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The show’s visual aesthetic is certainly iconic, with fashion publications praising the series’ look. I thought that we could be very fashionable in the cartoon, and that’s why I hired real fashion designers to draw their wardrobe.” “They are teenagers - in school, they’re dressed differently than when they are doing sports or when they are going out for a drink, or when they go to the beach, or for skiing, or any other situation. “I wanted it to be another element of originality.” “You end up having Scooby-Doo where the characters wear the same outfits throughout many, many episodes, and even sometimes in different weather conditions, just simply because it’s too expensive and too complicated to change,” he explains.
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Straffi explains that the process of animating different outfits is incredibly costly, which is why most shows don’t bother. They wear fashionable, trendy clothes and change them depending on the episode and location. “I had to try to leverage on what good at.”Įven among other girl-tailored cartoons, Winx Club is notable for having characters who regularly change outfits. “We are not famous and established in entertainment,” he laughs. Eventually, he decided to tap into one of the things Italy is best known for: fashion. “I threw it away because I wanted so much to do something original and different, and it was not good enough,” explains Straffi. It could be something very fresh, very dynamic.” The team at Rainbow worked tirelessly to get these fairies right, even completely scrapping the first nearly complete pilot when Straffi decided to change the look and story. He decided the show should center on fairies, because he wanted to reinvent them as more contemporary creatures: “Fairies don’t mean fairy godmother or a woman with a wand. “But believe me, 20 years ago, when we were pitching Winx for the first time … it was not so obvious to have female characters who were in control of their destiny, of their life, independent with their own personalities, and all the things that Winx Club is.”įrom the get-go, Straffi wanted to make the show unique. “You can think that this is something very common now because we have plenty of female heroes, and they are stronger than the boys and men,” Straffi says. the Forces of Evil, and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts featuring dynamic female characters at their centers, it’s hard to imagine a world where characters like that were rare. Nowadays, with shows like The Owl House, Star vs. Shows like She-Ra: Princess of Power and The Powerpuff Girls were exceptions to the norm in a sea of cartoons featuring large casts of boys and only one or two girls. Winx Club wasn’t the first girl-tailored cartoon out there, but there were so few long-lasting ones that getting it made was an uphill challenge. Winx Club shattered expectations by proving that girls watched action-oriented cartoons too. Though the Winx world has evolved in these two branching directions, the original show’s legacy remains. And in 2021, Fate: The Winx Saga, a live-action young-adult show designed for those who grew up with the series, premiered on Netflix. In 2012, a rebooted show, tailored toward a younger audience, premiered on Nick Jr. It eventually started airing on Nickelodeon, with ViacomCBS purchasing Rainbow in 2011 and co-producing Winx Club. As it turns out, Straffi’s hunch was right: Girls loved Winx Club, and the show lasted far beyond its originally planned four seasons.
#WINX CLUB MAGICAL ADVENTURE COMPLETE FULL#
Full of bright, jewel-toned visuals and fashionable outfits, Winx Club emphasizes friendship between its female characters as they navigate fearsome villains and magical happenings.Īt the time, 4Kids broadcast series like Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which meant a magical girl show like Winx Club stood out in the lineup. At Alfea College, she meets a host of other girls with various cool abilities, learns about the fantastical world, and uncovers the secrets of her past. The show follows a teenage girl named Bloom, who discovers she has fire powers and gets whisked away to a college for fairies in a magical realm. Winx Club debuted in Italy, but it eventually found a stateside distributor in 4Kids, which regularly dealt with imported cartoons.
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