Phoebe Halliwell

Phoebe Halliwell
Alyssa Milano as Phoebe
First appearance:       "Something Wicca This Way Comes"
Last appearance:       "Forever Charmed"
Created by:	Constance M. Burge
Statistics
Full name:	Phoebe Halliwell
Species:	Witch, Charmed One, Empath,
Affiliation:	The Charmed Ones, The Bay Mirror
Notable family:	Husband Coop Children one son (via Cole; deceased) three daughters (via Coop) Sisters Prue Halliwell (deceased), Piper Halliwell, Paige Matthews (half sister) Parents Victor Bennett and Patricia Halliwell (deceased) Grandparents Penelope Halliwell (deceased) and Allen Halliwell (deceased) Cole Turner (ex-husband/divorced; deceased, kind-of, maybe), Dex Lawson (ex-husband/annulled)
Notable powers:	Aside from the basic powers of a magical witch, such as spellcasting and scrying, Phoebe possesses the gifts of: Premonition Levitation Empathy Enhanced power due to Charmed status
Portrayed by:	Alyssa Milano (adult) Samantha Goldstein[1] (child) Frances Bay[1] (elderly) Lori Rom (adult, unaired pilot)

Phoebe Halliwell is a fictional character from the American television program Charmed, and one of the four leading characters featured during the series' run. The character is primarily portrayed by actress Alyssa Milano, as well as a few other notable actresses during different stages of the character's life.^[1] Initially Phoebe begins the series as the youngest child of three sisters. However, at the start of Season Four she becomes the middle of three sisters after the death of her older sister, Prue Halliwell, and the discovery of a previously unknown fourth sister, Paige Matthews. Phoebe has been married three times; to Cole Turner (2002-2003), Dex Lawson (2005) and Coop (2006-Present) In 2007, AOL named her the 7th greatest witch in television history. Alyssa Milano was the second cast member to appear in highest number of episodes arising a record of 178 episodes just behind Holly Marie Combs who appeared in all 179 episodes recorded in the entire series' run.^[2]

Background

Early character history

Phoebe Halliwell was born in her family manor at 1329 Prescott Street,^[3] San Francisco, California on November 2, 1975 meaning she is a Scorpio like her sister Prue, who was born October 28, 1970^[4] to the Charmed Ones' mother Patricia Halliwell and mortal Victor Bennett. Phoebe had two older sisters, Prue Halliwell and Piper Halliwell and a younger half-sister Paige Matthews. Phoebe was named after the favorite aunt of her mother.^[5]

Phoebe was initially born with the power of premonition. While pregnant with Phoebe her mother Patty shared her gift of premonition.^[5] Phoebe's maternal grandmother Penelope Halliwell bound or temporarily removed the powers Phoebe and her sisters possessed while they were still toddlers to keep a warlock named Nicholas from killing them and taking their powers for himself. To further protect the children, they were never told of their supernatural heritage. In effect, they were raised as mortals.

Phoebe's father Victor Bennett, and maternal grandmother Penny Halliwell would argue over the fact that Victor, as a mere human, was unable to protect his own children from the supernatural, and a disgruntled Victor eventually left his family. During this time her mother became pregnant with her Whitelighter's child, but the baby was given up for adoption when Phoebe and her sisters were still too young to remember her. On February 28, 1978, Patricia was drowned fighting the water demon.^[6] Phoebe and her two older sisters were effectively orphaned and were raised by their maternal grandmother Penelope.

Phoebe had a very frigid relationship with Prue growing up. While Prue thought Phoebe was immature and irresponsible, Phoebe thought Prue acted less as a sister than a mother. They bickered constantly, and Piper, as the middle sister, frequently had to mediate between them.

Phoebe was a good student, and once earned an award for student of the month. At the age of 10, Phoebe was transported by a spell cast by her future self to the year 2002, where she met two older versions of herself, her sister Piper, her half-sister Paige Matthews, Piper's husband Leo Wyatt, and Phoebe's future ex-husband Cole Turner. Cole protected her from the demon Kurzon and then she visited the realm of Whitelighters with Leo. After she helped the older Phoebe listen to her heart about marrying Cole, she returned to her own time, where Penny quickly erased her memory of the time travel.^[1] Unlike her sisters, Piper, Prue and later, Paige, Phoebe is more susceptible to turning evil because she is the only one of the sisters who was born in the Halliwell manor.

