[ SECRET POST #5472 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5472 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 19 secrets from Secret Submission Post #783.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Maleficent is actually one of the few where I don’t mind this. Mostly, I think, because it’s not a sequel/prequel/remake. It actually changes the story. It’s not just ‘the events of Sleeping Beauty as viewed by Maleficent, justifying her actions’. They changed the events. And Maleficent doesn’t justify her actions. Her arc is realising Aurora is an innocent person, and realising she’s in the wrong for having cursed her, regardless of what Stefan once did. So the ending changes, and Philip doesn’t even appear, and it’s Maleficent herself who saves Aurora. It’s not so much a remake or even a flipped-perspective retelling, it’s a ‘what if the circumstances were just a little different, how would that change things’.

And the fact that Stefan did do something actually makes that arc stronger, so it goes from ‘cursing children because you got snubbed is bad’, which should be a no-brainer, to ‘no matter how badly you were hurt, it doesn’t excuse taking it out on innocents’. So I can see why they had him do something villainous. And, as well, if Maleficent herself is suddenly not the villain, they needed someone to replace her to give a climax. That still doesn’t necessarily take the bad taste away, though, I get that. They could have given Stefan a chance to make the same realisation Maleficent had, to have her mercy highlight to him that he had been wrong first, and have him follow her mercy with his own in the end. It’s not a strong fighty climax like the original ending, but it might have followed the theme better.

So I do still understand the aggravation of watching a character who was completely innocent in the original suddenly being an absolute dickbag in this new version of the story. I can personally mostly forgive it in this instance, because the new story is interesting and I can see why they restructured it, even if they didn’t do all they could have done, but I do get it in general. In sequels, particularly. I hate when the new part of the story has to suddenly and violently strip away the good of the previous parts. See also: the Star Wars sequels, Mission Impossible, etc.

TLDR: I get you, but I didn’t mind it too much in this particular instance.

[(Anonymous)]

Good breakdown! And just adding on that I feel like Stephan /could/ have been the "hero" of his own little story--what he did to Maleficent was, sort of, mercy, in that he was asked to kill her and spared her life (obviously maiming her is /worse/ but from /his/ POV, I mean), and then he's caught up in his fear and trying to protect his family from a clear danger. TL;DR obviously he's /Maleficent's/ villain, but looking at his own narrative in the movie, I didn't really see him as The Villain (until the very end, when he was unhinged by his obsession/fear)