It’s no secret that I am a Roxy stan. When
she was first introduced back in season 4, I remember taking a quick liking to her, and
I was so excited to see the new dynamic she’d bring to the Winx Club after it’d gotten
so comfortable with six members. Especially given she was a protege, it would shake things
up in a much different way from when Aisha joined the group in season 2.
Unfortunately, Rainbow seemed to do everything they could to get Roxy out of the picture.
In order to make the Winx appear 16 again and stay locked away in class at Alfea forever,
they needed to remove their mentorship of the young Roxy, to the point she appears older
than them in season 6. As such, they kept Roxy from shining, keeping the Winx Club at
a solid 6 members, and banishing Roxy to the background.
Though this aggravated most viewers, myself included, Rainbow did try to appease fans
by giving Roxy a handful of scenes in season 6, and making her a supporting character in
season 7. Unfortunately, it wasn’t nearly enough. And now, it seems Roxy’s existence
has been completely erased. She isn’t in season 8 at all, and with season 9 being yet
another soft reboot, it looks like Rainbow is keen to forget Roxy ever existed. *“I
Forgot That You Existed” by Taylor Swift* So, what happened. How did we go from Seven
being the perfect number to this? Why did people love Roxy to begin with, and what could
they have done differently to keep her in the club? If she was ever in the club at all.
Winx was unique compared to other animated series, allowing its characters to actually
grow up alongside its audience. They started the series as 16-year-olds, and then became
adults who graduated from Alfea. Season 4, then, is the first season where the Winx are
graduated adults. In many ways, it feels more juvenile than the first three seasons, but
I at least respect its concept of having the girls grow up to deal with more adult problems
on Earth. For full coverage of that, check out my video on how Season 4 didn’t age
very well. “Allegedly.” Still, one of the highlights of the season
was the Winx’s new pupil: Roxy, the Fairy of Animals, and the last fairy on Earth. The
Winx’s mission in season 4 is to stop the Wizards of the Black Circle, fairy hunters
who’d stolen the wings and magic of all fairies on Earth, and are the reason why Earth
is so… terrible. In addition to making humans believe in magic, the Winx Club’s goal was
also to protect Roxy, as once the Black Circle captured her, Earth would’ve been doomed.
Well, more doomed than usual. “You in danger, girl.”
Roxy doesn’t have many friends, instead preferring the company of animals, including
her dog Artu. There are close encounters between the Winx and Roxy in the first few episodes,
namely when Stella shoos Roxy away before the Love & Pet shot opens.
“Sorry, but we’re not ready for the big reveal just yet!” “Whatever…”
And when Roxy makes a snide comment on Stella’s vanity when the girls go to the Frutti Music
Bar, ordering endless drinks while she bartends. “I’ll have strawberry and cream, and make
it a double!” “Don’t overdo it, Stella!” “But it’s for my hair, so it’ll be even
more beautiful and shiny!” “Wow, looks like someone sure is full of herself...”
“Wake up, Roxy, those smoothies coming?!” Roxy’s already having less-than-stellar
impressions of the Winx, which is hilarious since most of that is coming from Stella.
“Don’t be f***ing rude!” “Are you kidding me?!”
And it becomes mutual when Tecna discovers someone is breaking Love & Pet’s rule of
one pet per person. See, the pet shop’s purpose - aside from introducing toyetic elements
for young girls - is to introduce magic into the lives of Gardenia’s citizens through
the fairy pets. Roxy, as an animal lover, isn’t a fan of this one-pet rule, and as
such, finds a way around this to get a whole shed full of fairy pets to befriend.
The Winx think it might be someone up to no good, perhaps trying to sell off the pets
secondhand. Instead, they find an animal lover who’s quite rebellious, doing whatever she
wants. And when they realize she has magic, Roxy calls them all nutjobs for saying she’s
a fairy - and also for cornering her. Stella did literally descend from the ceiling.
“Nah, she doesn’t look like a fairy! Fairies don’t look like this! Fairies are elegant,
kind, graceful! But above all, they don’t hang out with rude dogs!” “Easy, Artu!”
