Disney Villains Show ‘Book Of Enchantment’ Coming To Disney+
Memorable villains can often be more interesting than a story’s protagonist, and The Walt Disney Company has created a whole host of baddies over the years. So it’s not surprising to hear that a Disney villains show is in the works for their upcoming streaming service, Disney+. Learn more about the new show, which will be calledBook of Enchantment, below.
The Hollywood Reportersays that the new drama is based on authorSerena Valentino’s book series which has focused on characters like The Evil Queen fromSnow White and the Seven Dwarfs, The Beast fromBeauty and the Beast, Ursula the Sea Witch fromThe Little Mermaid, Maleficent fromSleeping Beauty, and Mother Gothel fromTangled. (Wait, wasn’t Gaston the villain ofBeauty and the Beast?)
THR says the series “has been in the works for months”, and now it officially has a writer/producer – but one whose credits don’t exactly indicate he’s the perfect fit for the job.Michael Seitzmanis leading the charge here, and so far he’s largely been known as a writer of shows likeIntelligence, Josh Holloway’s post-Lostsci-fi drama that ran for one season, andCode Black, a CBS medical drama that lasted three seasons. He’s also spearheadingthe John Grisham universeover at Hulu, working on shows likeThe RainmakerandRogue Lawyer. Nothing on his resume signals that he’s the person who can bring these Disney characters to life on the small screen, but maybe he’ll surprise us.
If you’ve walked around the Disney theme parks, set foot inside a Disney Store, or even just passed a kids' clothing stand in a mall over the past twenty years, you know that the Disney villains are absolutely huge in the merch arena. From that angle, this show makes tons of sense. AlongsideStar Warsand Marvel characters, Disney is building up its own in-house characters for the streaming service and adding to its own mythology – something they’ve already done in the fairy tale realm with both ABC’sOnce Upon a Timeand the Disney Channel’sDescendants, TV movies that center on the children of several key villains.
But while Valentino’s books dive into the backstories of these fairy tale antagonists, how will a show that combines them all work? Will this just be a live-action inverse of the princess scene fromRalph Breaks the Internet, full of little nods and winks to the way the characters have behaved in the stories we know them from? We’ll keep you posted when we learn more, but here’s hoping it’s as entertaining as this old sing-along video in which the villains teamed up in live-action:
