Maleficent

Maleficent is a sorceress and the main antagonist in Sleeping Beauty. She takes offense at not being invited to the christening of Princess Aurora, and attempts revenge on King Stefan and the Queen by cursing Aurora. Like Chernabog, Maleficent is an incarnation of pure evil, responsible for all misfortune in King Stefan's kingdom; she appears to be particularly unfond of the three good fairies Flora, Fauna and Merryweather, her polar opposites, who do all in their power to keep Maleficent's overwhelming evil magic at bay. Maleficent is also famous for her role as one of the primary antagonists of the Kingdom Hearts series. With her Gothic, elegant design, dramatic and flamboyant animation and unlimited arsenal of magic powers, Maleficent is currently one of the most recognizable and most popular Disney Villains.

Personality
To make a long story short, Maleficent represents pure evil. She is ruthless and devious, and will do whatever it takes to achieve her (evil) goals. Additionally, she is very spiteful, which is shown by taunting Prince Phillip after she captures him. Her most famous quote "You poor simple fools, thinking you could defeat me. Me, the mistress of all evil." indicates that she is somewhat narcissistic. She thinks herself above everyone, even calling her closest allies "her pets".

Design
Maleficent appears in the form of a tall, slender, beautiful, pale green skinned woman with a narrow face and a prominent chin. She also has yellow eyes and a horned headdress, which is symbolic of her dark magic. She is clad in a black and purple robe with bat wing-like edges, and wears a gold ring with a large mysterious circular black stone in it. Maleficent is an evil fairy, unlike the other three fairy godmothers in the movie, and her evil enables her to perform many magical and powerful spells. She carries a staff with a glowing green orb at the tip through which she casts her spells, which include an ability to teleport herself, or send bolts of lightning at enemies. She is also capable of shape shifting at will into numerous forms, including a floating hypnotic light resembling a will-o'-the-wisp and a massive, monstrous black and purple dragon. She is not at all comical or goofy like some of the other Disney villains, although she does at times display something of a dark sense of humor. Her minions are a legion of goblins and troll-like creatures. She is also frequently accompanied by her pet raven called Diablo. She seems to have a minor quirk in regards to holding light objects, as she seems to extend her pinkie when holding a torch in the forward direction, as evidenced during her capture of Prince Phillip.

Placing a curse on Aurora
At the christening of the newly born Princess Aurora, the Three Good Fairies come to bestow three gifts on the child: Flora’s gift is Beauty, and Fauna’s is Song. Before Merryweather has a chance to give the child a gift, Maleficent arrives with Diablo, perched on her staff. Angry at not receiving an invitation, she curses the child, decreeing that, before the sun sets on Aurora’s 16th birthday, the child shall die, by pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel. She then leaves, whilst cackling. Merryweather, unable to undo the entire curse herself, is able to alter it such that Aurora will not die, but merely enter a deep sleep, that can only be broken with true love’s kiss.

Exacting Revenge
As Aurora's 16th birthday draws near, Maleficent punishes her Goons, who have stupidly been searching for a baby for 16 years, to find the princess. She then sends her raven Diablo to search for the princess. Diablo manages to find the hiding location of Aurora and the fairies. With this new information Maleficent plans her next move. When the princess and the fairies return to the castle late that afternoon, Maleficent finds Aurora alone and, as a hypnotic apparition resembling a will-o-the wisp, lures her up a secret stairway in the castle atop a high tower to a spinning wheel. She pricks her finger and falls to the floor. The fairies arrive in time for Maleficent to scoff at them; she then disappears. She and the Goons go to the cottage, where they wait for Prince Phillip, who had arranged to meet Aurora (whom he only knew to be as a peasant girl). When he arrives, they capture him and take him to Maleficent's domain, the Forbidden Mountain.

