Kiernan Shipka returned to Riverdale on Sunday night, reprising her role as fan favorite Sabrina Spellman as she came to the aid of Cheryl Blossom (Madelaine Petsch) in “The Witches of Riverdale” after the town’s first born children were all killed thanks to the machinations of Percival Pickens (Chris O’Shea). By the time she was through, she’d helped bring back the gang’s fallen loved ones and while this wasn’t the first time the witch had come to help save the day in Riverdale, it also may not be her last. Shipka told TV Guide (via Screen Rant) that not only would she be happy to come back in Riverdale’s final season, but she feels like Sabrina has to.
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“Yeah, she has to come back. I think they’re gonna need her help again,” Shipka said. “I would say [they should] lean into the chaos — no pun intended — as much as they can and work hard and have faith that it’s all gonna work out, but at the end of the day, just truly probably call Sabrina again. I think they’re gonna need her, to be quite honest.
Shipka also said that she feels passionately about keeping the character of Sabrina alive despite the cancellation of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina and she is always up to play her again.
“For the final season of Riverdale, I told [Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa] whenever you need me, I’m there. I’m your girl,” she said. “And besides that, I think that both Roberto and I — and I don’t want to put words in his mouth — but I really do think that we’re both so passionate about this character and keeping her alive and well in the zeitgeist, in the universe. She means a lot to a lot of people, and it’s fun to share her with everyone and it’s really fun to not only be her, but to get people excited about her. One of the joys of doing this is sharing the work, and when people love it, you want to keep doing it. I, certainly, and I think Roberto too, want to continuously see where she could go. I truly don’t know what that looks like, but I am up for it. I don’t know if it’s a year from now, I don’t know if it’s two or three, but I’m still Sabrina.”
As for that final, seventh season of Riverdale, it sounds like the series will go all out. Aguirre-Sacasa previously spoke about how Season 6 will end with a “big swing” that will in turn set up for a big Season 7 — which certainly sounds like something they might need Sabrina for.
“It came out of conversations with the studio and The CW and [network president] Mark Pedowitz,” Aguirre-Sacasa said. “When we were renewed for Season 7, though we weren’t told at the time it’d be our final season, I think we were all feeling that it might be. When Mark and I talked about it… it was bittersweet. That said, we are so proud of the run we’ve had, and the call did come as we were working on the last episode of Season 6. We were debating on what the final beats of that episode would be and torn between a very big swing and a quieter ending. And it definitely emboldened us to go for the big swing for Season 7. It’s really exciting.”
Riverdale airs Sundays at 8/7c on The CW.
