The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina Part Three from Netflix has now dropped, and we finally get to see Sabrina try to save Nick Scratch from Hell after he let himself get possessed by Sabrina’s actual father, the Dark Lord himself. For a run down of the previous seasons, you can find my write-up on Part 1 here, and Part 2 here. Here’s some of the best things that happened over season three.
WARNING: Remainder of article contains spoilers for The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina Part Three as well as the previous seasons.
Sabrina Spellman
My favorite thing about Sabrina is that she still fights to live her life on her own terms. It’s a struggle she’s had since the first season, and every time she thinks she’s won, another complication keeps coming up. The family and friends she always wants to protect in Greendale are both her strength and her weakness. Sabrina agrees to claim the Throne of Hell because Lilith can’t seem to hold it with her credentials and the other option is letting Prince of Hell Caliban claim it, but he intends to make the mortal world the tenth circle of Hell. So much for her plan to just save her boyfriend, Nick. Even as Hell tries to pull her in deeper, she wants to do things on her own terms like refusing to take the soul of a man who bargained to be brilliant at chess, but also refusing to let another man bargain for more immortality by trading in the souls of innocent children. The one moment she put Hell above her friends, she literally caused the end of the world, proving just how important they really are to her. Of course she fixed it, taking advantage of an object that could cause a time loop. However, in typical Sabrina fashion, her drive to live her life on her terms causes her to make a dangerous choice. Instead of closing the time loop, Sabrina allows two versions of herself to exist. One that can rule in Hell, and one that will live in Greendale. The fallout from her time paradox will make quite the storyline for a fourth season, and I am so there for it.
Hilda and Zelda Spellman
The beloved aunties have their own struggles this season. Hilda tries to carve out her own identity much to the annoyance of Zelda (particularly after discovering Hilda has made her a villain in a bodice ripper romance she wrote). She also gets engaged to Dr. Cee in one of the season’s sweetest moments. One of my favorite moments with her was when she discovered that she did not actually kill Dr. Cee after the Pagan Witches turned her into a spider, but merely cocooned him.
Zelda had quite the challenge on her hands when she realizes that the witches get their powers from the Dark Lord and now he’s mad and withholding them. The Pagan Witches are also looking to destroy the coven as Satanic Witches decimated the Pagan Witches centuries ago. Zelda’s the one trying to keep things together as everyone looks for solution after solution. It’s Zelda who figures out how to restore their magic by calling upon Hecate to bestow her powers upon the Greendale Coven. Zelda is the one who works out a deal with the Hedge Witches (and has a romantic moment with one too). It’s Zelda who will lead the Greendale Coven into a new future. The Church of Night and their patriarchal focus was clearly holding Zelda back.
Ambrose Spellman
Ambrose is stepping into his own leadership role very nicely this season. While he may have felt like the cousin you try to get to help you pull off something naughty in the first season, he’s now the someone you absolutely need at your back in a crisis. His horror as he tried to emphasize to Sabrina that a time paradox is going to blow up in their faces really underlines that Sabrina’s fight for her free will is far from over, and who knows what casualties it might take along the way.
Theo Putnam
Theo is the character that I feel must be protected at all costs, or the fans will riot. The first two seasons highlighted Theo’s journey to coming out as a transgender male, and the support that his friends gave him in particular is one of my favorite things about the Fright Club. This season, Theo gains a romantic interest in Robin Goodfellow, a hobgoblin from the carnival the Pagan Witches run. Robin’s acceptance that Theo is transgender was such a great moment. It also meant that if he did anything to hurt Theo, the fans would want him destroyed. Luckily, Robin was willing to betray the Pagan Witches for Theo and the Fright Club.
Roz Walker and Harvey Kinkle
Roz and Harvey are still going strong, sort of. Roz seems to be ready to take their relationship to “the next step,” but Harvey isn’t so certain. In fact, when Harvey is told that to save Roz, he would have to give up his love for here, a little complication comes up. It seems what Harvey’s heart desires is actually Sabrina. Roz even gets wind of this by vision thanks to “The Cunning.” After Roz saves Harvey’s life, he seems more secure in his feelings for her, but I still can’t help but to wonder if he really is truly over Sabrina. It may be next season before we’re truly certain of this.
Prudence
This season really pulls Prudence away from the other Weird Sisters, and she feels like more of a leader than head Mean Girl this time around. She’s the one who realizes she and Ambrose need a different kind of magic to outsmart Father Blackwood (enter Mambo Marie, another dynamic character in her own right). The events of season three hit her some of the hardest when one of the other Weird sisters goes mad thanks to the Pagan Witches and kills the other. Prudence blames herself for bringing in Blackwood instead of killing him, and it destroys her relationship with Ambrose. Seeing how Prudence steps into her own with the Weird Sisters being no more is going to be one of the best things to watch next season.
Father Blackwood
No good is coming from what Father Blackwood has gotten into. He’s been messing with time and aged up his twins into pre-teens, recruited the gone crazy Agatha, the season ends when he awakens some sort of evil creature, and have we mentioned that the Mark of Cain he acquired makes him unkillable? Richard Goyle is a delight to watch, and figuring out what he’s pulling next is always a treat for viewers.
Lilith
I’m never quite certain if I should be cheering for Lilith or not, which makes her such an entertaining character to watch. The demons of Hell won’t take her seriously, so she’s forced to align herself with Sabrina. But when the Dark Lord gets loose and she knows she’s in trouble, she does what she does best: survives. Lilith made a little deal and is now pregnant with the Dark Lord’s son, buying herself some temporary immunity. How that all is going to play out remains to be seen, but no good can come of it for Greendale.
Nick Scratch
Nick might win the most sympathetic character of the season. His time trapped with the Dark Lord left him traumatized and he’s now self-medicating with alcohol and sex demons. Sabrina is highly sympathetic, but also a little naive regarding how easily it will be for Nick to go back to being boyfriend Nick. At one point, he has an outburst that the torture he went through was for Sabrina, that she wasn’t worth it, and that he thinks she’s still hung up on Harvey. Ambrose and Sabrina do remove the last traces of Dark Lord from Nick, but he can’t be certain if his words to Sabrina were his or Dark Lord influenced and breaks up with her to get some space and clarity. Watching what he does as he’s recovering is going to be another big thing to look for next season.
Are you watching The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina? What did you think of the newest season and what storyline are you most excited about next season?
