When it comes to Sabrina the Teenage Witch versus Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, there is really no need for a rivalry. Both shows are awesome, and despite having the same source material they are both radically different from one another.
But because they’re so radically different, there are certain things that Sabrina the Teenage Witch totally nailed, and other points where Chilling Adventures of Sabrina absolutely killed it. Obviously no TV show can be the absolute best at everything, but here are 5 reasons why Chilling Adventures of Sabrina is the best Sabrina Spellman adaptation ever made, and 5 reasons why Sabrina the Teenage Witch is obviously the superior.
Original: Because It’s Nostalgic
Sure, there are plenty of younger kids who watch and love Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, and eventually CAOS will become a nostalgic show for them too. But pretty much everyone alive has watched Sabrina the Teenage Witch at some point, and it has been on for so long that now a lot of young adults and adults truly grew up with the original version of Sabrina.
Sabrina the Teenage Witch undeniably set the standard for all things Sabrina in the minds of most, so the OG series deserves it’s props for being the one to pave the way for Chilling Adventures in the first place.
Reboot: Because It’s Rebellious
One of the overarching themes of Chilling Adventures of Sabrina seems to be the idea of rebelliousness. Sabrina herself is an extremely strong minded individual who questions everything, and everyone and everything in the series seems to point towards the benefits of going against the grain and not accepting the status quo as it is.
The entire Spellman family religion is literally sacrilege, but they don’t even take the word of Satan as gospel even though they’ve signed their souls away to him. Chilling Adventures of Sabrina isn’t just edgy to be edgy either, there’s real thematic thought behind it.
Original: Because It’s Fun
When the original Sabrina the Teenage Witch was airing it wasn’t just a hilarious family sitcom, it was one of the biggest anchors of ABC’s old standby programming slot, TGIF.
TGIF was designed to be the peak of family fun, and for years it totally worked. And as a result of their target audience, Sabrina the Teenage Witch was a series that well and truly knew how to have fun. The subject matter was silly, and the show leaned into that.
Reboot: Because It’s Dark
On the other side of that coin we have Chilling Adventures Of Sabrina, a series that takes it’s bread and butter from story lines about demonic possession, witch hunters, and the literal devil himself. Sabrina Spellman might be a teenage half witch/half mortal, but that doesn’t mean that the show shies away from the scarier elements of a world where supernatural beings actually exist.
Quite the contrary in fact, the show relishes in the scarier, more horror-based elements of the story, and the series is much better off for it.
Original: Because Of Salem
Salem is still a significant presence in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, but clearly he could not appear in the same way that most Sabrina fans had become accustomed to in Sabrina the Teenage Witch.
And while there’s clearly no room for a clever talking cat in CAOS, it seems safe to say that the original Salem Saberhagen was one of the most memorable and beloved aspects of the first Sabrina series. This painfully fake looking cat puppet is a legend at this point, and voice actor Nick Bakay made what could have been silly into something truly iconic.
Reboot: Because It’s Gothic
Something that Chilling Adventures of Sabrina truly nails is it’s entire witchrafty vibe. Sabrina the Teenage Witch is ostensibly about a witch, but aside from Sabrina’s actual powers the series really looked like every other TGIF sitcom.
That makes sense, but it doesn’t really capture the essence of Gothic witchcraft either. It’s fun seeing Chilling Adventures of Sabrina fully embrace it’s aesthetic and theme.
Original: Because It’s Relatable
Aside from being a half witch, half mortal girl, who lives with two ancient witch aunts and a talking cat that is in fact a witch criminal who has been sentenced to punishment as a cat, and who has a doorway to a literal other realm in her linen closet, Sabrina Spellman is actually a totally normal and relatable girl.
What made Sabrina the Teenage Witch so much fun in it’s original run is that Sabrina has these incredible powers, but she is also a completely normal girl with average teen girl trials and tribulations.
Reboot: Because Of It’s Representation
Something that Chilling Adventures of Sabrina has been incredibly clear about is how inclusive it wants to be. Obviously there is a whole lot of girl power on screen, but they also pay a lot of attention to every kind of diversity under the sun.
Although diversity in television wasn’t much of a conversation when the original Sabrina the Teenage Witch aired, it’s still pretty uncommon to see a series that is as on top of things as CAOS is, and it’s pretty rad that CAOS fans can either see themselves represented on TV in a way that they’ve never been before or learn more about experiences that differ from their own through the series.
Original: Because It Doesn’t Take Itself Seriously
There are plenty of shows out there about witchcraft that involve good witches who fight against evil spirits and demons and bad witches who love to mess things up, but there aren’t a lot of shows about witches where witches seem to use their powers to just have a blast.
Sure, Sabrina’s powers and spells don’t always go as planned on Sabrina the Teenage Witch, but at worst she accidentally turns her high school rival into a pineapple, and at best she zaps Britney Spears into her room for an impromptu performance. Basically, Sabrina the Teenage Witch just leans into the magic power fantasy with zero shame.
Reboot: Because It’s Feminist
This is no dig at the first iteration, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, because the OG Sabrina was definitely chock full of girl power. However, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina clearly comes at it’s fictional world through a feminist perspective, and that is a lot of fun to watch too.
Sabrina is a seriously empowered and rebellious lass, and this series does not shy away from pretty complex feminist topics that don’t get a lot of representation in mainstream film and television as it is. This Sabrina Spellman has the heart of a warrior and is the kind of role model young girls today deserve.
Original: Because It Captures The Spirit Of Magic
No matter how old anyone is, we all have that instinctive impulse to just believe in magic sometimes. The idea of magic makes the world feel like it’s constantly full of wonder and possibility, and the real beauty of magic is that it allows everyone’s fantasies and imaginations to feel like they could be reality.
And this is what the original Sabrina the Teenage Witch captured so perfectly. There aren’t any philosophical questions to be asked or any reasons why, it’s just a world where pure fantasy comes to life, and where the audience can come along on that fantasy ride too.
Reboot: Because It Captures The Spirit Of Witchcraft
Magic is an extremely abstract concept that can encompass almost anything, but witchcraft is not. Witchcraft is not satanism to be sure, but Chilling Adventures of Sabrina has managed to ground itself in a much more (at least relatively speaking) realistic set of mythology that actually has a lot of basis in real human mythology.
Real witchcraft feels like a form of mysticism that is grounded in reality, so the way in which Chilling Adventures of Sabrina adapts to that and incorporates it into the series makes it feel like CAOS is just real enough to exist in our own world.
