Based on an Italian comic book. This show aired on ABC Family and Toon Disney's Jetix block and decided to try something else from the typical comic book adaptations at the time. It re-imagines the first two story arcs of the comic, tying them together and making them one central, stand-alone, connected plot-line told in the show's serial narrative. To some fans' regret, however, this results in them changing a few things around. Greg Weisman, creator of Gargoyles, was a showrunner during the second season.On the distant planet of Meridian, a tyrannical young man named Phobos has acquired the royal throne and begun his crusade to spread his reign over all other planets in the universe. In order to counter his ambitions, a magical wall, known as the Veil, was created in order to seal Meridian away from the rest of the universe. However, over time, the Veil has begun to deteriorate, creating tears in the fabric of space which turn into portals, allowing free passage between Meridian and Earth. On Earth, five young girls are recruited to become the Guardians of the Veil, a group of super-powered defenders who are tasked with keeping order in the universe and acting as the protectors for all planets in the various galaxies of space. To do this, they must maintain the Veil by closing the portals.Soon into their Guardianship, they encounter Caleb, the young leader of a rebel army on Meridian. The rebel army opposes Phobos' rule, as Meridian is a matriarchal planet, and he tells the Guardians that the rightful heir to the throne, Phobos' sister, is hidden away somewhere on Earth, and now that the Veil is weak enough to pass through it, both the rebels and Phobos are racing to find the heir located somewhere on Earth. As they work together to search for the rightful heir to the throne, the Guardians slowly begin to learn that other forces are at work behind the scenes, manipulating and coercing various events involving the war on Meridian, and that everything and everyone they encounter is not what they appear to be.The five girls (whose initials spell "Witch") form a classic Five-Man Band, plus a sort-of Sixth Ranger (one of the Meridian rebels, who's pretty much there from the beginning), a Mentor (grandmother of one of the girls from a previous team, CHYKN), and a Non-Human Sidekick (a goblin-like smuggler from Meridian who is both cute and utterly gross) which sounds fairly standard, but the show distinguishes itself by clever plotting, writing, and bold attempt at creating a series with a centralized plotline that develops each episode with little-to-no filler episodes. Most of the episodes revolve around chess-like maneuvers between the villains and the girls, and the girls start out on the losing side of the war, and must slowly build up their victories. However, they tend to lose more often than they win due to the villain's cunning intelligence, but the plot still moves one step closer to its conclusion.This show is also notable for totally avoiding many tropes found in the action genre. One example is the Sorting Algorithm of Evil; neither Phobos' minions or the girls get any more powerful, or visibly better at using their powers. Instead, the Character Development comes from how both sides treat their war. The girls initially treat their missions like a game or a nuisance, and get much more serious with time. Both the girls and Phobos get much smarter, too. Early episodes have the girls making Keystone Kops blunders in trying to hide their secret, while the bad guys make ham-fisted attacks. By the end, both the girls and Phobos are incredibly sneaky. The second-season avoids it as well, even though the girls get some upgrades and neat new powers, they still have trouble beating the season's Big Bad Nerissa, even though she's arguably weaker than Phobos. The trouble the girls have stems from Nerissa's uncanny scheming ability. The girls never match Nerissa in terms of strength, so they must rely on their wits to outsmart her. Unfortunately, Nerissa tends to be the one outsmarting them and leading them right where she wants them.See also, the comic: WITCH.This show provides examples of:
The Ace: Caleb, though only when it comes to non-powered opponents
Action Girl: Well, it's a show with heroines and an acronym for a title. To make this scream action girl any louder, you'd have to add the word "squad!"
Adults Are Useless: Averted, the only times the kids beat the adults are when there's a large power gap, such as the Guardians fighting the non-magical Mooks. When they fight other magical-endowed adults, however, they tend to lose the battle due to their lack of experience and power.
Age Inappropriate Dress: The guardian costumes are rather...provocative for 13-14 year-old girls.
All Your Powers Combined: This was a major theme for the villains in the second season, with each villain becoming more powerful than the last because they kept capturing each other.
Alpha Bitch: Cornelia sometimes, mainly in the first season, the Grumper Twins definitely.
Ascended Extra: Caleb had a much smaller role in the comics.
Asian Airhead: Hay Lin is gorgeous, absolutely adorable, cute, sweet natured and popular...and because nature wanted to be fair, she's also dumb as a board.
Actually she's more of a Cloudcuckoolander, as her artistic ability shows she's more talented then she lets on.
Someone can be creative or highly perceptive and still be an airhead.
