The Craft: Legacy (2020)

The Craft: Legacy (2020) tries to update 1996 The Craft to a more modern audience while also trying to appeal to fans of the old one by recreating some of it and giving its lead a direct link to the original witchy quartet. Did it work? Well, if it had, I wouldn't be reviewing it. Warning: SPOILERS.

When her mother moves in with her boyfriend, Adam, Lily switches to a new school where she meets Tabby, Frankie, and Lourdes, three teen witches looking for a fourth member to complete their coven. Soon, they're doing real magic and fighting against their main bully. But will they be able to keep everything under control?

Lily is different, Tabby is black, Lourdes is transgender, and Frankie isn't pretty. That's it for the current coven. Lily has more to do, clashing with her strict stepfather, bonding with magically reformed bully Timmy, and finding out her mother, Helen, has been hiding things from her. Unfortunately, the movie never gets around to show the audience exactly what makes her so different that her mother feels the need to reassure her. Sure, there's the whole witch thing, but she had no idea she could do magic until she met her new friends. And yet, that's still way more than what the rest of the coven gets. Tabby, Lourdes, and Frankie are nothing but sidekicks who provide a dull, sometimes annoying backdrop for Lily's magical evolution. Ironically, for a movie so focused on girl power, it's a male character, Timmy, that ends up getting the most development.

The new witches are a poor substitute for the original ones. While Bonnie and Rochelle had significantly less to do than Sarah and Nancy, their struggles - Bonnie's burns and Rochelle's racist bully - were better defined and much more personal. Now, we get Frankie's jokey wish to make herself look like Kristen Stewart, and Tabby's brief, generic remarks about racism during Two Truths and a Lie. Like Sarah, Lily has issues with her parents, but she doesn't seem to really care about her unknown father and only finds out about the adoption near the end of the movie. On the other hand, Sarah felt the burden of knowing her mother had died giving birth to her. She also even had a suicide attempt in her past. The new characters are basically shallow versions of the more complex older ones. Lourdes being transgender adds nothing to the character or the story. Don't expect something like in A Game of You when Wanda gets excluded from the Moon ritual because she's not a biological woman. Also, don't expect to see any bullying because apparently, the same bullies who make fun of Lily's period mishap, Frankie's looks, gay boys, and the idea of consent don't have a problem with transgender people.

As for the remaining characters, Adam is a motivational speaker that wants to preserve masculinity and has three biblically named sons who go to the same high school as Lily but barely feature in the movie. At one point, we find out Isaiah is a sleepwalker, but nothing comes of it other than a jump scare for Lily. Timmy starts as a bully and ends up becoming the girls' friend after they hit him with a spell to bring out his best self. Helen is supportive of her daughter, though she inexplicably decided to get together with Adam. Really, I don’t get how that happened. How did she miss all the red flags? Did he put a spell on her?

But why am I not talking about the plot? After all, a good plot can compensate for bad characters. That's because there isn't much of it. The characters' magic is as bland as they are. There's no sense of progress like in the original. Suddenly, they're stopping time and then they just go around engaging in some socially conscious mischief. The greyest thing they do is put the spell on Timmy. Soon, he's bonding with Lily, sharing everything with the girls, and standing up against other bullies. His new attitude is obviously something the movie approves of, but it also feels like a parody, which makes Lily falling for this new Timmy a bit weird. He also comes out as bisexual and confesses he hooked up with Isaiah. I'm sure Isaiah would love to know he was outed to his stepsister and her weird friends. Not that it matters since he just disappears from the movie around this time. Anyway, though Timmy is clearly into Lily, she tries to put a love spell on him. Like everything about this movie, it's nothing but a watered down version of the original and doesn't even make sense, as he already likes her.

While the girls are bettering their community, Lily is clashing with Adam (Lilith and Adam, geddit?), who can be both strict and understanding. He also has an old family crest featuring snakes. He explains that they represent regeneration and rebirth. Isaiah (I think) even has a pet snake, so snakes are welcome and cherished in Adam's house. How ironic. Still, it's nice that The Craft: Legacy is trying to rehabilitate this poor animal's undeserved bad reputation.

