Chilling Adventures of Sabrina 2018

I've really tired of Netflix political correctness. Every TV series has it, especially this one. I mean read after me: not every tv series has to have a woman battling for her rights, lots of different races/nationalities, and the whole LGBT community in it (transgenders, lesbians, and homosexuals). I mean c'mon it's like putting salt or sugar in every dish out there. It's just a quiet town somewhere in the US, how can you have so many nations in one place historically? There's no authenticity left in the script at all. This script is very political and those things are shadowing everything else. And please don't get me wrong, I'm not against LGBT or any race out there, or feminism, it's just like putting all world problems into one place, which are totally unrelated to the story and environment itself. It looks like indoctrination to me. Also, it's biased, why men are hated in this script so much? How is that fair? That's why I call this TV series political indoctrination

Also, you have too much blood in here, seeing scissors in someone's neck with streaming blood - is not what Sabrina tv series been about. I mean I've been watching it when I was 10 years old. Blood is fine but not a bloody balsamation of body on the table either.

There are some fillers you can just skip them and you won't miss a plot. And some strange stuff like a guy is using an iPhone 7 but it's the only time I've seen anyone having a mobile phone at all. It seemed like they showing some 70s at most, but now I'm not sure anymore after seeing that iPhone 7 :D

Good things though.. great actress, the intriguing concept of the satan.

I have a love hate relationship with this show. Originally I only watched it because Kiernan Shipka was the lead, so I wasn't expecting anything to really amaze me but... the first Season was actually pretty good. It had this element of mystery and dark horror that you don't get to see for the rest of the show, a few episodes felt a little crap, but overall the first season was peak.

Season 2 was also pretty good, but it felt like a massive step down from the first. I didn't like the romance that was starting to develop, I much preferred the romance in the first season and I didn't really care about Nick at all so it kinda lost me in that aspect. The horror here felt tame, and so did the gore - it just felt like a tamer version of the first season. Season 3 was pretty bad, and the music choices were awful. I think I hated every music scene this show had and all the covers, sure Kiernan has a great voice but the songs they chose are really shit imho. Besides that, Season 3 made no sense, like, it was all over the place, I didn't know what I was watching. Easily the worst season with a lot of cringe worthy writing.

Season 4 surprised me, I actually liked it as opposed to others. For me, it brought back the mystery of Season 1 and combined it with what it was trying to go for with Seasons 2 and 3 and it kinda worked. My only problem with this Season is that it was rushed near the end, and there was still a portion of the writing I did not like. I don't understand the teasing of Harvey and Sabrina's relationship in the previous Season when it goes nowhere and we go back to this boring kinda uninteresting relationship with Sabrina and Nick.

Overall, I don't think any of the romance and teen-y kinda things in the show are my style, I only care about the horror, mystery and mostly Kiernan Shipka. Kind of a mid show, enjoyable at times, awful at other times. Not sure what my final words are on it. I guess I can recommend it but don't expect anything amazing after Season 1.

First of all, It's confusing how in here the show is divided in two Seasons while in Netflix it has 4 Parts. Season 1 in trakt in Part 1 and 2 in Netflix, Season 2 in trakt is Part 3 and 4 in Netflix. Ok? Ok. That said, Season 1 is easily the best, generally quite consistent. I think the show overall gets too messy and all over the place after that.

In the very beginning specially (Part 1) I really liked how the Dark Lord was (not) portrayed. That changes later (Part 2) but it's all still mostly good.

Then when it comes to Season 2 it feels like they just went for... Everything. Season 1 was focused on mainly one thing (the witches' coven and the Dark Lord), Season 2 has many new forms of magic, new realms and the story just isn't as tight anymore. It can be a fun romp and select episodes are very good, but the story will probably lose you by the end. Not that it isn't easy to follow, but they try to escalate the tension too much all the time and by Part 4 there is little weight left to the characters, their powers and struggles.

This is a show with a lot silly fun intertwined with dark gruesome moments that end up being tonally and storywise a mess, but if you like the theme of magic and wanted to see a weird dark take on Sabrina you might enjoy at least most it. PS: it is an unapologetically feminist show (specially Season 1) and if that grinds your gears just don't bother.

