Cruella De Vil

" Ever since I was a little girl I've said, why not splash in and have fun?"

Cruella De Vil is a supporting character on Once Upon a Time. A chic diva with a penchant for fur coats, Cruella was psychopathic from a young age, opting to kill her mother's husbands and the like; that is, until she met the Author and he made it so that she couldn't kill. And so Cruella made her way to the Enchanted Forest to be a part of the Queens of Darkness, whose plotting led them to Storybrooke so that they may force their way towards their own happy endings. Ultimately, however, Cruella took drastic measures to have the Author killed... and it ended with her being flung from a cliff to her death by the savior.

Before the Curse
"The game is rigged. The villains never win."

Cruella De Vil is a disturbed young girl who uses poisonous trumpet flowers to kill her father at a young age, leading her mother Madeline to use her expertly-trained dalmatians to keep her daughter prisoner in her attack. Despite her constraints, Cruella is still able to make sure that her proceeding two step-fathers die as well, for she finds enjoyment in it, but she grows incredibly bored being locked away all the time. When a man from the newspaper - Isaac - visits hoping to ask Madeline some questions, she kicks him out for being rude, and so Cruella beckons him, knowing that he's looking for a great story and offering her own for him to use... but only if he can set her free first. He is successful, and wants to find a private place to talk, but being cooped up for so many years has made Cruella restless, and she wants to find a nice loud club in which to enjoy herself. She tells Isaac that her mother has been killing her husbands, keeping the truth hidden, and the two make a fast connection, going on to dance together and fall in love. Isaac feels so close to her in the end that he reveals himself to be an Author - a sacred recorder of events across many realms, and his magic quill and ink are capable of manipulating people's stories as well. He writes it so that she can control any animal she desires, meaning she can escape her mother and run away with him, but Cruella has other ideas, stealing his quill after he's given her his vintage car and using her newfound magic to make her mother's dogs turn on her and eat her alive. She makes a fabulous coat out of their skins, but Isaac, having learned the truth, comes back for her, wanting his quill back. They fight for it, and the magic ink ends up spilling all over her, warping her appearance evilly. She tries shooting him, but he scribbles something down which means she can't - in fact, she can never again take a human life, much to her dismay.

Cruella De Vil is summoned to Maleficent's Forbidden Fortress along with Ursula by Rumplestiltskin, who wants the three villainesses to team up with him in order to steal something that will make it so they can achieve their happy endings - the Dark Curse. Though reluctant at first, they soon agree to work together and make their way to a dark cave. Cruella's magic is first needed to control a horde of poisonous bugs, which she inhabits and forces to deviate, granting them access to what's inside. Maleficent then uses her staff to swallow the fire that surrounds what they're aiming to steal, and Ursula grabs it using one of her tentacles - the scroll which contains the curse, sealed in a glass orb which is then dropped into Rumple's hand. A grand demon named Chernabog then emerges and Rumple leaves the three ladies to deal with it, having planned on betraying them all along, and the trio has to work together in order to escape. Maleficent tackles the beast as the other two get away, and Ursula uses her tentacle to pull her to safety. From then on, they decide to form a tight-knit alliance with one another.

Whilst Belle, Rumplestiltskin's maid, is outside doing laundry, she becomes distracted by a small dalmatian, which she proceeds to follow. It isn't long before she loses it and someone grabs her from behind, kidnapping her. Rumplestiltskin soon receives a sand dollar with a message inside which depicts a captive Belle; she tells him that he has to meet with her kidnappers and give them his magic gauntlet in exchange for her life, and later he arrives at a cliff with said magic gauntlet that points to a person's greatest weakness, and he meets who he expects to meet: Maleficent. However, Ursula the Sea Witch is also there, to his surprise, and, to his further surprise, so is Cruella De Vil. He is hesitant about handing the gauntlet over, but when Ursula begins strangling Belle with her tentacles, he quickly tosses it over to Cruella, who explains that they shall use it to point to their enemies' weaknesses and then they shall be the victors. Rumple leaves with Belle whilst the self-proclaimed Queens of Darkness leave with the gauntlet, only to have Rumple corner them later and steal it back with ease, for one must have a death wish to demand a ransom from the Dark One. The Queens lament their loss, and Cruella points out that the game is rigged and that the villains never win. They suggest that Rumple join then so that they can change the game together, but he refuses, saying that he wins and he wins alone.