Doesn't being an airhead mean they're not perceptive? Check the trope page, Hay Lin doesn't fit either Type 1 or Type 2 of Asian Airhead.
Not that she hides it as "X is for Xanadu" had her entering an art show and garnering praise from a famous artist.
Averted Trope: Most ones found relating to the execution and plot of action series are broken, particularly in the second season.
The Bad Guy Wins: In both seasons, the Guardians are completely helpless to stop the villains from carrying out their scheme, until they finally get to win in the season finale.
Bigger Is Better: Subverted. Irma tries on two occasions to use breast expansion to her advantage, but in both occasions ends up being embarrassed. Played straight with Will, who prefers her Guardian form because of the larger chest.
The Blank: In one of the early issues of the comic, Will dreams that she's woken and looked in the mirror to find that she has no face! Then she tries to draw one on with a black marker before being woken up.
Cornelia almost seems to be trying to invoke this trope, yet she and Hay Lin often subvert this with accurate observations and creative use of their powers. Why would Kandrakar pick idiots to protect the multiverse, anyway?
Brainwashed / Brainwashed and Crazy: Virtually every major character as fallen victim to one of these at some point. Even many of the supporting characters do (in particular the Witch's boyfriends).
Breast Expansion: like... a lot. Like all of the main girls at least once.
Try at least once every episode. Hell, in the first episode, it's referenced on!
So obvious that it actually made front page news in Britain.
Brick Joke: In "I is for Illusion" the Guardians go to Kandrakar for information on Nerissa, not knowing her name they refer to her as "Ugly old hag" with a "No offense!" thrown in from Irma to The Mage, in a OOC moment The Mage (normally The Stoic) puts her hands on her hips and glares out a "None taken" back This becomes a billion times funnier when it's revealed that The Mage is Nerissa in disguise and has been all along. Really there’s a lot of them in regards to Nerissa's identity as both The Mage and Trill
Buxom Is Better: It's an official plot point, in the comics, novelizations and TV series...subverted by Irma, however, whose oversized bust is the butt of jokes.
Camera Abuse: In the first episode, after the girls first transform, Hay Lin starts flying circles around the other girls (especially Will), presumably due to her being the air element. She ends up flying straight into the camera. Also possibly a case of Breaking the Fourth Wall.
The Chessmaster: Nerissa - this is unsurprising given that the second season had as a showrunner Greg Weisman, creator of Gargoyles and thus of David Xanatos.
Cold-Blooded Torture: Phobos does this to Will in episode 2; we don't see all of it (just the part where she's trapped in plant vines) but when Will encounters Phobos face to face several episodes she's visibly terrified of him.
Composite Character: In the original comics, Hator and Khor are simply a random man and his dog, transformed by Nerissa. In the cartoon, they are the transformed forms of Will's boyfriend Matt and pet Mr. Huggles.
Arguably, the main characters and our heroes as they keep up The Masquerade. Strangely, they're actually pretty bad liars and this leads to Elyon believing Cedric over them as he's a much better one.
Deus Exit Machina: Elyon is imprisoned for much of season two, keeping her out of fights she should've been easily able to win for the Guardians otherwise.
In the second season it gets a bit more complicated, with Raythar first being The Dragon to Nerissa, then Shagon. When Phobos regains power, Cedric becomes The Dragon again- and when he takes over, Miranda becomes his Dragon for all of one episode.
Fanservice: What kind ya want? Take your pick of the main gals. Perpetually adorable Taranee is like Rei but Black, with a dash of Hartman Hips. Will is a slinky little Pettanko with dreams of Breast Expansion, ditto for Hay Lin. Cornelia is a gorgeous blonde bombshell with ample superpowers. And Irma is...well very◊, very◊ big.
Caleb gets an extended Shirtless Scene in season one when he's captured and put to work in prison camp.
Fighting Your Friend: Caleb and Aldarn in one episode, due to Elyon's inadvertent mind control.
First Kiss: All the W.I.T.C.H. girls and their respective crushes.
Fisher King: Meridian is a dreary wasteland under Phobos and a fairytale-style kingdom under Elyon. Justified because of the magical powers of both rulers, as well as Phobos damaging Meridian during his rule by leaching life-energy out of it, which Elyon didn't do.
Five-Man Band Well okay; they're girls, but there's still five of them.
In comic issue #100, the girls go to a party and find out it's a costume party. Guess what happens next.
Gag Boobs (in the comics, Irma's attempts at using her busty Guardian body ends in hilarious and ego-deflating Epic Fail). As an aside: there are some 'how-to-draw' model sheets of Irma describing her as "the biggest" of the girls and instructing not to be stingy when drawing her chest.
