Merlina, the mystery-comedy series that premiered a month ago on Netflix, featured a lot of strange characters, including faceless students. The fans believe they have discovered who they really are.
merlinthe drama of the platform Netflix directed by Tim Burton, premiered on the streamer at the end of November becoming one of the top programs with the most views worldwide. The series stayed in the Top 10 from the first week after its release, dominating the list among other major shows.
The first season of the Netflix series has 8 episodes and stars Jenna Ortega in the title role as Merlina Addams, a young woman who attends Nevermore Academy as a high school student, with the purpose of mastering her psychic powers and thus stopping a series of murders in her town.
As fans saw, Nevermore is flocked to by all forms of supernatural beings, from werewolves to vampires to mermaids. However, the ones that perhaps drew the most attention from the viewers were the faceless students. When Jenna Ortega’s character first came to the school, Enid gave her a rundown on everyone who makes up the academy, but neither she nor Merlina ever explained who these young people really are.
Fans of the supernatural could easily distinguish the different groups of outcasts at the school. The most obvious are werewolves who, during a full moon, “go crazy.” Enid is a werewolf, just like his family. But unlike his brothers, he has yet to fully transform into a wolf.
The next group are the vampires, distinguished by their round, jet-black sunglasses. It is unknown how they survive in the sun. Fans also learn a bit about gorgons, mythological creatures with snakes on their heads, similar to Medusa. They also meet Bianca, a mermaid distinguished by her piercing blue eyes. They use their siren song to manipulate others into doing their bidding and can turn into their mythical form while in the water.
Fans of the Netflix series were left wondering who the faceless students are. The show showed them together with their parents, which would suggest that their physical appearance is a genetic trait. Considering that the production did not take it upon themselves to explore these faceless characters, fans on Reddit put forward some ideas of who they are, after conducting some research. They conclude that they are part of Japanese mythology.
“I wasn’t sure either, so I googled faceless mythology and found this: Noppera-bo.” It makes sense because the outcasts in the series are based on mythology. “The noppera-bo, or faceless ghost, is a Japanese yokai that looks human but has no face. They are sometimes mistakenly called mujina, an old Japanese word for badger or raccoon dog. Although mujina can assume each other’s forms, noppera-bo often disguise themselves as humans. It was thought that such creatures sometimes transformed into noppera-bo to scare humans.”
Merlina: Fans discover who are the faceless students that appear in the series