Cruella
Maybe it’s primarily a Disney thing, but I’ve noticed a lot of movies where classic villains are given origins. This ends up making them sympathetic characters and explains why they’re bad. It even goes so far as to say they aren’t evil, but either misunderstood or misguided. For a while, it seemed to be going well, but then the trend started to die off with Cruella. Why?
Well, one of the things that seems to work for revamping an established villain is not going for one that could be considered irredeemable. Maleficent is evil, but she does a lot of fantasy punishments that are rather over-the-top. Darth Vader was already established as a fallen hero and died doing something good in ‘Return of the Jedi’. So, showing them as good people who were turned bad by circumstances or cruel treatment can help the audience relate to them. We wouldn’t go that far with their villainous actions, but we can see how they turned.
With Cruella, I saw a lot of people pointing out that her whole goal as a villain was to make clothing out of puppies . . . Yeah, I don’t care how poorly you were treated. There’s no excuse for that type of villainy. People typically don’t relate to anyone who goes on to kill animals or children. In fact, you’re more likely to upset people with the former instead of the latter, so Cruella was a really bad choice. This makes me wonder if there is more these villain origin stories that crop up at times.
I think ‘Joker’ tried to touch on this, but I didn’t see the movie, so I can’t be 100% certain of what I’m about to say. Many people told me that it was about a regular person descending into madness. You end up seeing how someone can turn evil. Not because you want them to be sympathized with or seen as a victim, but for the audience to understand that nobody is born that way. There are events in a person’s life to put them down the path of evil, which we don’t always acknowledge. It’s easier to believe someone is born a villain instead of being made. To think otherwise means accepting that we or someone we know could turn evil, which is unnerving.
A story that examines the psychology behind a villain makes sense to me. It still can be dangerous depending on the character you’re analyzing. Some crimes really don’t come off well if you try to say they did it because of past trauma. Even though that could be true, people won’t take to it very well. That’s because many don’t want to hear excuses for things like cannibalism, rape, puppy killing, etc. So, villains who do some truly horrific acts probably won’t work out with an origin unless you make them somewhat unlikable prior to being a villain. If not unlikable then at least pathetic to the point where the audience won’t mind turning on them.
So, what do other people think of taking established villains and giving them a sympathetic backstory?