Defeat
Flora, Fauna and Merryweather rescue Phillip and give him the Shield of Virtue and the Sword of Truth; this is noticed by Diablo, who fetches the goons. The prince and fairies are still able to escape, and Merryweather turns Diablo to stone. However, Maleficent emerges, sees Phillip escaping and attempts to strike him down with lightning. As he continues, she summons thorns to surround Stefan’s castle. When she sees that Phillip, with help from the Good Fairies, is able to hack through the thorns, she appears before him, and transforms into an enormous dragon. The two battle, but Phillip eventually stabs her when Flora, Fauna and Merryweather enchant the Sword of Truth,'killing her'. She falls from a great height, and Phillip looks down to see that she has become her cloak on the land; the Sword of Truth, still embedded in the cloak, turns black.

House of Mouse
Maleficent made frequent cameos as one of the guests on House of Mouse. Notably, one episode, "Halloween For Hades", centered on Hades trying to woo her. Maleficent initially rejects Hades, so Mickey tries to help him by teaching Hades how to be good. The technique fails and he becomes so mad he tries to kill the mouse. Maleficent likes the evil in Hades and agrees to go out with him. Later in the episode, they're seen dining together. Maleficent also appears alongside the villains as part of their song in Mickey's House of Villains. In "Mickey and Minnie's Big Vacation", Maleficent, alongside Mushu, Madam Mim, Elliott and The Reluctant Dragon, cause a fire in the club.

Kingdom Keepers
Maleficent plays a major role in the novel that tells the story of Walt Disney World after dark. Maleficent is one of the Overtakers and believed to be the leader. There has been controversy on this subject though, after the author, Ridley Pearson, released Chernabog into the mix.

Once Upon a Time
Maleficent will play a central role in the storylines for the 2011 American fantasy drama series Once Upon a Time, in which she is a sinister rival of the series' primary nemesis, The Evil Queen from Snow White. Maleficent is played by Kristin Bauer.

She appears in episode 2 of the first season, "The Thing You Love the Most". She is visited by the Wicked Queen who seeks to retrieve the Dark Curse that she gave to Maleficent in exchange for the Sleeping Curse she inflicted on Snow White. In this continuity, Maleficent has moved on from the incident with Princess Aurora and spends her days in a remote castle with a small black unicorn pony rather than her trademark black crow from the Disney film. She wears purple in varying tones and still carries her trademark staff. The two women battle but the Queen wins, breaks the staff open, and takes the Dark Curse despite a warning from Maleficent that the curse will leave a hole in her soul. When Maleficent challenges the Queen to kill her, the Queen states she won't because Maleficent is her only friend.

Live-action film
On May 12, 2009, it was revealed that Brad Bird was developing a live-action motion picture based on Sleeping Beauty, retold from the point of view of Maleficent with Angelina Jolie starring as Maleficent. In January 2010, it was rumored that Tim Burton was to direct the film. Reports surfaced online in May 2011 stating that Burton had left the project to focus on his other upcoming projects; Disney began to look for a replacement director, with David Yates being cited as a potential candidate due to his experience with the fantasy genre, having directed the final four Harry Potter fillms. Linda Woolverton, who previously collaborated with Tim Burton on Alice in Wonderland, is writing the script for the movie. Angelina Jolie said in an interview that she is definitely interested in the role. Don Hahn, a producer of the movie, confirmed that Disney is developing a film about Maleficent and that it is in active development. On January 6th 2012 Disney announced that Robert Stromberg the production designer for Avatar and Alice in Wonderland will direct the film.

Mickey Mousecapade
Maleficent appears as the final boss of the North American version of the Nintendo game Mickey Mousecapade (in the original Japanese version, the final boss is The Queen of Hearts).

Epic Mickey
Maleficent appears in her dragon form in the Sleeping Beauty transition level in addition to several background cameos.

Kingdom Hearts series
Majority of information taken from Kingdom Hearts Wiki: Maleficent.

