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 During the Salem Witch Trials, a witch cut a deal: "Spare us, and we will fight for you." Thus, the Salem Accords were signed. The story follows the descendants of these witches, 327 years later, who have been drafted and have come to Boot Camp to fight for the US Army. A witch-supremacist terrorist group known as "The Spree" has been causing trouble, so this year's class has its work cut out for it. Season Trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TvUS6zlm3g Dramatis Personae summaries stolen from wikipedia  Taylor Hickson as Raelle Collar, a witch from a minor witch family line who enlists at Fort Salem, but who shows a surprising potential for work.  Amalia Holm as Scylla Ramshorn, a second year cadet at Fort Salem whom Raelle falls for, but who is evasive about her past.  Jessica Sutton as Tally Craven, a witch who enthusiastically enlists at Fort Salem despite her mother's opposition due to all of Tally's aunts being previously killed in action.  Ashley Nicole Williams as Abigail Bellweather, a proud enlistee at Fort Salem from the storied Bellweather witch family line.  Demetria McKinney as Anacostia Quartermaine, the drill sergeant at Fort Salem.  Lyne Renée as General Sarah Alder, who is the commanding general of the United States' witch armed forces and in charge of Fort Salem. She is also the witch who originally negotiated the Salem Accords 300 years ago, despite remaining a middle-aged woman to the present day. Motherland: Fort Salem airs Wednesdays at 9 PM on Freeform (the season finale is airing tonight, May 20th). The show was recently confirmed to get a second season, and it's not prestige TV in any sense of the term, but it's fun enough, and it's gay so I am legally obligated to post it. Senerio fucked around with this message at 14:32 on May 22, 2020 |
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May 20, 2020 18:49
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The trailers look insanely cheesy in a good way
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May 21, 2020 00:01
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Insanely cheesy in a good way is a good way to summarize the show so far. 20 minutes to go until the season finale!
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May 21, 2020 01:41
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So that was an interesting finale. I'm wondering where it's going to go from here.
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May 21, 2020 03:28
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This entire season was like an extended first act. From about episode two I was just waiting for them to realise that Adler was a bad guy and the stuff they've been brought up to believe is propaganda but even now they haven't even gotten that far. And I probably would have stopped watching already except I'm really curious about the setting. Like, there's that map at the start showing the US with the big gap in the middle called "the cession" but I don't think they've ever actually told us if the rest is one country or two or who or what that middle bit was ceded to or who controls it now or what their relationship is with the US (or the states on the other side if they're a separate country). And that's before you even get to the entire rest of the world. Presumably every major country must have access to magic for defence. Do they all have the same deals going on where witches get conscripted? And how much do Americans know about other countries in this world? What is their government like? We know they've got a president and that's about it. What is society outside of the military like? So many questions raised, so few answers given. And what the hell is everyone wearing in this picture? If this is meant to promote the show, it's not really representative of.... anything about it.
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May 21, 2020 14:20
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Fair point, I've swapped the poster with one that better encapsulates the show.
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May 22, 2020 14:32
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The weirdest thing about this show for me is that it's executive produced by Will Ferrel and Adam McKay
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May 22, 2020 15:16
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I don't know why nobody else is talking about this show! I stumbled across it on Hulu, and uh, I cannot believe this is a show intended for teens. It is extremely dark and it is astounding that perhaps the strongest theme is that war only leads to death and suffering, and that there is little point in fighting your inevitable early, violent end as a witch, dead on some foreign beach, filled with regret after seeing your extended family die around you. Part of me expected something like "SEAL TEAM SIX" but witches, but instead it is an extremely complex look at the horror of war and the terrible ethical challenges inherent to a system built on violence
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Jun 3, 2020 16:01
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Seven Hundred Bee posted:I don't know why nobody else is talking about this show! I stumbled across it on Hulu, and uh, I cannot believe this is a show intended for teens. It is extremely dark and it is astounding that perhaps the strongest theme is that war only leads to death and suffering, and that there is little point in fighting your inevitable early, violent end as a witch, dead on some foreign beach, filled with regret after seeing your extended family die around you. Part of me expected something like "SEAL TEAM SIX" but witches, but instead it is an extremely complex look at the horror of war and the terrible ethical challenges inherent to a system built on violence Then it is the perfect show for teens to prevent them for joining the american forever war.
