I finally saw it. Overall, I loved it, but I definitely need to see it again to have a fully formed opinion. I agree with others who have said that any issues with color saturation are due to the wrong equipment at the theater and not the movie. What I saw was extremely colorful, in a classic Hollywood way. Based on the crowd reaction, this movie will have significant legs, and I agree it will be a big awards contender given how positive the response has been from both critics and audiences. My audience cheered loudly at the end of Defying Gravity, and they clearly wanted to cheer at other points in the film. And this was not the pre-screening Wicked fanatics audience, but your general post-Thanksgiving day family crowd. The chatter coming out of the theater was full of lavish praise. Ariana and Cynthia were just perfect.
There were times where I wished the camera would zoom out and give a better sense of scale. This is something I think old Hollywood epics and musicals were great at - modern movies, not so much. And I definitely think they could have shaved off a full 25 minutes by tightening up some of the book scenes and just letting some of the songs fully play out rather than breaking them up with dialogue. But from the moment they got to the Emerald City until the end, I was on the edge of my seat. The scenes with the Wizard, Morrible, Elphaba, and Ariana were really well written, acted, and directed, and full of earned moments.
A few plot holes jumped out at me:
1) Why is Galinda the only student who is not required to wear the school uniform? It makes sense for Elphaba since she was not supposed to be a student, but not Galinda. Could have been addressed with one funny line.
2) Did Elphaba no longer need her glasses after Popular? They were noticeably absent from the time she got on the train.
3) Morrible tells Elphaba she will takes classes with Morrible only, but then Elphaba appears to be attending all classes like a normal student?
4) It took those guards a full five minutes to ramrod through a door that was NO LONGER LOCKED because the broom had been removed (yes, there was a cart in front of the door, but...that was a serious ramrod, and the cart would have easily been pushed out of the way).