Even the soundtrack gets in on this. Specifically, Bloom, Cornelia's character song, which involves her asking someone to 'plant a little seed and watch me bloom'. Subtle...
Grandma, What Massive Hotness You Have: Narissa, Kadma, and Yan Lin all look damn well eye-popping when they resume their young, busty teenaged Guardian bodies. In fact, all of the old Guardians were quite the hotties back in the day.
Karma Houdini: Nerissa ends up much happier than she deserves.
Kick the Dog: Phobos does this VERY frequently. He tortures Will in the second episode among other things.
Kick the Son of a Bitch: Phobos does this to Nerissa and Miranda; Nerissa by trapping her in a jewel and Miranda by turning her into a really small spider and locking her in a cell for almost half a season.
Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Will's decision not to tell Elyon ultimately results in Phobos successfully manipulating her for half the season.
No Bisexuals: Averted, sort of. A questionable relationship between Nerissa and Cassidy's relationship is alluded to, though later on we found out she seduced a man to impregnate her to have a child. While one could argue she only used him to get pregnant, she has shown loving feelings for him, such as when she spared him his life during a deadly confrontation.
No Loves Intersect: Rather than crush on a character for the entire series, the characters actually have the nerve to break trope tradition and ask the character out with little hesitance, which causes them to hook up fairly early on in the series.
Our Orcs Are Different: Many of Meridian's natives are orc-like to a greater or lesser extent, but the lurdens fit best both in terms of appearance and role in the story.
Psychic Powers: The girls gain some pyschic abilities in the early part of season two. Will has technopathy, Irma has suggestion/persuasion, Taranee has telepathy, Cornelia has telekinesis, and Hay Lin has limited precognition via her dreams.
Hay Lin can also turn invisible. Along with these, Cornelia has the ability to grow taller and Irma can change the colors of clothes, possibly other things, too.
Spared by the Adaptation: Kinda. In the comics, Yan Lin dies of old age shortly after having presented the girls with their powers. However, she turns out to live on in Kandrakaar, as part of the Council. In the series, she lives on in Heatherfield. Also, Mr. Huggles dies after being hit by a car in the comic, though it is in a later storyline that was never adaptated for TV.
Skeleton Government: The entire planet of Meridian seem to be run by a single monarch, assisted by a couple of advisors. In a particularly egregious scene in the second series, Elyon was asked to negotiate a boundary dispute between two groups of farmers. You'd think there'd be some sort of regional governor to see to such matters.
Xambala's the same.
May be justified in both cases as Meridian was recently under a dictatorship and probably lacks any infrastructure while Zambala's population is basically a bunch of living trees.
Shout Out: Several to the Lord of the Rings Films. In the second season, when Greg Weisman takes over, he can't help but put a few shout outs to Gargoyles, as well.
In two episodes of the second season Usagi makes a brief background cameo.
Pokémon cameo in the European intro sequence. Really.
The Sixth Ranger: Many thought Elyon would be it. And while the show does indicate that Caleb fills this category, the comic offers somebody different entirely.
Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Averted: when Nerissa first appears, she is much weaker and less influential than Phobos ever was, though that does change overtime.
The Starscream: Cedric and Miranda in the Season 2 finale. After being left to rot in prison by Phobos, the two plotted against him in secret, while forming a relationship. Their plan was successful as Cedric succeeded in capturing all of the power Phobos had collected as well as taking control of Kandrakar and Merridian in one fell swoop. Fortunately, they weren't any lucky than the previous villains they succeeded.
This trope was played with in one episode: while every girl cheerfully announce their element as they transform, Hay Lin stands still quietly with her head bowed.
What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: The Heart of Kandrakar grants 4 of the girls elemental powers, and to Will, the power to give them those powers! Maybe not totally lame, but at the least, unfair. Retconned in Season 2 of the TV show when it's explained she had no powers as most of hers were used to keep the Veil up. When the Veil is lowered, she gains a lot of new abilities.
Xanatos Gambit: Phobos pulls off a good one in Season 1, and everyone gets in on the act in season 2. Then there's the fact that Phobos' initial Xanatos Gambit was in fact part of an even bigger one pulled by Nerissa.
Which is the only way that Phobos' take-over makes much sense in the first place. Think about it. His little sister is in her early teens. He is in his twenties. Phobos would have been somewhere around twelve when Elyon was taken to another dimension because he was such a threat to her life. Enfant Terrible or not, you'd think someone was around with the power to send him to his room.
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