While Bloom was excited at the idea of being a real fairy, having dreamed about it since
childhood and loving fairy tale books into her teenage years, Roxy… could not care
less. “Don’t give a f***! Do I look like I give a f***, because I don’t!”
Admittedly, it’s more of a headcanon of my own, but I really like this contrast between
Bloom and Roxy. Roxy, in my mind, hates magic. She prefers a more grounded, mundane life
in Gardenia with her father and pets. “I have no intention of leaving Gardenia!
My whole life is here: my friends(?), my dad! I’m not giving up everything to spend three
years at a school so far away!” And so being thrust into this magical quest
of saving the world is… annoying, to say the very least. She’s even hostile at the
idea of being carted off to the far-off Alfea for a minimum of three years.
And even beyond this distaste of magic, Roxy wants to make her own choices and live her
own life. Though she must accept the reality of her being a fairy, and her world counting
on her, she still has to choose to embrace being a fairy. She’s not going to passively
go along with this. If it’s not a future she wants, she’s not gonna tolerate it.
Especially love the scenes she’s telling Bloom off after Artu nearly dies. It feels
nice to have someone tell Bloom off, especially in season 4 when she becomes a Mary Sue. “Roxy,
listen--” “Leave me alone! If I hadn’t met all of you, this never would’ve happened!
I don’t wanna be a fairy!” Roxy’s quite similar to many of the Winx.
She has superficial connections to Bloom through being a lost princess who grew up on Earth,
which I have… mixed thoughts on. But besides that, she definitely has Bloom’s feistiness
from the earlier seasons, Stella’s sassiness and wit, Flora’s love for the natural world,
Musa’s aloofness and occasional snarkiness (and tomboyishness), and Aisha’s rebelliousness.
As for Tecna… uh, she has her hair? Which believe me, we will get to.
So, Roxy is a saving grace of season 4. But what changed going into season 5? Before we
continue, I’d just like to ask you to subscribe and ring that bell for notifications because
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And if you enjoy my story analysis skills, you’ll probably enjoy my other videos talking
about different pieces of media, along with my urban fantasy novel, De Cineribus: From
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I’m currently working on future books, so that’s fun.
Season 5 has a solid-enough start, but all the red flags are there, especially for Roxy.
When there’s a convenient oil spill off the coast, Roxy says she wants to help the
Winx, but Bloom tells her to watch the people on the beach instead.
“Bloom, I wanna go too!” “Sorry, Roxy. I want you to stay here. I need you to look
after the people on the beach.” *“I Hate U” by SZA*
It prevents Roxy from transforming and feeling like an active part of the group. She isn’t
even allowed to help like the specialists. I don’t know, not like it would help to
ask all the sea life around the spill to get out of the way, or possibly escort any of
the fallen workers to safety. Let her be Aquaman, dammit.
The same goes for when Tritannus and the Trix attack the beach. Roxy doesn’t even try
to help. She doesn’t transform, instead cowering in the background with the civilians.
The fact they don’t even try to excuse this is telling, as Roxy has already been exiled
from significance. Her banishment officially begins when the
Winx return to Alfea. Roxy is excited to begin classes (unlike her attitude in season 4),
the Winx say she’s gonna do fine… and that’s it.
“Bloom! I can’t believe I’m really at Alfea! I’m so nervous!” “There’s nothing
to be nervous about.” “You’re going to do just fine.” “Thanks you guys!”
Roxy doesn’t speak for the rest of the season, only being seen along with the background
students at Alfea for the rest of eternity. *“I Hate U” by SZA*
She gets no subplots of her own, we don’t track her progress over the years like the
Winx’s three years at Alfea. Roxy gets… nothing.
She gets a bit more to do in season 6… but not much. When the Trix conquer Cloudtower
for the seventeenth time, they turn Headmistress Griffin into a crow, because why not? “But
you did this for what?” “Why not?” “Why?” “Why not?” “Why tho???”
Griffin escapes, and the Winx catch her, giving her to Roxy to care for her. “It couldn’t
be in better hands! If anyone can help, it’s you, Roxy.”
It’s incredibly contrived, both to deliver the news and exposition of the Trix’s plans,
which we could’ve figured out anyway. “So it’s the Trix! They must be back at Cloudtower!”