I really hope that this show has ended for good. The dark magic and everything about witchcraft was awesome even the effects were pretty lame and seriously with a lot of really bad actors. I loved the dark theme of this show but most of the time I was really bored during watching. I did not have favourite character here, except aunt Zee and Lucifer. I did not like even main character Sabrina. The actress never conviced me that she deserves to be Sabrina, most of the time her performance looked so fake and unconvincingly. With the last part of chapters I have realized how I appreciate the first season. The second one was really awful. Also I am not sure if the creators has that low budget so they rather kept resurrecting old characters, than rather bring there new interesting characters with new story. Blackwood was maybe interesting character in first season, but there was too much of this character. They also used many old characters which were really pointless in this show. As I said I loved the whole idea and everything about witchcraft was awesome but how they served this show, well it did not work for me. I think it was bad. Oh and of course there has to be so much of feminism that I thought that I will roll out my eyes... and I am woman. It was annoying.

What I expected was a mature, gritty version of Sabrina The Teenage Witch. What I got was a very political, very Christian, horror-themed version of Sabrina that still seems targeted specifically at a teenage demographic.

Is it just me, or was the original TV series accidentally progressive for showing an alternative non-Christian lifestyle in a positive light? This new series seems to undermine the progressiveness of its source material by re-imagining this non-Christian lifestyle as explicit devil-worshipping, where witches routinely commit murder and cannibalism. Sabrina's own aunt Zelda expresses disappointment about missing out on an opportunity to eat "long-pig".

The story also seems to take a few pages from Harry Potter with Sabrina being persecuted by pure-blood witches for being half-Muggle and it even has its evil version of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It actually really feels like it is a knee-jerk reaction to the popularity of Harry Potter; a story with a protagonist whose challenge is to resist the temptation of evil witchcraft.

Finally, why do they have to refer to everything as "dark"? When Sabrina tells Harvey about her "dark baptism", maybe it would have sounded a lot less crazy if she'd just called it a "baptism"? It's like listening to Dr Evil (from Austin Powers) explain how he got his M.D. in "evil medical school". There's absolutely no subtlety to be had here.

Looking past the early attempts for brownie points I did not really find something to grasp onto.
I have very little memories of the previous TV adaptation but it's certainly sad to see an iconic character like Salem was be pretty much non-existent in this. This version of Sabrina not shying away from the darker implications of witchcraft is certainly one of the better aspects of the show but it was still weird to watch as it's those elements that bite with the more YA topics of it (which shouldn't be when it has a demographic of 18+ tbh).
At some point I feel like Netflix took the "we don't have to limit episode run times" moto as an excuse to just stretch out content to better fit their business model... you can watch a 10 hours long season only to get superficial storylines. Many aspects of the show are only just starting to develop (her "mortal" friends in particular) and a lot of what went on felt very contrieved. It's so inconsistent that it feels like someone forced them to do it that way. But remember, she is a bad ass witch yo..! How this comes to be does not matter. Morality jumps all over the place unlike Sabrina's powerlevel which is Mary Sue tier. Her relationship with her boyfriend is awkward to watch and must have been though for the actors as well, her friends are just background noise to randomly insert when needed... and so is a lot of the stuff (including the past of her parents)... At this point I feel like I could rant on for quite a while so I'm just going to go ahead and lower the rating further. Yes, you can watch it... but I'm not sure who really should.

A delicious darker take on the Sabrina we all used to love, tainted by the SJW and feminist crap.

Well, that's what you get for writing a comment halfway through the first season: actually, the SJW and feminism elements get substantially toned down during the second half of the first season. Unfortunately, the writing also seems to take a bit of a dive by then and the show just isn't able to keep up with the quality of the first few episodes. Still, it's entertaining enough to watch, there are some interesting characters that are fun to keep up with (Ms. Wardwell being the most intriguing one and almost worth the show alone, and I found Lord Blackwood's campy and ominous overacting quite fun to watch).

I really should point out the thing I was disappointed the most about this show: Salem. He's barely even a secondary character, we only remember him when someone mentions him. He's absent most of the time and contributes nothing to the story. I know Salem from the other Sabrina show was an awkward, badly animated puppet, but I still adored the little guy! In this show, Salem is literally just your average black cat who occasionally roams around the set.

I appreciate the darker tone of this show, which often dwells into tacky territory, turning it into a fun combination. So, if you're into that sort of thing, maybe you should let Sabrina put a spell on you.

