WoW episode 2
2 New Powers
In the shadowy forest of Neverland Island, Annabel wakes up. It is a beautiful scene, the bare trees are muted colors of violet and green, in spite of which the whole island is gray. And foggy. I love scenes of beautiful desolation, but Annabel is naturally a bit nervous finding herself mysteriously brought here. She gets up to look around and is soon menaced by three shadowy specters that look a lot like the silhouettes of the Ancestral Witches, just sayin. She flees, specters in pursuit, and hides behind a tree. Really cool visuals of the specters flowing over the terrain as they leave.
Bloom opens her eyes on a desolate foggy beach. She looks into the ocean and sees Annabel's face reflected. Then bloom is wandering through the forest. She sees the kidnapped talents they're looking for: the rocker, a black guy with what I think is a skateboarder shirt, a martial artist who karate-chops a branch just so we know what his talent is, and a ballerina with a positively witchy amount of eye makeup. Bloom calls out to them, then Annabel grabs her. Annabel draws Bloom's attention to her missing earring, then something starts crashing through the trees nearby. Annabel runs, and when Bloom follows the trees grab her.
...and Bloom wakes up in the loft, back on Earth. Bloom's room is kinda impersonal. All the features in her room that you can see on the website are totally gone, and the color scheme is completely pink/peach/cream. Not bad, but very different.
The other girls come in to check on Bloom and Flora offers a cup of calming “namas-tea” without even a grin for that awful pun. All the girls have super cute pajamas. Bloom of course says she doesn't think that was just a nightmare, that she really saw Annabel. But before they can think what to do, the theme music for their show starts.
Sooo, can those drone cameras go in their bedrooms at any hour? 'Cause I would not be cool being on TV with my hair all morning-y and I bet Stella would mind that twenty times more than me. But it's hard to tell, since our show cute to the opening of the show within a show and there's Ace in front of the studio audience, hang on do the Winx sleep really late or does the audience get up really early?
Ok, ok, re-suspending my disbelief.
Ace reintroduces the judges. Margo says she hates talents and only likes her pup. I can relate to that. Cliff says whatever's spontaneous is talent.
I guess cameras don't come in the girls' rooms because Bloom has time to say that they can't find Annabel with cameras following them, and for the girls to fake sick. When the drones arrive at the loft they find Stella who says Annabel won't be back for the finals, that she said she already realized her dream by singing on stage and now she's gone. Ace is dismayed. He makes funny faces. Musa and Aisha show up, and they display Bloom, Flora, and Tecna sick in bed. Bloom has a thermometer, flora hides undrer the covers, and Tecna is scrolling her tablet mechanically and saying her symptoms indicate a full day of bed rest. Tecna is a very bad actor and for some reason I love this little scene with her.
But forget illness, Stella wants to show off her closet! It's fancy and gold and has Flora's Believix wings above the mirror. Musa and Aisha stop her before she can show off further, and here's the “Find! That! Talent!” scene from the trailer. Once those three and the cameras have left, Bloom, Tec and Flora “burst into action!”
But Stella and company have to lose the drones so they can... something. Aisha announces evasive maneuvers and does some very dangerous driving for a six-wheeled RV.
Back at WoW HQ, Ace is being pampered by two teenage lovelies, a blonde in blue and a redhead in pink. If this were an anime, they'd be dressed as French maids. Also, it is now my headcanon that the redhead is Mirta, working undercover, and that she really regrets letting Stella talk her into this. Ace leaps from his lounge when his bigscreen TV show the pink RV trying to get away. He races on stage with his maids in tow then has to quickly shift into his on-air persona.
But evasive maneuvers were wasted since the girls just went to their stage. They've dressed Musa up as Marie Antoinette more or less, with a big blonde wig. I guess they were buying time to get her in costume. She gets up on stage to do acting, fake Shakespeare. She's bad at it of course. Margo disapproves. Cliff says she should get another chance. The crowd boos.
A brown-haired man in the crowd gets out his phone and makes a call...
...To a young woman working in a taco truck. The fellow's name is Gomez and he's reporting on the whereabouts of the Winx. These two are new characters, and they must be significant since they're in the ending sequence. I'm gonna guess now: they're cops. They're also looking into the disappearances and have figured out the Winx are involved. But they don't seem like bumbling cops so... I'm really not sure what role these two are going to play in our story.
