It has been hinted that a major character from the Archie Comics universe will be showing up in the Riverdale season finale leading into Season 2… and many think it might be Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Picking up on that line of thought, Entertainment Weekly’s Natalie Abrams flat-out asked the Riverdale series’ showrunner, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, if we will be seeing Sabrina this season.
“I feel like I can say two things: One is, we are constantly talking about Sabrina and how to update her character and introduce her to the TV audiences,” Aguirre-Sacasa hinted, “whether it’s part of the Riverdale universe or it’s alongside the Riverdale universe. Hopefully sooner rather than later, there will be something to do with Sabrina. And the other thing I will say is that in the finale there is an appearance of a character from the Archie mythology that has a darker origin and backstory.”
Whether or not those two thoughts collide, could a Sabrina spinoff lead into a witchy series of her own… something we’ve talked about on the Archie Digest podcast?
“I talk about it all the tim because it’s my obsession,” the producer laughed. “I love that character and obviously I also write The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina comic book. It’s sort of like, you know how there’s the Arrow-verse and then there’s Supergirl, which kind of exists in a different universe — they still cross over, but they’re in a different universe. I think there’s a lot of ways to skin the Sabrina cat, and I’m talking about them all the time basically to anyone who will listen.”
One thing is for certain: Per the EW interview, there could be supernatural elements right across the river. “In my mind, the mythology is this: Riverdale is a non-magical grounded town with weird stuff happening. Then there’s Sweetwater River, where Jason died, and on the other side of that river is Greendale, where Sabrina and the witches traditionally live. On one side of the river, there’s no magic, there’s no supernatural — that’s where Riverdale is. And on the other side of the mythic river, which is sort of like the River Styx, there’s magic and witches and dark Lovecraftian horrors,” Aguirre-Sacasa hinted, revealing that there was dialogue cut from Episode 7 where they talked about the witches on Greendale.
Regardless of whether it’s Sabrina in the finale or not, there will be a big genre element in Riverdale Season 2, and that may or may not take an Afterlife with Archie approach. “I will tell you that Afterlife or not, there definitely will be a big genre element to season 2. It won’t suddenly just be a coming-of-age drama. There will definitely be a very strong, bold genre statement. If season 1 is a murder mystery, it won’t necessarily be another murder mystery. We’re telling, for us, kind of the best version of a murder mystery: Who killed Jason Blossom? So whatever twist in genre element that we add in season 2, it’s going to be different from that and probably, I think, it’s going to make people go, ‘They’re not really doing that, are they’?”
Riverdale airs new episodes Thursdays at 9PM ET/PT on The CW.
