#did i make a blog to put all my winx rants...

[winx-lore]

My thoughts on Believix and what should of been

(I know this is ultimately a kids show but sue me i'm not a fan of believix)

So the first three seasons show the girls evolving their powers till they get to the "final" stage of Enchantix. This was mentioned several times in the series as a fairies most powerful form, which seemed fitting with the larger wings, use of fairy dust, and being able to miniaturise like fairies in storybooks.

So when the concept of Believix was introduced, as a new stage to fairies magic that is stronger than Enchantix, it messed and downgraded all the sacrifice and effort that the fairies had to go through, both mentally (Charmix) and physically (flora drowned), to get earn Enchantix.

As well as this the concept of how they got their powers were a bit iffy - make people who don't believe in magic believe - like it seems very low barriers for a power which was stronger than Enchantix. Especially when there could be many planets in the magical dimension that may not be exposed to magic, so what is stopping any fairy from accidentally gaining Enchantix by making one of the people on one of these planets believe?.

So what would I propose instead?

I propose instead a magic transformation that can be more powerful than Enchantix but, so to not erase the concept of Enchantix, can only be used by fairies on Earth. (Terrix/Tirnix/Terranix)

This magic would be sourced from Tir na nog and would be what gives all earth fairies (such as Roxy & Morgana ) their powers. As their magic is connected to Tir Na Nog once they leave earth their connection with this magic is disconnected. This means that a fairy can only gain Terrix by being an earth born fairy or by being blessed with the power from an earth fairy.

These powers were originally centred around nature, with earth fairies being connected to the environment and lifeforms on the planet, but they later evolved to ensure earth fairy survival against fairy hunters and the wizards of the black circle. This created the abilities to see into the past, fly much faster than the average fairy or the ability to teleport (but an individual fairy can only have one of the three gifts).

This would mean the fairies still need to make Roxy believe in magic but they also need to make her believe in herself as until she transforms into an earth fairy and gives them the blessing they are unable to achieve this magic form and help defend from the Wizards of the black circle. This would also keep the environmental theme of S4 as the fairies would be much more connected to nature due to their new connection to Tir Na Nog.

Overall my concept of the season 4 power upgrade would allow the fairies to gain a stronger power but, by only having access to this power on earth, not erase the entire concept that Enchantix is the strongest power a fairy can.

This can also be carried to season 5 by making Sirenix be a power which can only be used exclusively in the infinite ocean. (Can then explain why Daphnes spirit is trapped in lake Roccaluce because her spirit is stuck in the infinite ocean cursed in her Sirenix form and lake Roccaluce can be an an entry gate to the infinite oceans)

[bre-meister]

So, I just watched the first 3 episodes of Fate: The Winx Saga and I know I don’t usually talk about Winx on this blog but... girl gotta put her thoughts somewhere. This show was my childhood and Netflix really said “Fuck it”.

 I’ll leave it under the cut so if you wanna stay for this rant, feel free

 I went into this knowing I would hate it and, honestly, I do and I don’t

 I think it is an absolute shit dumpster fire of an adaptation that someone poured gasoline on and then tried to lite on fire with Bloom’s inconsistent control issues and shit just got even worse 

But, this could have been a fairly decent show If it was a stand alone- It had no need to be attached to the Winx name because it really is not Winx

There are some problems I had with it that everyone had before the show even dropped - The whitewashing and lack of diversity, the atrocious outfits, the lack of wings (“We evolved” that’s fucking bullshit y’all know good and well that part of the fun of the OG show was the new transformations and the outfits and we can’t even have that)

Also there is def technology here so why the FUCK do we not have Tecna? She’s the straight laced girl of the group but at the same time I feel like she could have added some much needed levity 

And my girl would have told it like it is. Sometimes these people (not the Winx because they are NOT the Winx) do dumb shit for the sake of doing dumb shit and Tecna would never have allowed this!

Combining the Trix into one person is still iffy for me, like I get why they did it but I just don’t think it has the same effect as having the three of them

Sometimes she gives me Icy vibes and most of the time she gives me Darcy vibes and almost never she gives me Stormy vibes (even though her powers are most like Stormy) and that shit just gives me whiplash

 I also think that having the witches at cloud tower provided the original show with this great idea of “even though we use dark magic and are considered witches we still make the choice ourselves as to whether or not we use that magic for good or for evil” but then again I might be reading into it too much who knows 

It’s bad enough they had to go and make Aisha the token black character but then they also make her this mean, black woman caricature (and I know it stems from her frustration that she can’t do this one thing perfect but still, as a black young woman who has seen black women portrayed like this constantly it is damaging as hell)

