“Cast by Spell” by Franz Szony. Check out more of his work here (NSFW).

When I was a boy, I liked to pretend I was a strong woman. 

Most of those women had a touch of darkness. A broom beneath my legs, and I was the Wicked Witch; a cape around my neck, and I was the Evil Queen. More than once I sashayed through my dad’s flower garden like I was Poison Ivy. And if Power Rangers or Sailor Moon ever featured a female villain, they were quickly added to my rogue’s gallery of make-believe personas. 

But none held a candle to the original—the catalyst of my childhood obsession that led to countless moments of embarrassment for my family: Sleeping Beauty’s Maleficent. Many an unfortunate house animal found themselves cursed by me to prick their fingers on a spinning wheel and die. Does that make me a psychopath if they didn’t actually die? Let’s say no. 

I’m not sure why. Maybe I envied their power—their strength to go against the grain and do what they wanted. They might have been the villains, but at least they knew it. Maybe the Evil Queen did want to cut out Snow White’s heart, but the world forces a woman to be ruthless if she wants to rule. If you think about it, Poison Ivy wasn’t so much a villain as an eco-activist who became sexualized to take away her power. And poor Maleficent just wanted an invite to the party. 

Maybe for a little gay boy in rural Louisiana they were more relatable than anything else. Maybe he became the villain of his own story, the “heroes” the over-Christianized hillbillies at school. The small town a kingdom that needed to fall, full of parties he was never invited to. Maybe those female villains gave that little boy the strength to keep putting one foot in front of the other. 

Or maybe he just liked a boss ass bitch who knows how to cast a spell. 

I think both. 

-JRL