Serena Valentino Disney Villains 7

I regret ever complaining about the Odd Sisters and the intertwining of all six previous Villains books again. I was looking forward to this one because I knew it would be different. It was different, all right. It was utterly horrible. 

I'm so tired of these villains getting abusive backstories. Find a new angle for why people go bad. They can't all be victims. Seriously. 

Cruella's book simply went on far too long. It starts when she's 11. She's super rich and raised by a governess. Her father is nice to her and tries his best, but he's got a busy job. Her socialite mother clearly is not meant to be a mother and the hour a day she spends with Cruella is eventually revealed to be at the governess's insistence. Her mother cares about wealth, spending money, shopping, keeping in fashion, and hanging out with her like-minded friends. I believe she does love her husband, but it's eclipsed by her love of being rich. 

Cruella's best friend growing up is Anita. But her mother despises Anita. I don't know why she's so creeped out by the poor girl. It seems to be beyond just the difference in station. 

After her father's untimely death, the two girls go off to finishing school together, but Cruella is forced to quit after standing up for Anita and threatening to stop giving financial donations to the school. You see, Cruella's father willed his entire estate to her. Not her mother. Only her. Under the condition she keep the de Vil name, even if she did get married. 

You can see where this is going. Her mother schemes and plots to marry Cruella off to someone rich, hoping she'll fall in love and change her name, and because he's rich, she won't need her father's fortune. It doesn't work. Cruella's mother brings home the perfect man for her, someone who likely reminded her of her husband and she knows Cruella would only fall for a man who was more open-minded like her father. The pair end up being a match, but her mother is thwarted because Jack agrees to take Cruella's name! Ha. 

But no ha. Not long after, Jack dies in a fire. Cruella is left with nothing. Her home with Jack is destroyed. His businesses were failing and he didn't tell her. He was trying to burn a bunch of papers and that likely caused the fatal fire. Cruella also signed a pre-nup, so she won't see a penny of his family's money. And guess what she did right before learning her husband was dead. Yep, she signed her fortune over to her mother. And guess what her mother does. Yep, she sells the family home and doesn't provide for Cruella AT ALL. Cruella still has what becomes known as Hell Hall and she has a small bit of money left. She languishes there and mourns her losses. Then she decides to reconnect with Anita and that's where the puppy story comes in. You see, Perdita was a posthumous gift from her father when she turned 18, but Cruella managed to push away every good influence she had in her constant need to make her cunt of a mother happy. So she does the movie plot, intending to give the puppy coat to her mother, and ends up being locked away in Hell Hall by her mother, because she was so embarrassed by her. 

The book is really frustrating because it constantly changes. Cruella's father gave her those round jade earrings she always wears and they're supposedly cursed pirate treasure. There are several times when they appear to physically bother Cruella and she acts poorly when she wears them. But I believe there were also loads of times she didn't have them on and still was nasty. She starts out by not seeing servants as people, slowly gets better with that thanks to Anita, and then keeps vacillating on it. She has a few times when she clearly sees her mother for what she is, but every single time, she's roped back into her perpetual need for bitch mommy's approval. I did like Jack. He was a good influence on her. After Jack dies, Cruella loses it. That's when she gets too skinny, her hair turns half white, and she keeps wearing the same clothes over and over. And it's then that her mother seems to change for the better and start being a halfway decent person, but then after that, she doesn't help Cruella with anything. She seems better at the end before she locks Cruella in Hell Hall, but does she care about her or only about appearances? Probably the latter.  

Cruella starts out as a character with potential. She loves fairy tale adventure stories and she and Anita read about Tulip, Oberon and Popinjay, so that's worked into the story after all. Cruella doesn't want to marry. She wants to travel and have adventures of her own. She invites Anita along with her but Anita wants to go to typing school so she can find her own future. Seriously though, if my rich friend invited me to travel, I'd do that first. It's not like typing school is going anywhere. Do it later. I believe Anita's "abandonment" of Cruella is where Cruella truly becomes without redemption. 

I simply did not enjoy it. I don't think every villain needs an abusive backstory that's supposed to explain why they're like that. Valentino did it with Grimhilde (bad father). She did it with Ursula (bad brother). She did it with Maleficent (asshole fairies). She did it with Gothel (bad mother). Now she's done it with Cruella (also bad mother). Beast is the only one that was an asshole himself. Reading all of these spaced apart as they originally came out would likely have been far more enjoyable than reading the same "villain as abuse victim" story over and over. I'm hoping for something better for Tremaine and Hook, but I'm not really expecting to get that.