The CW’s upcoming Charmed reboot has faced quite a bit of backlash since the series was announced back in January. One of the biggest points of contention from fans of the original 1990s series of the same name is that the reboot is simply a copy of the original, but that isn’t the case — especially when it comes to the cultural background influencing the magic of these new “Charmed Ones”.
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At the Paley Fall TV Preview last weekend (via Variety), series executive producer Amy Rardin explained that the magic of the show will be deeply influenced by Latinx magical traditions.
“We have a real Latinx witch in our writer’s room,” Rardin said. “Every culture has their own witchcraft traditions, and we really wanted to explore not just from a Salem witchcraft but all kinds of different witchcraft that happens all around the world.”
This exploration of brujería is a bit of a departure from the original Charmed which generally leaned into more Western witchcraft traditions — the show even sent the Halliwell sisters back to 1600s Salem in the Season 3 episode “All Halliwell’s Eve” — but it’s one that makes sense and not just because the new Charmed Ones are themselves Latinx. The characters aren’t simply copies of the original and even feature a new power for one of the sisters. The youngest sister Maggie, played by Sarah Jeffrey, has the ability to read minds instead of premonition as the youngest sister in the original, Phoebe, did.
“We didn’t want to make it too easy for them to solve things with magic, so I think we pulled back a little, which doesn’t mean that the power won’t evolve,” executive producer Jessica O’Toole said. “Based on the original, the powers do evolve so that’s something we’ve had in the back of our minds as something we could get to.”
Even with the differences, the reboot is following in the original series’ tradition of empowering women, however. O’Toole explained that the show will feature the new sisters dealing with current, real-world issues in a way that she says is handled “organically”.
“[Charmed will] organically show the women handling current issues, without lecturing the audience,” O’Toole said. “Even before the election, we always wanted to explore that link between strong women and witchcraft.”
The Charmed Reboot stars Melonie Diaz, Sarah Jeffery, Madeleine Mantock, Rupert Evans, Ser’Darius Blaine, Charlie Gillespie, and Ellen Tamaki .Charmed is from CBS Television Studios in association with Propagate Content, with executive producers Jessica O’Toole (“Jane The Virgin”), Amy Rardin (“Jane The Virgin”), Jennie Snyder Urman (“Jane The Virgin”), Ben Silverman (“The Office”), Brad Silberling (“Jane The Virgin”) and Carter Covington (“Faking It”).”
Charmed premiers on The CW Sunday, October 14 and 9/8c following Supergirl.