For Bloom, Flora and Tecna, “bursting into action” apparently means, “a leisurely breakfast at an outdoor cafe. Flora brings tea, and Bloom draws Annabel's earring on her tablet. As they talk, Gomez photographs them from a few tables away. This is the cafe where Annabel worked, and her friend Louise is still there. She looks glum, as anyone would be after a friend disappeared.
Flora finds Louise crying in the kitchen and comforts her, and Bloom shows her the picture. The earrings were a gift from Louise, and Annabel wore them at her performance. Bloom says they have a lead, and an eavesdropping Gomez reports that to his contact. The girls almost catch him but he plays dumb.
Musa's performance is uninspired. Ace cuts her off.
Gomez's contact-he says her name but I didn't catch it-is now running an ice cream truck. She sees Bloom and company walk past and closes up shop, disappointing the same chubby man she disappointed at her taco truck last scene. The back of her truck is rigged with screens and pictures of Louise and Annabel, and a wallet with a badge lies on the seat. Above it is a picture of a brown-haired girl in a musicish shirt-a younger Annabel? Or just someone with the same coloring? The art style makes it hard to be sure, but I'm going to assume it's Annabel. Are these her PARENTS? She never mentioned her parents were cops/secret agents/mysteriously missing.
The spies reach the Frutti Music Bar at twilight, in time to see the Winx arrive. Inside the place is hopping, Roxy is mixing drinks, and I keep thinking I see background characters from the other show. Gomez chats up a pretty blonde and his friend-I looked it up, her name is Evans-calls him away. Roxy offers a smoothie with two straws in it. He ordered a smoothie for two; she's so not interested.
Probably not Annabel's parents then, unless this is some kind of a divorce and rebonding over missing child plot. I'm gonna go back to assuming they're cops. Evans asks Roxy about where Annabel was last seen but Roxy evades the question. When she goes to get them another smoohie, they disappear.
Real subtle, you two. Also, why not just flash badge and ask questions once Roxy knows you're cops? I mean, I know that it'd be best for fairies to try to keep muggles out of a magical situation, but muggle cops wouldn't know that.
The Winx arrive in Annabel's dressing room and look around. Roxy warns them about the cops by communicator.
Stella traces Annabel's likely movements using magic and her own imagination imagining what she'd do after a wonderful performance. This is pretty cool of Stella, using her own dramatic personality to empathize or something. Anyway. I liked it. The girls find the missing earring and more mysterious golden powder under a wastebasket.
The dust left by the talent thief! Tecna sucks it up into a little analysis device and yep, it matches.
Then a magical portal opens! Don't mess with magic, you never know what'll happen. The Winx vanish in a blur of light.
Evans and Gomez burst into an empty room.
At the other end of the portal... Dreamix!
So. Beautiful. I love the art, I love the outfits. I love the flower kaleidoscope theme. I gotta say though, they aren't really transforming. They just appear in the Dreamix clothes and pose and their wings appear. This sequence is in the style of the Tynix sequence, closeups of the girls' faces, somewhat erotic poses and movements. I'm not sure if they're going for “fewer complaints about nudity” or “more fanservice.” Possibly both. And it's a group transformation so the girls won't have any solo adventures this season. The song is just another transformation song.
The fairies are dumped out of the portal on the gray beach of Neverland, where they look at themselves and each other in awe. Yes! I have been waiting forever for them to acknowledge that they just transformed and want to see what they look like. I mean, wouldn't you?
Musa says it feels like their inner power has grown and taken shape, which is what I always thought a transformation should be like.
The girls fly through the forest looking for Annabel. They can feel her presence.
There she is! Annabel is shocked to see fairies, then she recognizes them and hugs Bloom, who returns her lost earring. Annabel asks about the wings and Bloom admits they're fairies. Stella says there was a magic portal, then wonders who opened it. Good question Stella, but no time for that now. Monsters are coming!
The specters return. They rise from the girls' shadows, but blasts of Dreamix magic drive them away.
Love the epic Lord-of-the-Rings-y fight music! I seriously listened to it four times.
The gang flees for the portal. Stella gets through no problem, but it won't open for Annabel! Tecna sprinkles the fairy dust on her and she approaches the portal, but it flings her back, and she hangs in space for a moment before disappearing in blue sparkles! She's gone!
The Winx appear back in the dressing room, having failed.