Maleficent appears as a major antagonist in the Kingdom Hearts series. She was first seen in Kingdom Hearts in Hollow Bastion. Unlike the other Disney villains (with the exception of Pete), she plays a large part in the overall story rather than just in the world she came from. Despite the appearance of other major villains, Maleficent still remains a powerful antagonist to the Keyblade Masters.

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep
Maleficent appears in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, her role downgraded to that of a minor antagonist, only appearing in her home world of Enchanted Dominion. At some point in time, Master Xehanort made contact with her and enlisted her help in luring Terra to darkness and told her about Kingdom Hearts and the seven Princesses of Heart.

From this point on, Maleficent became even more power hungry and lusted to gain complete control over all worlds, not knowing she is simply being used by Master Xehanort as part of a much bigger plot that would unfold in the following decade.

At her home world, Enchanted Dominion, she mostly plays out the same role as in the original movie, only this time manipulating the darkness in Terra's heart to force him into stealing Aurora's heart in return for helping him locate Master Xehanort. She offers Terra the opportunity to join her in her quest to rule the worlds, but he flatly refuses. Later, Ventus visits the world and frees Aurora's heart, inciting Maleficent's fury. In the ensuing fight, Ventus defeats Maleficent, who reveals that it was Terra who stole Aurora's heart.

Aqua arrives and staunchly denies it, as does Ventus, although he seems unsure as what to believe. After Aqua refuses Maleficent's offer to join her in Terra's place, Maleficent throws her into the castle dungeon with Prince Phillip, whom Maleficent had captured earlier to stop him from awakening Aurora. Aqua and Phillip break out of the dungeon with help from Flora, Fauna and Merryweather and make their way towards King Stefan's castle to wake Aurora. Maleficent gives chase and confronts them on the bridge to the castle, transforming into a dragon to battle them directly, but is defeated. Before she can be finished off, Maleficent flees the scene and begins her plans to capture all the seven princesses. Later on in the game, she crosses paths with the imprisoned Pete, and frees him, setting the scene for their alliance.

Kingdom Hearts
A year after the events of Birth by Sleep, the Heartless soon appeared and Maleficent decided to use her immense power of darkness to control the creatures and build up a destructive force to aid her in her plans to conquer all worlds. Over time though, her darkness went beyond her control and the Heartless soon used it to manipulate her for their own ends. She first captures Aurora and destroys her own world, going off to Hollow Bastion to make it her new base of operations.

According to Jiminy Cricket, Maleficent is personally responsible for the destruction of her world and for the capture of Aurora.

With the aid of Pete, Maleficent soon became the mastermind behind a council of Disney villains seen in Kingdom Hearts, composed of Hades, Jafar, Ursula, Oogie Boogie, and Captain Hook. Pete, as her then-unseen henchman, had helped assemble this group and was off building an army of Heartless for her to increase their forces. Acting as a guide, Maleficent warned each of her followers that they should be wary of the darkness, ironic as she herself was perhaps the biggest victim to the darkness. She led this group in pursuit of ultimate power by controlling the Heartless and unlocking the Keyhole that leads to Kingdom Hearts, the heart of all worlds.

She used Hollow Bastion, the former home of Ansem the Wise, as a base of operations where she directed the affairs of the group. She used Ansem's report to help her understand and gain further control of the Heartless and recruited Riku, Sora's best friend, to her side. Once she saw that Riku could wield a Keyblade, she used the Darkness in Riku's heart to corrupt him and turn him against his friends.

Maleficent eventually told Riku her plans to find Kingdom Hearts, involving the Princesses of Heart. Maleficent persuaded Riku to go after Kairi, as she is also a Princess. Maleficent lied to Riku and told him that she'd help Kairi regain her heart once she had control of the Kingdom Hearts. She in the meantime convinced Riku to commit sinister actions, such as abducting several of the Princess of Heart, gave him the power to control the Heartless, and even ordered him to attempt to murder those who interfered in her plans. Riku, blinded by his jealously of Sora and lust for power, did as he was told and became more and more corrupt as his heart gave in to the darkness.

