Heav­en can’t help a teenage witch in Chill­ing Adven­tures of Sabrina

You’d be for­giv­en for expe­ri­enc­ing reboot fatigue at the moment. Every­thing from Stephen King’s It to ​’80s detec­tive show McGyver has received a glossy remake in recent mem­o­ry, and the train chugs on with Netflix’s lat­est teen dra­ma: a dark reimag­in­ing of Sab­ri­na, the Teenage Witch. Although the mag­i­cal mis­tress first appeared in Archie comics back in 1962, she’s pri­mar­i­ly known to audi­ences through the Amer­i­can sit­com which ran from 1996 to 2003 and made a star out of Melis­sa Joan Hart.

Fol­low­ing the suc­cess of Riverdale – a grit­ty Archie adap­ta­tion star­ring an impos­si­bly beau­ti­ful cast in increas­ing­ly bat­shit sit­u­a­tions – some can­ny tele­vi­sion exec­u­tives saw fit to bring his com­ic cast­mate Sab­ri­na to the small screen again, sans the laugh­ter track and ani­ma­tron­ic cat.

In Chill­ing Adven­tures of Sab­ri­na, Sab­ri­na Spell­man is played by Kier­nan Ship­ka, best known for grow­ing up on AMC’s Mad Men, where made waves as Don Draper’s imp­ish daugh­ter Sal­ly. Sab­ri­na resides with her witch aunts, Zel­da (Miran­da Otto) and Hil­da (Lucy Davis), and cousin Ambrose (Chance Per­do­mo), and with her 16^th birth­day fast approach­ing, she’s forced to choose between her mor­tal life attend­ing Bax­ter High in Green­dale, and her mag­i­cal poten­tial as a stu­dent at The Acad­e­my of the Unseen Arts.

This dichoto­my between the mor­tal and super­nat­ur­al worlds sits at the heart of The Chill­ing Adven­tures, as young Sab­ri­na is torn between her Gen-Zen­ni­al teenage life with her boyfriend Har­vey Kin­kle (Ross Lynch, who made waves ear­li­er this year in My Friend Dahmer) and the oppor­tu­ni­ty to live up to the lega­cy cre­at­ed by her war­lock father. Mean­while, some­thing wicked this way comes in the form of Mary Wardell (Michelle Gomez), Sabrina’s high school teacher who’s har­bour­ing a dark secret.

Draw­ing on inspi­ra­tions from sem­i­nal witchy clas­sics such as The Craft and Ham­mer Horror’s The Witch­es but undoubt­ed­ly also inspired by the likes of Heathers and – quite pos­si­bly – Tai­ka Waititi’s What We Do in the Shad­ows, there’s a goth­ic lush­ness to the show, while the twin­kling Elf­man-esque score and impres­sive set design pro­vide the req­ui­site atmos­phere need­ed for a show that has ​‘chill­ing’ in the title. Although set in the present, Sabrina’s wardrobe harkens back to the ​’70s, favour­ing wine-red turtle­necks and plaid miniskirts with opaque tights. A suit­ably spooky (and some­times on the nose) sound­track includ­ing Donovan’s Hur­dy-Gur­dy Man and Cliff Richard’s Dev­il Woman helps cement a deli­cious, glee­ful tone, com­bin­ing guts and gore with pret­ty dress­es and blonde curls.

While its sib­ling-of-sorts Riverdale has been accused of becom­ing pro­gres­sive­ly more pre­pos­ter­ous with every episode, Sab­ri­na sets its stall out as a super­nat­ur­al con­fec­tion from the start, simul­ta­ne­ous­ly as sweet and bit­ter as a dark choco­late truf­fle. Kier­nan Ship­ka feels like a nat­ur­al choice as Sab­ri­na, her wide-eyed naïveté just as quick­ly replaced by a wicked glint and know­ing smile. It falls to Ship­ka and co-star Ross Lynch as Sab­ri­na and Har­vey to sell the rela­tion­ship at the heart of the show to audi­ences, and they’re infi­nite­ly believ­able as the star-crossed lovers, Ross so charm­ing­ly enam­oured of his girl­friend he doesn’t always seem able to believe his own luck at dat­ing her.

But what’s a witch with­out her coven? Michelle Gomez (who was always spec­tac­u­lar on Chan­nel 4’s off­beat med­ical com­e­dy Green Wing) is per­fect as Sabrina’s schoolmistress, while Miran­da Otto and Lucy Davis make an excel­lent dou­ble act as her mis­matched aunts. Female friend­ship – and female com­pe­ti­tion – is cen­tral to the plot­line, and ear­ly on, Sab­ri­na laments that she has to decide between her free­dom and her pow­ers. A fel­low witch and erst­while fren­e­my explain that the Dark Lord they serve is ter­ri­fied by the thought of any young witch pos­sess­ing both of these things. When Sab­ri­na ques­tions why, she smiles know­ing­ly: ​“He’s a man, isn’t he?”

For those who grew up on the delights of the orig­i­nal sit­com, The Chill­ing Adven­tures of Sab­ri­na is a nos­tal­gic but nev­er deriv­a­tive delight – it’s sump­tu­ous enough to keep you enthralled but spooky enough to still pro­vide chills and thrills. For a whole new gen­er­a­tion of view­ers, Sabrina’s a plucky hero­ine who tries, fails, and tries again. The sto­ry might be famil­iar, but with this delec­table exe­cu­tion it’s an indul­gent delight, and if binge-watch­ing is your bag, there couldn’t be a bet­ter title to curl up with this Halloween.

Chill­ing Adven­tures of Sab­ri­na is stream­ing now on Netflix.