Topic on User talk:DocColress
I think I'll get on that write-up tonight. But as for Maleficent... you're right, she is a tricky example indeed. I mean, within the movie Sleeping Beauty she comes off as pure evil and not only curses a baby to die purely out of spite and pettiness, but is also responsible for a lot of the kingdom's problems in general. She's feared by other characters in the story, and within the movie isn't shown to be redeemable at all. She seems to like her raven assistant, but I'm not sure if that would be a redeeming quality or not. But then again, there's the fact that within other Disney properties she doesn't come anywhere close to meeting this status. Given that not only is she shown to be a tragic hero in that live-action movie (Boy oh BOY do I hate the direction they took in that movie... but that's neither here nor there) but also shows a few noble traits in Kingdom Hearts (I'm specifically thinking in 2 where she's willing to hold off a swarm of Heartless to let Sora and co. get to Xemnas) seems to show that others view her as redeemable, or at least not pure evil.
But then again, I'm personally more inclined to list her as an example because her situation reminds me a lot of Sweeney Todd in how in the original stories he was shown to be a monster, but was written as more sympathetic in later adaptations. Or Ganondorf, who becomes a lot more sympathetic and even noble in Wind Waker but still qualified as a monster in not only the earlier Ocarina of Time, but in Twilight Princess which was made later and took place in another timeline. When I really look at it, I can't see why we couldn't list her as an example for the original Sleeping Beauty and mention that it was with later adaptations where she started moving away from Complete Monster status. I'll admit that I'm not fully sure if she should qualify, but I'm leaning towards a yes.
As for Cruella... well, not sure how much I can help there since I haven't seen either live action Dalmatians movie. If she didn't meet the cut in the animated original despite being hell-bent on stealing and butchering tons of puppies for the purpose of making fur coats and going as far as to hunt them down when they escaped from her, I'm not sure if she'd qualify in the live-action films. Now I did some research regarding the live-action movies and it seems that she remains hellbent on killing puppies and only stopped because of some sort of therapy that became undone later... but I'm still not quite sure if I'd say yes to her simply because I'm lacking context. How was she presented in the movies? Were there extremes she took that she didn't in the animated film? I'd rather try to avoid passing judgment on examples from media I'm not familiar with since I don't want to make any uninformed decisions.