When she was 15 years old Phoebe got her first job at the local zoo. Dressed as a penguin she passed out balloons to young children.^[7] Once puberty hit Phoebe became known as the school flirt. Her female rivals became jealous and started her nick-name "Freebie", which stuck throughout high school. After graduating high school, Piper and Prue moved into an apartment together in North Beach, leaving Phoebe to live alone with their grandmother. They moved back when their grandmother Penelope became ill. Prue became engaged to a man named Roger and she asked Piper to be her maid of honor.

Unfortunately, Roger began to hit on Phoebe at her bartending job and sent her flowers. When Prue found out, she accused Phoebe of coming onto him. Around this time, Penny took a picture of the three. Although Penny had long believed her granddaughters would grow up to become the Charmed Ones, she thought they were too disconnected to ever fulfill their destiny. She planned to use a potion to bind the girls' powers forever, but she died before she could use it. After Penny's death, Phoebe left university and went to New York City, partly in search of her father and partly because she was devastated that Prue thought she'd come onto Roger. In New York she met a mortal named Clay and formed a relationship with him. Due to his criminal past and secretive nature the relationship was often rocky. ^[8]

Revelation as a Charmed One

Six months after her grandmother’s death, having fallen on hard times, Phoebe called Piper in San Francisco and arranged to move back in with her sisters. However, Prue was still angry at Phoebe, thinking she'd wrecked her engagement. Piper was afraid Prue would be mad enough to change the locks on the manor (even though Phoebe owned one-third of it) and didn't tell Prue of Phoebe's return until literally minutes before Phoebe walked in the door.

While Phoebe and Piper were playing with their old spirit board, it suddenly moved on its own, spelling out the word "attic." Phoebe went up to check, and discovered the Book of Shadows from which she read the incantation that unbound their powers. The incantation was worded as:

Hear now the words of the witches,
the secrets we hid in the night,
the oldest of gods are invoked here,
the great work of magic is sought,
in this night,and in this hour,
I call upon the Ancient Power,
Bring your powers to we sisters, three,
We want the power,
Give us the power.

Phoebe leafed through the Book for most of the night, and discovered that one of their ancestors was a powerful witch named Melinda Warren, who had prophesied that each member of her line would grow stronger and stronger until the arrival of three sisters who would be the most powerful good witches of all time--the Charmed Ones. Phoebe strongly believed that she, Prue and Piper were those sisters, but it took a series of strange events over the next day to confirm it.

Charmed life

The youngest sister

Phoebe and her older sisters Prue and Piper were collectively called the "Charmed Ones".^[9] They served as powerful good witches who protected the innocent as best as they could. As the youngest, she had a rebellious streak. Compared to her sisters, Phoebe wholeheartedly embraced her destiny from the beginning. She often wanted to use magic for fun, and was the first to tragically learn that breaking the rules of personal gain will lead to serious consequences.^[10] She was also the one who desired meeting her mother, Patty, the most, because she could not remember her (Phoebe was only three when her mother died). She missed her mother to such an extent she was willing to change history by trying to inform her mother of her coming death.^[11]

The next three years saw Prue and Phoebe become much closer than they ever had been, and they gradually confronted their issues.^[12] Phoebe desired an active power, and finally her wish came true in the season three opener.^[13]

During the show's first three seasons, Phoebe was often the first to discover facts. She was the one who first discovered that they are the Charmed Ones, beginning with a series of events with their old spirit board that was left behind by their mother up until she got to the Book of Shadows in the attic.^[9] She also was the first one to know that Leo was their Whitelighter, catching him while hovering to replace a light bulb. Leo made Phoebe swear not to tell her sisters about him. She revealed the truth to her sisters, but they thought she was just joking around.^[14]

Out of all the sisters, Phoebe is seen to be the master of spell-writing. Phoebe authored a spell for vanquishing The Source that drew on the magic from the Charmed Ones' ancestors. She also helped The Seer to put the Hollow back in its crypt.^[15]