On that note - why did they have to make the one black and overall minority girl the control freak? Idk it just doesn’t really sit right with me

Speaking of jealousy...we gotta talk about Stella

 I know this is supposed to be more realistic and grown up and ya, I get it, girls can be catty but dude, Stella WOULD NEVER

THIS Stella endangered Bloom on PURPOSE because she was Jealous and then she really wanted to dipp on her in the woods after Bloom was trying to help her get back HER ring she shouldn’t have given her in the first place all cause she was a bit scared? Even scared Stella in the original show wouldn’t have done that! Would she have complained? YES! But she wouldn’t be so quick to give up

Need I remind everyone that she almost drained herself completely trying to protect her friends in the Omega Dimension from the Ice Snakes and only stopped because Musa was like “Stella, your hurting yourself. Take a break everyone will be ok”

And this shit show wants me to believe that these are the saem people? I think not!

 So I’m only on episode 3 but I can already tell that whatever they’re trying to say happened with Rickie is not what actually happened and that whole storyline is just super annoying like bro, there better be a good ass reason why she is pretending to be such a terrible person and I just don’t trust this show to be that creative 

This thing between her and sky is so confusing and makes like, no sense

Moving on...

I love Sam, he is so sweet and cute and amazing 

 His introduction “uh...I’m Sam...what’s up” made me laugh my ass off and I can’t even tell you why

Truly I love him but at the same time...he’s kinda getting in between Musa and Riven

 Like I get that their relationship was not the best at all (and this Riven has even more problems which was kinda unnecessary cause he already had SO MANY!) but at the same time when we’ve only got the opportunity to have 2 of the original couples like... I’m gonna need this show to give me something 

Riven - I loved him in the original show because he always had so many issues but then season 4 rolled around and he was genuinely trying to become a better person. And to have the guts to realize later that he was not ok and that he had to leave to figure that out? Respectable. I recognize that this dude had issues (and that Musa deserved better) but I respected him by the end of his journey

THIS Riven? He can eat shit. I know this is kinda supposed to be the whole Darcy arc he had in the first season or whatever but at least then he was being mind controlled to a certain extent which explained a lot of why he was doing what he was. But this dude is just an overall douche. 

Isn’t he supposed to be Bi? Internalized homophobia is amazing guys we definitely want more of that - -  (just to be clear that was sarcasm)

And I know this contradicts my wanting him and Musa to be together but I think that these two things go hand in hand

I hate that they upped his issues by 100000x because I legit want them to be together and have a genuinely good, functional relationship

But Sam is precious and should be protected

So now Terra

Honestly I think making her say “I have a cousin named Flora” only made the whitewashing more obvious and worse. If they seriously wanted to go this route they should have just committed and not brought Flora’s name into this at all. We the fans are not idiots Netflix! We know what you did!!

This might just be a more personal thing but I kinda feel like they made her entire personality (at least this far) only about her being plus size 

And this was FAR more prevalent in the few chapters from the book I could stomach to read

And wasn’t that their defense for whitewashing? That they wanted to have more inclusion in body types?

You can have a plus size character and not make almost 90% of their screen time about them being self conscious about their body- Like this legit seems to be almost 99% of the reason she’s socially awkward

Again, if you’re going to commit, COMMIT! Show her being ok in her own body and her own skin. Let’s fight against the same culture that makes this character feel self conscious

As far as Musa goes... still don’t really like that they changed her powers 

I guess they thought her new ones would be more useful in a more “practical” setting but um... they haven’t been? Not really?

I know she said she’s not a human lie detector but... they show keeps making her one whenever it’s convenient 

I guess they thought her new ones would be more useful in a more “practical” setting but um... they haven’t been? Not really?

 I still don’t understand why they have to sneak around but, idk maybe they’ll explain it later ( like I get that Sam is Terra’s bro but Musa and Terra don’t even know eachother like that for this drama to be such a big deal)

Bloom is alright

That’s all I have to say about her

Her mom though?

Idk why she was acting the way she was, Just why?

Not her making fun of Bloom going to antique shops when Vanessa owns a literal FLOWER SHOP in the original show!

I will say though, “This basic bitch will pull out her PhD and take you to school. Every comeback is another week without your door. Hit me.” with that confidence? BEST LINE IN THE SHOW!

She had my support for like .5 sec there

“Slam the door, loose the door” she was on some Black mother shit right there - the amount of time my mom has threatened me with this? 

