Pick any Laika film \u2013 from Coraline<\/em> and Kubo And The Two Strings<\/em>, to Missing Link<\/em> \u2013 and you\u2019re guaranteed a slew of great characters, both of the friend and foe variety. And with Wildwood<\/em>, their ambitious new fantasy epic, the animation studio is presenting a world teeming not just with wildlife, but a host of human heroes and villains too. The film sends our protagonist Prue on a desperate mission into the thickets of an enchanted Oregon forest to save her little brother Mac, with all kinds of complex characters awaiting her in there.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Including Alexandra, a morally-compromised antagonist who\u2019s far from a straight-up bad guy. \u201cWhen we meet her at the very beginning of the movie, she\u2019s not a villain at all, and you see how tragedy has completely upended her life and is the catalyst for everything that happens in the story after that,\u201d director Travis Knight tells Empire<\/em> in our special 16-page bonus Wildwood magazine, created in partnership with Laika. Alexandra is, he hints, compelled by the most human of emotions. \u201cGrief can propel us to do terrible things,\u201d Knight says. \u201cIt can propel us to do amazing things, perform amazing acts of healing and heroism, but it can also take you down a darker road.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Also swept up in Alexandra\u2019s plans is Brendan, aka the Bandit King \u2013 a resident of the Ancients\u2019 Grove, his ancestral homeland where a great civilisation once fell, which Alexandra has in her sights. \u201cBrendan is Alexandra\u2019s true foil in the story,\u201d says Laika stalwart Chris Butler, who wrote Wildwood<\/em>\u2019s screenplay. \u201cHe\u2019s the one who\u2019s holding back Alexandra\u2019s aggressive expansion in the woods. He is the thorn in her side. She has plans for the entire woods, and it\u2019s constantly Brendan and his bandits who are getting in her way.\u201d Get ready for a whole wild world out there.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Read more about Prue, Alexandra, the Bandit King and more in Empire<\/em>\u2019s bonus Wildwood magazine, created in partnership with Laika \u2013 which comes bundled with the Rings Of Power Season 3 issue, on sale Thursday July 30. Head to empireonline.com\/wildwood for more Wildwood<\/em>, and find the film in cinemas from October 23.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pick any Laika film \u2013 from Coraline and Kubo And The Two Strings, to Missing Link \u2013 and you\u2019re guaranteed a slew of great characters, both of the friend and foe variety. And with Wildwood, their ambitious new fantasy epic, the animation studio is presenting a world teeming not just with wildlife, but a host […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12323,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-47"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12322"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12324,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12322\/revisions\/12324"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Wildwood\"](\"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/meet-wildwoods-complex-human-antagonist-alexandra-tragedy-has-upended-her-life.jpg\")
<\/div>\n![\"Empire](\"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/meet-wildwoods-complex-human-antagonist-alexandra-tragedy-has-upended-her-life-1.jpg\")
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