Praise Satan, witches, it was announced on Monday that Chilling Adventures of Sabrina will return on April 5. Based on promo photos, it’s looking like the main drama of part two will focus on Sabrina’s (Kiernan Shipka) relationships with the show’s resident twinks, Harvey (Ross Lynch) and Nick Scratch (Gavin Leatherwood) — Netflix even made an homage to Ariana Grande, tweeted out photos of Sabrina with her beaus, telling fans to “break up with your boyfriends” because “the dark lord has other plans.”
We’ve already seen a teaser of what’s to come in the new season, which finally gave us a take on Sabrina’s magical wardrobe changes from the Melissa Joan Hart sitcom. As fellow Sabrina stan Out social editor Ian Martella and I discussed in our heated debate following part one, there is a lot to love about CAOS but also a lot that could use improving.
With that in mind, here are a few things we’d like to see in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina part two.
Salem served as the comic relief on the 90s sitcom and is still highly memeable to this day, but Netflix’s black cat was entirely silent. It seems unlikely that this will change, but we’d really like to hear Salem throw Sabrina some shade over those headbands.
This feel like the most likely change we’ll see on the show, considering the way part one ended: Sabrina, having finally signed the Dark Lord’s book, got a power upgrade to match her newly white hair and was ditching her mortal life to matriculate at the Unseen Academy. While the holiday special backpedalled on these changes a bit, I want to see Sabrina really give in to her darkest impulses this season, and not just in her relationships. I want her to be a powerful, badass witch — Dark Willow, mama!
While it's exciting that a Netflix show would introduce a character coming to terms with their own nonbinary understanding of gender, the way Susie’s arc was handled during part one was confusing. Yes, I get that Susie is a teenager in a small town (in an modern world that also somehow takes place in the 60s) and doesn’t necessarily have the language or inclination to unpack their identity the way we might want. But as the show continues, I hope that the writers will explore this carefully while giving us actual answers. Is Susie nonbinary? Gender nonconforming? Trans? Kids of those identities watching the show want to see someone like them reflected on TV, so being clear about that distinction could be really important for them!
As much as I’d love for the show to retcon Hilda and Zelda as lesbians instead of sisters — or, in a Game of Thrones twist, lesbian sisters who are doing the dirty — that seems unlikely. But I would like the show to expand on their backstory. How did they come to be in their Boston Marriage? Just how old are they? In the comics that Sabrina is based on, Hilda and Zelda’s beauty is actually the work of carefully crafted glamors hiding hideous, ravaged crones underneath — I would like to see it.
Sabrina’s sexy pansexual warlock was one of the high points of part one, and I’m hoping he gets even more screen time in the follow up. “I don’t remember the last time I saw a pansexual person of color written with depth,” Perdomo told Out last year. “I’m happy that we’re finally having wider representation of the world we live in. Its timely and refreshing.” He also said he’d like his character’s “past to really come into the forefront.” The skeletons in Ambrose’s closet are bound to be sexy.