While Maleficent's plan seemed to be working, her allies were falling to Sora. With each failure, she would have to make another plan or just ignore it for another time. One by one, each of the Disney villains was defeated by Sora. Maleficent's knowledge and control of the powers of darkness had enabled her to control the Heartless, or so it seemed. Unknown to Maleficent, the Heartless were simply using her to reveal the Keyhole in Hollow Bastion, and in the meantime were eating away at her heart. Overconfident in her abilities and underestimating Sora's, she fought him and lost.

When Riku, possessed by Ansem, Seeker of Darkness, unlocked her heart, the darkness seeped into it, and Maleficent turned into a far more powerful version of her dragon form, but the darkness did not see her through. Although she proved a far more dangerous enemy as an empowered dragon, Sora still defeated her for the second time, the darkness ate her heart and she faded away into darkness.

By defeating Maleficent, Sora obtains the fifth page of Ansem's Report, and Donald learns the Cheer ability. Defeating Dragon Maleficent rewards Sora with the Fireglow Gem, which unlocks the ability to summon Mushu if taken to the Fairy Godmother.

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
Maleficent appears to Riku as a memory-based illusion in Castle Oblivion. She is one of only two characters, along with Aerith in Sora's story, to realize that she is not real. She mocks her old student, and how he once clung to her and the darkness, before he stands up to her and destroys her.

Also, in Sora's story, she is the boss of Hollow Bastion and is revealed to need to steal hearts in order to practice her magic and attempts to use the love found in Belle and Beast's hearts to make herself invincible. When Sora and company attempt to stop her, she turns herself into a dragon and attacks, shooting flames from her mouth, causing earthquakes by stomping, and trying to bite Sora, but she fails and is defeated. Zexion later makes note of this to Lexaeus.

Kingdom Hearts II
Maleficent is revived in Kingdom Hearts II, in which she poses as a secondary villain but still plots against Sora and the others. Her raven, Diablo, brings her empty robe to Yen Sid's tower, and the memories of Flora, Fauna and Merryweather accidentally bring her back to life.

In Kingdom Hearts Another Report, it is hinted that Organization XIII is inadvertently responsible for her return. Xemnas once sent Axel and Roxas to Hollow Bastion to wipe out Heartless and release a raven from a cage suspended from the ceiling. It is heavily suggested that this raven is Diablo and was released to revive Maleficent. The Organization may have planned to use her to create more Heartless for their plans. Like in Kingdom Hearts, she attempts to control the Heartless to locate Kingdom Hearts. However, she now competes with Organization XIII for supreme power and considers the group and Nobodies in general as vastly inferior to her and her Heartless, even as far as calling them "white husks".

Maleficent, with the help of her only loyal follower remaining, Pete, goes from world to world reviving her other followers and building an army of Heartless. Although only Oogie Boogie is witnessed being revived, it may be guessed that she is also responsible for the return of Ursula and for Barbossa, Scar, Hades, and Jafar using Heartless. Indeed, when she first meets up with Pete again, she asks about "the others", suggesting she was supposed to be holding a meeting with "them" like she did in the original game. Pete, however claims that "they must have had something better to do", perhaps meaning he was busy with his own endeavors. This infuriated her, and she demanded from Pete what could be more important than her return.

Maleficent reveals herself to Sora and his friends at Disney Castle when she tries to fill the Hall of the Cornerstone with Darkness in order to take over the Castle and make her new base of operations, worrying Queen Minnie. Maleficent is defeated however by Sora when he and his friends go back in time and stop Pete from destroying the Cornerstone of Light. Maleficent appears in Halloween Town and tries to destroy Christmas town by resurrecting Oogie Boogie but his memory loss causes him to drive her away and Sora defeats Oogie Boogie. She then appears in Hollow Bastion during its invasion by Heartless.

The Gullwings apparently once were followers of Maleficent, until she did not show up to see them like she said she would.

