W.I.T.C.H

[angel of salvation]

Well...for all those who (still) watch cartoons then you might have seen this floating around. W.I.T.C.H is a new cartoon thats started on Jetix (cuz i'm a big kid and watch cartoons to my hearts content) and the name pulled me in, as well as the ads. And after watching it I see that it has probably been influenced (a lot) by Buffy and Angel. Just looking at the names of 5 girls that are the main characters shows it all...:

Lets see theres....



Will -er WILLow?- shy new girl and ends up the ring leader of the group....and looks JUST like her if she was a cartoon school girl.

Taranee -Tara anyone?- also shy, scared of fire which she ends up being in control of and is a sensible girl.

Irma -I was thinking of Anya, meh- confidant character who talks whats on her mind and seems to be becoming best mates with Will...heh

Cornelia -Cordelia anyone?- a bitchy blonde who says what she wants, and blames things that go wrong on Will. So far she has anyway...

Hay Lin -Thought bout Harmony or maybe even the Chinese Slayer spike killed in Buffy- calm collected girl who's friendly and helpful...as you do.



Also theres a rebel in a different dimension that they meet who screams Angel and looks like he also has the role of Giles coming up as the one who keeps the girls all together and doing what's right. He's called Caleb, meh.



Thats my evidence, make up your own desicions. I laughed when I heard all of their names for the first time As for looking the same as some of the characters from Buffy...this lil pic mite help you to visualise it:

W.I.T.C.H PIC



Yes the red head is Will *ahem Willow*. Other than the links to Buffy and Angel, I enjoyed it...yay so I'll be watching it again...and for those who want to know its on in the UK at 4.30pm on the weekends I think...

Thankx for listening



Jess xxx

'You're my angel of salvation, and hope, and strength...your my multi-angel'-Jay (My baby)

"Denial, Party of one, You're table's ready"-Spud

]|My Anime Site|[

[WebWarlock]

We have some posts here on this now, but no actual thread.



Here is a post Bob had made in the Cartoon thread:

p081.ezboard.com/fthekitt...51&stop=55



And an even older one in the index thread:

p081.ezboard.com/fthekitt...t=6&stop=7



I have been watching it for a while now.



Couple of things...



Will is Wilhemna.



W.I.T.C.H. predates Buffy (so they are not coping from them), I have seen some W.I.T.C.H. stuff in Italian from 1995 (although the first comic was not published until 2001).

The author, Elisabetta Gnone, says she wrote W.I.T.C.H. after watching "Sailor Moon" in 1995 and feeling she could do better. web.tiscali.it/albator/ez...icolo2.htm



You can get more information at disney.go.com/WITCH/main.html or disney.go.com/jetix/witch/ or www.worldofwitch.com/ (turn off your speakers, you will thank me.)



And some of the original Italian at www.disney.it/Publishing/Witchmagazine/



There is even a Wikipedia entry for them, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W.I.T.C.H.



The books are cute, aimed at pre-teen girls, and are doing quite well.



Warlock

Web Warlock, web.warlock@comcast.net, The Other Side.

Liber Mysterium: The D20 Netbook of Witches & The Dragon and the Phoenix: New Adventures of Willow and Tara

"Thats some powerful goodness." - Frozone, Mr. Incredible and Pals

Edited by: WebWarlock at: 4/11/05 6:40 am

[urnofosiris]

Damn Tim, you have one fine memory thing going there. I knew this comic has been discussed before, but did not know which thread. I saw the comic at a friends house a while ago and was immediately struck by the resemblance to WT, except for the unfortunate them not being gay thing in the comic.

Like Tim said, any copying that might have been going on has got to be the other way around as the comic is older than that show. The resemblance not just in the names of WT, but in appearance as well is amusing.

Anyway, it can have it´s own thread as this is a cartoon show as well apparently. Feel free to discuss any similarities between them and WT, just not the other characters as general Buffy stuff is off topic.

[angel of salvation]

Ah ha, I stand corrected.

This is what you get for being left out of things cuz your in the UK. Happens a lot of the time. Meh.

Never knew it was older then that, Cartoon Network is so slow. *mumbles about doing more research next time* Oh well. The resemblence's struck me when the beginning titles came on hehe. I'll have to keep a look out for the comic's as well...



Jess xxx

'You're my angel of salvation, and hope, and strength...your my multi-angel'-Jay (My baby)

"Denial, Party of one, You're table's ready"-Spud

]|My Anime Site|[

[WebWarlock]

Yeah, there are bound to be similarities. After all the story of a young girl protecting the world from darkness is not new (and no show can claim to have invented that). I see similarities between W.I.T.C.H. and Charmed or Ghosts of Albion as well (Guardians, Charmed Ones, Protectors).



My son and I watch the toon, it's cute. He calls it "that silly witch show".



The biggest comparison I see is with "Sailor Moon", which followed a similar evolution, magna comic to cartoon.



Like SM, W.I.T.C.H. stresses the power of friendship and love to overcome anything. W.I.T.C.H. also places high value and regaurd on family. We know all about the girls families and the support system they provide.



The comics have won numerous awards, including an European 2004 best comic of the year award, and the show averages about 1.2 Neilsen, which for a daytime cartoon on a cable chanel is outstanding.



It will be interesting to see if (or how close) the TV series stays with the comics. I have seen some storylines that clearly have their origin in the comics, but given a slight twist or turn.



Warlock

Web Warlock, web.warlock@comcast.net, The Other Side.

Liber Mysterium: The D20 Netbook of Witches & The Dragon and the Phoenix: New Adventures of Willow and Tara

"Thats some powerful goodness." - Frozone, Mr. Incredible and Pals

Edited by: WebWarlock at: 4/11/05 6:53 am

[Wright805]

W.I.T.C.H is brilliant! I love it.

