Empowering Girls in the Transnational W.I.T.C.H. Magazine and Comic Series excerpt

Empowering Girls in the
Transnational W.I.T.C.H. Magazine
and Comic Series
Simona Di Martino
Abstract: The Italian-made comics series W.I.T.C.H. and the homonymous mag-
azine enjoyed global success. The series tells the story of five girls who discover
they have magical powers and are called on to save the universe from evil forces. I
investigate this transnational and transmedia series and explore how girls’ empow-
erment is pursued through the trope of the teenage witch in the comics’ storyline,
revealing the hybridization of manga, European, and Disney graphic styles and
themes, and in the magazine itself where the editors use techniques of engage-
ment with readers (surveys and quizzes, problem pages and letters from readers,
DIY pieces, and diary-like pages). This analysis involves scholarship on Girlhood
and Cultural Studies and serves as a springboard for further investigation.
Keywords: adolescence, comics, Disney, Euromanga, Girl Power, magazine,
transnational, witches
A New Comics Series for Teen Girls

From adult comics (Castaldi 2010) to graphic journalism (Fasiolo 2012),
from Topolino (Gadducci et al. 2020) to Disney Italia’s productions (Tos-
ti 2011), and from studies on single characters such as Tex Willer (Leake
2018), to reviews of the most representative comics artists (Prandi and
Ferrari 2014), the Italian fumetto (comics book) is increasingly attracting
academic attention. While until the early 2000s, surveys of Italian comics
featured mainly male authors and characters (Pizzi 2004), more recent and
specialized studies devote space to female artists and characters (Bonomi et
al. 2020; Zanatta et al. 2009). In examining W.I.T.C.H, both the magazine
and the comics series inside it, I aim to build on these studies and contrib-
ute to the growing critical movement of women in Italy for the recognition
of comics and female characters. To date, Marco Pellitteri has been the only
scholar to analyze W.I.T.C.H. critically by focusing on the comics series and

effectively examining its success and hybridization with foreign traditions
regarding comics (Pellitteri 2009, 2018).
W.I.T.C.H. was first published in Italy in October 2001, produced by
Disney Italia and created by Italian authors, artists, and editorial staff. In
his article published in the online magazine Fumettologica, Andrea Fiamma
(2021) retraces the origins of the comics and explains that children’s au-
thor Elisabetta Gnone, then the director of the girls’ publications division
at Disney Italia, was commissioned to design a product aimed at young
teenage girls, a segment of the public not yet targeted then. Gnone con-
ceived the idea of a story centered on a group of adolescent girlfriends with
magical powers and sought artists to bring her idea to life. She involved
Barbara Canepa, a comic artist and painter who studied at the Disney
Academy and was already working as an illustrator for the Disney maga-
zine La sirenetta (The Little Mermaid), and Alessandro Barbucci, a former
teacher at the Disney Academy with significant experience and important
projects under his belt.
Using witchcraft as a metaphor for adolescence, W.I.T.C.H. follows the
adventures of five teenage girls, Will, Irma, Taranee, Cornelia, and Hay Lin,
who discover they have magical powers and are tasked with protecting the
universe from evil forces while balancing this with their everyday lives. The
aim of the project was not only to craft a product for young girls, but also to
innovate graphic designs and involve characters beyond the standard Dis-
ney roster like Mickey and Minnie Mouse, and Donald and Daisy Duck.
W.I.T.C.H. was indeed the first Disney publication conceived of as a mag-
azine for adolescent girls featuring a comics series with human characters
instead of anthropomorphized animals (Tosti 2011; Zanatta et al. 2009).
According to Mara Pace, the W.I.T.C.H. magazine sold over 250,000
copies per month in Italy in 2004 and enjoyed considerable popularity
worldwide (Corriere della Sera 2004). In Issue 34 (January 2004), the ed-
itorial team celebrated the new year by dedicating space to ‘W.I.T.C.H.
in the world’ (48–49). There, they show that the adventures of the five
magical girls were translated into more than 30 languages and distributed
in 51 countries from China to Iceland. In Issue 50 (May 2005), the mag-
azine’s director Valentina De Poli celebrated millions of W.I.T.C.H. fans
worldwide, testifying to an increase in the publication’s reach, now printed
in 63 countries. as a magazine and a comics series primarily directed atSIMONA DI MARTINO
48
adolescent girls. In this analysis, I assess how the trope of the teenage witch
and the editors’ engagement with readers contribute to the representation
of empowered adolescent girls and invites reflections from the perspective
of Girlhood Studies.


