The reboot Winx Club: The Magic is Back feels like old wine in new bottles. As a child, I devoured all the episodes of Winx Club, especially the first three seasons. It was a delightful children's series with adventure, magic, the battle between good and evil, but most importantly, depth. When I rewatched the series at a later age, I still appreciated it, and not just from a nostalgic point of view. The original Winx Club knows how to lightly address topics such as death, loneliness, and fear, and package them into a story about friendship and magic. So, I was very curious about the reboot that appeared on Netflix in early October.
[quote-8195] The original series produced eight seasons, with the first three seasons already telling a complete story. The other five seasons were added later, and especially towards the end, the series received more criticism. By then, the entire animation style had also been changed. With various spin-off series (World of Winx, PopPixie) and a live-action (Fate: The Winx Saga), it seemed they weren't ready to give up. Now, a full reboot—which starts the story from scratch—has been added to that list.
The first episode of Winx Club: The Magic is Back begins partly familiar, but several changes quickly become apparent. For example, Flora plays a larger role at the start of the adventure, rabbit Kiko is absent, and we meet Layla/Aisha right away (while in the original, she only makes her entrance in season two). Another major change is the destruction of Cloud Tower, the school for witches, causing all witches in this series to also attend the fairy school Alfea.
Changes aren't necessarily bad; a reboot doesn't have to be an exact copy. What I find unfortunate about the story I've seen so far (and that's just one episode) is that I miss a certain depth. The pace of the series is lightning-fast. I think that fits the children's brains of 2025. Those brains also consume at a faster pace than twenty years ago. At the same time, building in some calmness is better for the story. I know the characters, so I have some idea of who is who, what they do, etc. But based on this episode, you only get a very superficial view of that. Besides the pace, I also miss depth. Of course, I don't know what will happen in the upcoming episodes, but I expect that the dark storylines from the original won't be addressed in this series. Or at least in a much lighter way. That's a shame because children can learn a lot from that too.
The animation itself is fine. I read a lot of criticism online about the animation, but I think it's not that bad. If it's true that generative AI was used in the animation, that's quite a shame. To keep the genre alive, artists are indispensable. I don't believe AI can completely take over that role. So let's continue to support those artists.
Overall, this reboot mostly feels like old wine in new bottles. The story is rushed, the characters superficial, and the depth of the original is missing. The dumbing down of children's series is a phenomenon I would like to break through because it's really unnecessary. I'm curious about the rest of the series, but for now, it mainly feels like a way to quickly cash in on nostalgia. And that often turns out more wrong than right.
A meager six.
About the writer, Karzal
Mike (1995) has been a member of MySeries since 2016 and is mainly active on the English version of the site. Since 2018, he has been actively translating news articles, columns, reviews and basically everything that ends up on the Dutch site. The original articles, columns and reviews were actually written by others. During the week Mike can be found at IKEA, where he is a national systems specialist and occasionally also in the classroom to teach an English lesson. In addition, Mike logically enjoys watching series and has actually been spoon-fed this from an early age. The genre doesn't matter, there is a place for everything in the otherwise busy life.
Perhaps you mean this last sentence the other way around? "And that goes well more often than it goes wrong." At least, that's what I gather from the tenor of your otherwise fine story.