Phoebe learns one of her past lives was that of her great-aunt P. Russell, a good witch who turned evil under the influence of her boyfriend Anton, a warlock. Anton seduced Russell to kill her cousins, P. Bowen and P. Baxter--the past lives of Prue and Piper, respectively--for their powers. Bowen and Baxter feared that Russell and Anton would be too much for their descendants to handle if they got back together in the future, so they cursed Russell's soul to make her future lives die at 24. However, they were able to fend it off by finding an amulet that protected its wearer from all magic.^[16]

Phoebe is also noted as the weakest Charmed One by some demons (like the Source) because her powers are the weakest out of the four.

The middle sister

After the death of her sister Prue,^[17] Phoebe met a woman named Paige Matthews at the funeral for Prue. It turned out that Paige was her younger half-sister. Phoebe and Cole witnessed Paige inadvertently orb out from a demonic attack, and realized that she was half Whitelighter, signifying that her mother had a relationship with a whitelighter. This Whitelighter was Sam Wilder. He and Patty Halliwell left the baby girl on the door step of a church with the instruction that her name begin with a "P". Phoebe and Piper helped convince Paige to join them and reconstitute the Charmed Ones, and subsequently vanquished Prue's demonic killer, Shax.^[18]

For awhile, Phoebe must get used to the fact that she is no longer the youngest sister. At first, she doesn't like the idea of stepping into Piper's shoes as Piper is filling Prue's, though in the end Phoebe loves the idea that she finally can have someone around who is younger than her. She also finds it difficult to play the traditional middle sister's role of mediator. However, she once told Leo that mediating between Piper and Paige reminds her of how Piper had to mediate between her and Prue for so many years.

Phoebe followed a wolf that she saw in the hallway of the Magic School. The wolf lead Phoebe to Enola the shaman, a student at the school, who sent Phoebe on a vision quest to help her see her own future more clearly. On her quest, Phoebe finally managed to reach the portal that took her to the future. There she saw Piper, an older Wyatt, and a younger boy that turns out to be Piper's second son. Paige had become a teacher at the school, Phoebe is pregnant with a little girl, and they are living a life without demons. Wyatt's brother approaches her, saying, "Aunt Phoebe, we need your help," and she is returned to the present to hear Chris asking, "Phoebe, we need your help." Phoebe thus becomes the first one to know that their new whitelighter, Chris Perry is actually Chris Halliwell, her nephew and Piper and Leo's second son.^[19] This in itself is ironic as she often describes herself as "the wrong Halliwell" to keep secrets.

Chris tried to enlist Phoebe's help to get his parents back together, but Phoebe felt that meddling with Piper and Leo's relationship would be wrong. As Chris tried to persuade his aunt to join his cause, Phoebe gets a premonition and they go to a Middle Eastern desert where they rescue a female genie named Jinny from her demonic master. Jinny says that she wrote to Phoebe because her former master, Bosk, is trying to raise an ancient demonic city – the lost city of Zanbar – and she thought that if Phoebe became her master, Phoebe would wish her free so that Bosk could not use her to resurrect the city.

Bosk soon enough attacked the manor, and because of his protective amulet that blocked her vanquishing potion, Phoebe wished Jinny free. Apparently, Jinny was actually a demon, and she could be freed only at the expense of the one who freed her, so now Phoebe would have to pay the price: she had become a genie herself, with Chris as her new master. Chris accidentally wished for Leo to get over his issues with Chris, and Phoebe made Leo become very friendly toward Chris. Chris decided to take advantage of the situation and wished for Piper and Leo to sleep together and it worked, just not as he planned: Piper and Leo fall asleep on the floor. Richard takes the genie bottle, with Phoebe in it, and attempts to use it to have Paige love him forever. To make up for his mistake, Richard wishes Phoebe free, and Phoebe and Paige manage to get Jinny back in the bottle.^[20]

