‘Cruella’s Baroness is the best Disney villain in years

One of the biggest questions surrounding Disney’s live-action Cruella was “How in the world can Disney possibly make Cruella de Vil a sympathetic character?” After all, her plan in 101 Dalmatians is to kill puppies to make a coat. You can’t get much worse than that.

With Cruella‘s release, the answer to that “sympathy” question becomes abundantly clear: To make us root for Cruella (Emma Stone), you have to pit her against another absolute monster. That monster is Baroness von Hellman (Emma Thompson), and she is the best Disney villain to grace the screen in years.

The perfect Disney villain has to pose a believable threat to a Disney hero, but they also have to be intriguing, almost captivating, to the audience. Many of the most iconic Disney villains — like Scar, Ursula, Maleficent, and even Cruella de Vil herself — end up stealing the show from the protagonists with their strong presences and villainous flair. 

Unfortunately, there hasn’t been a truly great Disney villain in almost a decade, with Mother Gothel from 2011’s Tangled and Dr. Facilier from 2009’s The Princess and the Frog being the last evildoers to perfectly balance treachery and charisma. Plus, with Disney’s live action films reframing evil characters’ actions as heroic (a la Maleficent), a villain like the Baroness has been long overdue.

The Baroness is cunning and ruthless. She has a complete and utter disregard for anyone who isn’t her, stealing people’s ideas and treating everyone around her terribly. When presented with a taser, she zaps a maid and proclaims she could do it all day. Also (and this is a big one), she’s a murderer. To say she’s a horrible person would be an understatement.

So why is she so fun to watch?

It takes a village to build the perfect Disney villain. Thanks to a number of factors, including references to other villains, Thompson’s performance, and her stunning wardrobe, Cruella is able to build a larger than life villain who could easily hold her own against Disney’s worst.

Despite being new to the Disney canon, the Baroness’ villainy can be traced back to other iconic antagonists. With her fashion background and her staff of frightened underlings, there’s a definite resemblance to Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep) from The Devil Wears Prada, a film Cruella clearly takes inspiration from. 

Just look at clips of the Baroness’ entrance into London’s Liberty store and Miranda’s entrance into the offices of Runway magazine. In both scenes, people scramble to cater to these characters’ needs while dealing with their bosses’ casual yet brutal verbal abuse. The power of both Miranda and the Baroness is immediately apparent, and they become formidable forces for our protagonists to square off against.

Like Miranda, the Baroness requires perfection from those who work for her and hides her vulnerabilities behind a hardened exterior and pointed insults. It’s almost too easy to imagine her delivering Miranda’s line “Details of your incompetence do not interest me” to any other character in the movie. In fact, she basically does, asking, “Why am I the only one who’s competent?”

Before you can dismiss the Baroness as Miranda Priestly-lite, remember that she is an actual murderer. She kills Estella’s mother and also implies that she’s killed many, many others. When she tells Estella that she needs to have killer instinct, she’s not speaking metaphorically. 

The Baroness’ literal killer instinct contains traces of another great villain: Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) of Game of Thrones. Compare Cersei’s assertion that “power is power” with the Baroness’ belief that “if you need to talk about power, you don’t have it,” and you get a clear image of two people desperate to hold onto their status and relevance, whatever the cost. However, while the Baroness bears similarities to Cersei, she is still her own entity. Where Cersei’s one redeeming quality is her fierce love for her children, the Baroness tries to have her own child killed. When you manage to outdo Cersei in the evil department, that’s how you know you’ve gone too far.

Thank goodness for Emma Thompson, who imbues every second she’s on screen with delicious, simmering evil.

Finally, the Baroness also resembles Cruella de Vil — the fully evil version we see in 101 Dalmatians — in that her dedication to fashion and perfection, which is in itself rooted in her narcissism, leads her to do some truly terrible things.

On paper, the concept of a Cruella de Vil-Miranda Priestly-Cersei Lannister hybrid is already exciting, but the wrong actor could have easily turned it into a caricature. Thank goodness for Emma Thompson, who imbues every second she’s on screen with delicious, simmering evil.

The strength of Thompson’s performance lies in her restraint. A twitch of her eyebrow or a quirk of her lip speaks volumes. Every time she pauses while speaking, she lets the silences fester just moments longer than feels comfortable, drumming up anticipation for whatever vile thing she may say next. She delivers her lines with maximum devastation – the way she hisses the word “desiccated” deserves all the awards — but she never even raises her voice. That’s power right there.

Adding to the villainous legend of the Baroness is her clothing. As a fashion mogul, she needs to look good, and costume designer Jenny Beavan more than rises to the occasion. In a featurette about the fashion in Cruella, Beavan and Thompson explain how the Baroness’ looks were inspired by Dior and actresses like Joan Crawford and Elizabeth Taylor. These references easily catapult her to the height of the fashion world, exaggerating the power imbalance between her and Cruella and making her a formidable foe.

On Thompson, Beavan’s designs become a weapon for the Baroness. Fashion is her livelihood, and it’s also the battlefield where she and Cruella butt heads. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the final gown the Baroness wears. Like all of her looks, it’s structural and fitted, but its silver detailing and striking neck and chest piece make it look like armor as she enters the climactic fight against Cruella. With this gown, the Baroness could easily fit in alongside the Evil Queen from Snow White.

The final piece of the puzzle for making the Baroness such a strong villain is the fear she inspires in everyone else. Cruella‘s ensemble cast and extras do invaluable work in establishing the villainous myth of the Baroness. The MVP here is Andrew Leung as the Baroness’ assistant Jeffrey, whose  indignant looks and shocked glances immediately telegraph just how scared everyone should be of the Baroness.

Since a Cruella sequel is already in the works, it’s highly likely that we haven’t seen the last of the Baroness. Who knows, maybe Disney will even give her her own prequel story somewhere down the road. One request, should that ever happen: Please keep her as horrible as she is in Cruella. A great Disney villain is something to be treasured.

Cruella is in theaters and available on Disney+ with Premier Access.