Line #23 YMMV/TheWitches


1	The movies from [[YMMV/TheWitches1990 1990]] and [[YMMV/TheWitches2020 2020]] have their own pages.
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3	* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: The witch who exclaims, "We can't possibly wipe out all of [the children]!", due to AmbiguousSyntax. Was she [[EvenEvilHasStandards expressing moral reservations about conducting a mass slaughter of every child in England,]] or was she just [[PragmaticVillainy worried that doing such a thing would be impossible?]]
4	* AntiClimaxBoss: Despite being described as a nigh-undetectable race capable of horrible deeds, yet never getting caught, [[spoiler:it was apparently easy to turn all of the Witches in England into mice without the possibility of them using magic to reverse the transformation.]] Somewhat justified, in that the witches of the piece mainly employ potions to destroy children. The only act of magic we actually see in the book or movie is the Grand High Witch "frying" one of her subordinates. [[FridgeBrilliance With no sign of defensive magic, turning their own potion on them makes a degree of sense]].
5	* CompleteMonster: [[WickedWitch The Grand High Witch]] is the ruler of the [[ChildHater child-hating]] witches, and the most malevolent of them all. A vicious demon with a propensity for [[BadBoss abusing and murdering her own underlings]], the Grand High Witch has spent decades teaching her followers ways to [[WouldHurtAChild dispose of as many children]] as possible. Unsatisfied with her followers' progress, the Grand High Witch schemes to wipe out every child in England by utilizing a potion to [[ForcedTransformation transform them into mice]], then watch as they are killed by their own oblivious parents and teachers. Demonstrating this on one hapless boy, the Grand High Witch follows this up by kidnapping the main character and inflicting upon him the same fate. With a cruelty unmatched by her underlings, the Grand High Witch instills terror in everyone who knows of her, friend and foe alike.
6	* EsotericHappyEnding: The book infamously ends with the boy permanently stuck as a mouse, since there's no cure for the potion. This is still portrayed as a ''happy'' ending, since this way, the boy won't outlive his grandmother, and they'll use the years they have left to track down and destroy all the other witches in the world. The two also ponder Bruno's fate. One states that his mouse-hating mother probably drowned him in a bucket, but nobody seems very disturbed by this possibility. The 1990 movie has an unabashed happy ending where the last witch, who had undergone a HeelFaceTurn, undoes the mouse spell on the protagonist and is implied to do the same to Bruno. While many were appreciative of this happier ending, Roald Dahl was infamously ''not''.
7	* HilariousInHindsight:
8	** The story features a [[{{WesternAnimation/Ratatouille}} rodent running around in a kitchen.]]
9	** The plot is also noticeably similar to that of ''Film/TheyLive'', except with a cartoonishly murderous MageSpecies in place of greedy {{alien inva\|sion}}ders. This book was published five years before ''They Live'' came out.
10	** When [[spoiler:Bruno and the Narrator]] are sneaking around the hotel and trying to find the Narrator's grandmother after [[spoiler:being turned into mice]], they encounter the Narrator's pet mice William and Mary. [[spoiler:Bruno]] asks [[spoiler:the Narrator if they were children turned into mice, but the Narrator says no. Come an adaptation [[Film/TheWitches2020 30 years later]] and this is indeed the case (at least for Mary since William is AdaptedOut).]]
11	* ParanoiaFuel: ''Any woman'' you encounter could be a witch, as the opening chapter emphasizes that [[TheyLookJustLikeEveryoneElse witches look like regular people with ordinary careers]]. A witch could be someone you happen to encounter in a public space, your neighbor, or even the teacher reading the book itself to a class full of children.
12	-->I am not, of course, telling you for one second that your teacher actually is a witch. All I am saying is that she ''might'' be one. It is most unlikely. But -- and here comes the big "but" -- ''it is not impossible.''
13	* SignatureScene: The meeting of the witches is often considered to be the story's most iconic scene, since it's at this point where we finally see the Grand High Witch and her subordinates in their fullest forms.
14	* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: The tells for witches include them hiding their clawed hands with ConspicuousGloves, hiding their bald heads with wigs (and having sores from wearing them directly on their scalps) and squared-off feet without toes that they cram into pointed shoes anyways. While the ConspicuousGloves would still be strange, they might play bare hands off as long acrylic nails which are fashionable in the 2020s (and were before in Black and Latino communities). They wouldn't be obligated to wear wigs to maintain hair and could just write off their hairlessness as a byproduct of chemo or other causes for hair loss that they could state aren't anyone's business--and wig technology has advanced if they did want to, with wig caps and other liners. As for pointed shoes and high heels, many shoes past the 80s for women have been practical and squared off at the end anyways. Can't do anything about the blue saliva, though. Just have to eat a lot of mouth-staining candies.

Context YMMV / TheWitches