Maleficent

**Maleficent** is the main antagonist of Disney's 1959 animated feature film Sleeping Beauty. An evil fairy, Maleficent is an incarnation of pure evil, and is responsible for all misfortune in King Stefan's kingdom.

## Character Information

### Aliases:

Mistress of Evil (self given name)
Lizard
Mother (by Mal)
Apollonia

## Other

### Relatives

Hades (ex-husband)
Mal (daughter)
Ben (Future son-in-law)

### Enemies:

Aurora, Prince Phillip, Flora, Fauna and Merryweather, Belle , Beast, Fairy Godmother

## Appearances

### Sleeping Beauty

At the christening of the newly born Princess Aurora, announced by the herald, the Three Good Fairies come to bestow three gifts on the child. Before Merryweather has a chance to give the child a final gift, Maleficent appears with Diablo, perched on her. Angry at not receiving an invitation from the kingdom, she curses the child, decreeing that before the sun sets on Aurora's sixteenth birthday, the child shall die by pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel. Before the guards can get to her, she disappears, laughing wickedly, leaving everyone in despair and filled with worry. Though she is unable to undo the entire curse herself, Merryweather softens it so that Aurora will not die, but will merely enter a deep sleep that will only last until true love's kiss. As Aurora's sixteenth birthday draws near, Maleficent punishes her Goons after finding out that they have stupidly been searching for a baby for sixteen years. After angrily calling the goons idiots and imbeciles and intimidating them into running away by conjuring dark lightning bolts with her staff, she sends her raven Diablo to search for the princess. After managing to find the hiding location of Aurora and the fairies, Diablo flies back to Maleficent to inform her of Aurora's whereabouts. With this new knowledge, Maleficent plans her next move.

When the three fairies return the princess to the castle and leave her alone for a while, Maleficent uses a hypnotic apparition resembling a will-o-the-wisp to lure Aurora to a spinning wheel conjured by Maleficent. Though Aurora is momentarily snapped out of the trance by the fairies' voices (who call after her to not touch anything), Maleficent orders Aurora to touch the spindle while the fairies try stop Aurora from touching the spindle with her finger. But before the fairies can reach Aurora, she pricks her finger in the process and subsequently falls to the floor, motionless, having fulfilled Maleficent's curse bestowed on her when she was a baby. When the fairies arrive too late to save Aurora, they were horrified to see Maleficent, who briefly mocks her arch enemies of their efforts to defeat her. She uncovers the fallen princess before their eyes and vanishes, cackling maniacally, leaving the fairies to weep over Aurora’s fate. Following this, Maleficent recruits her goons and they capture Aurora's true love (who turned out to be Prince Phillip, rather than a peasant). On Maleficent's orders, Phillip is taken to Maleficent's domain in the Forbidden Mountain. When the fairies arrive at the cottage in search of Phillip, all they find is the prince's hat, allowing them to deduce that Maleficent has captured him. At the Forbidden Mountain, Maleficent visits the imprisoned Phillip in the dungeon. She taunts him with the knowledge that Briar Rose is actually Princess Aurora, and ridicules the notion that "true love conquers all". She then reveals her intent to keep Philip imprisoned until he grows elderly, then let him go to seek out Aurora, who won't have aged a day since.

Maleficent then leaves the dungeon to sleep saying she shall sleep well for the first time in sixteen years. Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather infiltrate Phillip's cell and arm him with the Shield of Virtue and the Sword of Truth. As they make their escape, they are confronted by Diablo, who fetches the Goons. As the prince and fairies dodge the Goons and make their escape, Diablo flies to warn Maleficent of Phillip's escape, with Merryweather in pursuit. Diablo reaches outside Maleficent's tower, where Merryweather finally turns the raven into a stone statue with a satisfied scowl before rejoining Flora, Fauna, and Philip. Awakened by Diablo's constant cawing, Maleficent emerges from her tower where she finds Diablo's petrified form. Shocked by Diablo's state and enraged at the sight of Phillip escaping to reach Aurora, Maleficent attempts to strike him down with lightning. As he continues, she summons a forest of thorns to surround Stefan's castle as a blockade. With the help from the Good Fairies, however, Phillip manages to hack through the thorns and towards the castle. Infuriated, Maleficent transports herself to Stefan's castle to appear before Phillip personally. As a final attempt to kill the prince, Maleficent summons all the power of Hell to transform herself into an enormous dragon.

Phillip charges at the dragon, who drives him backward with her blasts of flame. As Phillip retreats, Maleficent chases him up onto a high cliff and corners him at the ledge. With another powerful flame blast, she blows his shield off. As she bursts out laughing and prepares to finish off the now defenseless Phillip off, Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather magically empower the Sword of Truth, and Phillip immediately throws the sword at the dragon's heart. Maleficent screams in pain and collapses onto the ledge, attempting to devour Phillip for the last time, but he dodges. Her enormous weight, upon impact, causes the ledge to crumble, sending Maleficent tumbling down to her demise below, into her own dragon flames and dissolves into a purple coloring dark smoke. Phillip looks down to see what remains of Maleficent, to see nothing more than her shredded cloak on the ground, plus the Sword of Truth, still embedded in the cloak, turning black, its enchantment having worn off. With Maleficent finally destroyed, Prince Philip reaches Aurora in her tower and kisses her which successfully breaks Maleficent's curse.

### Olympus?

As every other powerful villain, Maleficent plays an important role in this book. She is first introduced in "The One who Destroys" as a common damsel at Thebes.

She interacts with Philoctetes throughout the chapter and offers herself to help find Hercules, Megara and Pegasus. She is then mentioned in "Back to the Fields" by Megara and reappears in "Welcome to Thebes".

Maleficent is shown to be weaker in this book as she was already defeated by prince Philip.