It wasn’t even a threat it was a promise

Sky seems to be the most in character but then again the bar isn’t set too high

Why are the teachers so fucking shady? And are there only 3 professors in this giant ass school?? (I say that knowing there were only, like 4 in the original - 5 if we count Daphnee)

It also took me a min to realize that they kinda combined Feragonda and Griselda into one person. I don’t really like it that much

 I still don’t understand why they had to strip Aisha and Sky of their titles. I felt like that added so much to their characters - Aisha felt the need to be so perfect because she was a princess and Sky had all these increasing obligation through the show that would create conflict (sometimes it was stupid but still)

Also for a show about they Winx they sure as hell don’t spend that much time together 

They got their name in the FIRST EPISODE of the original show. It’s been 3 and the only mention of “Winx” was a quick pan of the door label for their suite. Blink and you missed it

And they seem to keep flip flopping between being best friends to being indifferent to each other, to “I don’t really know you” to sometimes hating each other (the emotion flop is mainly Stella but the others seem to have some weird ranges as well)

From a technical standpoint this show has some weird choices

 Sometimes cuts will just ...happen? Especially during actions scenes sometimes it’s hard to make sense of what’s happening 

And all the fight scenes - especially the training scenes - just seem so rehearsed it hard to watch

and why does Riven keep flip flopping between the worst specialist and a great one?

The utter lack of creativity in terms of the technology and weapons and even just the representation of the magic in this show is sad

The Original was so magical and colorful It was always obvious that this was a different dimension

I feel like I could legit go to Switzerland and find a place just like this and it wouldn’t be anything super different or weird

I also still don’t get why earth can’t know? Are we just gonna pretend that the Earth fairies and Believix and the Wizards of the Black Circle just... didn’t happen?

If this person that Beatrix is working for isn’t Lord Darkar or Valtor like...idk what to do

Again I would just like to stress that this show did not need to be an adaptation

 In fact it really isn’t I don’t know what they hell they are adapting cause this is NOT Winx and I cannot stress enough just how utterly wrong this felt while watching it

 All most of the characters have the same names but they are not the same people at all - no where close

Also can I just say, Sky’s hair seemed so different (length, part, style) almost every other scene sometimes I would legit have to sit back and be like “this is the same actor right?”

 Speaking of I’d like to finish this off by saying: absolutely no hate to the actors and actresses - I can see they are doing their best with what they have been given and most of the more controversial decisions were not made by them 

I will say I did think that linking Fairy magic to emotion was a good touch - idk if they did this in the Original show or not. I can’t remember 

So far this show...

As and adaptation:

words cannot describe how bad it is

As a stand alone property:

 I mean, it’s noting amazing or truly different but I’ve definitely seen worse 

I’ll probably make another one of these for the last 3 episodes. I could literally get 0 notes on this and still do it anyway. Sometimes you really just gotta rant

[sailor-freak]

Funny Thing About Me #8

Idk if this really comes under music but I thought about it while listening to KARA so I'm gonna rant about it here ��.

So recently I've seen a lot of videos popping up about the demonisation of "girly" things by the media, how the girls who like fashion and looking nice and wearing pink and didn't reject femininity from a young age are cruel people. I think for real life this still applies, not so much a demonisation but more of a rejection? Like, if you're a cis woman (trans women I haven't seen it happen to as much, maybe cos people presume all trans women are super "girly" and that's why they're trans which hhh) who likes pink and things traditionally made for girls you're not "cool", or people don't really respect you as much?

I'm not gonna sit here and say I'm the "girliest" person in the world, cos I'm not, I think by half of this blog you can tell I like dark colours and heavy music and things like that. But I'm also not going to sit here and say that I hate anything "girly". When I was a kid I loved Barbie and Monster High, fun fact the first K-pop song I ever heard was Pretty Girl by KARA and it was on a Monster High dress up game. No, not a cool Monster High game with dragons or cars or shit, one where you put different clothes on them and make them look nice or stupid as I sometimes used to do. And I feel ashamed about it, but I don't know why I should, there's nothing wrong with it, plenty of kids enjoy those games and play with dolls and shit why are we making them feel like they're not "cool" for doing so? You know, when I was a kid I watched Winx Club and Hannah Montana, but I also quite enjoyed Top Gear and Power Rangers (Samurai specifically I know nobody agrees but I LOVED that series), I just kind of did what I did and didn't give a fuck, but now as an adult I feel ashamed for half of what I loved as a kid?

well not Hannah Montana that show was COOL

Even now my style and music taste isn't all dark heavy rejections of femininity, I like skirts 😂. I don't really dig trousers if I'm honest, which is weird cos I wear them every day but that's sort of what I'm talking about, I feel awkward wearing "girly" clothes (even if it's black lol) cos of how people think of you when you like things that don't reject traditionally "girly" things. I STILL LIKE PINK. Hot pink EXID And So It Went Taylor Momsen style tho, genuinely still think it's a very nice colour. Anyone hears you like pink you're immediately pinned as superficial and dim... it's a fucking colour mate 😂.

