Maleficent (also known as Mal) is a character in ABC's fantasy series Once Upon a Time and Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. She is a powerful sorceress who has the ability to transform into a dragon, as well as a former member of the Queens of Darkness.
She is based on the character of the same name from Disney's 1959 film Sleeping Beauty.
Appearances[]
Once Upon a Time[]
Maleficent appears in ABC's Once Upon a Time portrayed by Kristin Bauer van Straten. She debuts in the second episode of the first season and also makes an appearance in the spin-off series Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. In the series, Maleficent is portrayed as a witch, as opposed to being a fairy.
After failing to kill Princess Aurora's mother, the original Sleeping Beauty, Maleficent inflicts a sleeping curse on Aurora, unintentionally allowing Aurora to escape the Dark Curse that sends everyone to Storybrooke. Maleficent also curses her true love Prince Phillip by transforming him into a beast called the Yaoguai and banishing him to another land so that he is incapable of reaching Aurora. He remains in this form until he is found by Belle who returns him to human form.
Maleficent talking to the Evil Queen.
She is approached at some point by the Evil Queen, who trades the Dark Curse created by Rumplestiltskin, for Maleficent's sleeping curse, in order to punish Snow White. Later, Rumplestiltskin offers to give Prince Charming a spell that will allow him to locate Snow if he manages to hide a potion inside the belly of a beast. Upon arriving at the Forbidden Fortress Charming discovers that the beast is, in fact, Maleficent. During the subsequent fight, Charming manages to toss the egg containing the potion into the gill of sorts on Maleficent's neck. Eventually, Maleficent gives up on her vendetta against Aurora and her mother, finding solace in her pet black unicorn. However, the Evil Queen, frustrated at the failure of the sleeping curse, desires the Dark Curse once more, but Maleficent refuses. The Evil Queen magically duels with Maleficent eventually defeating her and taking back the curse. Despite defeating Maleficent the Evil Queen allows her to live, saying that she is her only friend.
After the Dark Curse has been cast, it is revealed that Regina Mills (the Evil Queen's counterpart) trapped Maleficent in her dragon form and imprisoned her beneath Storybrooke's abandoned library. Later, when Henry Mills falls under a sleeping curse to prove the curse's reality to Emma Swan, Emma is forced to kill Maleficent to retrieve the potion within her, later revealed to be a bottle of true love. Sometime after the curse has been broken Regina travels beneath the library to retrieve the 'fail-safe' trigger to destroy Storybrooke, where she discovers that due to a spell she placed on Maleficent to ensure that the 'fail-safe' would always be guarded, her friend is trapped in a form that appears to be neither dead nor truly alive.
Maleficent in the fourth season of Once Upon a Time.
In season four Maleficent returned with a brand-new look that was much closer to that in the 1959 Disney film. In the second half of the fourth season, a flashback reveals she allied herself with Cruella De Vil and Ursula, as they all sought their own happy endings. Part of this involved stealing a special gauntlet from Rumplestiltskin, though in order to do so, the villains concocted a scheme to kidnap his maid, Belle, and hold her hostage. After successfully doing so, Maleficent sent a raven out to deliver the message of Belle's capture, and the price for her return with the help of Ursula. Once Rumple arrived on the scene, Maleficent appeared and a confrontation followed; she was immediately pinned down by the Dark One's magic, only to announce the presence of her allies, dangerously outnumbering the sorcerer. Without a choice, Rumple hands over the gauntlet and Belle is freed.
Sometime afterward, Rumple manages to take back the gauntlet. He warns the Queens of Darkness not to steal from him again, angering Maleficent, who claims that taking the gauntlet was part of the deal, and he never breaks his deals. In retaliation, Rumple claims that stealing from him is not a deal, and he always wins and wins alone, declining Cruella's offer to join the trio.
Maleficent reveals her pregnancy to Snow White.
It is then revealed that Maleficent, Ursula, and Cruella teamed up with Snow White and Prince Charming to learn how to prevent Regina from casting the Dark Curse from the Tree of Wisdom. However, Snow and Charming choose to sneak away from the three villains to prevent them from also gaining knowledge. When Snow and Charming attempt to communicate with the tree, it refuses to give them the knowledge that they seek, something that is witnessed by the three villains who have just arrived on the scene have caught up to their erstwhile allies. Maleficent realizes that the tree has rejected the pair because Snow is pregnant with a child that, as the product of true love, can be a great force for good or just as great a force for evil. Maleficent later appears to Snow and suggests that they ally with each other to prevent Regina from casting the Dark Curse. At this time, Maleficent also reveals that she is pregnant and wishes to spare her child the pain of the curse; however, Snow rejects Maleficent's suggestion, believing that if she allies herself with a villain, then it will affect whether her own child grows up to be good or evil.
After Gold is banished from Storybrooke by Belle, he locates Ursula and Cruella and tricks Regina into allowing them into Storybrooke. They later go back for him, and once all three are reunited again, he says, "It's time to reunite the band," as he talks about resurrecting Maleficent.
Maleficent mourns her child.
After tricking Regina into letting them stay in Storybrooke, Cruella De Vil and Ursula secretly work with Mr. Gold to resurrect Maleficent. The women steal an ornament of Maleficent's from the pawnshop, which David and Mary Margaret believe will be used to resurrect the dead sorceress. Instead, this is only a ruse to bait the couple into venturing into the cave below the library where Maleficent's ashes reside, and after David and Mary Margaret are knocked out by Ursula, Cruella sacrifices some of their blood to Maleficent's ashes to complete the spell that proceeds to morphs her ashes into her undead form, then her dragon form before restoring her to life. Although Mary Margaret fears she will reveal their past dealings to Emma, Maleficent affirms she only cares about relishing in their suffering, which will be as long and as unyielding as her own had been. Departing with Cruella and Ursula, she later goes with them to a hilltop overlooking the town. Maleficent summons the ornament into her hand and connects it with the totem from her necklace, forming a small baby rattle, which she shakes as a pained look crosses her face.