This is the turning point in the game, where she and the Disney villains finally lose control of the Heartless to Organization XIII. At the climax of the battle she holds off the Nobodies so that Sora may escape and devise a way to defeat Organization XIII. Although she hated Sora, she realized that she couldn't defeat them herself, since they easily defeated her Heartless, and even took control of them from her. She flees a battle against Saïx, escaping with her life, bringing Sora to the Realm of Darkness.

She last appears in The World That Never Was in one more attempt to acquire a suitable headquarters, aiding Sora once more by fending off an immense wave of Heartless with the help of Pete while Sora defeats Xemnas, though she claims that she will take the castle for her own afterwards. The outcome of this is unknown.

Kingdom Hearts coded
Having apparently survived the destruction of The Castle that Never Was, Maleficent was at a loss with her plans with the Heartless gone, her control over the darkness weakened, all her allies save for Pete defeated, and still without a base of operations. Desperate to make yet another comeback, the sorceress sends Pete to Disney Castle to spy on the king and bring her up to date on events. Pete eventually enters the journal world when Mickey turned the journal into a Data World to find answers to unsolved questions. Maleficent is summoned into the data world by Pete when he is sent there.

Together they decide that they could use the data world to forward Maleficent's original plans to find Kingdom Hearts and fill the worlds with darkness. The pair plan to build up a huge army of Heartless under their complete control by using the Journal's data on the creatures and then send them into the real world to conquer Disney Castle and the rest of the worlds. Maleficent planned to either destroy Mickey or simply leave him trapped in the Journal's data world.

She reappears in person in the data version of Agrabah. At the entrance to the Cave of Wonders, she strikes down the data version of Sora and destroys his data Keyblade. After, she gloats and summons Shadows. Data-Sora later fights and defeats her in her Dragon form. Later, when the debugging of the journal is complete and the Data World is being deleted, Jiminy Cricket remembers that Pete and Maleficent never left the Data World. Data-Sora rushes back to the Data Hollow Bastion to save them, and finds them fighting the corrupted version of Sora's Heartless, who is completely immune to their attacks. The Data-Sora attempts to save them, but they are both deleted before he can do anything.

However, after the battle, Data-Sora and King Mickey walk outside to find them alive, standing next to Data-Riku, who explains that there was a "rift in the data" where he was able to rescue them. Maleficent points out that this makes them even, referring to when she helped them in Kingdom Hearts II. Data-Riku then escorts Pete and Maleficent out of the Data World. A digital version of both later appear when Data-Sora goes to Castle Oblivion and attack him before leaving.

Development
The style for Sleeping Beauty was based on the art of Eyvind Earle, who claimed to have a 'Pre-Renaissance' style, with strong vertical lines and gothic elegance. Eearle was involved with the design of all the characters, and designed and painted most of the backgrounds in the film. Though early sketches depict a hag-like witch, it was decided that Maleficent's final, elegant design suited Earle's backgrounds. Davis' decision to make Maleficent a powerful fairy rather than an old crone may also have been influenced by Eleanor Audley's voice, which he recalled suggested a very powerful character.

The design for Maleficent's clothes occurred to Davis when he was looking through a book on Medieval art; one of the manuscript images featured a religious figure with long robes, the ends of which resembled flames. Davis incorporated this into Maleficent's final design. He based the sides of her headdress on the wings of a bat, and the top of her headdress on the horns of the devil.

Animation
After Eleanor Audley's vocal and live-action performances for Lady Tremaine, Walt Disney personally suggested that she be considered for the voice and live-action reference for Maleficent. Davis praised Eleanor Audley's live-action performance for the character, claiming that she created many of Maleficent's expressions and mannerisms that were ultimately used in the animation. The animators were more limited with how their characters could move against the detailed backgrounds. The manner in which Maleficent moved, perhaps limited by her costume, later inspired Andreas Deja to take a similar route when animating Jafar for Aladdin.

