Do we like them?

Do we like Maleficent?

A character from Sleeping Beauty (1959)

Our score: 2 out of 10. Iconic, glamorous and great company on screen, but she curses a baby over a snub. We'd cheer her entrance and still back the fairies against her.

Maleficent is the villain of Disney's 1959 animated Sleeping Beauty. The film is a fairy tale about a princess, Aurora, whose kingdom celebrates her birth with a grand christening. Three good fairies bring her gifts of beauty and song. Maleficent is the dark fairy who arrives uninvited, and her entrance steals the film.

She is elegant and theatrical, with a horned black cowl, a raven on her shoulder, and a voice that is polite and menacing at once. She is vain, quick to take offence, and keeps her power by fear. A crowd of dim-witted goons serve her, and she is hard on them when they fail.

We score her low because her response is wildly out of proportion. A snub from the guest list becomes a curse on a baby, then years of hunting for a girl who has done nothing to her. She is a joy to watch and she never does a kind thing, so she gets 2 out of 10.

When her henchmen fail her, she takes matters into her own hands. In the climax she turns into a huge fire-breathing dragon to stop the prince from reaching the princess.