How Fantasy Epic Wicked Unexpectedly Channels... The Truman Show and Pleasantville?!

The fictional land of Oz is a place of staggering beauty and unconscionable cruelty, as director Jon M. Chu will prove when his long-awaited film adaptation of Wicked opens on the big screen this November. Adapted from the acclaimed, Tony Award-winning Broadway musical (itself based on the 1995 novel by Gregory Maguire), the movie takes place in a much more nuanced version of the fantastical realm young Dorothy was dropped into via Kansas twister over 80 years ago.

To be more specific, Wicked takes place in an Oz where bigotry is rampant against anyone who doesn't fit the "norm." Our main character, Elphaba (The Outsider's Cynthia Erivo), is shunned from society because of her vivid green skin, while talking animals — such as Shiz University goat instructor Doctor Dillamond (voiced by Game of Thrones' Peter Dinklage) — are excluded and ridiculed to the point where they must form their own underground gathering spots like the Ozdust Ballroom.

RELATED: We're Not in Kansas, Anymore! Wicked Director Promises "Totally New" Depiction of Oz

How Wicked channels The Truman Show and Pleasantville

"We definitely wanted the underbelly of Oz,” Chu recently said during an interview with Entertainment Weekly. “It’s a place where animals all get to hang out, and there's an animal band."

It's also a place where Shiz University students can sneak off to when they're feeling a tad rebellious. In turn, the youngsters have their eyes opened to a woefully broken system that cannot be allowed to stand. Chu compared this disillusionment to a pair of classic films centered around characters who leave the comfort of an insular existence behind in order to confront the beautiful complexities of the wider world.

“It helps create this idea of the rebelliousness that this new younger generation are discovering," the director continued. "How far will that take everybody in Oz throughout the course of the whole story of both movies? It's an awakening of a generation. I always see it as a little bit of Pleasantville, a little bit of The Truman Show. You start to see the truth about things that maybe you were taught differently."

When does Wicked open in theaters?

Audiences will be able to punch their tickets into Oz once Wicked arrives on the big screen Friday, November 22. Chu promises that viewers will leave satisfied on "the highest of highs" with "a strong connection" to Elphaba and Glinda (Ariana Grande).

The sequel, meanwhile, is scheduled to debut in theaters just a hair shy of a year later on November 21, 2025.