So I know a usual criticism regarding the introduction of Anodites, and hence linking magic and more specifically Gwen's powers to aliens, is about how they sort of "robbed" the franchise of one of its core elements. But have you ever thought that, given the additional information from the OS, something like that might have been Man of Action's intention all along?
I mean, Omniverse retconned Bezel as a part of the franchise. He was introduced as the greatest sorcerer in the universe, as a person, but that was only because the team couldn't get their hands on all the pop-ups from the original show.
You know what the pop-ups said?
This:
Bezel was never supposed to be a great sorcerer, but a different dimension that was more technologically advanced than Earth! The charms only seemed magical because they were literally too advanced for humans to really understand how they worked.
That's how Gwendolyn was able to wield them in the future even though she destroyed them years ago. She went to the dimension of Bezel and asked for new ones.
So given the charms' initial origins, the fact that there were more advanced magical artifacts that, for some reason, Gwen could handle just fine (the Staff of Ages), and the heavy sci-fi setting of the show, is it really that difficult to believe what we came to know as magic was, deep down, some sort of alien energy/technology we didn't understand or know of?
Because it that was Man of Action's intentions all along, then having Gwen's proficiency with magic be due to belonging to a race of mage aliens is a perfect way to answer the questions raised back in the OS.
Now, this admittedly seems like it's disregarding a beloved aspect of the franchise entirely. I personally would feel cheated too if it turned out there was no such thing as magic in the first place, but luckily UAF managed to avoid just that with the introduction of the Alpha Runa and Ledgerdomain.
Although I just found this pop-up that seems to indicate Hex and Charmcaster were originally intended to be from Bezel, as well.
Having said that, if you ask me, I think that in the end the UAF team did a perfect job at blending both interpretations.
If Man of Action did intend to reveal magic was just something too advanced for humans or that we simply didn't understand or know of, the introduction of Anodites and mana covered that splendidily. And on the other hand, the Ledgerdomain lore served its purpose of keeping magic alive and real.