Transnational Comics
According to Kraenzle and Ludewig (2020), comics are defined as transna-
tional when they provide the reader with “narratives, histories and imaginar-
ies that transcend national boundaries [and when] practices of comics pro-
duction [are] indebted to multiple comics traditions” (2). The W.I.T.C.H.
comics series evidently manifests signs of transnationality, boasting an ap-
parent hybridization of styles, themes, and imageries with Japanese manga,
Disney, and European graphic styles (Pellitteri 2009).
To design the W.I.T.C.H. comics, artists Canepa and Barbucci em-
ployed a graphic fusion style called Euromanga that blended the Western
graphic tradition with Japanese manga (Pellitteri 2018). According to Ar-
ianna Rea, a Disney character designer and teacher at the Scuola Romana
dei Fumetti, the Euromanga style originated in Europe in the early 2000s,
and, in Italy, it developed primarily in the Disney publishing world (Scuola
Romana dei Fumetti, 2022). Japanese traits that characterize Euromanga
typically include
physical features of the characters (large eyes, pointed chin, young-looking faces,
bodies often slender and thin), the not orthogonal layout of the panels, the fre-
quent use of graphic conventions like kinetics lines, and the brevity of the di-
alogue in comparison to the overflowing literariness of most popular Western
comics. (Pellitteri 2010: 432)
The W.I.T.C.H. series incorporates features typical of manga regarding
characters’ looks, page design, decorations, themes, and concepts. In terms
of characters’ appearance, the W.I.T.C.H. group leader Will is inspired by
the young cyborg Alita from the homonymous dystopian manga (1990) by
Yukito Kishiro. Will and Alita have a similar physical appearance and hair-
style along with stylish attire. However, Barbucci refined the character of
Alita for the younger audience for whom Will was conceived, refusing Ali-
ta’s futuristic and cybernetic appearance and intense gaze (Locatelli 2021).
Recurring manga features include dynamic page design with characters
coming out of panels along with irregular borders, as exemplified in Issue
22 in which Cornelia, crying and drenched from running in the rain, enters
EMPOWERING GIRLS IN THE TRANSNATIONAL W.I.T.C.H.
49
her room and gradually remembers small events from the past that a spell
had caused her to forget. The emergence of memories in a fragmented and
painful manner is graphically reflected in irregular panels of different shapes
and sizes resembling shards of glass, while the figure of Cornelia crying ex-
pands across the background in a full-page spread. Fluttering flowers, often
seen on the covers of the W.I.T.C.H. magazine (see Issues 24, 26, 38, 40,
47, 48, 51, 54), are also features reminiscent of the floral motifs common-
ly found in shoujo manga, a genre of Japanese comics and graphic novels
aimed primarily at a young female audience.
On a visual and conceptual level, W.I.T.C.H. features the girls’ transfor-
mation into adult versions of themselves; they are taller and more feminine
than their everyday appearance, thus adhering to the main theme of many
majokko genre. Majokko is a subgenre of Japanese fantasy media that targets
“female prepubescent viewers” featuring magical girls and generally involv-
ing an “elaborate description of metamorphosis that enables an ordinary
girl to turn into a supergirl” (Saito 2013: 144). These narratives are usual-
ly developed in manga and then transformed into anime. Jason Thomson
(2007) credits Himitsu no Akko-chan (1962) and Sally the Witch (1966) with
being the first magical girl productions, later followed by Creamy Mami
(1983), Sailor Moon (1991), and Magical Do-Re-Mi (1999). These anime
series reached immense success in Italy, thus shaping the imagery of young
viewers (Pellitteri 2010). Pellitteri (2009) asserts that “the basic narrative
structure of the [W.I.T.C.H.] series is a recapitulation of the Japanese for-
mula of a group of five witches, each with different and complementary psy-
chology, color, totemic symbol, power and dressing style, united together in
a team” (389). Both Canepa and Barbucci declared that the Japanese Sailor
Moon series served as a model (Locatelli 2021). Despite resembling Sailor
Moon, which also features a group of female friends with magical powers,
Pellitteri maintains that the protagonists of W.I.T.C.H. are characterized
by a different distinct aesthetic identity given by Gnone’s Italian creativity
and sensibility, along with the plasticity of the art by Barbucci and Canepa.