Snow and Charming return from their honeymoon to find everyone in their castle under some sort of sleeping curse, and the culprit is soon revealed as Maleficent, who's come to make a deal with the two royals along with Cruella and Ursula: they want to go with them to the Tree of Wisdom, which only answers the questions of the most valiant heroes, so that they can figure out a way to stop Regina's Dark Curse. Snow and Charming agree to go with them, begrudgingly, but begin to have their doubts when Maleficent slaughters good soldiers who stand in their way; as such, they take off in the middle of the night when the self-named "Queens of Darkness" are sleeping, and they find the tree by themselves. However, when they ask it a question, it repels them, and the three villains soon catch up and realize that the reason it didn't answer them is because Snow is pregnant and, being a product of true love, their baby has potential for great darkness as well as a great good. The trip is deemed useless and the separate parties part ways, but Maleficent later revisits Snow in the middle of the night and reveals to her that she's pregnant as well, which is why it's so important to her that this curse be stopped. She wishes to join forces with Snow, but Snow declines, refusing to delve into darkness while trying to protect her child for she believes that there is a better way of doing things. She vows that she will never be like Maleficent.

Maleficent takes dragon form in a cave and lays an egg inside it, waiting for her child to hatch, and Ursula and Cruella wait outside this cave standing guard. As they're complaining about the cold, with Ursula pointing out that Maleficent could send some dragon fire their way and Cruella adding that she wishes she'd bagged an extra two puppies to make mittens out of, Snow and Charming sneak up from behind and knock them both out with a magic powder. They proceed to head into the cave and steal the egg so that they may cast a spell with it that will siphon their child's potential for darkness into Maleficent's. However, unbeknownst to them, this spell entails sending the egg - which begins to hatch, revealing a baby to be inside - through a portal and to another land. Ursula and Cruella show up to try and stop them, appalled by what they're doing, but they simply end up being sucked into the portal as well, thus landing in our world. Cruella and Ursula use the magic from the dragon's egg to keep them young for years, then abandoning the child in the woods to die.

Season 4
"There's more than one way to skin an Author."

Cruella's husband and source of income is arrested by the FBI and she scarcely manages to snatch away one of her priceless fur coats before they take everything, just as Rumplestiltskin and Ursula approach her in order to strike a bargain - she aids in their plan, and she shall receive her happy ending. Cruella is enticed by the idea and agrees to drive the three of them in her vintage car to a quaint little town called Storybrooke, where magic is present. When Cruella and Ursula learn that this town cannot be seen or entered, however, the former pulls a gun on the Dark One and threatens him, warning him not to betray them like the last times because he is nothing but a weak cripple without his powers; he assures them that he won't, pointing out that so much of his plan relies on him placing his trust in them, and they agree to proceed, using his cell phone to make contact with the Evil Queen. They tell her that they've turned over a new leaf and want to enter Storybrooke, and she agrees to help them should they help in turn to defeat Chernabog, who's attacking the town. They give Regina the information she needs and Chernabog is defeated, followed by Cruella and Ursula being given a scroll that allows them to enter Storybrooke. Later that night, the give the same scroll to Rumple and he enters too, regaining his magic and losing his limp. He reveals his plan to both resurrect Maleficent and turn Emma Swan to the dark side while, later that night, his two lady villainesses meet up with Snow White and Prince Charming, who threaten to kill them should they reveal what happened all those years ago.

Cruella and Ursula, after taking much issue with the service over at Granny's Diner, head to Mr. Gold Pawnbroker & Antiquities Dealer under the pretense of wanting a new hood ornament for Cruella's car, when in fact they want to steal a totem of Maleficent's in aid of her resurrection; they are successful. However, they are pulled over by Emma and Charming, the latter of which finds the totem and takes it, realizing what the two villainesses are up to and deciding to head with Snow down to the mines in order to steal Maleficent's ashes to nullify the revival. As they soon learn, this was all a part of Cruella and Ursula's plan, and Cruella takes a small knife and cuts into the hands of the two heroes: the totem was unneeded, but the blood of the people who wronged Maleficent most is very useful indeed. It is dropped onto the ashes, and Maleficent rises once and for all. They decide to spare the Charmings, preferring to leave them stewing in their own guilt, and the three Queens of Darkness - together again - head to the town's woods. Maleficent completes the totem and shakes it, revealing it to have been a rattle intended for the baby she lost at the hands of the Charmings.

Regina approaches the Queens of Darkness as they hang out in an empty Granny's Diner and says that she'd like to join them in ruining everyone else's happiness (when in fact she's going undercover for the town's heroes in order to get info on the trio of villainesses). They decide to play a game in order to find out if she's gone as soft as everyone says, parking Cruella's car on the train tracks and making it so that whoever poofs them away first is the loser. Regina assumes this role and the Queens are disappointed, but Maleficent assures her associates that it means nothing except that her old friend is rusty. After a night of wreaking havoc together, the Queens return to Rumplestiltskin, who later reveals himself to Regina. She and Maleficent have just kidnapped young Pinocchio because it is believed that he knows something about the Author - a mysterious magical someone who appears to have control over the fates of happy endings. Rumple explains that Pinocchio will never remember anything so long as he's a child, and so he transforms him into the man he used to be, known as August W. Booth.

