Fxflex:3

The shipped:

On the right, is Felix. You know him, you love him (romantically) ((don’t lie to me I know you do)), you’re a big fan of him, everybody is.

The lesser known one on the left with the badass cloak is Xilef, “Felix” backwards. Why? Well for the most original reason ever!

He’s an evil doppelgänger of our pal Felix over here, or course!

He came from another unknown dimension with the help of his “dimension hopper” (pink bunny), presumably seeking out Felix’s magic bag for more power than he already has. (He doesn’t explicitly say it, as he gets cut off in the second image, but it’s pretty obvious)

The common misconception:

*I’m using Venn diagrams because it’s easier to explain, even though I prefer Xilef, I tried to be a little more unbiased comparing the two

you might’ve seen this be talked about before (by me or others) but idgaf I’ll explain it again just in case.

Xilef is exclusively in the Felix graphic novel, and not featured in any other official Felix media, just resembling Alex because of how simple the concept is.

I mentioned in this diagram that The Twisted Tale “Version of Alex” doesn’t count. Why? Well they’re only in one episode, and are just made in a dream. To me they seem to more of an anti-Felix than they are Alex. They don’t talk, they aren’t real, and Felix never acknowledges them by Alex. Even if they are in reference to Alex, I still don’t believe that they’re the same person.

if you wanna headcanon Alex and Xilef as the same person, fine, that’s your choice, I can’t change your opinion on that. But please don’t come at me or my friends if you do. It’s honestly rude and just shows you don’t have any fandom experience at all.

When I first started reading the graphic novel:

The first time I started reading this book I did draw the comparison between Xilef being Shadow, and Felix being Sonic, which sonadow is a popular Mirrorship in the Sonic community…I did consider Felix and Xilef together (mostly jokingly), but never expanded on it at first since I was kinda into Alex at the time.

And, believe it or not, I wasn’t a big fan of Xilef the first couple of times I read. WOAH. SHOCKER. It’s even funnier when I remember taking one good look at Xilef and thinking: “He’s gonna become my favorite at some point isn’t he”

The Great Shippening:

As a Multishipper, I usually ship rarepairs because I like both characters and wondered how’d they’d interact in a romantic relationship…Which is kinda silly I’ll admit, but that was how my fascination between this pairing started.

Back when I first got into the Felix tumblr community, I came across a now good friend of mine, @cartoon-buffoon , who started openly shipping Xilef x Felix a little bit before me. She’s the one who gave me the courage to post about Exta-Wonderful for the first time and make tons of friends and mutuals on here.

Toon, I know you’re reading this so I just wanna say that I owe it all to you for making me as openly creative as I am today, thanks for shipping the same stupid thing as me. Even if this doesn’t make any other people like this ship at least I’ll have you to talk about it to lol

The ship background info:

Enemies to lovers is one of the most popular tropes out there and is constantly used in media everywhere, and so is Mirrorshipping (to a lesser extent). Sonic x Shadow, the Undertale + Lorax fandom in the early 2010s (which we do NOT talk about), Spy x spy, Smg4 x Smg3, etc.

Mirrorship (Aka subcategory “Selfcest” but that name makes me cringe so badly) is internet/fandom slang meaning for the romantic pairing of a fictional character with an alternate universe version, clone, or "mirror" of themselves. While it can be seen as way too close to being in love with someone blood-related to you, or as just loving the appearance of the double, but that simply isn’t normally the case.

What I personally enjoy about Mirrorshipping is not about the physical aspect, but more about the psychological and emotional parts.

I also didn’t see Felix and Xilef fight and go “Awww they’re so in loveee yaoiii” (even though I am like that sometimes) it was more like “Ok but what if they were in love?” And the “why” is in finally here, in the section below. (I love stretching things out I know)

The big, over-complicated explanation:

*Another venn diagram just to summarize below

Felix and Xilef are both very important characters in the graphic novel. Their conflict is the main plot in the story, and so is the comparison and contrast of the two.

Contrast:

Xilef tries to take from Felix because he believes he deserves something that rightfully belongs to Felix, while Felix gives away what he deserves just to please someone he loves.

Felix loves and cares about his magic bag as if it was a sentient creature (which it is btw), while Xilef doesn’t care about his magic cane and even sees it as less powerful than Felix’s magic bag.

Xilef jumps straight to lust without even meeting Felina, While Felix wants to stay loyal because he already has a lady at home.

Xilef can be good, and Felix can be bad.

Xilef says he’s known for being a good person throughout dimensions (which isn’t confirmed but let’s just say it is) and Felix is a bitchass boyfriend (some of his flaws are more prominent in other adaptations, especially the 60s show)

And finally, Felix is very resilient and doesn’t surrender, while Xilef gives up immediately (which is probably the actual reason why he had Master cylinder, Professor, and Rock bottom do the challenges for him) ok guys guess what. This post is so long and I’m starting to reach the image limit I gotta make a second sooo