There is only one Maleficent to me, and that is the animated. I don't know who the live action is, but it's certainly not her. Come back to me when there's a story about her past encounters with Flora, Fauna, and Merriweather; come back to me when it covers how she came to command the Forbidden Mountain; come back to me when she still relishes in how deliciously devious she is. I want to know how the flip she never realized her minions had been trying to find a baby for sixteen years, and what she had done to not receive an invitation to the baby's christening. Whoever Angelina Jolie is portraying, it is not Maleficent.
There seems to have been a trend in making fabulously devious female villains into tragic figures who were hurt when they were young. And it's just...no. Just let them be what makes them fun! To me, there is something seriously wrong with making female villains (or any female character) what they are because they were neglected, bullied, raped, and so forth. And as much as I support having female characters with a feminist story, it feels like pandering to include those elements, and to characters who don't need it. Keep female empowerment away from Maleficent because she has always had it. And away from the Witch of the West for that matter. Run, green skinned magic ladies! RUN! RUN FROM THE TRAGIC BACKSTORY!
In my mind, follow the example of Grendel, not Wicked. It's okay to have some kind of childhood/youth trauma, but don't pander to it. Grendel was unable to communicate with his mother and learned his ruthlessness from watching the ruthlessness of humans among one another. I would love to see a live-action Maleficent with more in common with Grendel than with Wicked. Let her have some weird aspect of youth, but the thing about Maleficent is that she RELISHES in being the bad guy, and she does it in a way that is awesome. Is there a level of tragedy? A little, but not enough to be overpowering. Grendel might not have been able to connect with his mother, but she never neglected him; she loved him dearly. But there was still a mutual wall between them that made things difficult.
Then there's another infuriating aspect of the live action is that Aurora's fairy caretakers didn't know how to take care of a baby, which is a bit of a slap in the face to the true leading ladies of Sleeping Beauty. In the end, the animated Sleeping Beauty is the fairy godmothers having to cope with giving up their ward and trying to protect her from something that was destined to happen. I would take a movie about the Three Good Fairies raising Briar Rose over a movie about Maleficent any day. Or just a story about the lives of the four fairies. They all have great personalities in the animated, and oh to see all of them clash together in one big pink and blue dress of a mess.
I love the animated Maleficent, and wouldn't touch the live action with a forty nine and a half foot pole.
Wait, wrong evil green person...(but that's another live action green person I don't care for either)