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Jun 3, 2020 20:49
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I was kind of expecting big changes in season two, given what happened at the end of season one, but everything's pretty much undone and I guess it's back to normal? And it still doesn't look like they're at all interested in explaining anything at all about the setting. It's really hard to get invested in the bigger conflicts when we've no idea what the history or political situation is. Or even why Alder is apparently allowed to be the immortal vampire queen of the army.
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Jun 23, 2021 14:57
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The line between what's supposed to be mysterious and what simply hasn't been explained is very blurry on this show. Or rather, there are things, like the wall of mushroom or the woman erased from the photo, that are obviously supposed to be mysterious, but there are also basic pieces of world-building that are mysterious to the audience despite the characters presumably knowing all about them. It makes it hard to be particularly invested in finding out the answers to the explicit mysteries when I'm still waiting for someone to explain the core concepts to me. I thought for a moment the new recruit who only just found out she's a witch might be an excuse to give us some of that information, but it looks like she was just there so that Tally would have a reason to be in the museum and see the photo.
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Jun 30, 2021 13:37
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It's setting up interesting stuff, and I'm curious to see what happens.
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Jun 30, 2021 17:56
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Raelle's amazing, groundbreaking powers don't seem to be particularly amazing, tbh. And there's another witch hierarchy outside of both the civilian government and the military, and they're eugenicists? Every detail that gets revealed makes it more and more obvious that the protagonists are living in a dystopia, but I'm not sure if the writers realise that or if they're just doing it by accident?
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Jul 7, 2021 13:38
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Just caught the episode. The mushroom scene made me laugh. Honestly it kinda speaks to the power level of the show that Raelle's powers are considered groundbreaking. I do think that the writers were at a minimum aware of the show being dystopian, seeing as how Raelle's whole character is basically a traditional YA Dystopian protagonist, and Alder is, while the least overarching threat right now, still a primary antagonist.
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Jul 11, 2021 05:17
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Senerio posted:Honestly it kinda speaks to the power level of the show that Raelle's powers are considered groundbreaking. Senerio posted:Alder is, while the least overarching threat right now, still a primary antagonist.
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Jul 11, 2021 05:40
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It's still super weird to me that apparently no one considered it a problem that Alder was a vampire. They're really upset about... whatever it was she did hundreds of years ago that led to the formation of the Spree - to be honest, I didn't really follow what that was all about - and mind controlling the president was an obvious no-no, but all this time she's openly been a vampire and no one even cares.
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Aug 19, 2021 14:59
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My impression has been that a lot of people do care about that, but there's not much they can do about it. Like the President and her VP often seem openly hostile toward Alder in their interactions. Also, most of the scenes we see take place within the military context where Alder has a lot of control within the hierarchy, so we as the audience see more open support of her. Maybe a lot of the regular citizens have come to see her as more of institution owing the the fact that she's been head of the military for centuries. At a certain point though, I remind myself that I'm watching a brooding, teen urban fantasy tv show on Freeform. I can only try my best to fill in the blanks and otherwise enjoy the ride.
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Aug 19, 2021 15:57
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The scene where Alder puppeted the President combined with this week's scene where the President clearly thought it was her own idea before being told kinda makes me think that whenever they were wary they changed their minds mysteriously
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Aug 19, 2021 19:49
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https://twitter.com/Variety/status/1429866239329984519?s=19 Season 3 is gonna be the last season. Honestly more surprised that it got renewed than that S3 is the end.
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Aug 24, 2021 00:47
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The morality of this show is insane. How can you tell if a terrorist or insurrectionist is really a bad person or not? Well, are they a witch? If so, they were probably just doing what they felt was right and they deserve our understanding and sympathy. In fact, we should probably hear them out. Let them make their case. And even if we don't agree, who are we to judge? But if they're not a witch, they're definitely evil. Kill 'em.
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Aug 25, 2021 18:29
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First episode of the third (and I'm assuming still final) season down, and I have no idea what's going on. I guess the three protagonists were framed for killing someone but I don't remember how, why or by whom. And even though they're on the run, they won't wear disguises because Oh, and Scylla knew all along that there was a simple, effective way for Abigail to phone her mum but hadn't told her until well after she snuck out to use a payphone and almost got caught. And we still know basically nothing about the setting. Nothing makes any sense because there is no wider context for anything. They're now moving into "the cession" but we still don't know anything about that place - or the part of what, in the real world, would still be the USA (but we've never heard a single thing about it in this show, to my knowledge), that lies on the other side. I'm assuming that the US is basically three countries, but maybe it's more like two countries with a lawless wild
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Jun 22, 2022 14:54
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