Timmy unexpectedly dies, making the girls believe it was their fault. When they find out Lily added another spell, they're furious. Only now do they start talking about consent. This is an interesting dilemma: was it wrong to give Timmy a soft version of the conditioning of A Clockwork Orange if it changed him for the better? Lily's love spell, which came out of nowhere, is more obviously wrong, but it's not even clear if it worked. However, the movie doesn't go beyond the surface and when the (convenient) truth is revealed, the girls are free of blame for that tragic turn of events. By the way, after Timmy's confession, you'd think the movie would show Isaiah's reaction to his death. You'd be wrong.

Before the funeral, Lily finds out she was adopted and angrily confronts her mother. Helen, who used to be a psychiatric nurse, tells her it was a complicated situation. The obvious conclusion is that Lily's birth mother was a patient, but since discussing that would've ruined the reveal in the end, Lily never says it. After she accidentally telekinetically pushes Helen during an argument, the other girls decide she's a menace. Even though it's clear from seeing her face that it wasn't on purpose. And they don't even try to talk to her. Idiots. (Then again, maybe the fact that it's an unfair reading of the situation is the whole point, a homage to all the wrongfully vilified women throughout history) Oh, and the trio also include themselves in the binding ritual. Hmm, why? Are they afraid to start hexing people? It's clear that none of them is in danger of losing control. And of course, that includes Lily, even if they don't know it. Because these characters have no dark side, no real bad thoughts (apart from Frankie making some mean girl bump her head) (funnily, no one thought she was out of control then), nothing but goodness and light. I'm not saying they should go all Carrie on everyone, but surely they could've done more questionable things? Or maybe the movie could’ve given us a good intentions gone astray scenario. After all, why stop at Timmy? Anything to make these dull, bland characters seem more human and relatable. And to give this plot some much needed conflict. Sure, it's a bold choice to make a movie without a real villain but...

Never mind, evil Adam is here to unite the witchy sisters against the snake-loving patriarchy because The Craft: Legacy missed the memo about snakes being a symbol of the divine feminine. He wants Lily to give him her powers because women fuck up everything and should defer to men. And of course, it was he who killed Timmy because the girls' spell ruined him. See? It wasn't because they screwed up a spell they had never done before. Or because of Lily's love spell. It was the toxic masculinity cult! This means the coven is not to blame! The other girls show up and they all call the four corners, trapping Adam in the middle and burning him alive. Hooray for sisterhood! No one here is going bad or turning against each other! Take that, infighting, messy, morally complex witches of the original! If you're wondering what was the deal with Adam, the family crest, and his wanting to steal powers, just forget it. We don't even see Adam's newly orphaned sons again. There's also no conversation between Lily and her mother about what happened. The movie doesn't bother explaining anything because it's really about the symbolism and not about these particular characters in this particular story. 

And it's time for the final reveal. Lily goes to meet her birth mother, who's still in a psych ward, and she turns out to be Nancy. Lily is clearly happy, but we don't get Nancy's reaction. Hmm, did the people who made this lifeless, shallow, shitty movie forget that she's a murderer and an attempted rapist? It makes sense that Helen and therefore Lily wouldn't know, but many people who will watch this will probably remember that. So, Lily being happy about this just feels really weird.

Look, I get that it's possible to interpret the 1990s The Craft as some anti-feminist manifesto that shows out of control, catty teen girls who can't handle great power (basically, what evil Adam says about women with power). However, that's only if you ignore everything particular about it and just focus on the most superficial aspects. Sarah, Nancy, Bonnie, and Rochelle are characters in conflict in a movie with a female main cast. Even the older witch who helps Sarah is a woman. They're not perfect, they make mistakes, and they're not always nice, even good girl Sarah. Also, any one of them is more interesting than their successors. Isn't this what everyone means when they ask for different types of female characters? The Craft shows women fighting women with the guidance of other women and what's wrong with that?

VERDICT

With lame characters, a flimsy plot, and forgettable dialogue, The Craft: Legacy is not just a bad sequel - it's a bad movie in general. Watch the original instead.

By Danforth