It seeps into peoples' music tastes as well, specifically thinking of K-pop girl groups... people seem to REALLY hate cute concepts. If it's the music fine cool your choice, but the way people ONLY accept cool badass concepts from girl groups now, why cos a group doing a cute concept is conforming to the patriarchy or some shit? I can get down with any concept for a girl group honestly if the music's good I'm THERE, but a group doing a concept that isn't completely about empowerment and throwing fuck yous around for 3 minutes is slated by people and I don't really see why.

am I referring to the absolute disrespect people had for Lovesick Girls saying Pretty Savage should have been the title track absolutely people said that cos they just want a badass concept from BP COS IT'S CLEARLY NOT THAT THE MUSIC WAS BETTER LOL

I think what I'm trying to say (idk I didn't really have a plan going into this oops) is that ladies if you like pink and you like cute fluffy things and you wear dresses and something that was traditionally made for girls then why should you be ashamed of it fucking embrace it, it works the other way if you're a girl and you like "boyish" things there's nothing wrong with that, everyone is different and there shouldn't be a hierarchy of who's cool or not based on how "girly" they're taste in media is.

We really need some new non-gendered words hhh.

[iveonlyeverseenliketwoanimes]

How Horikoshi treats his female characters (Feat. How his ‘Fans’ treat him): A Rant

Something that has recently been popping up a lot in the BNHA tags, for me at least, is this idea that Hori is a “Lazy/Bad Writer”. It’s a topic that’s genuinely interesting to me and I would love to discuss it! After the reaction i got to my last post on discussing the fandom, i feel like this is a really fun topic for me to look into and i love having an open discussion with people. So just to let you know before we start, everything here is my opinion - feel free to respond with your own thoughts and i’d happily have a conversation with you about anything and everything! If you disagree with me then that's fine, if you agree with me then that's fine too! I'm just a person with a keyboard and an opinion and so are you! :)

So today i would love to discuss how people treat Hori in regards to his female characters and i hope you enjoy this 1500 word essay/ramble i did. (PS if you came from my last lil essay then this one is a lot less sarcastic because its a more serious topic and i don’t want to come across as too rude also i actually got sleep today)

Now, this was actually the first topic I came across when looking into the Hori tags. At first, I was on board with the general theme of what was happening. I saw some lovely artwork of Momo where people had redesigned her costume, they were very creative in how they did it and overall, I had no complaints – if the whole topic of this tag was about how people wanted to be creative and redraw characters in their own design then I’d 100% support it, but the more you look into it, the more…. Nasty is gets.

So, the overall theme of what I gathered from this little tag is that idea that Hori is some sort of [Word I really don’t want to type out but im sure you can guess what it is] because of how he draws his females, most of which are underage. So if you, as a consumer, are, well, consuming something, such as a TV show, film, anime, Manga etc. and you see something that makes you go “This is disgusting – I need to write a Tumblr post about this to warn other people about what's happening here” then I fully support you – please keep on doing what you’re doing. 

However, this isn’t what I see, what I see are posts going “F*CK HORI HE’S A [Nasty word] AND I HOPE HE D*ES – HERE EVERYONE I MADE AN ANTI FLAG, SHARE IT EVERYWHERE AND LET ME KNOW WHERE I CAN SEND MY D*ATH THR*AT TO” Meanwhile, when you go on this same persons page it’s all reposts of the characters and screenshots of the show, posts of them saying “Yo did you guys see the new BNHA episode last night?!?” and overall just very fandom-y stuff. I truly cannot comprehend this type of behaviour – you are so set in this belief that Hori is a [Nasty Word] and yet here you are, on the very same blog you use to slander his name, actively supporting him! Listen, if one of you Anti’s were to sit there and say “I wholeheartedly think Hori is a [Nasty word] and therefore I am no longer going to participate in this fandom or with supporting his creations” then, while I don’t agree with you, I support you in your decision as you have made a clear stance on something with both your words and your actions and I can truly respect that, and hell you would actually get my attention and I might read into what it is you’re talking about. I’m not, however, going to waste my time reading a piece of material written by someone who does all that nasty stuff I previously mentioned and take any of what they say seriously. Let me put it this way; you think Hori is a [Nasty word], you are supporting the show, you are therefore supporting a [nasty word], so why should I take anything you say seriously? I don’t want to see any more of this ‘One minute we love him, one minute we hate him’ attitude because when you hate him the things you are saying are some of the worst things you could possibly say to another person and its childish, disgusting and you’re giving this fandom a bad name.

