Summary
Season 1 will not be blessed as the next teen addiction this year, mostly due to its pitfalls, but it just teases the audience enough in the second half to want a second instalment.
This review of Netflix’s Fate: The Winx Saga season 1 contains no spoilers — the series will be released on the streaming service on January 22, 2021.
In the weird and wonderful world of streaming, nothing is surprising anymore due to the wide-ranging opportunities platforms can bring. Netflix releasing a Nickelodeon live-action remake based on 2004’s Winx Club should not come as a surprise. Where network TV has to rely on repeat viewers, Netflix can smartly sit back and watch their subscriber base give them budgets to try out anything. But looking at social media, Fate: The Winx Saga is relatively welcomed in some quarters, while on others, there’s already discourse on the cast chosen against specific characters. Welcome to fandom. We can’t please everyone.
If you are unaware of the source material; Netflix’s Fate: The Winx Saga follows fiery redhead fairy Bloom, who after learning that she possesses magical powers, is enlisted by a prestigious school, Alfea, in the Otherworld, as an opportunity to learn how to wield her powers. The series has chosen a YA feel; it thrusts the fairy into a teen-drama setting, mixed up with fantasy, and the series attempts to heckle us with the other characters and bubbling plot points.
Bloom meets an assortment of fairies all bearing complementary powers; it’s the perfect mix to build a squad; to protect the Otherworld while ensuring the First World is not impacted. There’s an underlying and significant storyline to all that involves Bloom which is apparent from the first minute. The series attempts to enhance the integral plot with romance and teen drama while developing all the other characters in one thick hotpot.
Once we are introduced to the core cast (Sky, Musa, Terra, Headmistress Dowling, Silva, Aisha, Stella, Beatrix), we are bamboozled with a flurry of plot points; the writers were clearly battling with the 6-episode commission and a responsibility to flesh out the universe. And that’s a sad shame because the first three episodes do not conquer the audience’s imagination at all. Instead, they torment the viewer with a toxic need to place exposition on every corner, with no clear storyboarding and patient character-building in sight.
But there is something in this series that keeps the audience wanting more — the second half of the six-part series conjures the imagination with this ignition of potential war. Once the characters are established, bedded in, and the stakes are known, the Netflix series benefits from relaxing. Fate: The Winx Saga season 1 moved from a jagged mess to a universe sticking around for.
YA series fans will be undoubtedly enjoying the cast. There’s a saleability around them; a vision with the characters in mind. I’ve noticed some fans are disappointed not to see wings in the trailer, but I genuinely believe this is purposeful so when/if the moment does occur, the wings bring utmost importance. Fate: The Winx Saga season 1 will not be blessed as the next teen addiction this year, mostly due to its pitfalls, but it just teases the audience enough in the second half to want a second instalment.