Loss of active powers

Later, the Charmed Ones go on to trial against Barbas the demon. He admits to meditating a plan to trick them out of their powers, but argued that he still had a point – the Charmed Ones are risky with their magic. He turns the bulk of his accusation against Phoebe, who had recently been using potions to force premonitions; an action Paige believed might have led to Inspector Sheridan catching them. The Tribunal reversed their decision to kill their ally Darryl Morris, but they decided Phoebe must suffer the consequences for using her powers for personal gain. She lost her powers of premonitions, levitation, and empathy. This was a "temporary" punishment, and she had the possibility of earning them back if she used her magic correctly.^[21]

Utopia and retirement

Phoebe earned her power of premonition back again, but her powers of empathy and levitation were much harder to come by. She and her sisters participated in the Avatars' plan to change the world into a utopia.^[22] However, Phoebe's power of premonition revealed the truth and showed that trauma, death and sacrifice could not be covered up by the Avatars. The world was returned to what it once was, but a powerful demon named Zankou was released from his prison.^[23] He attempted to gain control of the manor to receive the power of the Nexus. By turning the Book of Shadows against the sisters, Zankou was able to use the spell and potion to steal a witch's powers. Zankou stole Phoebe's power of premonition so that he could anticipate their attacks and see what they were doing.

Phoebe and her sisters destroyed Zankou and the Nexus.^[24] Everyone, both normal and supernatural, believed they were dead. This was their chance to finally get a normal life.

Rewitched and the Ultimate Battle

Phoebe's new alias was Julie Bennett and everyone else but her loved ones could only see her "new look". They soon realized that hiding from their identities was a mistake however, so after consulting Homeland Security, Phoebe and her sisters returned to their normal lives.^[25]

Not long afterward, the Charmed Ones met a young witch named Billie Jenkins, and agreed to teach her everything they knew. Although Billie was Paige's charge, she eventually grew much closer to Phoebe, in part because Phoebe was always there for her.

Phoebe got her old job back and was dating a guy named Dex Lawson, who she had a premonition of marrying.^[25] She did marry Dex while under a spell cast by Billie. The marriage was annulled since both participants were not in their right state of mind. Phoebe was no longer romancing Dex. Phoebe lost her faith in her gift, until she had another premonition of the future. She was talking to her older self 6 years from now, and she was still supposed to have a daughter.

Phoebe soon moved out of the manor and got her own condo in the city.

When Phoebe found out that Billie was the Ultimate Power, she was reluctant to vanquish her and she and Piper were at a disagreement until a spell was cast on her because of Billie. She and her sisters had to hide out in the Underworld, as the magical community had turned their backs on them.^[26]

Phoebe married Coop the Cupid in the series finale^[27] and gave birth to three daughters one of which she had foreseen with her premonition. Phoebe has turned into a warlock, a banshee,^[28] the Queen of the Underworld,^[29] a mermaid,^[30] a superhero,^[31] a Greek goddess (of Love),^[32] a genie,^[20] a ghost, a mummy,^[33] a Valkyrie, a witch beast that came out during a blue moon^[34] (along with Piper and Paige), a 1950s housewife and was trapped in the body of an evil sorceress.^[35]

Powers and abilities

Phoebe has the power of premonition, a passive power. She triggers this power when she touches or is in presence of something that has to do with what her premonition is about.^[36] This power was initially uncontrollable, but in later seasons if she wanted or pleaded for a premonition, she usually got it. While her premonitions are shown as black and white in the show, it is mentioned several times that Phoebe experiences them in color. As her power grew, her premonitions become more vivid to where they become slightly colored and she can hear and feel what is going on and to hold her premonition longer. (Phoebe's premonition increases in "The Eyes Have It" episode to include astral projection into her visions and also in "Hulkus Pocus" episode when she is able to interact and communicate with her future self in her premonitions).

Her premonitions are triggered by objects or strong psychic auras, making them a form of psychometry. This originally only encompassed precognition, to see the future, but grew to include retrocognition, to see the past, too.^[37] Phoebe also developed the power to trigger a vision in somebody else with similar powers, "sharing" visions with Elders and knowing how to trigger a specific "trap" premonition in Mitzy, who had stolen her powers. Kira, a powerful demonic seer, told Phoebe her powers were once limited to psychometry but they grew, like Phoebe's will in time. Phoebe's premonition powers also grew to her visions always revealing the truth, and in one episode, it gives her enhanced intuition as she was hiding to anticipate when demons were firing fireballs,^[38] and in many instances Phoebe has sidestepped and jumped out the way of incoming fireballs and energy balls with perfect timing.