Now back to the girls, I personally do find certain characters outfits a little distasteful, especially with how they’re done in the anime and how they zoom in on certain body parts, i also dislike how it’s ‘funny’ for characters like Mineta to get away with such disgusting behaviour. I do think that’s the biggest flaw I can find in this show – I don’t however 100% blame Hori for this. Now obviously at the end of the day, it is down to Hori what happens in his show, but can we all stop pretending that it’s just him that does this? When I think of anime the first thing that comes to mind is anime girls and their… attributes. It’s an industry issue and Hori is one of many people that partakes in it – so im not saying he’s not to blame, im just saying some of you are a little dramatic and need to realise if you truly want this behaviour to stop then you need to go after the industry and not just one guy.

Now this next point I want to make is something im sure might be a little confusing for most of you and something I can 100% see the other side of better than some other points ive made. It’s also kinda hard for me to put into words so please bear with me here.

I don’t think its necessary for Hori to develop his female characters as much as their male counterparts – now im sure that’s an odd concept but let me explain. As a child growing up in the age of great TV shows such as Hannah Montana, iCarly, Wizards of Waverly Place etc. I think ive spent a fair amount of time watching TV, my personal favourites as a child were Winx Club, BRATZ and W.I.T.C.H (Im from the UK so apologies if you have no idea what they are). Now all of these shows were ‘for girls’, they all revolve around a group of girls and their adventures in their respective worlds, they learn things along the way, because, even if you don’t realise it, these kids shows have hidden messages in them that are like ‘we should be kind’ ‘we should treat others with respect’ and all that jazz you need to know to be a decent human being. However, the one thing that these shows always lacked was any form of male presence. Now im not saying these shows had no males in them, that would be weird, but what I am saying is that the males in these shows were very one dimensional and they were always the love interest of one of the characters, or you might get the odd parental figure that would show up for one episode to be a motivation for a character. However with BNHA, a show that is specifically aimed at teenage boys, I don’t feel like they do such a disservice to females (AKA the ‘men’ equivalent of my other shows), sure they’re not treated great in certain aspects that I've already discussed, but look at their actual characters, Uraraka is the main girl, sure she very much has the same role as many of the men did in my childhood shows of the ‘love interest’ but her character is more than that and we see it in the sports festival as well as some of the more recent chapters (213-215 to be specific). Her character isn't just some airhead and neither are the other girls, Momo is literally top of the class in terms of written ability and she had her own little mini-arc around gaining confidence (which is still ongoing because guess what – people don’t change overnight), Mina has had some spotlight on her and is seen to be a very confident and skilled fighter, Tsu was literally described as the ‘perfect student with no flaws’ and is shown to be a badass on multiple occasions, Midoriya’s mum is even a character that’s had some form of arc with her learning to believe in her son and she's not some faceless character we hear about every so often when they need a plot device.

Now im not saying the female representation is perfect and it’s certainly not 100% equal to that of the men, but im saying it doesn’t need to be. This is a show for boys, sure girls can watch and enjoy it, but its made for boys in the same way my shows were made for girls, and the average boy isn’t going to want to watch a bunch of fairy princesses run around saving their fluffy little pets like I did (im sure a some of them will – and good for them, in the same way that some girls might want to watch superhero films, it’s not something im saying is bad, its just most people raise children into predetermined stereotypes of what gender roles they should fill and the media caters to that).

So what im saying is that taking a show aimed at boys and comparing it to shows aimed at girls and how each handles the opposite sex (we’re not going into gender here, that’s a whole other topic of diversity), I don’t think BNHA is all that bad. I guess if I want to be a little harsher in my approach, why is it okay to have a near-all female cast and not a near-all male cast? I understand a need for diversity, truly I do, but sometimes having a token character for each ‘type’ of person takes away from what the show is actually trying to convey – and in BNHAs case I think its trying to teach young boys that it’s okay to be emotional or vulnerable when you’re in situations that other shows teach you to ‘man up’ in. Not every show can solve racism, sexism and homophobia, I’m sorry to break it to you, but some shows are a little more basic in their approach to what it is they want to show and I think BNHA is a perfect example of that, it’s showing boys that you can cry, you can go through struggles in life, you can even come back from being a terrible person through growth and development, and I think that’s something boys need. A lot of people in this day and age want men to change (and I agree that there are a lot of things all groups of people can work on) and BNHA is showing boys how to grow up in a way that’s not this ‘tough guy that has no feelings’ and at the end of the day isn’t that something we want?

