The film series takes inspiration from the 1959 animated classic, Sleeping Beauty, but from the perspective of the villainous Maleficent, where she's adapted as protector and the most powerful fairy of the Moors, who, in revenge for betrayal, casts a curse on the daughter of her ex-lover King Stefan, Aurora.

[5] Around the same time, Hahn approached Linda Woolverton, with whom he had previously worked on Beauty and the Beast (1991) and The Lion King (1994), to write the script,[5] and in March 2010 she officially joined the project,[6] while the studio began negotiations with Angelina Jolie to star as Maleficent.

[7] Burton personally supervised the development of the film for six months to a year,[3][5] until in May 2011 it was announced that he had left the project due to his commitments to Frankenweenie (2012) and Dark Shadows (2012).

[21] Miranda Richardson and Peter Capaldi were cast and shot the Queen Ulla and King Kinloch scenes, but their roles were cut in the editing process together with more than 15 minutes of the first act of the film.

Stromberg said, "We spent a bit more time originally in the fairy world before we got into the human side of things ... we wanted to get it [the film] under two hours.

"[22] Stromberg later claimed in an interview that he employed an "age-old" emotional storytelling for the film and called it "the biggest thrill" against all technology advances.

[33] On June 15, 2015, Walt Disney Pictures announced that the sequel was in the works and that Linda Woolverton would return to write the screenplay for the film.

[42] In May 2018, it was announced that Harris Dickinson would replace Brenton Thwaites in the role of Prince Phillip, due to scheduling conflicts with the latter actor.

Sam Riley, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple and Lesley Manville were also confirmed to reprise their roles from the prior film.

[54] A video game based on the film, titled Maleficent Free Fall and made by Disney Electronic Content, Inc., was released on May 15, 2014.