Within her premonitions, they gave Phoebe the gift of Intutition this allowed Phoebe to sense whether she was in danger. Like in the Season 7 episode Freaky Phoebe where she was able to sense the demon was behind her with a pair of scissors, or the Season 7 episode Ordinary Witches where she and Piper lose their powers to mortals and the mortal who has her powers is able to sense when and where the next fireball was going to be launched. This was a power that wasn't really explored on the show but has slightly been talked about. Throughout the series, Phoebe was always the first one to sense something was wrong or the one to find something out. She was the first to find the book and believe they were witches, the first to find out about Leo being a whitelighter and Cole being Belthazar. She sensed that Kira was an ally as they were connected through their powers. Intuition is not a separate power, but more so power that is within her premonition power that she was able to harness separately.

At first Phoebe was unhappy with only her passive power of premonition, so she took classes in self-defense. However she realized how useful her power is when her premonition helped to revive Prue from death after a dragon warlock killed her.^[39]

In the season 2, episode,"She’s A Man, Baby, A Man!", Phoebe somehow develops a psychic link with a succubus that is seducing and killing men in San Francisco. She is able to see and feel what the succubus does. Towards the end of the episode, she is able to influence the succubus through this link to save Prue. This was possibly a new psychic power, but it is the only time it was seen during the series run. Later on Phoebe obtained her first active power of levitation, to defy gravity and float in the air (but not fly).^[40] This power was uncontrollable when she first obtained it but she later gained complete control over it. She cannot usually move horizontally, and at one time, Prue has to use her telekinesis to move Phoebe over to another side of a cave while she was levitating.^[41] Phoebe usually mixed her martial arts and kick boxing with her levitating power to knock out her enemies. In Season 4, she was able to glide short distances with this power. In Season 5, she was able to propel herself through a ventilation duct with this power.

Prior to their wedding, Cole Turner became the Source. Once Phoebe became Queen of the Underworld, she acquired the ability to throw fire, which Leo told her was an upper level demonic power. She uses this power to vanquish several demons who upset her during Cole's reign as the Source, including his secretary (a demon who wanted to be Cole's queen), and an unnamed demon. However, Phoebe soon learned that she was channeling the power of her unborn child, which was the spawn of the Source. Later, when the Seer magically transferred the child into her own womb, Phoebe lost all of her offensive demonic powers, and she later vows never to use black magic again even when confronting Cole for closure.

Season six saw Phoebe develop the power of empathy. Being an empath allows her to channel the emotions of those around her. This initially caused considerable problems, as she would encounter other's emotions and act on their whims and wishes. The success of her advice column may be due to her empathic abilities. She may have already had the ability to feel other's emotions, thus allowing her to understand others and give good advice to those in need of it. Her ability to understand others may have simply advanced to the complete empathy seen throughout season 6. Since powers are tied to emotions and Phoebe can feel other's emotions, she could sometimes tap into their powers.^[42] This also allowed her to backfire energy balls and fireballs. When the sisters traveled to the future, it was revealed that Phoebe had used electrical powers to kill a man named Cal Greene,^[43] although it was never clarified if this was an expansion upon or usage of an existing power or an entirely new one. A possibility is that her empathy power allowed her to retain a power or channel a distant one.

• Like the power Phoebe possess when marring Cole, in the episode "Pardon my Past" season 2, when Phoebe goes to the past she is able to throw fire.

Phoebe's powers were stripped by the Tribunal because she was misusing her powers for personal gain.^[21] She received back her premonition power in "Styx Feet Under" and she probably received her other active powers later on. Like the other Charmed Ones, Phoebe can also brew magical potions and recite/write spells. Even in the flash-forward in the series finale,^[27] it was never made completely clear if Phoebe ever did get her powers of levitation and empathy back, but in the 8th season, "The Last Temptation of Christy", of the show when the sisters went up against the Triad, Phoebe mentions that she planned to use her powers to draw out the Triad's active powers so Piper and Paige can vanquish them, she would draw out their powers like she did with Piper in the first episode of season six, "Valhalley Of The Dolls". Furthermore, in season 7, "Freaky Phoebe", she is most probably using her levitation power in an elevator to knock one of the demons that attacked her out.

