Disney Drops Trailer For Cruella de Vil Origin Story, Drawing Comparisons To 'Joker'
We truly live in a society where everything is Joker-fied. As anti-hero origin stories become the predominant form of entertainment, Disney has jumped on the cash cow and released a trailer for Cruella, the origin story for the villain of its classic 101 Dalmatians, painting her as "Brilliant. Bad. And a little bit mad."
Emma Stone stars as Cruella de Vil, taking on the difficult task of making a woman whose sole motivation is murdering puppies a sympathetic main character. Perhaps it's because Disney released their trailer a few days after a certain Zack Snyder Trailer, but the internet seemed primed to see Cruella as "Disney's Joker," which trended on Twitter after the trailer dropped.
Since "Disney's Joker" is trending for #Cruella …… pic.twitter.com/qSvBCUPWfk
— Landon O'Leary #AssociateProducer (@LandonOLeary) February 17, 2021
You can almost hear an executive saying, “The Joker made $1 billion and we need to compete in that space with Disney’s uniquely vibrant brand of villain” https://t.co/JffLByoHXc
— Matt Bors (@MattBors) February 17, 2021
Furthermore, people were puzzled by the casting of Emma Stone as the main character when she seems to be doing a clear impression of Eva Green.
Eva Green wouldve ate this right on up https://t.co/LLevdjewwM
— thick thighs~thin patience (@TheLady_Artemis) February 17, 2021
I can’t yaas kween hard enough for a puppy killing heroine who would have been better played by Eva Green
— jess (@the_tolerater) February 17, 2021
Cruella will come out May 2021, at which point we'll know how Disney pulls off Joker-fying one of its most notorious villains.
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mammon
Cruella's whole schtick is that she wants to skin some dogs to create a new coat.
I seriously don't know how you can redeem that…
Alex Reynard
No one wanted this. They made it anyway. Because studios have discovered that trainwreck rubbernecking works just as well for catching eyeballs as telling good stories.
toad_cat
That actually looks interesting. At least they're copying good movies. Also, love me some good villiain origin story.
A Concerned Rifleman
This is less "Joker" and more "Maleficent", no one needs to humanize what was essentially a pure antagonistic device in a story made for children.
Molemanninethousand
(Gregory Maguire has entered the chat)
…That being said, such a premise as you just described it has basically only ever worked that first, most famous time.
Molemanninethousand
Also, it's worth pointing out that someone wrote and produced a full-length musical in this vein about Jafar as a direct parody of Wicked before Maleficent came out.