I honestly didn’t anticipate this to take me as long as it did. I just wanted to draw a Ella that was based on the headcanon that Maddie Fenton’s hair is naturally curly.
Despite having her show up in two episodes, we don’t really learn much about Ella as a character. Her clone status has always been her core theme. I hated this even as a kid. Like, come on, Ella is traveling the world! Am I being selfish for wanting a spin-off show focusing on Ella’s adventures of encountering other cultures’ mythical creatures/cryptids? My God, can you imagine if Ella got the chance to meet other liminals?! I want a supernatural spin on Dora the Explorer/ Go,Diego, Go!
I don’t have any issues with OG Ella’s human outfit, so I didn’t really gravitate away from it nor it’s color scheme. I just wanted to play off the idea of Ella starting to experiment with her fashion. Mainly, the introduction of the skater skirt. They are so comfortable and pretty! Like, I wanted to show a stage were Ella is starting to realize ‘girly’ clothes doesn’t equal uncomfortable, but hasn’t dropped her tomboy vibe. Because of her travels, I gravitate to the idea of Ella being much more spiritual. Her relaxed eyes and the gradient blue shirt Ella is wearing is my attempt to show how much more ‘hippy-like’ Ella is now. Her raised right hand is a gesture of fearlessness in the beliefs of Buddha Mudra. It represents protection, peace, benevolence, and the dispelling of fear. The second meaning that I believe really speaks to Ella is overcoming fear. The biggest change I did beyond her hair is the inclusion of the scarf/veil. Despite how many people see it as a form of oppression, veiling has been a practice common in European, Asian, and African cultures throughout history. Veiling is to hide/protect the wearer from outside harm, mainly negative energies and harmful intentions. Despite how many see this as a common fabric, this veil is the main thing protecting her from Vlad. I imagine their is a sigil stitched on the inside of the the veil, but we’ll get more into that later. While I was working on her, Ella started giving me strong Romani vibes which I honestly started to fall in love with. Not only that, but I also liked the idea of Ella getting really into gremlincore/goblincore. The idea of her having mushroom accessories was adorable, but I didn’t want to get sick of working with Ella, so these ideas can be explored on a different day.
I hit an even bigger wall of possibilities with Ella’s ghost form. My ultimate goal was to get rid of Ella’s mid-drift. Seriously, why was this ever a thing?! Even though I don’t dislike the idea of Ella wearing an hazmat suit like Danny, I just decided to drop it all together. With this outfit, I wanted to play on the idea of Ella “dressing to impress”. Ella is pretty observant despite her naivety. People clearly respected Vlad when he was in a suit, so she wears a dress. She wears long white gloves for a dash of sophistication. And the white tights and the long black boots are for comfort. I inverted the color of her pink veil, which got me this really cute blue that I made the main color beyond the black and white. The blue gives me ocean vibes, which is only enforced with the giant blue bow that looks like seashells to me. And once again, I was overwhelmed with a sea of ideas. I love the idea of Ella encounters being equal to meeting a straw cat on the street: Everyone wants to adopt her.
-Ella could have a Far Frozen outfit, a fur coat/shawl created with the shedded fur of the yeti’s as a sign of affection
- Ella could have a blue galaxy dress as a connection to Nocturne
- A purple cloak that matches Clockwork’s
- A blue medieval dress that Princess Dorathea gifted her
- A purple flamed medieval dress that Fright Knight stitched for her
The ghosts she decides to claim as family created the sigil that marks her for protection on her veil, but again, I got too overwhelmed by the possibilities, so I’m sticking with the simple black dress for now.
Expanding more on Ella’s ghost abilities, I wanted to expand on my headcanon of her being a slime ghost. It's nice to see that I'm not the only one who has thought of Ella having slime/acid abilities. https://www.tumblr.com/schnuffel-danny/701858169515835392/what-if-dani-used-her-natural-ability-to-melt?source=share
For Ella’s slime form, I was inspired by the character Inque from Batman Beyond- mainly with metamorphosis abilities and the white face. Ella would be different with her acidic compound, but would be weak against water and ice just like Inque.
I imagine Ella first believing she’s becoming destabilized again and goes to the Ghost Zone to find Danny as he is off training in the Far Frozen. However, she is stopped by what appears to be plague doctor. He tells her that it’s a terrible idea for her to go to the Far Frozen, and decides to make her his patient, thus kidnaps her for ‘observation’. Danny finds out and tries to save her, but appears to be too late as he finds Ella in a puddle state. However, the green puddle moves, which then morphs into this slime form of Ella.
Ella needs to morph into this slime form every once in a while for her core to proper rejuvenate itself, she needing to eat a rich ecto-diet that the plague doctor offers multiple options as Ella moves between the Ghost Zone and Earth(Ella has a Fenton gadget that lets her explore more easily, deal with it). The doctor says that Ella doesn’t need to worry about destabilizing if she gets low on ectoplasam, which eases her and Danny’s worries.
The relief vanishes when Danny get’s surrounded by panicked ghosts. They tell him that his sister/cousin is on a rampage in the Ghost Zone. Worried, Danny quickly goes to see what has going on, and came face-to-face with this:
Many ghosts quickly learned to always offer food tributes whenever they see Ella. Nobody wants her to ever be hungry again.
While I was drawing Ella, I remembered that she apparently likes space just like Danny. I always got the vibe she only knew of it because Vlad wanted to make her as ‘Danny-ish’ as possible, but the memory made be think of something. What if I made Ella be like The Thing from The Thing? While I drawing it, I then wondered how I was gonna make it clear that this was Ella? Then I remembered that Grandma monster from The Spongebob Movie. So, yeah, this is my Eldrith Ella I guess.
Ella has to be one of the most underrated characters in Danny Phantom. There’s so much you can do with her, yet she is always delegated into her clone status. The show treats her as an afterthought. The phandom typically treats her as an afterthought. Even google treats her as an afterthought.
Ella deserves to be seen as her own person. I never want destabilization to ever be an issue for her again, for she’s more than a clone.