“Again? A-f***in’-gain? Nothing new, nothing changed, same old s***. Same ol’ f***in’
sh--” And to get Roxy arbitrarily involved. It adds
nothing to Roxy’s character, nor to the story. She doesn’t learn from this encounter,
nor apply her new magical skills she’s learned from Alfea. She doesn’t even get a mentorship
with Griffin. Personally, I would’ve liked if Griffin had animal powers and became a
mentor of Roxy, like Faragonda was a mentor of the Winx. And it could show how fairies
and witches could learn from each other. But no, we don’t get nice things. *“This Is
Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” by Taylor Swift*
It’s just… there. For like two scenes. Oh, and I guess Roxy plays a guitar at the
Music Cafe, so… thanks, I hate it. Season 7 is arguably the most insulting, which
is ironic given she gets more here than she did in seasons 5 and 6 combined. Given it’s
a season all about animal rescue, and the main villain Kalshara is building an army
of fairy animals, you’d think the Fairy of Animals would play a pivotal role in the
plot. But she does not. “NO, I’M A STAR! PLEASE I’M A STAAAAAARRRR!!!”
In the first episode, she escorts the Winx through the random Alfea Natural Park - the
latest addition to the Alfea Mall - then doesn’t help fight the bird when it kidnaps the digmole.
She just lets the Winx get beaten up, I assume to prove how profoundly useless Bloomix is.
Roxy does join the Winx on their first mission into the past… yes, there’s time travel
in season 7, and no, they do nothing interesting with it. She transforms in a lazily-animated
recreation of her original transformation, oh god it burns my eyes. “Oh my god, what
is that… OH MY GOD. WHAT IS THAT?” And is relatively more useful than any of
the other Winx. But unfortunately for her - or maybe fortunately, given how ugly the
new form is - Roxy doesn’t gain Butterflix when the Winx defeat the stone giant, despite
the fact Roxy told them to look to the digmoles for how to stop it. “The digmoles are fairy
animals! If we free them, they’ll know how to defend themselves!” (Aisha) “I think
we can do it!” And she’s literally rigtht next to them
and caught up in the light, but nah, f*** that b****.
Yep. A transformation all about nature and magical animals, and Roxy doesn’t get it.
Delightful. Oh but don’t worry, it gets worse. Because in the very next episode, Roxy
gets her Stone of Memories stolen by Brafilius, a buffoon and one of the most irritating,
terribly written villains of the franchise. Wonderful.
“I’ll use my Stone of Memories to go back to Magix prehistory and find the Cry Cries.”
“I never would’ve thought of that on my own!” “IT’S TIME TO STOP. IT’S TIME
TO STOP, OKAY?!” This means she can’t time travel anymore,
and she’s officially worthless to the narrative. The most she does from here is… have plot
birds who yell when a new plot cul de sac appears. Yay.
It’s also made worse given Roxy’s stone got stolen because she wanted to do things
her own way, and no one was listening to her, especially Bloom. What a surprise. “I’m
the Fairy of Animals, trust me! This is why Faragonda sent me with you.”
She was trying to prove herself, and was punished for it by the narrative. She then doesn’t
get a chance to redeem herself. The Winx aren’t punished for pushing Roxy to this point, and
they don’t develop a newfound respect for her. It just feels like the show wanted to
cement to viewers: “No, Roxy doesn’t matter, she will never matter. F*** you.” “F***
all y’all!!!” And then… she’s gone. Completely erased.
*“Gone Girl” by SZA* She’s not in season 8, and I very much doubt she’ll be in season
9. Weirdly she’s a supporting character in the first season of World of Winx, who…
doesn’t transform? Okay then. Why even have her then? “Why?” “Why not?” “Why
tho???” But why? Why do all of this to a fan favorite
character? The reason is simple: Roxy is an obstacle.
We’ve talked a lot about how Rainbow’s goal was to keep the Winx eternally young
for easy plot generation. By maintaining this status quo, they could theoretically make
as many Alfea plots for them as they want. No need for good writing, and all the money
you could hope for… ah how capitalism and the profit motive ruin art, huh?
