About W.I.T.C.H.
W.I.T.C.H. started out as an idea by Elisabetta Gnone, Alessandro Barbucci, and Barbara Canepa, who formerly worked for Disney Italy. The trio brainstormed and worked on the series in secret for three years before finally taking it to the executives at Disney. Their idea was laughed out of the room. They were told that the project was "crazy, a sure-fire bomb, complete waste of time." (1) They were also told that the comic too closely resembled Japanese manga, which the executives assured them was only a fad which would not do well in the long run. (>_<)

However, W.I.T.C.H.'s creators were not to be discouraged, and continued to work on the series an extra year, with a tiny budget and little publicity. And, to everyone's surprise (except the creators'), the series became an international success. After that, W.I.T.C.H.'s success story becomes a sad one. Disney bought out the series and removed Elisabetta Gnone, Alessandro Barbucci, and Barbara Canepa from the project. None of them work for Disney any longer, and the storyline was given a different ending than the ones the creators had actually intended.

With Disney at the helm, however, W.I.T.C.H. began its journey outside of Europe. In early 2004, the series made its way to Japan, where it was translated and given new art and a slightly altered storyline by Japanese manga artist Haruko Iida. While the series was not as phenomenally successful in Japan as it was in Europe, running only two volumes (due undoubtedly to the over-abundance of "magical girl" anime and manga in Japan), the series nonetheless attained a faithful set of fans, and continued its journey across the globe.

W.I.T.C.H. first appeared in America in mid-2004 with a series of junior novels. These were novelizations that told the story of the comics (albeit, watered-down versions to fit in with the younger audience Disney craves), with color inserts of some of the pages of the comics included. An animated series began airing weekly on Disney's new "Jetix lineup" in January of 2005, on ABC Kids, ABC Family, and Toon Disney. This series has drastically altered just about everything from the comics, leaving pretty much only the characters' names and elements the same. Nonetheless, this W.I.T.C.H. series is still worth watching, with lovely animation and good music. The changes, at least, make it feel like a new series (not unlike the drastic changes made to the Sailor Moon series with the live-action version).

Finally, American fans of the comics will be able to rejoice at not having to buy the translated W.I.T.C.H. magazines for big bucks on eBay anymore: in May of 2005, the W.I.T.C.H. comics started being released in Graphic Novel form, two issues per volume (120 pp), at the extremely affordable price of $4.99 a volume. Hopefully, this will open up the W.I.T.C.H. comics to a brand new fandom...

(1) Magic Attack No. 10, July 2002. Translated by Lunar Archivist of Genvid.