It’s hard to adapt a children’s show especially when you’re trying to “age it up” for an older audience. Netflix has tried to do exactly that with
Fate: The Winx Saga, a tale about fairies trying to balance their magical destiny with romance and homework. But can you
really turn a fairy show for preschoolers into a sexy teen drama? All wings point to no.
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Fate: The Winx Saga stars
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina’s Abigail Cowen as Bloom, a teenager from California who discovers she’s actually a fairy. In this show’s universe, fairies are the ruling class of a magical place called Otherworld and attend a school called Alfea. Each one controls a unique element (their society also used to have wings but lost them at some point in history, though I’m guessing that’s more of a show budget thing). Bloom, a fire fairy, is recruited to a magical school to hone her magic, where she makes friends with her fairy roommates; light fairy Princess Stella (Han
Not too cool for school . Elisha Applebaum as Musa, Hannah van der Westhuysen as Stella, Abigail Cowen as Bloom, Precious Mustapha as Aisha and Eliot Salt as Terra. Photograph: Netflix
How do you make teen TV magic? You call Brian Young. The writer cut his teeth on The Vampire Diaries, a supernatural teen drama that emerged from the Twilight era of sexy-horror fandoms, but it soon established its own identity, resulting in a successful eight seasons. So, when Netflix wanted to turn Winx Club â the hit Italian cartoon about fairies â into a live-action fantasy series for young adults, they recruited Young.