Yet another edit: it seems the first season was split into two parts that aired at different times. So, when I'm referring to the "second half of the first season", I'm actually referring to the second part of the first half of the first season (up to 1x11). Blame the show runners for this mess.

This is a post-Season 1 review. It contains light spoilers (and any major spoilers will be spoiler tagged).

This series is a campy teen drama, as should have been expected from the creator of Riverdale. It's exactly the sort of thing you can expect from that, but with an extra dose of horror, sexuality, and blood. This is not your sitcom-y '90s Sabrina (though I loved that series so), but it also doesn't pretend to be. The themes here are entirely different. However, if you're down for a kitschy, overwrought teen drama, then let's get into it.

Let's start with the big, obvious issue at hand. This series plays hard on f-word: 'Feminism'. I'll make no bones about it, feminism makes me cringe. I love girl power, I came to this series hoping for a good dose of strong female lead, but I do not consider that a 'feminist' standpoint. I consider that a human standpoint, and I make a clear distinction on that. This series has a lot of good examples of why. The snappy, immature eyerolls of 'What did you expect? Satan is a man' simply do not do the series any favours (and holy crap, that little ending bit where the warlocks get all Third Reich-y around the High Priest's son is really on the nose). There are a lot of great progressive themes here that become childish jabs when the series points and gapes at its own progressiveness while reminding you that the antagonists are 'the patriarchy'.

I would have loved to see strong women standing up and getting things done, and I'm happy to see men take a backseat, Dark Lord knows that women have played second fiddle to men enough times. I have absolutely no problem with that. I love that the series has a non-binary character. I am happy to see at least a bit more representation for minorities in the series in general. This all would have been great if the series didn't feel the need to point it all out at least once an episode.

Now, that said, the whiny, sore posteriors of the people crying 'WAHHH, progressive messaging!' is absolutely no better. It's easily worse, especially since the series, while definitely overdoing it, still has other things going on.

As for other cons of the series, Harvey and Sabrina's relationship feels a little unearned. They lay the 'Lovey Dovey' on thick really early, without giving the audience any time to find it believable or grow to appreciate it. While I like that there's not this awful sexual tension, 'will they, won't they' laziness, it would have been nice to spend a little time with them to establish their relationship before it got heavy. That said, from my previous review, it does seem that series was willing to acknowledge (at least to a degree) Sabrina being a bit selfish, and explored those themes, hopefully it will do so more in the coming seasons.

Roz is still kind of tedious, though definitely moreso at the beginning than the end. Susie's storyline is interesting, but jerky and awkwardly written. The whole series shows its place as a teen drama, with a decent bit of janky storytelling to go with it. Still, if you're up for a teen drama, this should be par for the course. It's a little disappointing they didn't try harder, but it shouldn't be that big an issue for the type of show it is.

On the plus side, the series is happily willing to lean into its darker themes. It isn't afraid to throw in all the horror, gore, and sexuality that should come with a group of Satanic occultists (especially ones with a clearly LaVeyan bent). I also appreciate that it doesn't shy away from referring to Satan repeatedly, out of some fear for offending some poor Christian sensibilities. Like most of the series, the way it handles the 'Church of Night' is pretty overwrought, but at least it doesn't dance around things.

Ambrose is an interestingly ambiguous character, acting as the 'new Salem' (though Salem still exists), straddling between darker tendencies and still being Sabrina's companion (and even starts the series on House Arrest for some crime).

Ultimately, what it comes down to, is this is a teen drama with a dark supernatural bent, and with all the flaws that entails. If you're up for that, it's likely to be a lot of what you might expect. It's not great, but it's good for what it is.

First of all, i really like the other sabrina. Shes a clever, snappy and powerful young girl. I really was suprised how she is displayed in this show. I enjoyed how she is questioning every single decision someone made for her. On the other hand i didnt like that the show is somehow not really getting to a point. there are always some nice mysteries and revelations but they doestn seem to be important. the story just goes on and eventually things which were mented will come back to the table, but not in season 1. To the end of the first season it becomes really really dark and i wonder how this young girl is coping with everything shes done. so she witnessed a suicide and cannibalism right in front of her but it doesnt really effect her at all, but she looses her mind because of her love to harvey. i understand the intention behind this but for me it doesnt add up. i think sabrina really has some good parts and i hope it will continue, but please make a nice story out of it and just let some things happen and go on. there was so much to explore in the season and it all ended like no big deal.