I do believe there are areas that BNHA really needs to improve in when it comes to it’s female cast, but can we stop with this awful hate? This fandom had such potential to be an amazing community of people who are skilled with art, writing, storytelling, cosplay, etc. but it seems like half of you just want to tear each other down and it’s sad to see such potential wasted because you can’t handle someone having a different opinion or view to you.

[teenage-fairy]

Season 7 Review (Includes Massive Spoilers)

*This review has been sitting in my drafts for months now unfinished, but with the excitement and weariness of season 8 buzzing through everyone’s minds, I’ve decided to finish it (and maybe let it serve as a reminder to everyone worried about season 8)

So... I finished season 7 and I have a lot to say.

When I first sat down to watch the first episode, my initial thought within the first 30 seconds was, “what the fuck is this.”

Right away I was met with:

-An AWFUL theme song

-The new transformation revealed IN THE OPENING because fuck build up and suspense and mystery am I right???

-Not to mention it was a fucking UGLY transformation

-A lot of dancing I didn’t ask for

-One look at the fairy animals and I knew this season had a shit plot already

Then the episode actually started and

I heard the horrific voices oh my god.

This was all I needed to see to have my hopes for another kickass season smashed to smithereens. I was convinced, “this is the end of a good thing.”

I don’t remember if I actually made it to the end of the first episode the first time I tried to watch it. But I had seen enough to come to the conclusion that I was in no way watching this season. I looked up a summary and watched a clip of the finale and decided it was all I needed to see.

The issues I originally had with it:

-The plot. From what I’d gathered in the beginning, the Winx had gone from fighting bloodthirsty enemies who caused mass destruction and demolished entire civilizations, to fighting a shapeshifting cat and dog who kidnapped neon, sparkling animals. H O W.

-Butterflix. Not only is it fucking ugly, but there obviously was no effort put in to make a cool transformation. None. What did we get instead? A dance routine. A DANCE ROUTINE. And not even a good one! A long, stiff, shitty one that did nothing but waste time!

-The voices. Call me a fake, but I was raised on Nickelodeon Winx Club. I was spoiled. The voices were great. You could differentiate between them, they suited their character, and they were powerful. But Nick pulled out for season seven so everyone sounded the same. Whiny, nasally or dainty. *[Since writing this I’ve watched the original show and have learned to adapt to different voices. This is no longer an issue I have, but in the beginning it was so I’m going to leave it in]

And I could rant about how useless the specialists are, or how powerless the Winx seemed despite supposedly being the most powerful fairies in the magic universe, but unfortunately these issues aren’t exclusive to season seven.

At some point though, I decided to give season 7 another shot. Perhaps because I wouldn’t have felt like a true fan otherwise, because I wanted to know how the hell the Trix managed to come back, or maybe just because, damnit I love those faires and I missed them. Ultimately, I think I needed to be reassured that my favorite childhood show hadn’t completely gone to shit. I had to see all of it before I could say with certainty that for me, Winx Club was cancelled.

And I can’t believe I’m saying this - especially after recounting how much I absolutely dreaded the creation of the season in the beginning - but I loved it.

Is it one of my favorites? Absolutely not.

But here are some of the things that saved this season for me, and actually also led me to believe that this season was groundbreaking for Winx Club and necessary for it to continue being amazing.

-The concept of time traveling. This was one of the first aspects of the season I fell in love with. It gave us insight into the backstories of some of the most important characters, and was linear and made sense. When they altered something in the past, no matter how big or small, it really did affect the future. I loved that they were able to manipulate this to their advantage, and every decision had an impact that could make or break their future. Pretty complex for new Winx Club if you ask me.

-Tynix. I was unsure of how to feel about this transformation in the beginning, but I came to really like it. The mini-worlds were awesome and I loved how they incorporated real life science into some of them (I’m such a nerd I know). And I thought it was pretty dope that they could spend hours in a miniworld only for seconds to pass by in their worlds. The logic makes sense and is another instance of them completely bypassing the flow of time. Oh and the transformations were really cute and I liked the music lol

-How the Trix came back. When I found out that they were going to make a reappearance, I was so confused. Weren’t they trapped in the legendarium?? A completely separate plane of existence with no supposed exit?? I was convinced that RAI had to be sacrificing the integrity of their use of “trapped forever” in order to make this happen. I was so pleasantly surprised. Their reappearance made sense. And the “ultimate power” lived up to its name as something that was completely limitless in its influence. I loved that only because of his poor word choice, and because of how clueless Brafiliusis is, the Trix were able to come back. He asked for the most powerful creatures from any universe, and that’s what he got. Plus that says a lot about the Trix, doesn't it? But we’ll touch on that later.

