Fiyero Is Part of 'Wicked' and 'The Wizard of Oz' — Does He Become the Scarecrow? (SPOILERS)

Spoiler Alert: This article contains major spoilers for Wicked: Part Two.

The release of the film Wicked has brought much-deserved attention to the Broadway musical. Since the movie adaptation starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo premiered, theatre kids everywhere are happily witnessing viewers unfamiliar with the film connect the dots between Wicked and its predecessor, The Wizard of Oz.

For those uninitiated, Wicked tells the origin story of the Wicked Witch of the West, Elphaba (Cynthia), and the Good Witch of the North, Glinda, formerly Galinda (Ariana).

Elphaba and Glinda began their journey as friends, though unforeseen circumstances cause them to part ways. One issue is their shared love for a rebel student at Shiz University, Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey). Fiyero ultimately chose Elphaba as his love, though not without consequences.

In Wicked the Musical, the movie follows the story succinctly. Fiyero and Elphaba's love comes at an extremely high cost.

Act 2 of Wicked the Musical takes place years after Elphaba becomes the Wizard's enemy at the end of Act 1. When they reconnect, Fiyero works as the Wizard's high-ranking security officer as Elphaba remains on the run. Though it's been years since they've seen one another, their chemistry is undeniable, as expressed in the song "As Long As You're Mine."

In a later scene, Elphaba is captured by the Wizard's guards, and Fiyero tries to defend her by threatening Glinda to make the Wizard's release her. As a result, the Oz guards turn on him and drag him to the field near Munchkinland, where the guards interrogate him. The guards attacked him when he refused to fess up about her whereabouts. Elphaba tried to protect Fiyero from death by casting a spell on him so that he would remain alive after the attack. Her spell worked, just not how she'd hoped.

Elphaba's spell ultimately turned him into a scarecrow, allowing him to live after the guards attack him. It's assumed he goes through the rest of Act 2 in the Wizard of Oz's canon, where Dorothy (Judy Garland) finds him on a pole in a cornfield. By the end of the musical, after Dorothy melts Elphaba, Fiyero as the Scarecrow goes to the scene of her death and finds her hiding under a trapdoor. The two then leave Oz together and live happily ever after.

Unfortunately, Stephen Schwartz used creative licensing when he wrote Elphaba and Fiyero's happy ending in the stage version of Wicked. In the book, written by Gregory Maguire, Fiyero is killed by the Oz guards and isn't saved by Elphaba's spell. Sadly, in the book, she imagines he's secretly the Scarecrow, but the fantasy ends after he's torn apart in the book.

Fiyero is on Elphaba's side throughout Wicked's entirety. However, in The Wizard of Oz, he, along with Dorothy, Tin Man, and The Cowardly Lion, is afraid of the witch and wants her dead. So, if Fiyero is Scarecrow, why would he help Dorothy kill the woman he loves?

TikToker The Oz Vlog, explained in November 2023 that Fiyero might not have felt genuine toward Dorothy. At least, not at first. She suggested he went with Dorothy's plan to follow the yellow brick road to Wizard to see Elphaba again possibly, and would blend in to do so.

However, the Oz Vlog believes Scarecrow and Dorothy had a genuine friendship and that, as the musical shows, he and Elphaba ultimately saved her and left Oz together.

The possible hidden agenda between Scarecrow and Dorothy's relationship changes their classic Wizard of Oz friendship. Thankfully, while Wicked and Wizard of Oz cross timelines, the relationships aren't canon.