Maleficent talks with Regina.
As the villains have a get-together at the diner, Regina enters and persuades them to let her join their inner circle. Still skeptical, the ladies test their newest addition, in which Cruella drives her car onto railroad tracks while a train approaches. With everyone still seated in the vehicle, Regina must prove she is not heroic by not using magic to save them. Waiting until the train almost crashes into the car, only then, she teleports them out of harm's way. Having bet earlier that Regina would not save them, Maleficent loses the bet and pays up a necklace to Cruella. While the women think she's gone soft, Regina then suggests they stir up trouble elsewhere, and the foursome spends the night drinking and damaging public property.
The next morning, Ursula, Cruella, and Maleficent report to a cabin in the woods telling Mr. Gold about Regina. He considers her a possible asset for their scheme since she's just as desperate as them to find the author, which convinces the women to trust her. That night, Maleficent borrows Cruella's car, which she enchants to drive automatically, and meets up with Regina alone, instructing her to kidnap Pinocchio, who they need to interrogate about the author. The plan goes smoothly, and they bring the boy to the cabin, where Regina is shocked to see Mr. Gold has returned. When Ursula and Cruella arrive, Mr. Gold reveals Pinocchio is no use to them, but the man he used to be remembers everything. Using his dagger, he reverts the boy into August, who they'll torture for information about the author.
Maleficent with Gold, Cruella, and Regina.
At the cabin, the trio awaits Regina, who returns with a snapshot of the door page since she wasn't able to steal the illustration. After Cruella notices a light glare on the photo, Mr. Gold deduces that it's magic and that the Author is actually trapped in the door within the illustration after being imprisoned by the Sorcerer. With the page more vital to them than before, Maleficent puts everyone in town to sleep, although those already once affected by a sleeping curse remain immune. As they head to the apartment to search for the page, Maleficent pressures Mr. Gold to provide answers about her lost child so as long as she continues to help him find the Author. When they find nothing at the apartment, Mr. Gold figures Henry must have disappeared to the mansion with the storybook.
After he leaves to conduct other business, the women head to the mansion, and with Regina's persuasion, Henry forfeits a forgery of the door illustration. Regrouping outside the pawnshop, Mr. Gold examines the page, realizing it's fake, and then has Maleficent put Regina to sleep. Believing she is culpable; the trio hauls her to the vault. There, Maleficent once again asks Mr. Gold for her child's whereabouts. He asks her to let go of her pain since the truth may make it worse, but she adamantly wants to know her child's fate. Mr. Gold relents, and using Maleficent's baby rattle, he shows her the child, Lily, being adopted thirty years ago.
Maleficent confronts Cruella as to why she lied to her about her daughter, Lily and tells her that she was dead. Cruella simply tells her that she's a terrible person and left her in the woods to die, claiming she isn't "mother material". She tells her that Ursula and herself took her dragon egg to absorb the magic and keep themselves youthful. Furious at her, Maleficent tells Cruella her death will last for days and turns into a dragon. However, Cruella uses her powers to put Maleficent under her control as she can control animals and tells her that today is the day, she gets her happy ending now that the Author is here.
Regina, Mary Margaret, David, Hook, and Emma are all in Granny's diner, where Emma is asked by Maleficent to locate her daughter. Emma asks what her daughter's name, and she reveals it to be Lillith (a childhood friend of Emma's). While Regina and Emma go look for her daughter, she is sent to guard Belle's heart which is used to leverage Regina against Gold. There Mary Margaret comes to apologize to Maleficent for what they did to Lily and tells her that they'll do whatever it takes to earn her forgiveness, but she replies that they turned her own daughter into a monster and if she can't forgive them, why would Lily.
Maleficent and Lily hug.
Maleficent is finally reunited with her daughter, and the two go to Granny's Diner. Lily asks Maleficent about what they will do about Snow White and Charming, but Maleficent tells that she doesn't want to waste her time on revenge and that they should all look forward to telling her that they can either be happy for the future or angry about the past. Maleficent works to keep Lily in Storybrooke while warning her that she won't be able to get back into Storybrooke if she leaves, and she can't leave as the magic keeping her alive will wear off, and she will turn back into dust; however, Lily doesn't care and decides to leave. She later approaches Mary Margaret and David to help her find Lily and convince her to stay. The trio later encounters Lily in her dragon form.
Maleficent approaches Lily's dragon form as Mary Margaret runs after her. Then Maleficent confronts Lily, she regresses back to dragon form as Maleficent gives Lily her baby rattle, which she never got the chance to give her. Lily claims that she destroys everything she touches ever since Snow White and Prince Charming put Emma's darkness in her. Maleficent convinces Lily to stay for a week to teach her some tricks.
In the series finale, it is revealed that Zorro was Maleficent's lover and that he is the father of Lily.
Once Upon a Time in Wonderland[]
Will Scarlet joins a group of thieves led by Robin Hood and convinces them to break into Maleficent's castle to steal a chest of gold. In actuality, his real intention is to get an object that can take him and his loved one (Anastasia), away from the Enchanted Forest. When Maleficent realizes the treasure is missing, she projects her voice around the thieves' campfire; warning of the consequences of taking something that will only have a bad outcome. Despite her threats, Will secretly leaves with the stolen item.
Trivia[]
- The alias Mal is the same name as the protagonist of the Descendants franchise, who is the daughter of Maleficent in that franchise.
