It Still Stings: The CW’s Charmed Reboot Never Stood a Chance

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https://www.pastemagazine.com/tv/the...reaming-legacy

By Anna Govert | November 15, 2023 | 11:15am

Editor’s Note: TV moves on, but we haven’t. In our feature series It Still Stings, we relive emotional TV moments that we just can’t get over. You know the ones, where months, years, or even decades later, it still provokes a reaction? We’re here for you. We rant because we love. Or, once loved. And obviously, when discussing finales in particular, there will be spoilers:

In our current Hollywood machine, reboots and remakes are a way of life. They are unavoidable, and, more often than not, feel more like cash-grab nostalgia-slot machines than actually worthwhile pieces of televised art. And they just keep coming, no matter how tired audiences seem of rehashing the same stories over and over again. However, there are times when a reboot is surprising, when the series can take that original idea and build on it, creating something meaningful and pointedly different from the source material. One of those rare, few reboots was The CW’s take on Charmed, which premiered in 2018.

Charmed follows two sisters, Mel (Melonie Diaz) and Maggie (Sarah Jeffery), who are confronted by their long-lost sister Macy (Madeleine Mantock) in the wake of their mother’s death. Living comfortably in the college town of Hilltowne, Michigan, the trio of sisters must learn to live together, all while discovering (and attempting to master) their newfound witchy powers, which are stronger when they all use their magic together. They are the Charmed Ones, and they possess the Power of Three, the most powerful force within the magical world. Guided by their trusted Whitelighter Harry (Rupert Evans), the series eventually moves the Charmed Ones to Seattle, where they encounter even more magical mayhem, ultimately leading to the discovery of another Charmed One (Kaela, played by Lucy Barrett) after Mantock’s exit from the series—in an eerie parallel to the original series.

Despite its various upheavals, The CW’s take on Charmed is extremely charming, and remains an incredibly entertaining watch to this day. The chemistry between the series’ three leads (whether that be Diaz, Jeffery, and Mantock or Diaz, Jeffery, and Barrett) carries the show, always grounding its sprawling magical and demonic plots to the relationship between these three young women who find themselves just trying to make the world a better place. The first season’s setting in Hilltowne is delightful, and gives the series a distinctly hometown vibe, but even when the series ups and moves to Seattle, all the elements that made Charmed so interesting come with it—and a few new faces are added to the mix as well, including Poppy Drayton’s morally gray Demon Overlord Abigael Jameson-Caine and Jordan Donica’s cursed Jordan Chase. And even when Macy makes her grand sacrifice and Kaela arrives, Charmed’s commitment to these three women, their larger purpose, and the sisterhood that they must forge between them remains the heart of the show.

What makes The CW’s Charmed so special is the series’ ability to twist and reshape the existing lore from the original show, ultimately offering a new take on the Power of Three for a new generation. It’s campy and lighthearted, but always engaging in the complex politics of both its witchy world and the status of our own. Charmed pointedly stars countless people of color, and features numerous queer characters as well, who all get their own storylines regarding their race, gender, or sexuality, which are only elevated by the series’ magical setting. Very literal commentary about Maggie’s status as a biracial character, Mel’s experience as a lesbian, and cousin Josefina’s (Mareya Salazar) journey as a trans woman all are handled with a grace on-par for The CW, but still undeniably important. In magical worlds, oftentimes these stories get reduced to metaphors, where the (more often than not) white witches are outcasts from their community for being different, but in this Charmed, the series takes on real world stakes while keeping its magical commentary just as biting.

In fact, as the series progresses, Charmed questions why the Power of Three is only used to help witches when the entire magical world often suffers in the same ways. Numerous seasons of the show focus on the battles between the witches and the demons, and the Charmed Ones’ belief in the power of hope and change allows them to finally find solid footing with those who are different from themselves. In the series finale, the Charmed Ones became representatives for all magical creatures, bringing its series-long battles with demons and other non-witches to a close on a uniting note. And that, more than anything, is what Charmed has always been about: bringing people together through the power of sisterhood and magic.

Unfortunately, though, not everyone was brought together by the magical themes of this reboot. In fact, the cast and writers of the original Charmed made their disdain for the series quite clear, as often as they possibly could. Holly Marie Combs (Piper) asserted that the reboot “capitalized on [their] hard work,” while Rose McGowan (Paige) claimed the series “sucks,” despite admitting to never actually watching it. Even worse, after the Charmed reboot ended with the Charmed Ones traveling through a portal and landing at the Halliwell Manor, one of the writers on that original series tweeted: “Piper, Phoebe & Paige vanquished the 3 imposters right after they invaded Halliwell Manor. Then [Holly Marie Combs] blew up the portal to that other universe & quipped: ‘We wish them well.’”

While the cast and writers of the Charmed reboot have only actually spoken about this apparent feud a few times (Jeffery herself called Combs and McGowan’s comments “sad and quite frankly pathetic” after seeing a video of the two slamming the reboot), the negative energy permeates any discussion of this series, and split the fandom into two sides for the reboot’s entire run. While I do have sympathy for the original cast, as it’s undoubtedly difficult to watch such a cultural phenomenon be reworked and redone without your involvement, such is the reality of our current TV landscape, and the collective disdain for this reboot never actually succeeded in willing it out of existence, no matter how hard anyone tried.

In many ways, The CW’s take on Charmed never really stood a chance. Like many other reboots and remakes, there will always be those who prefer the original, but the vitriolic hatred not only from fans but from the original cast themselves only created a larger and larger target on this series as it attempted to solidify itself as a separate entity from its source material—simply a reimagining for a new generation. The Charmed that aired on The CW for four seasons was delightful and fun, and remains a series worth seeking out, but its reputation as the reboot that “sucks” will always mar its legacy.

Maybe the original cast was right, maybe The CW should have just made an original magic series, unattached to any preexisting IP. If they had, maybe the series’ campy humor and heartfelt examination of family and love could have allowed Charmed (2018) a reputation of its own, unattached to any behind the scenes drama or continued disdain from those who loved what came before. But unfortunately, in a Hollywood that favors IP more than anything else, that likely never would have happened.

Charmed without the Power of Three and the Charmed Ones has no value in a media landscape that values brand recognition over story and heart. So what do you do when faced with that? Create a reboot that has all of those things: brand recognition, story, and heart. And The CW’s Charmed did just that, it’s just too bad hardly anyone gave it a chance to show it.