After another 2 weeks, the fall TV season is definitely in full swing. I’ve already given up on some shows (Goodbye, Manifest!) and some I’m still waiting out to see (Talkin ’bout you, Murphy Brown!). Another thing I’ve been waiting for has been the new “witch” shows to debut. I was semi-excited for the Charmed reboot (even though I didn’t think it was going to be good), but I was really anticipating the Netflix reimagining of the Sabrina the Teenage Witch series. Even though I normally don’t include streaming series in the scope of “fall TV”, I wanted these two to go head-to-head.

The Rookie

Another show I should have anticipated more was the return of Nathan Fillion in The Rookie. The previews all focused on age jokes, since Fillion plays a middle-age man who has a life-changing experience and decides to become a cop. The first episode (which is the only one I watched) paired up the rookies (Fillion’s character is only one of four) with experienced trainers to help them get up to speed. It’s a little bit like Training Day: the series, but without the corruption or Denzel. While a lot of time was focused on Fillion, it didn’t seem like he was the only star. Though I loved Castle for its ensemble, the secret sauce was still Fillion and Stana Katic as a mismatched team/couple. The way they’ve made this show, it seems a lot like just another semi-gritty cop show. I’m not a big fan of cop shows, so without something more special to it, I’ve decided to drop this show from my watchlist.

Black-ish

Last season ended Bow and Dre successfully pulling out of the marital nose-dive that they took in the run-up to the season finale. There were some pretty intense and sad episodes there. However, this season starts with the family all together, except that their oldest kids are off to college. However, in the season opener, Junior quickly decides that he’s not ready for college and decides to take a gap year. That is crazy. Are kids doing that a lot now, or is it just a device for shows to keep their aging child characters around when they’re old enough for college? I don’t remember any of my friends taking gap years (though I guess I did kind of waste a stretch of time after graduating, so maybe I kind of get it…) The series focus is now a bit more on the young twins, Jack and Diane. I love this because I enjoy the two of them, and I’m excited to have them fleshed out a bit more as characters.

Charmed

On to the witches … I’ve actually been re-watching the original series on Netflix and so it’s fresh in my mind how rough the early episodes of that show were. That makes me a bit more lenient on the reboot. Unfortunately, what the new show lacks is actresses who bring much personality to their characters. All three are pretty flat, so it’s difficult to care about them. Instead of three sisters with P names, we are introduced to sisters Macy, Mel, and Maggie. Other changes include the sisters being Latinx, middle sister is a lesbian, and they live in Michigan instead of San Francisco. The first episode packed in a whole lot more story elements that originally took more time to build, including the death of their mom, the discovery of their third sister (only two knew they were sisters at the start), and the arrival of their guardian (aka “whitelighter”). The new series also blends a lot of supernatural and monster/demon-fighting adventures with sisterly bonding and female power metaphors. However, this time around everything seems a lot more strident and the scripts seem pushy about the themes coming across. The special effects have improved, but the new show does not seem as fun as the original. Everything seems forced. I hope the show will improve over time, but like so many reboots before  it, this one seems to pale in comparison to its predecessor.

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina

In stark contrast, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina kind of follows the Battlestar Galactica philosophy of reboots which is to make something that is so different from the original that you barely remember that it’s a reboot. In this case, a candy-coloured sitcom featuring a lot of twinkly magic effects and a talking cat is now replaced by a dark, teen drama with occult and satanic tones throughout. As Sabrina the teenage witch reaches her 16th birthday, she has to choose between the human world or committing herself to the “dark lord” and the world of witches. The way it makes teenage life intense and melodramatic strikes a common chord between this show and its sister series, Riverdale, which both spawned from Archie Comics. However, this show is set many decades earlier (when no one had computers or cell phones; kind of feels like the 60s) but the characters’ attitudes and issues seem to be very much of today, including gender and sexuality, and independence and agency for women. Sabrina lives with her two witch aunts, Zelda and Hilda, and now has a new cousin (who is openly gay). She is in love with a human boy named Harvey (again), but now she is sent to a witch school (kind of an anti-Hogwarts) called the Academy of the Unseen Arts, where her nemeses, the weird sisters (who are your basic malevolent mean girls) torment her. I know a lot of people might balk at the unsubtly demonic overtones, but I am finding the series a wonderful reinvention not only of the original sitcom (I’ve never read the comics), but a fun gloss on the classic teenage story. I’m only about half-way through the series, which is definitely binge-able, and I’m enjoying the mix of story arcs. I think it’s a good show for everyone (except kids), but is best for those who enjoy horror-tinged shows like Supernatural, Stranger Things, The Walking Dead, or The Vampire Diaries.

Legacies

Now that I mention it, I almost forgot to include the grand-child spinoff series of The Vampire Diaries, called Legacies, which picks up from the first spinoff series The Originals and introduces us to the Salvatore School, a kind of Hogwarts (yes, another one) for supernatural teens. In the TVD world, there are witches, vampires, werewolves, and hybrids who all develop supernatural abilities and of course they need a place to learn to control them. The various human characters who survived the first series (i.e. professor Alaric Saltzman, and sheriff Matt Donovan) are a part of the new series cast. Also reappearing are the twins (Alaric’s powerful witch daughters) Josie and Lizzie, who are now teenagers. The first episode was a typical teen school series opener, with a new student arriving (a werewolf) and us all getting to meet the other students, and finding out about the social dynamic of the school. Added to the mix is the character of Hope Michaelson, who is the daughter of Klaus, the baddie and main character of The Originals, the other spinoff from TVD. So far, the show has not done much to distinguish itself. It’s mostly been fan service, allowing people familiar with the other two series to connect the dots to this one. I only recently finished The Vampire Diaries on Netflix, and I never actually got into The Originals — mostly because I hated Klaus — so I hope that Legacies has more to offer. I doubt it, but I guess we’ll see.