Deviations form Source Material
In the Sleeping Beauty ballet the evil fairy was named Carabosse. In some versions of the fairy tale, she only appeared to curse the child at the beginning, and did not appear elsewhere in the story; in these versions, the spinning wheel the princess pricks her finger on is not magical but simply a normal spinning wheel. One version of the story shows the fairy who curses the princess as old and grumpy, but not necessarily evil; this version of the character lived (most of the time sleeping) in a tower at the top of the castle, and, after cursing the princess, goes back to sleep, not appearing afterwards.

Disney Parks
Maleficent appears in various shows and parades. She does not appear as a meetable character very often at the parks, although she has recently been released into the meet-and-greet mix at Walt Disney World's annual event, Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party.

At Hong Kong Disneyland, she hosted the 2010 Halloween festivities, with an animatronic dragon Maleficent being placed in the hub and hosting a variation of the HalloWishes fireworks show. Maleficent can be seen in One Man's Dream II: The Magic Lives On!, Mickey and his Magic Halloween Night and formally Celebrate A Dreams Come True Parade just to name a few.

Fantasmic!
In the live nighttime spectacular Fantasmic!, Maleficent is called forth by The Queen, who plans to kill Mickey Mouse once and for all. In order to battle Mickey, Maleficent transforms into her dragon form and burns the area with her fire-breathing abilities, but is killed along with the other villains by Mickey when he uses the Sword in the Stone.

Disney Villains Mix and Mingle
Maleficent is the lead villain in the show and celebrates Halloween with her fellows villains. After she joins in a meet and greet.

Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom
One of the villains in Fantasyland, Maleficent is recruited by Hades to steal Fantasyland's crystal, though Maleficent plans to use it for her own gain rather then let him have it. Capturing Flora and Fauna, guests have to help Merryweather free them and retrieve the crystal.

Dream Along with Mickey
In the live castle stage show in the Magic Kingdom park in Walt Disney World, Maleficent attempts to take over the Magic Kingdom. However, Mickey uses the power of dreams to defeat Maleficent. Maleficent decides to leave but reminds Mickey they have not seen the last of her.

Starlight Dreams
Maleficent was the leader of the villains in the show as she and some others come together to fight against Mickey and Friends.

Trivia

 * Maleficent was nominated for a place in 'AFI’s 50 Greatest Villains list', along with the Queen, Stromboli, Man, Lady Tremaine, Cruella De Vil and Ursula. The Disney Villains to make the final list were the Queen (10), Man (20), and Cruella De Vil (39).
 * Maleficent is one of the ten villains featured in the tongue-in-cheek Disney's Villains' Lair. Maleficent's section of the book includes the catalogue she chose her costume from, and an invitation to Aurora's christening arriving 17 years late (with a small 'oops!' scrawled in the corner). Maleficent is ranked as the second greatest Disney Villain at the end of the book.
 * The noise Maleficent makes when she strikes her scepter on the floor is the same than when she snaps her jaw as a dragon.
 * Since the death of Eleanor Audley, Maleficent's original voice actress, Susan Blakeslee has taken on that role in, the Kingdom Hearts video game franchise and the "Happy Hallowishes" fireworks show held at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom during Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party among others. Blakeslee also replaced Audley as the voice for Lady Tremaine in Cinderella (1950 film). She was voiced by Lois Nettleton in both the TV series 'House of Mouse' and the movie 'Mickey's House of Villains'. In the stage show 'Fantasmic' she is voiced by Linda Gary.
 * The Nostalgia Critic listed Maleficent as Number 2 on his "Top 11 Disney Villians" list while his female counterpart, The Nostalgia Chick, listed her as Number 1 on her "Top 11 Nostalgic Villainesses" list.
 * Both Maleficant and Ursurla are the only two non-human villians of the offical disney princesses and of whom both form into a giant version of themselves for the climatic battle, except that Malificant tranforms into a dragon and not a towering version of herself unlike Ursurla.