W.I.T.C.H. features three Caucasian girls, an African American girl, and a
Chinese girl, showcasing a more inclusive and diverse cast than Sailor Moon
and actively promoting graphic narratives that challenge nationalist, top-
down, and white-and-male-centered representations of Italian culture.
W.I.T.C.H’s five protagonists have their own identifying marks, person-
alities, fashion styles, and elemental powers (Irma controls water, Taranee
fire, Cornelia earth, Hay Lin air, and Will energy). Will has red, short hair in
a bob cut, and big brown eyes. She likes wearing practical clothes like wide
SIMONA DI MARTINO
50
pants and hoodies with zippers. Taranee, shy and determined, is a Black girl
of African American descent. She wears glasses, has blue-black hair and loves
streetwear fashion. Irma is a very expressive and witty girl with shoulder
length hazel, wavy hair, and big greenish-blue eyes. Her desk mate is Hay
Lin, a Chinese girl with long dark hair tied in pigtails who wears brightly
colored outfits she personally designs. Cornelia is tall and slender with long
blond hair and light blue eyes and is very stylish and elegant.
Another characteristic derived from manga is the modern portrayal of
female characters who are not only independent and no longer defenseless
but also assist male characters who are often fragile and in need of help
(Pellitteri 1999). The W.I.T.C.H. series includes several episodes featuring
the five girls rescuing boys. In Issue 11, the girls support their schoolmate
Martin, demonstrating their teamwork and solidarity against bullying; in
Issue 15, Cornelia restores her beloved Caleb to life after he is turned into
a flower by an enemy; and in Issue 62, the girls free Matt, Will’s boyfriend,
from a magical diary that had imprisoned him, just to name a few examples.
Finally, from the Japanese majokko tradition W.I.T.C.H. derives the mi-
crocosm of feelings that potentially interest teenagers. Young readers could
easily project themselves onto heroines who transform into young women,
embodying a transition from childhood to maturity both physically and in
terms of independence. In an interview published in the magazine Scuola
di Fumetto (2010), Barbucci confirmed that the W.I.T.C.H. project aimed
to reproduce adolescence in its complexity and in a realistic manner like
Japanese authors generally represent it. Magda Erik-Soussi confirms how
realistically the Japanese represent adolescence: “Sailor Moon’s feminine
core was raw and honest, putting focus on the huge, mostly female cast’s
struggles with morality, friendship, jealousy, sexuality, vulnerability, and de-
sire to protect loved ones” (2015: 26). Pellitteri effectively summarizes the
W.I.T.C.H. transnational phenomenon in saying,
Gnone had adapted the scheme of the action team, which is far older than Sail-
or Moon, to cover important themes for girls such as growing up and moving
from childhood to adolescence, with all the many temperamental, emotional,
and physical evolutions that such change involve. The art has been able to per-
fectly translate these themes, portraying five fashionable girls having their own
insecurities and individualities while still maintaining . . . a wide set of stereotyp-
ical characteristics in which young female readers can see themselves. (Pellitteri
2009: 391)
However, as Nicolle Lamerichs states, “It would be wrong to portray this
dynamic solely as an influence from Japan’s side” (2015: 76). Japanese cre-
ators have also been influenced by American culture and have produced
EMPOWERING GIRLS IN THE TRANSNATIONAL W.I.T.C.H.
51
manga and anime that, in turn, have entered Europe, mediating both Jap-
anese and American cultures. Lamerichs explains that “Osamu Tezuka, Ja-
pan’s preeminent author, was inspired by Disney productions in his work”
(2015: 76). The American television shows Bewitched (1964–1972) and
I Dream of Jeannie (1965–1970) have proved influential for the Japanese
witch storylines set in modern urban settings, from Sally the Witch (1966)
to the transforming Sailor Moon’s girls in the 1990s (Pellitteri 1999; Saito
2013). The mediated trope of the teenage witch prompts further investiga-
tion, to which I now turn.