
If the magic is in the broom, i.e. it’s flying and she’s just riding or holding onto it, then all the force fighting gravity is coming from it, producing some crazy torque on her wrist and shoulder.
Fifty kilograms times 9.81 meters per second squared for gravity times the length of the lever arm equals 235.44 Newton-meters.
And she’d have to counteract this with the weakest type of wrist motion, what us nerds call radial deviation.
This study measured a bunch of healthy females and found that the maximum force they could exert in this direction was roughly 1.3 Newton-meters.
Some simple division tells us that this would make Elphaba a whopping 181 times the strength of a normal human female.
She’s built different. Maybe only when she’s angry.
The other option: the magic is hers
But there’s another option, which ties into the soul of what makes this movie so amazing.
And it doesn’t involve a harness. We’re sticking in-movie with this one.
Defying gravity isn’t just a song. It’s the theme of the entire movie, carefully woven throughout.
From her first scene, being born, Elphaba lifts everything in her birthing room up in the air, aside from herself. All emotion and power, but no control.
As a young girl, we see her made fun of by her peers, until again she explodes with emotion, lifting everything around her.
We see that her deepest desire is just to fit in.
So she learns to fear her power and suppress it by suppressing her emotions, which is exactly how she deals with the fear and scorn of her peers: by pretending she doesn’t care.
Galinda notices the cracks
But there are cracks, which Galinda begins to notice when they finally start to connect, giving us what was, for me, the most emotional scene of the whole movie.
I cried.
She doesn’t give a twink what anyone thinks. Something is not the same. Of course she does. She just pretends not to.
Learning control through emotion
Madame Morrible tries to teach her to control her powers by levitating a coin, which she completely fails at until she lets her emotions free.
Absolutely remarkable.
But Elphaba’s problem is that she can’t fight for herself.
She fights for Nessa, for Dr. Dillamond, but she lets everyone walk all over her, and she thinks she deserves it.
Then she gets pushed into realizing that she is just like those animals she’s trying to protect, being hated for being different.
By putting herself in that same group, she allows herself to start fighting for herself and value herself.
The Grimmerie as focus
And what does all this have to do with magic and the Grimmerie and the broom?
Everything.
The Grimmerie takes her raw power and gives it focus.
The first spell she casts is sort of referenced as a levitation spell, but when cast, it’s much more than that.
It alters a monkey, and all the monkeys, to be no longer bound by gravity.
Rejecting the Wizard’s version of acceptance
But then come two separate breaking points.
First, the Wizard and Madame Morrible try to rope Elphaba into their plans for controlling all of Oz by turning them against the animals.
And we get to see her character growth by her turning her back on her lifelong dream of joining with the Wizard, being de-greenified, and being accepted by the citizens of Oz.
She could become one of them, no longer hated, but still bound as they are by gravity.
But she says no, and instead embraces her differentness, rejecting the Wizard and siding with the animals.
The balloon fails because it is the Wizard’s way
She runs away and first tries to fly using a mechanical external tool: the Wizard’s balloon.
But that’s still the Wizard’s way of doing things, and it fails.
Then when all is almost lost, she turns back to her magic.
Using the Grimmerie, she again casts the levitation spell, this time focused on herself.
Hopefully not expecting wings, but I don’t think she really knows exactly what to expect. She just wants to be free.
The broom as talisman
At first, it doesn’t seem to work.
But then, the broom. It comes to her. It hints that it can let her fly.
She’s on the cusp of realization, enough to grab it, to trust it, to turn full superhero mode and take a leap of faith through a glass window that somehow doesn’t cut her.
Magic.
And she falls and falls. But the broom doesn’t save her.
Defying gravity as self-acceptance
She, who has been put down her whole life, held back, made to blame herself for her own mother’s death and her sister’s disability, made to fear her own magic, has a moment with her past self as she’s falling.
And the story gives her more time: time to realize that she doesn’t need the Wizard.
She doesn’t need the surface-level praise that Galinda’s had her whole life.
What she needs is to accept herself, her beliefs, and the magic that has always been a part of her.
Something has changed within me.
And so she reaches out and the broom comes to her, not to act as another flying machine and lift her up from below, but to become a talisman, a symbol of her own magic.
And when she holds it, she doesn’t need to ride it, because the power is hers.
She is no longer bound by gravity, and nobody in all of Oz, no wizard that there is or was, is ever going to bring her down.
Closing recommendation
If you like this science-y distillation of what made a movie great, you might like this one of the Buzz Lightyear movie centered around a complete science fail.
And let me know what I should cover next.
Additional Notes
The caption says: “Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.” It also asks who already has tickets for Wicked Part 2.
Hashtags: #wicked #wickedmovie #TikTokHeroVillainContest #science #scienceismagic
References
- Radial deviation force study mentioned in transcript; study title, DOI/PMID, and source link not listed in workbook.