This happens in a lot of shows. They have a status quo and are afraid to change it,
so they let the characters hang in perpetuity, no matter how sick of it the audience gets.
Idk, it’s not like it’s more interesting to have your characters age and grow up with
the audience for new, interesting storylines. It’s not like that’s what fans loved about
the first four seasons. “And that’s on a period!” Not at all, no.
But to do this, Rainbow needed to keep the numbers of the Winx Club low to make for easier
plots. And they also, more importantly, needed to remove any indicators of the Winx growing
older - including their pupil. “Oh my god… you’re 40?!”
By making Roxy nothing but a background character with only a superficial relationship with
the Winx, they manage to maintain the illusion of the Winx being 16 again, while paying lip
service to Roxy fans. As I’ve mentioned, season 4… is a bit
of a mess, but Roxy is one of its best elements. However, her role isn’t perfect. I’m not
a fan of the whole “secret princess” plot, especially because her being the daughter
of Morgana, Queen of the Earth Fairies, introduces many plot holes about the timeline of events.
(Morgana) “Every sign of me disappeared, as if I’d never existed. But Ogron had made
a mistake. Not all the Earth fairies had been caught. One was too young to reveal her powers.
That saved you.” And how the Black Circle didn’t go, “Hey,
maybe the fairy queen’s daughter is also a fairy?” Even though they did have the
sense to erase the memory of Morgana from Roxy and her father’s minds. Real thorough,
Ogron. And in general, I’m so sick of this idea,
cuz it implies that you can only matter if you’re a secret noble. An elite, who you
are innately makes you more important than commoners and peasants. The fact the most
important Winx members plot-wise are princesses? You may not have noticed it, but your brain
did! Abolish the monarchy, pull a Zaheer. “I don’t believe in queens.”
Along with all of that, Roxy’s powers could’ve used some work. “Get your f***in’ ass
up and work!” While Flora is a Fairy of Nature, her powers mostly have to do with
flowers and plants, and occasionally earth. It’s a decent distinction from Roxy’s
animal powers, but to drive the point home, giving her more creative powers featuring
the abilities and traits of animals would’ve helped. It would’ve especially been welcome
given it was also a season of generic energy beams.
And then her design. She’s generally presumed to be a white girl, given fair skin and ambiguous
hair colors and phenotypes (*cough* anime) tend to make people go, “Oh, white’s prob
the default here.” But does the club need another white girl? “No. I said no. You
can kill all that right now!” We’ve already got Bloom and Tecna, and if
you wanna argue Stella is a white Latina - which I do actually like for her - Stella would
still be white-passing (so white). I think the club could use a little bit more diversity
here. A lot of people were curious about my redesign
of Roxy for the rewrite, where I made her brown-skinned. For why this isn’t that big
of a deal, I recommend Veridis Joe’s video about blackwashing, but to summarize, it’s
about allowing for more representation of underrepresented groups, and it’s not at
all the same as whitewashing, which steals already rare representation away from marginalized
groups. Look at this way: one group is heavily more
represented to the point that it’s the default. Does this group need to steal rep from group
B, which is already begging for representation? Specifically, I made Roxy South Asian, given
Musa is East Asian. Roxy is a mix of Indian and Malay, and I would likely adjust the stories
of her parents, as well as little design elements of her family, to show her heritage, as well
as cast an actress of that background to voice Roxy. Representation matters, period. Plus,
it would mean that Flora and Aisha wouldn’t have to be the only dark-skinned girls of
the bunch. On top of that, because Roxy has pink hair,
it makes a lot of people confuse her for Tecna, especially casual fans. I remember a lot of
people thought she was Tecna’s sister when she was first introduced. It’s just bizarre
to have two white girls with pink hair. By having Roxy be dark skinned, and adjusting
the shade of pink in her hair, it allows her to remain visually distinct. I tend to give
her more strawberry and red shades of pink to complement the greens in her designs.
And speaking of her greens, while I do like green as her main color, it does cause a bit
of conflict between her and Aisha. Aisha is a bit of an odd case, since her main color
tends to oscillate between blue and green depending on the form. Her Magic Winx is green,
her Believix is blue, and even her Enchantix switched from blue to green three quarters
of the way through season 3 (the blue one is better, fight me).
