For the last few years, fans have noticed that the latest animated Disney movies were lacking a once-vital ingredient.

The classic Disney villain, the singing, dancing incarnation of pure evil, seemed to be on the verge of extinction, as Disney’s heroes began to grapple with internal battles, rather than flamboyant antagonists with irredeemable wicked souls. 

In Frozen, Elsa’s greatest enemy was herself, as was Ralph in Ralph Breaks the Internet. Raya and the Last Dragon, along with Moana, feature antagonists, but no overarching villain, no unapologetic evildoers that prove more memorable than the protagonist - characters like Scar, Jafar, Ursula, Maleficent and Cruella de Vil are either being left in the past, or rebooted into sympathetic characters with tragic backstories. 

Which brings us to Cruella, Disney’s latest reincarnation of an iconic villain. Cruella is a fun film - it’s a bit like a Harley Quinn-starred remake of The Devil Wears Prada - and provides an origin story, of sorts, for the deranged puppy-skinner we saw in 101 Dalmatians. 

Except it doesn’t, really - Cruella is the story of a lovable rebel on a journey of self-discovery. And in a bid to explain Cruella’s eventual eagerness to, umm, slaughter puppies, a now-infamous scene shows Cruella’s hapless mother being killed by a group of dalmatians, who manage to push her off a cliff, somehow, while a young Cruella watches in horror. 

It’s an unintentionally hilarious scene, doubtless the most memorable of the film, one that has completely dominated the Cruella discourse online. 

The ham-fisted scene doesn’t even turn Cruella against dogs - it’s difficult to imagine Emma Stone’s Cruella morphing into the monster we saw in 101 Dalmatians. But really, who cares? Disney is mining its old IP to create new stories centered around villains, which is (arguably) more interesting than the flood of live-action remakes. 

I’m just not sure why we need to sympathise with villains in the first place. Fans already loved these characters, and not because they understood their side of the story. 

Indeed, Cruella’s original “motivation,” i.e., being a rich, entitled narcissist, was easy to understand. She wanted to kill those puppies simply because she wanted a unique fur coat, for her to wear once, and probably never think about again. The intent tells us everything we need to know about the character.

Viewers didn’t need dalmatian homicide and mommy issues to root for the new Cruella - Emma Stone’s performance was enough. Villainous protagonists don’t have to be “likeable” to be, well, likeable. Especially considering the fact that these films are aimed at slightly older audiences.  

With The Little Mermaid’s Ursula suggested by Stone as the focus of Disney’s next reboot, it's not hard to imagine an interesting story which focuses on the sea witch - it could be a great opportunity to improve the LGBTQ representation Disney struggles with, considering the original inspiration behind the character. 

An Ursula movie could be unabashedly weird, sinister and surreal. But we don’t need to see Ursula’s parents chopped up into sushi, or whatever; heroes are allowed to be one-dimensional, motivated by nothing more than the desire to do the right thing. 

Why not let villains be bad, simply for the fun of it?