Romantic life

Phoebe has had the most tumultuous love life of all the sisters.She is probably the only Halliwell to have the take-a-chance gene. Early in the show, Phoebe's former boyfriend Clay came into town after helping steal a cursed urn in Egypt. He tried to have Prue auction it off, but when she learned it was stolen she had it removed from the auction. The guardian of the urn attacked Clay, and the sisters saved him. Their relationship was not exactly successful, since Clay essentially tried to give them a curse.^[44]

She started a romance with district attorney Cole Turner,^[40] who turned out to be a half-demon named Belthazor, sent to kill the Charmed Ones. Although Cole had started out using her to get close to the sisters, they fell in love. When Cole's demon half was revealed to the Charmed Ones, Phoebe helped him fake his own death and then let everyone, including her sisters, believe he was dead.^[45] Phoebe then spent time researching Cole's past, confiding only in Leo that she did not really vanquish Cole.^[46] She eventually told her sisters, which strained their sisterhood. Cole and Phoebe had a chaotic romance at best, constantly threatened by each their conflicting feelings and doubts, not to mention demonic interference. By the end of season 3, they finally commit to making the relationship work.

In Season 4, Phoebe's half-sister Paige, along with Leo, goes back in time to see why her parents died in a car accident and how she managed to survive. Two spirits, Lulu and Frankie, escape through the time portal and possess Phoebe and Cole. The two go on a crime spree, holding up a jewelry store to take a diamond engagement ring, steal a wedding gown and head to the local church, where a possessed Cole holds a gun to the reverend's throat, forcing him to marry the couple. Before they can say 'I do', the spirits of Lulu and Frankie escape their bodies, leaving Cole, bleeding to death after being shot by Darryl Morris. Leo heals him, and Phoebe and Cole vow to marry each other.

While Cole started getting nightmares of becoming the new Source, Phoebe started to get a bad feeling about her upcoming marriage, so Piper suggested she use magic to find out what her heart felt. Phoebe cast the spell to hear her heart's desire, which ended up summoning her future and past selves. Older Phoebe refused to tell Phoebe about the events of the future for fear of changing things for the worse. Younger Phoebe reminded Present Phoebe of her favorite fairy tale, Cinderella, and her dreams of finding her prince. Older Phoebe admits to Cole privately she never married him, but sacrificed herself to save Cole from a demon attack.^[1] The spell reversed itself, and Phoebe decided to go through with the wedding.

On the day of the wedding, Cole uses his evil magic to bring chaos into his bride's life: he made her wedding gown bigger, and reorganized the letters on the tag to say "Millie Platt", blaming the mess on Paige. To make up for it, Paige gives Phoebe an all-natural face cream, but Cole intervenes again, making the cream give Phoebe acne. To prove she is not sabotaging the wedding, Paige casts a vanishing spell to get rid of Phoebe's pimples, but instead make Phoebe disappear completely. In the meantime, Cole, with the help of the Seer, seeks to stop his own "White Wedding" in order to coax Phoebe into a Dark one. While the girls prepare for the ceremony, Cole unleashes a Lazarus Demon and orders him to attack at the White ceremony. The sisters transfer the vanishing spell from Phoebe to Paige. Phoebe's father, Victor Bennett walks her down the aisle, but the Lazarus Demon attacks and eventually Phoebe leaves Cole at the altar. Paige is nearly killed, and, still being invisible and now unconscious, Leo could not see her to heal her. Cole saw a growing puddle of blood and, realizing it was Paige kept quiet, as he wanted her dead. But, seeing Phoebe grow hysterical at the thought of Paige dying, pointed out where she was and Leo healed her.

