This witchcraft series might depress the business of hook-up apps. Blame Domino
Day. She considers herself a witch, but the way she sucks the life force out of
men is very much like a vampire. Technically, she is a lamia, even though she
never shape-shifts nor slithers on a serpentine tail. She does not know her
true nature, but she intuitively understands it would freak out other witches
in creator-writer Lauren Sequeira’s six-episode Domino Day: Lone Witch,
which premieres tomorrow on Sundance Now.
Day
is trying to lay low in Manchester. She works part-time as a barista, but she
lives by sucking the life-force out of horny jerks she meets through apps. She
never takes enough to kill them, but she always lives them seriously depleted and
with their memories wiped. Unfortunately, she did not find her latest victim’s
recording device. He will be a problem.
Her
ex, Silas was a problem too, but she banished him to an alternate dimension
very much like “the Further” in the Insidious movies. Much to her
surprise, Silas returns, but he insists he harbors no ill-will. Silas still
hopes to harness her power to restore his own magic. Silas’s spell-casting abilities
were [justifiably] hobbled by his mother Esme, the governing elder witch for
Manchester. Clearly, Day needs help from the local coven that discovered her
presence, but she only trusts Sammie, a practitioner of aura magic. In fact,
she will have good reason to be angry with Kat, the coven leader, who secretly consorts
with forbidden ancestor spirits.
The
series has plenty of sexual undercurrents, but Sequeira wisely keeps more bubbling
under the surface rather than in viewers faces. Frankly, sex usually leads to
very bad things, so it almost offers a weird argument for abstinence. (Of
course, there is a long history of vampirism serving as a metaphor for sexually
transmitted diseases, so the same can be true for lamias.)
Unfortunately, you can have a witch-hunt without a witch. However, Sarah Fenn really is
a witch, so it is dangerously easy to target her. Supposedly, Sanctuary is a
town founded on tolerance, where white magic is legal and law-abiding witches
cast spells for the willing. That all changes when her daughter is accused of
using witchcraft to kill a popular fellow student in creator-writer Debbie
Horsfield’s 7-part Sanctuary: A Witch’s Tale, based on V.V. James’
novel, which premieres tomorrow on Sundance Now.
For
years, Fenn always felt comfortable in Sanctuary (sister-citied with Salem),
because she believed it was a place of acceptance. She also did a lot of
favors, including a big illegal one for her mortal coven-member Abigail Whithall,
involving her beloved son Dan. Unfortunately, that would be the same Dan
Whithall who falls to his death during a raging party.
Rather
ominously, suspicion falls on his ex-girlfriend, Fenn’s daughter Harper, who
was q uite distraught when somebody
started playing a sex-tape of her and the deceased during the blowout. To make
matters worse, some of Dan’s neanderthal friends reveal video of Harper making
what they consider suspicious hand gestures. They claim she cast a fatal spell,
even though the teen girl has been officially declared non-magical.
Outside
investigator DCI Maggie Knight tries to keep an open mind, even though most of
Sanctuary immediately turns against Harper. Knight even provisionally clears the
teen, but suspicion then falls on her mother, especially when the persecuted
teen publicly accuses Dan the Man of forcing himself on her, after plying her
with drugs. That sets his mother Abigail and her wealthy doctor husband Michael
on the witch-hunting warpath.
To
say Horsfield lays on the witch-hunting persecution themes heavily would be an
understatement. Yet, it still resonates in this era of trial by social media
and cancelation. Horsfield might be aghast if someone suggested Sanctuary
was a Kyle Rittenhouse allegory, but his supporters could surely draw
parallels. Regardless, it is a vivid illustration of the principles explained
in Charles Mackay’s Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of
Crowds. When a lot of people act collectively on emotion, they can do truly
heinous things.
In
fact, the toxic social dynamics of Sanctuary are quite believable, especially
thanks to Horsfield’s drop-by-drop escalation. These teen characters are
absolutely awful, but maybe that makes them true to life. Hazel Doupe’s portrayal
of Harper Fenn might be the one notable exception. Viewers will feel for her
despite her record of spectacularly bad decision making.
