Disney The Wicked Witch Archetype

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disposition in our favorite movies (Adams). Disney created an origin story arch for Maleficent. In this arch, it is explained that the actual story line of Sleeping Beauty was told from a point of view that wasn’t quite spot on. Ever since her debut in Sleeping Beauty, Maleficent has held the rank of an iconic super villain. She did everything we expected and needed her to do: she cursed the princess, impeded the heroic prince’s progress, lost everything in the end, and did not live happily ever after. Disney had created a character that jived with what the public was looking for. However, this archetype did not appear with the creation of Maleficent. The “Wicked Witch” archetype has been around for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. The association of witches with evil can be traced all the way back to the Bible. In Deuteronomy 18:10-12, Moses relays the words of the Lord God to the Israelites, specifying that anyone “who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells… is detestable to the Lord” (Deuteronomy). This is a good starting point for how witchcraft came to be seen as evil. Since it was something God did not approve of, it therefore had to be inherently evil. However, this was not necessarily an archetype with a negative impact because the verse itself is not gender specific, it can be applied to males and …show more content…

In this rendition of the fairytale, Maleficent is shown to retain all of her formidable power. This is demonstrated through her ability to curse the princess, though now with a lesser penalty than the original curse, to summon giant tree monsters to defend her home realm against the kingdom’s invading army, and by enchanting the forest to grow large spiked trees which form an impenetrable barrier between her realm and the kingdom (Maleficent). These acts of power, while still impressive and

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