-While I originally thought the plot was pretty weak, it ended up morphing into something much more threatening than was let on. Perhaps RIA didn’t reveal all their secrets too soon after all. As the season progressed and different parties became more powerful, we were able to see just how incredibly strong nature really is, and how important it is for it to remain balanced. The cutesy magical animals weren’t just there to be cute after all, they were truly detrimental to the balance of the universe - and the season really showed that. In the end, so much more was at stake than I could have ever imagined - perhaps much more than some past seasons, after all.

-The ending. This was a huge turning point for Winx Club, and something that we’ve never seen from any of the past six seasons. I thought this season was not going to offer anything exciting or fresh to the WInx’s story, and only be a filler for RAI to rake in more money, but I was so wrong.

For the first time, the Winx didn’t stand a chance. They were going to die. For the first time, the Trix had become so powerful that they were going to win for good and nothing could stop them.

Only nature, what had given them all their power in the first place, could defeat them. And only because the fairy animals sacrificed themselves to call the guardian of nature did this happen. This is incredibly heavy. The fairy animals loved the Winx so much, that they died so that they could survive. That was the only way and they did it willingly. How sad????

And because of this the Trix are gone for good, never to come back. They’re trapped for eternity outside of every universe, in oblivion.

I’ve ranted about my initial hatred for this season MANY times, on this blog and off. After giving it a chance, my newfound awe of this season has reminded me of the importance of not judging at first glance. You’ve always got to keep an open mind and investigate further (you may even be surprised).

I was startled by the teasers for season 8 at first, but now I’m so excited - season 8’s going to be breaking down even more barriers and accomplishing even more that’s never been done before. I’m ready to be wowed all over again.

[taz-writes]

I was scrolling through your blog and saw something about a mermaid incident in class... date I ask for the story behind that?

I will absolutely tell you the story behind that, because it is equal parts baffling and hilarious, even now an entire year later. 

It begins… with my creative writing minor. Last fall I took a class called Survey of Forms: Fiction, which was an introduction to the canon of literary fiction, as well as literary fiction writing and basic style skills like characterization, narrative voice, dialogue, et cetera. Sounds pretty typical, right? Well, my professor was a fun guy, and one of our assignments around the middle of the semester was to write a rant. What sort of rant, you may ask? Literally anything. It was an exercise in narrative voice, he wanted 2-4 pages of a first-person tirade on something that you had strong opinions about, to be read out loud in class the next week. We had the option to write as a character from our short story WIPs or to write as ourselves. 

I chose to write my rant about a subject very near and dear to my heart: mermaids. Specifically, how much I fucking hated them as a child.

A bit of backstory, so you can understand why this got me so incredibly riled: I’m all about fairies. I was the fairy kid. I literally thought I was a fairy princess from outer space until I was, like, 11 or 12 years old. I wanted to have cool magic powers and sparkly wings and all that good stuff! I wanted to fly! I wanted to live in the forest and grant wishes! But like, mermaids are and have always been way more popular. If you’re a little girl who loves mermaids, your options are everywhere. You’ve got mermaid TV shows! Mermaid movies! Mermaid book series! Mermaid-themed makeup, mermaid-themed clothing, mermaid-themed Halloween costumes and lunch boxes and merchandise, mermaid stuff is everywhere. If you’re a little girl who loves fairies… you get, uh, Winx Club? Barbie Fairytopia? And maybe some Disney stuff if you squint. This was before even those Tinkerbell movies went mainstream, and if you were (like me) the sort of tomboy to frown at pink ruffly stuff, then you had absolutely NOTHING. 

And for bonus points, every single one of those fairy things I mentioned? Yeah they have mermaids in them. And the mermaids got overmerchandised, while the fairy MAIN CHARACTERS were neglected. Winx Club has a whole mermaid season, Barbie Fairytopia has mermaids and got a freaking mermaid-based sequel and never did justice to the actual fairy protagonists until long after I’d outgrown Barbie media. So like, I’m salty. I literally started writing Feilan because I was tired of every story with fairies being either immature Disney shit for 5-year-olds or edgy grimdark YA novels with too much kissing and inappropriate language for baby 12/13-year-old Taz’s tastes. I wanted something in between–fairies who weren’t stupid little glittery farts, but who didn’t spend all their time being ~evil and sexy~ or whatever either. If you like mermaid stuff, you can find a zillion different interpretations of merfolk lore, but despite the vast breadth of fae lore the fiction inspired by it only has two real subgenres. Fairies just aren’t as popular. I think they’re coming back a little bit because of SJM and Holly Black, but I HATE SJM’s fae and Holly Black’s are unbearably edgy, so that’s not really a good thing? 

