BIANCA BARCLAY IS THE TRUE STAR OF NETFLIX'S 'WEDNESDAY' (ACCORDING TO ME)

When Netflix’s Wednesday premiered in late 2022, the culture instantly crowned Jenna Ortega’s sardonic heroine the face of a new gothic era. Ortega’s deadpan one-liners, jet-black braids, and knowing smirk were alluring enough to revive Tumblr, inspire Halloween costumes, and ignite thousands of TikTok audios overnight. But tucked into the gothic shadows of Nevermore Academy is another character—one who doesn't just steal scenes, but who shifts the show’s emotional balance: Bianca Barclay.

Nevermore’s reigning siren queen (played with icy precision by Joy Sunday) is more than your typical grade school  “mean girl”. She's the heartbeat of a deeper, often overlooked story about power, identity, and survival.

As Season 2 returns for its second half, it’s worth asking: is Bianca the show’s real star?

I Prefer to be Vilified.

Television has a long history of the “mean girl” archetype, especially in teen-centered stories. From Chris Hargensen in Stephen King's Carrie to Regina George in Mean Girls, to Blair Waldorf in Gossip Girl, or even Cheryl Blossom in Riverdale. These characters are glamorous, intimidating, and often exist primarily to make the protagonist seem more sympathetic. But Bianca Barclay complicates that narrative.

At first glance, she ticks all the boxes: impossibly gorgeous, socially dominant, always flanked by a crew of sycophants. She’s introduced as an immediate threat to Wednesday’s outsider credibility. But very quickly, Bianca’s surface cracks reveal something far more compelling: she’s performing. The “perfect girl” image is armor, covering a story defined not by cruelty, but by survival.

Bianca isn’t scheming for the sake of it. She doesn’t wield manipulation purely as entertainment. Her sharpness has context. She's a Black girl in a world where her natural gifts—her voice, her beauty, her charisma—are constantly policed, exploited, or mistrusted. The siren’s song is a metaphor for both allure and danger, and for Bianca, it’s a label she can’t outrun.

Fantasy and sci-fi have often struggled with how to write complex Black girls. They’re the magical best friend, the sacrificial lamb, the background witch in the coven. But Bianca’s existence on Wednesday challenges that. She isn’t a token character in Nevermore’s supernatural melting pot. She has her own arc, her own conflicts, her own emotional interiority.

Her siren heritage brings this into sharper focus. Sirens in mythology are associated with temptation and manipulation. In popular imagination, they're untrustworthy women, irresistible yet dangerous. And for Bianca, this trope echoes the racialized myths that have historically been projected onto Black women: hypersexualized, uncontainable, and threatening.

What makes Bianca’s story so powerful is that she refuses to be confined to a type. In fact, she actively resists it. She hides her siren scales, distances herself from her manipulative mother, and tries to carve out a space where she can be more than what people assume. In doing so, she embodies the tension many Black women face, being hyper-visible and invisible at the same time, known only for the myths that precede them.

What Kind of Dystopian Hellscape is This?

Season 1 gives us glimpses of Bianca’s fractured home life, specifically, her mother, who uses siren powers in a cult-like enterprise that exploits others’ free will. This revelation shifts Bianca’s icy demeanor into something more nuanced. Suddenly, her ambition and perfectionism are not about ego but escape. She is literally running from the fate her mother represents, which makes Bianca’s family history more than just an add-on detail; It's the engine behind her choices. It reframes her rivalry with Wednesday as less about petty competition and more about self-determination.

In recent years, we’ve seen a rise in Black heroines reshaping the fantasy and sci-fi genres: Rue in The Hunger Games, Leti in Lovecraft Country, Shuri and Okoye in Black Panther. These characters are complex, flawed, and central to their narratives—a stark contrast to decades of sidelined roles. And Bianca belongs in this lineage.

She is, in many ways, a subversion of the “magical Black girl” trope. She is magical, yes, but her power is not in service to a white protagonist. Her abilities are both blessing and curse, and a constant negotiation of autonomy. And while she does occasionally help Wednesday, her narrative arc isn’t tethered to Wednesday’s growth. She's building her own future.

Bianca resonates with me specifically because she embodies the contradictions I know all too well: feeling powerful yet misunderstood, being ambitious yet punished for ambition, and being expected to prove my own humanity over and over. Watching Bianca fight for hers on-screen is more than entertaining—it’s validating.

I’m Not Interested in Participating in Tribal Adolescent Clichés.

There’s a case to be made that Bianca, not Wednesday, is the real emotional center of the series. Wednesday’s identity is already solid: she knows who she is, revels in her outsider status, and rarely questions herself. Bianca, on the other hand, is constantly negotiating—her identity, her friendships, her loyalty, and her ambitions. This makes her more dynamic, more human, and arguably, more relatable.

Bianca embodies the stakes of Nevermore in ways Wednesday doesn’t. She’s the bridge between the school’s supernatural politics and its emotional undercurrents. Without her, the story would lack its most compelling tension: the clash between who you are told to be and who you want to become.

And let’s be honest, she also brings the glamour. Bianca is the girl you remember long after the credits roll. She’s the one who makes fans think, “I’d watch a spin-off just about her.” She’s the character you can build thinkpieces around (welcome!).

Bianca Barclay’s rise as a fan favorite also speaks to a broader cultural hunger. We want complexity, nuance, and characters who feel real. Bianca's not a saint, not a villain, not perfect and that’s precisely why she works. She’s a young Black woman trying to make sense of her power in a world that constantly misreads it. Still, she proves that a Black girl can be the queen bee, the rival, the survivor, and the heroine all at once.

As Wednesday Season 2 hurtles toward its conclusion, Bianca has quietly become the character to watch. And her arc remains one of the show’s most vital threads. Will she fully escape her mother’s shadow? Will she claim her power on her own terms? Will she continue to evolve from queen bee to something even bigger?

Because at the end of the day, Bianca Barclay is proof that you can be complicated and flawed, and still deeply sympathetic. She’s also, let’s be real, iconic.