To keep things consistent, and to keep Bloom’s blue and Roxy’s green, it’d prob help
to have Aisha’s palette be more of a turquoise-y color. Play up the ocean vibe. Roxy, meanwhile,
could have more earthy, forest-y greens, as well as some yellow accents in her color palette
to differentiate from the pink accents in Aisha’s. Originally, Roxy’s color seemed
like it would’ve been indigo, but… thank god they didn’t go that route. She already
looks too much like Tecna, we don’t need her stealing purple too.
And design aside, the show has always had little nuggets of queer representation. “Can
he never not be gay for five seconds? I’m just like, can you not be gay for five minutes?!”
Mirta’s coding as a witch who becomes a fairy really hits home for trans viewers.
“It’s that trans magic loser, Mirta!” “You know that girl?” “Yeah, she claims
to be a fairy who just happened to be born into a witch’s body.”
And she and Lucy’s friendship is giving bitter lesbian exes who eventually make up.
“And they were roommates!” “Oh my god, they were roommates…”
And we all know Palladium and Avalon are an item. The show has always been a haven for
queer viewers, and I think having some queer members of the Winx Club themselves would
help with that, including Roxy. Look, she just gives this confident sapphic
energy. Idk what to tell you, actually I do, she’s sapphic. She’s a lesbian queen,
end of story, and I would love her to have a girlfriend. I know she has a boyfriend in
the comics, named Manuel, but… he looks like discount Sky. I refuse to accept this
on the basis that it’s trash. Roxy deserves better, and so do you, audience. Sapphic Roxy
for life. And most importantly, I really wish they had
Roxy build relationships with all of the Winx. This would’ve gone nicely with a more character-driven
focus like season 2, with Roxy learning from each of the Winx individually, and in turn,
them learning from her. Instead, canon makes it seem like only Bloom cares about Roxy,
and everyone else simply tolerates her existence. I try to do this a bit more in my rewrites,
as well as have roxy have her own life outside the club. In the season 5 rewrite, though
she does try to be involved with the Winx, she still has classes at Alfea to worry about,
along with conflicts with her dorm mates - one being Princess Krystal - and her little friendship
with Knut the Janitor. She doesn’t really commit to being a member
of the club until they lose their powers in the midseason finale. Given Earth fairies
retain their magic, it allows Roxy some time to shine while the other Winx have to work
without their powers, and also allows Roxy to prove herself to gain Sirenix, joining
them full time. That can seem a bit strange given she’s
so much younger than the others, and her form was never really explained like the others.
Its aesthetic is very similar to Magic WInx, but the marketing and giant wings made it
feel more like Believix, likely to make her dolls feel more cohesive alongside the Winx’s.
However that’s solved, including introducing a different power system for Earth fairies,
I feel like it would help to have Roxy struggle as a sort of gifted kid. You know the type:
advances in many subjects, considered best in class, has all these expectations, only
to burn out early in young adulthood and become aimless, depressed, and self-loathing, as
they realize the system that upheld and praised them is actually s****y, and doesn’t give
a s*** about them as people. “Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s clinical depression!”
That could work really well for Roxy, having her feel isolated from both peers her own
age, as well as the Winx given how much older they are than her. Given how Roxy tended to
be a loner to begin with, this new situation probably isn’t helping her, and that could
give way to a lot of interesting stories for her character… ones which I may or may not
explore in the season 6 rewrite. All in all, I love Roxy. She’s a fun, interesting
character with a lot of potential that the show has been squandering for… over a decade
now, wow. She deserved a better story. Even if she didn’t become the seventh Winx, they
still owed her more than exiling her to the background forever.
Anyways, if you enjoyed this video and would like to see more content like this from me,
then you can subscribe and ring that bell for notifications because YouTube hates creators.
If you’d like to support me and the channel further, then you can pledge your support
over on Patreon, and check out my urban fantasy novel De Cineribus: Form the Ashes wherever
books are sold! I’m the Unicorn of War… and Roxy is a
sapphic icon.