Just when the girls think there's nothing that can be done, they come up on a Dark chapel in the Mausoleum, and unbeknownst to Phoebe, Leo and her sisters, a Dark Priest marries them.^[47] While Cole becomes even more evil, no one knows he is the Source yet. To her shock, Phoebe finds herself to be pregnant; unknowingly, she is carrying the next Source. During the pregnancy, she began manifesting the ability to shoot flames from her hands and to teleport.^[48] Cole attempted to give up his position of Source of All Evil to an evil wizard, but failed when Phoebe used her baby's powers to kill the Wizard.^[29] She then joined Cole as his queen. Phoebe tried to live the life of evil, as a combination of hormones and demonic potions made her so cranky, she ended up vanquishing a good number of Cole's demons.^[48] She tried to play both sides of good and evil, but realizing she could not, Phoebe rejoined her sisters in opposing Cole. Together they cast a spell which used the power of their ancestors to vanquish Cole.

After Cole died, he ended up in the demonic Wasteland, where all demons go after being vanquished. His powers as the Source were absorbed by the creature there, but he survived by clinging to his love for Phoebe. Although he tried to get Phoebe to help bring him back to life, she refused and asked him to move on. When Cole learned he could absorb the powers of other demons when they were killed in the Wasteland, he collected an impressive array of abilities and escaped, just in time to save Phoebe's life.^[30]

Alyssa Milano, in character, as Phoebe Halliwell, transformed into a mermaid in "A Witch's Tail", the inspiration for the spin-off series Mermaid.

Phoebe was transformed into a mermaid by a spell, but was turned back when she admitted her love for Cole. Phoebe told Cole that their relationship was completely over and pushed through with trying to obtain a divorce.^[30] Despite Cole's efforts to pursue her, Phoebe realized how dangerous their relationship could be and tried to move on with her life, beginning to date other men.

In one final effort to win Phoebe back, Cole became an Avatar. He cast a spell which altered reality, making it so that the Power of Three had never been reconstituted after Prue's death which meant they would never have met their long lost half-sister Paige. He was disappointed to find that in this other reality, he was trapped in a loveless marriage with Phoebe, who only remained his wife to protect Piper from being killed. By altering reality in this way, Cole resumed his former identity of Belthazor, making him vulnerable to being vanquished. Because Paige also crossed realities, she was able to unite with her sisters to vanquish Cole once and for all and reversed the effects of his spell.^[49]

Phoebe then dated the new owner of the paper she writes for, Jason Dean (played by Eric Dane). Their relation was very serious and Phoebe even went to live with Jason in Hong Kong. After 15 months, Jason finally finds out Phoebe is a witch, as opposed to her telling him. He reacts negatively, and they ultimately break up.

After Phoebe had a vision about life without demons and her being pregnant, Phoebe does math and decides she needs to find a husband urgently. She uses her empathy to find out if her dates feel love or committed, and if they do not she dumps them. She even went so far as to force her premonitions, so she can have more time for her dates. Her active powers were stripped because of this abuse.

Much later, Phoebe decided to take a sabbatical from work. Her editor Elise Rothman, instead of just rerunning Phoebe's column for two months, hired a ghostwriter, Leslie St. Claire (played by Nick Lachey). Phoebe immediately fell in lust with him, though she did not want her column to be written by a male writer.^[50] After a brief tryst, Phoebe eventually got her column back as well as her power of premonitions. Leslie moved on after his ghostwriting job was over,^[34] feeling that Phoebe has too much to hide for his taste (Phoebe kept on standing him up at their dates, and never explained it—she was always doing witch-related activities).

Phoebe gained a romantic interest in the new literature teacher at Magic School, Drake (played by Billy Zane).^[51] Unfortunately his only problem was that he was destined to die after two weeks. However, he managed to fulfill his mission; he was sent by none other than Cole, to restore Phoebe's faith in love.^[52]

At the beginning of season 8, Phoebe had a premonition that she would marry an acquaintance named Dex Lawson. She decided to pursue a relationship with him, and later married him while under a spell gone awry. Instead of getting the marriage annulled, she convinced Dex to stay married to her. When Phoebe revealed to him she is a witch, Dex had a similar reaction to Jason's (rather negative). He learned that his relationship with Phoebe was solely motivated by spells and premonitions, not Phoebe's own heart. When Phoebe agreed with this conclusion, they annulled the marriage and broke up.