[WebWarlock]

For anyone that is curious I found translations of the first two (and 3/4ths of the 3rd) comics online.



www.myconaut.com:8080/jk/misc/witch.html



In the US these are released as chapter books.



If anyone knows where to find the other books let us know!



There are some differences between the European Comics and the US books, but not much really. The story is (from what I can tell) the same.



These translations refer to "the Tissue", bad translation I am thinking for "the Veil". They are often refered to as "witches" when "Guardians" would be a better choice. "Star Drops" should be "Astral Drops" when refering to their astral projections.



The US books take the point of view of a different character in each chapter. I very neat way of getting into the personalities of the girls. I can see why they are popular among 9-15 year olds.



There are also some differences between the books and the show.



Again, the basic story is the same, but the details are slightly different.



While the girls look older on the TV show, they act older in the books. Though in both cases they are supposed to be 13-14 year olds.



Elyon's true identity is discovered sooner in the books than the show (I liked the TV show's angle a bit better). And Hay Lin's Grandmother has a different story arc in the books than the show.



Warlock

Web Warlock, web.warlock@comcast.net, The Other Side.

Liber Mysterium: The D20 Netbook of Witches & The Dragon and the Phoenix: New Adventures of Willow and Tara

"Thats some powerful goodness." - Frozone, Mr. Incredible and Pals

[eirnlove]

We had a comic book of it here in Turkey. It dissapared sometime ago. It's more like Barbie than BtVS..

[ambercissism]

I was spending some time this Holidays with my nieces and nephews, and I was so surprised when I saw a copy of the comics, and read it. The characters were seemed named after our fave BtVS cast. Will, Taranee and Cornelia. Will really reminds me of Willow coz she actually looked like Willow, in some part in the comics, she fixed the laptop of one of her fellow witch.

[WebWarlock]

Except, and please remember this, W.I.T.C.H. pre-dates Buffy.

Will can fix a laptop because her magic controlls all forms of energy including electricity.

Warlock

[Willow Watcher]

Alright! My kids were watching Toon Disney this afternoon and watching the animation W.I.T.C.H.
http://tv.disney.go.com/jetix/witch/characters/index.html

I totally think it's a rip off of Buffy. I mean c'mon, Will, Taranee, Caleb are NOT original names and who does the blonde 'Cornelia' remind you of?

So since this board is already up and running...I am soooo behind the times. I don't normally watch TV. My kids dominate it! But they did bring my attention to it this afternoon even though they have watched it THOUSANDS of times.
Gotta love my kids!

[kisstheviolets]

whoa. that's crazy. will, taranee and cornelia?!? LMAO.

[Lucian]

But as WebWarlock mentions, W.I.T.C.H. pre-dates btvs. So I guess we know who's original and who's not.

[WebWarlock]

Alright! My kids were watching Toon Disney this afternoon and watching the animation W.I.T.C.H.
http://tv.disney.go.com/jetix/witch/characters/index.html

I totally think it's a rip off of Buffy. I mean c'mon, Will, Taranee, Caleb are NOT original names and who does the blonde 'Cornelia' remind you of?

So since this board is already up and running...I am soooo behind the times. I don't normally watch TV. My kids dominate it! But they did bring my attention to it this afternoon even though they have watched it THOUSANDS of times.
Gotta love my kids!

Yeah, sorry but W.I.T.C.H. actully predates Buffy. It was in print in Italy during Buffy's first years and was pitched as a concept before that. Given the title and how it came about we can then conclude that those names were picked sometime before publication.

I had also read an interview with Elisabetta Gnone and she said wrote W.I.T.C.H. after reading "Sailor Moon" in 1995.
Buffy didn't even make it to Italy till 2001 and even then it was not very well recieved.

My kids love it too and we are all enjoying the new season.

Warlock

[BBOvenGuy]

Someone's posting Season 2 on the USEnet, and I made an interesting discovery. One of the episodes ("L is for Loser") was written by Andrew J. Robinson, who you may remember in his recurring role as Elim Garak on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

[WebWarlock]

Bob,

What newsgroup? Getting these things off of my DVR onto DVD is kind of a pain.

Thanks!

Tim

[BBOvenGuy]

What newsgroup? Getting these things off of my DVR onto DVD is kind of a pain.

alt.binaries.multimedia.cartoons

[WebWarlock]

Thanks!

I also found them in alt.binaries.multimedia.disney.

Though I still need to get all of Episode K.

BTW if you want to see how well someone can do a "magical girl starts out good but turns evil" story arc, then have a look at this season of W.I.T.C.H.

Andrew J. Robinson has also written some Trek books too.

Warlock

[DaddyCatALSO]

As well as playing the serial killer in _Dirty Harry_, the husband in the first Hellraiser picture (I think from thats eries, the one with the Cenobites, right?) Liberace in a TV bio-pic, and JFK on a episode of the 80s version of Twilight Zone. (And yes I am showing off here, so sue me. )

[BBOvenGuy]

I'm finally watching this show now that it's being posted on the USEnet, and I must say that it's a lot of fun. My favorite Guardian is Hay Lin.

[WebWarlock]

My damn Usenet has a 2 gig monthly limit, so I am only up to "I" for now, but we watched "Q" on Jetix the other day.

This season has been great. Nice tight plot with an adversary that is believable.

Of course readers of the comics will notice that this is the same as the "Nerissa's Revenge" arc, though with enough differences to keep it interesting.

Personally I am fan of Irma.

Warlock

[iamyouknow]

Lol i remember seeing this on TV and thinking Willow??? red haired witch..wait a min..

its not that bad either
-kath