Some initial torture of August is done, involving a knife and a fireball, and Rumple soon returns to the wood cabin in the woods with a potion stolen from the fairies - one which will temporarily reverse any spell they've cast. He forces it down August's throat and he turns back into wood, before reverting to his human form almost instantly. However, the potion has made it so that his "built-in lie detector" has been activated, meaning that his nose will now grow every time he fails to tell the truth. Rumple grabs him and aims him in front of the fire, learning from him that he tore an illustration of a door from the book, and the Author is trapped behind. Rumple demands to know where this door is, but all August knows is that it's in Storybrooke. Since Regina took August's things, the page is in her possession, or rather, Henry's. She is tasked with retrieving it while Cruella is left with August, but the Charmings quickly storm the place (with Snow knocking Cruella out from behind with a frying pan and knocking her out) and rescue him while Ursula betrays her associates and leaves town with her father, telling Hook before she does so about Rumple's plan: he wants to fill Emma's heart with darkness so that the savior's presence doesn't interfere with the upcoming shift in happy endings. Cruella slips away and warns Gold of Ursula's betrayal as Regina retrieves the page from Henry, learning from August that the door and the page are one in the same, so the Author isn't sealed away in the Sorcerer's house like Rumple thought - the Author is trapped inside the book.

Regina is "unable" to retrieve the page, and so brings Gold, Maleficent and Cruella a photo of the door instead, taken on her phone. Cruella sees this as useless, pointing out the glare on the picture, but Gold soon realizes that this is no glare: it's magic. He works out that the Author is trapped inside the book, and he employs Maleficent to use her magic to put the whole town to sleep so that they can search for the door. They head to the Blanchard Apartment, where Regina says she last saw it, but it is soon figured out that Henry - who's immune to Maleficent's spell because he's been under a sleeping curse before - has run off with the page to the Sorcerer's mansion, for he knows the villains are after it. Regina goes to collect it from him and Gold sends Maleficent and Cruella after her to make sure she gets the job done. When the Queens of Darkness then return, Regina brings with her a forgery of the page made by Emma, and Gold figures this out quickly, forcing Maleficent to knock her out. He has her carried to her vault and Cruella wants to kill her, but Rumple says that he has something that will make Regina do his bidding forever - referring to a captive Robin Hood.

Cruella is driving through town when she's confronted by Maleficent, who demands to know what happened to her daughter, Lily, upon arriving in this world with the two other Queens of Darkness. Cruella explains that she and Ursula left the baby in the woods to die, having used the egg's magic to keep themselves young, and the infuriated sorceress takes dragon form, wanting to make Cruella's death last days - but this just means that Cruella can use her magic to take control of her, and she makes the beast fall asleep as she vows to herself that today is the day that she gets her happy ending. After confronting Isaac, the Author, and knowing she can't kill him, Cruella uses Pongo (a trusted dalmatian) to kidnap the son of the savior and the Evil Queen: Henry. She alerts his two mothers via video message, threatening to kill him if they don't do what she wants and kill the Author, but they refuse, deciding to track their son through the woods instead. Henry escapes his binds and Cruella is forced to chase after him using Pongo's help, all the while David and Mary Margaret learn that Rumplestiltskin has already meticulously planned out the ending to this entire occurrence, wanting to use it to make Emma's heart darken. He intervenes and makes it so that she and Cruella face off alone on the edge of a cliff, with the latter holding Henry at gunpoint and threatening to murder him. Emma raises her hands, prepared to use magic, but Cruella doesn't think she'd dare, pointing out that she's a hero, and heroes don't kill... and then Emma uses a blast of magic to send Cruella hurtling off of the cliff and to her death.

Season 4
"I'll miss her... furs and all, I'll miss her."

- Isaac

Following her death at the hands of the savior, Cruella De Vil is laid to rest, and both Rumplestiltskin and the Author watch as her coffin is lowered down into the ground of Storybrooke's graveyard. Isaac, staring down at the lipstick-stained napkin Cruella kissed all those years ago in the club they attended, comments that he'll miss her - furs and all - for he realizes that in her own special way she cared for him. The napkin is placed onto the grave, and Rumple says that someone had to die for the progress of his plans. Isaac questions this, and they proceed to discuss the state of Emma's heart. Meanwhile, Emma watches them from nearby, and glares are exchanged. The savior has a look of darkness on her face, regretting what she did to Cruella. ("Lily")

Gallery
Gallery of photographic stills released to promote the character.