Stronger Than You

I started drawing the Ever After High girls in random historical fashion eras… why? I have no idea

Raven Queen in 1890s, Apple White in Italian Renaissance.

Briar Beauty in 1920s, Madeline Hatter in 1880s

No particularly reason for the eras, just the vibe I get from the characters and their designs!

YESSSS, I got you!!

Movies:

- Into the Woods, an incredible musical that combines Cinderella, Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, and Jack and the Beanstalk. Act 1 retells the fairy tales, interweaving them together. Act 2 continues after “happily ever after” to examine the consequences of their actions in Act 1. It’s a beautiful story. Watch the pro-shot starring Bernadette Peters as the Witch. The Meryl Streep movie changes too important elements, you’ll miss out on major details, especially in the second half.

- Shrek and its sequels

- Disney’s Descendants and its sequels

- Happily N’Ever After, a movie I have seen at least three times and yet I couldn’t tell you a single thing about it.

TV:

- The 10th Kingdom (I know it’s already listed here but it bears repeating because it’s so good) is set 300 years after the golden age of fairy tales. Snow White’s grandson is about to take the throne when his own wicked stepmother transforms him into a dog and sends him to our world. He finds a girl named Virgina and her father and the three of them travel into the fairy tale world, where they team up with a werewolf to traverse the kingdoms looking for a magic mirror to take them home. Although it doesn’t “retell” the fairy tales, you get to see plenty of fairy tale characters and learn what’s happened to them after all this time. It’s very witty and funny and is quite clever with its use of fairy tale themes and tropes.

- Once Upon A Time, I’m not recommending it but it does exist.

- Tell Me A Story, a series from CBS All Access that somehow ended up on The CW during the former’s shift to Paramount*. Season 1 involves The Three Little Pigs, Little Red Riding Hood, and Hansel and Gretel. Season 2 retells Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast. Although I genuinely enjoyed the spins on Cinderella and Little Red, and found the Pigs story interesting, I still don’t love this series. But if you’re interested in gritty, modern, magicless, drugs-sex-and-Murder versions of the stories, this is the one for you.

Books:

- The Tyme Series by Megan Morrison, as always I’m begging everyone to read these books. Book 1 combines Rapunzel and Jack and the Beanstalk, book 2 is mostly Cinderella but hints at The Wild Swans, and book 3 combines The Frog Prince with another tale that I won’t reveal because it’s a bit of a spoiler. Throughout the books, we get hints of other fairy tales that were intended to lead to books 4-6 but unfortunately Scholastic had cancelled the series. But each book contains its own story while all existing in the same universe, so even though it’s unlikely the rest of the series will ever exist, you’re not left on any kind of cliffhanger (though you will want more because they’re so good!!!). The titles to look for are Grounded: The Adventures of Rapunzel, Disenchanted: The Trials of Cinderella, and Transformed: The Perils of the Frog Prince.

- The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer, an obvious answer. Each book is it’s own fairy tale but the characters thread throughout the series. So book 1 is Cinderella, and though the Cinderella mostly is contained to book 1, the characters go on to meet the Red Riding Hood characters as that story unfolds in book 2. Genius storytelling happening here, and so engaging, you’ll be clamoring for the next book each time you finish one.

- Never After by Rebecca Lickiss, a book not many people know about but I LOVED it when I first read it as a teenager. Follows a prince, a noble lady, and a wizard as they discover that a misreading leads them to find three sleeping princess instead of one sleeping princess as they expected. It’s been a long time since I read this one but as I said, I really liked it back then and I’m eager to reread it.

- Never After: The Thirteenth Fairy by Melissa de la Cruz, I just finished this one and it’s cute but not perfect! A young girl finds out that her favorite book series, Never After, which combines and retells the “true” fairy tales, is actually about a real world! She meets Jack Stalker, who takes her to the land of Never After, and she encounters characters like Scheherazade and the Big Bad Wolf. A sequel is coming out soon which will feature Cinderella as the villain!

- The (Fairly) True Tales Series by Liesl Shurtliff, again each book tells its own fairy tale, but they share a universe and the characters overlap. This is a middle grade series, so it’s a fun and easy read but deceptively smart with how it treats the tales! Titles to look for are Rump, Jack, Red, and Grump.

- The Ravenspire Series by C.J. Redwine, I actually just finished reading these YA novels that are actually pretty dark. Once again, each fairy tale is its own book but they share a universe. I almost didn’t include them because although they share a universe and the characters cameo in each other’s books, there is far less overlap of the stories than Tyme, The Lunar Chronicles, and the (Fairly) True Tales. Titles to look for are The Shadow Queen (Snow White), The Wish Granter (Rumpelstiltskin), The Traitor Prince (The Prince and the Pauper), and The Blood Spell (a very strange title for a Cinderella retelling). This series also treats the tales FAR more loosely than anything else on this list.

Books I Haven’t Read:

- The Land of Stories books by Chris Colfer

- The Ever After High books by Shannon Hale

- The Descendants books by Melissa de la Cruz

- The School for Good and Evil books by Soman Chainani

- The 500 Kingdoms books by Mercedes Lackey

- Fables comic books

I’m sure that there are more that I’m not thinking of but these are my favorites and arguable the most prominent!

I’d also recommend The Fairy’s Return and Other Princess Tales by Gail Carson Levine! It’s a compendium of six original stories (that take place chronologically) and they each combine elements from multiple classic fairy tales, including some more obscure ones. Definitely worth checking out!