On top of this, I am the type of person who clings very tightly and personally to minor things that aggravate me. I’m not sure why, and I wish that wasn’t the case, but at this point I’ve accepted it as part of my personality. It’s very rare that I find something I’m quite so passionately mad about, but when I latch onto a pet peeve I take it seriously. You can’t argue with me about the meaningless petty grudges, those are my lifeblood, and the mermaid thing is one of the oldest pet peeves I have. 

Back to the topic! The rant I wrote for Survey of Forms was the above tirade, expanded over several pages with sources cited. I was pretty proud of it! I came up with some really brutal turns of phrase, I thought my ~authorial voice~ was top of the line, it was a good rant. Time rolled around for us to share our rants with the class, and I gave a fabulous dramatic reading. My comedic timing is one of my strengths as an actress. 

Everything went as normal for the next few rants… and then, one of my quieter classmates began to read his rant. It sounded fine for the first few sentences, a discussion of traditional elements and their thematic associations okay whatever… but it became increasingly obvious, as he went on, that this wasn’t what he’d written. No, he was improvising a speech on the spot, because he was SO upset that I didn’t like mermaids that he had to tell me exactly how and why I was wrong about my entire worldview. 

In public. In front of our ENTIRE CLASS. 

He explained how mermaids belong to elemental water, and they’re valuable to modern society. See, water is the element of empathy and compassion, and those things are so rare in modern American society! It was almost a year after the 2016 elections, and our politics were so vicious and divisive, and the influence of water’s empathy was dwindling and he could see it burning through society! An over-emphasis on elemental air and its transience was leading to the rise of fake news and misinformation and alternative facts, elemental fire led to rage and passion and an inability to think logically, and we needed water to balance everything! So in fact, we need more mermaid stories! Because mermaid stories teach us to feel empathy! And the lack of water’s empathy, this growing hatred of mermaids (and by extension anything water-based)–that was the reason America was falling apart! That’s why Trump was elected! Because… uh, because I don’t like mermaids? 

Yeah, this guy basically implied that I was the reason Trump became president and the media devolved into vitriolic chaos. Because I don’t like mermaids. 

I couldn’t make this shit up on my own if I tried. 

I was absolutely livid, a friend of mine in the same class told me I turned redder than my scarlet school hoodie. I’ve never had the best anger management skills, I was literally shaking in my seat, I was inches away from flipping the table I sat at. I probably would’ve done it, too, if my classmate hadn’t put her boiling hot cup of soup down on it without the lid on. One of the lovely side effects of my ADHD is that sometimes when I get upset, my brain gets so hyperfocused on that one emotion that I’m physically incapable of feeling anything else or even thinking straight, and I can’t snap myself out. Those rages are terrifying. This was one of the worst rages I’ve ever experienced in my life, and I thanked my lucky stars later that I didn’t hurt somebody. I did get to scream at the guy for a couple minutes, but I don’t remember what I actually said. It involved a few physical threats and a lot of being embarrassed in front of my peers. 

Anyways, the professor didn’t even stop this guy, because–like everyone else–he didn’t realize what was going on until it was too late. And once he realized, I guess he froze up or something? I don’t know. I lost my fucking mind about this, I went into my next class and screamed for like fifteen minutes. My poor Music History teacher was so confused. 

The Survey professor emailed me and asked me to stop by his office later, and I thought I was going to get lectured for throwing a fit in class. I used to throw a lot of tantrums in grade school and even when I grew out of that, I was always the person blamed when an argument or fight broke out with me involved, so I had some muscle memory… the professor actually wound up apologizing. He told me he just didn’t know what to do in the moment, and he was really nice about it, and by then I’d calmed down enough that I wasn’t literally frothing with rage. It was very very surreal. I felt quite validated. 

Mermaid guy wound up writing me a length apology email. I’m pretty sure the professor put him up to it. He went on to explain that he was from Singapore and he was raised right by the water and so it was really important to him, his culture has some kind of mermaid thing that he’s emotionally attached to, et cetera… He seemed very sincere about it, so I accepted the apology, but I still have no freaking clue what possessed him to derail the entire class in order to argue over my goofy childhood grudge. It’s hilarious in retrospect, I just can’t even begin to understand the logic. I still have that email saved because it was so mind-blowingly absurd. 

So yeah, that’s the Mermaid Incident. I wish I could say it went down in university history but I’m not sure if anyone remembered it longer than a week or so after it happened. Nobody ever mentioned it again. 

And despite said classmate’s best efforts, I still have a grudge against mermaids. They’re very nice in their own dedicated media, but if I see them popping up like plot cancer in stories you told me were about fey? I will come for you.