Later in season 8, Phoebe falls in love with a Cupid named Coop. It was revealed in the series finale, that the elders sent Coop to Phoebe hoping that she would fall in love with him to make up for a little of what she had lost through the years. Although it is "against the rules" for a Cupid to find love for themselves, the Elders lifted this restriction for Phoebe. The finale shows that in the future Coop and Phoebe are married by the Angel of Destiny in Magic School and that they will have three girls.^[27] As a sidenote, Phoebe almost fell in love with another Cupid who had to leave her to keep his job.^[53]

Once marrying Coop, the couple have three children, all girls. Also, it seems as Phoebe and Billie are still close as the finale season showed their relationship and how well they connected and cared for one another, as Billie is seen watching Phoebe's older two daughters as she's on her way to give birth to a third.

Phoebe's most notable relationships:

Professional life

In the first season, Prue hires her to work for her at the Auction House in the episode The Wendigo, which she quit at the same episode due to her having a vision after touching an artifact. After graduating from college with a B.A. in Psychology, Phoebe lands a steady and successful job as a journalist specializing as an advice columnist for the newspaper, "The Bay Mirror". She initaly takes over when an innocent who had that job before her was in trouble. She saves the innocent's job, but the innocent liked her work better, quit (she didn't like the job anyway) and recommended her to the editor Elise who hired her. Her column is titled "Ask Phoebe." She attends graduate school to further her studies in Psychology while working for the newspaper, but was forced to fake her own death and assume a new identity after vanquishing Zankou. It is never mentioned whether she resumes her studies or not. In the future, she publishes a best-selling book.^[27] She also continues to write for "The Bay Mirror", but after falling in love with Coop her advice column focuses on helping people find love.

Prior to her work at "The Bay Mirror", Phoebe had accepted multiple odd jobs (especially during her six-month stay in New York). Upon her return to San Francisco in the autumn of 1998,^[9] she had been a bartender, a hotel lounge psychic,^[54] a hospital volunteer,^[55] and an executive secretary at SWA Properties, a real estate company.^[56]

Death count

During the run of the series and her life as a Charmed One, Phoebe died 6 times, including both times she died and time was reset in the first season.

Notable moments

• In high school Phoebe was a terrible flirt. Her classmates used to call her "Freebie".
• Phoebe briefly swapped powers with her sister Prue,^[36] and gained the ability to move objects with her mind. She also swapped bodies with Paige.^[57] Phoebe later tried to switch powers with Piper so that Piper could see her vision about the Avatars.
• Phoebe once received hot flashes that were linked to the Succubus, which led the sisters to cast a spell to transform Prue into a man.^[58]
• Phoebe also was linked to a man, Bo, who also had the power of premonition and was locked in a time loop.
• Phoebe once was granted the power of flight by a Genie, who stole the power from a Dragon warlock, but that power was returned.^[20] Phoebe later developed the power of levitation.
• Phoebe was once turned evil by the Woogyman, and was granted the power to make objects out of shadow as well as telekinesis.^[3]
• Phoebe was once turned into a Banshee after she was heartbroken by her break up with Cole.
• Phoebe was once shrunk to a few inches tall by Gammil's magic wand.^[59]
• Cole put Grams' ring on Phoebe once, without knowing that Grams cursed it. Phoebe temporarily became the 1950s housewife that Grams feared she might turn into by marrying anyone else.^[60]
• Phoebe was once turned into a Mermaid.
• Phoebe was given the power of the Goddess Aphrodite to defeat the Titans
• When Phoebe was in the 1600s ("All Halliwell's Eve") she blew on an apple skin to see the initial of her true love and the apple twisted into the letter "C." This was meant to be Cole at the time. However, Phoebe marries Coop in the series finale. Similarly, her first boyfriend was named Clay, also a "C" name.

References in other media

• Phoebe is mentioned briefly in the movie "Big Fat Liar" where Amanda Bynes said "I was watching Charmed on the WB last night and right when Alyssa Milano was about to cast a spell on her super cute, demon boyfriend..."

See also

• List of women warriors in folklore, literature, and popular culture

References

External links

• Phoebe Halliwell at the Internet Movie Database
• Phoebe Halliwell at the Charmed Wiki

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