We all know that Motherland Fort Salem was filmed in Vancouver, Canada. Much of it was filmed in studios, but some of it, including some of the very memorable scenes were shot on location around the city.
One of my post pandemic promises to myself for 2023 was to use my passport. So, with my birthday coming up, I decided to really do it in style and go to Vancouver and visit some of the filming sites that I knew about.
And where there is Motherland Fort Salem, there has to be blue balloons. Having some of these left from the Witchbomb convention, I took balloon pump, balloon sticks and blue ribbon with me on the adventures.
The blue balloon has its suitcase packed and ready to go.
Arrived at Heathrow and ready for Air Canada and the Vancouver Pilgrimage.
Maps are essential to find anywhere. Three key locations are within a few streets of each other in Downtown Vancouver.
I have been to a lot of conventions over the years, in the UK and abroad, but Witchbomb was undoubtedly one of the best I have ever been to – anywhere., ever. Just listen to what Sean Harry had to say at the Facebook Live (32) after the event. https://www.facebook.com/starfuryevents/videos/1020995032256504 Listen from 5.10 to 6.20. They acknowledge it was their best ever.
Before the con, I was concerned about two things. I was concerned that this might be the last hurrah for the fandom and that expectations were set so high that I felt people were almost bound to be disappointed. I was glad to be very wrong on both counts. One thing I had not expected was the level of generosity, never has so much free stuff been given to the fans by other fans.
In some ways this was a typical Starfury event, with little early indication that this was going to be special. But when news emerged that three of the guests would be working and would have to curtail their attendance, it did raise stress levels. Lyne and KTY were having to leave early on the Sunday and Amalia wasn’t going to attend until Saturday. But, as Sean said, guests in similar positions would usually have cancelled, rather than make valiant efforts to be with us for the weekend.
The Friday evening opening ceremony set the tone for the event. No, I don’t mean that it started 20 minutes late. We all know convention time is only approximately ever similar to clock time. When it did start, we got the Starfury promo film, followed by the Witchbomb promo and then Sean introduced the guests in order of their appearance on the promo, starting with Diana. So, after KTY, we were expecting him to go straight to Taylor. So, the first surprise of the evening was that Amalia came out on stage. She had been seen at Oslo airport earlier by one of the Norwegian fans, but she was actually there and made it to the Meet and Greet afterwards as well.
Saturday morning was a crazy mix of photoshoots and fan meets, before we settled down for the guest talks in the afternoon. Even here there were surprises, like the announcement of the ice cream van that had free ice creams for attendees. Of course, we all had to find a few minutes to check that out. And there was the LED screen van parked next to it, showing material about Motherland Fort Salem. Photos later emerged of cast members getting their ice creams too!
After the guest panels, there was the autograph session for gold ticket holders. Fans had brought a lot of gifts to give to the cast. But it was reciprocal. Emilie had brought Canadian candy that she was giving out to people getting her autograph. Very nice Maple candy. Just sorry I didn’t take a photo of it before I ate it! Kandyse and Amalia had by far the longest queues. Kandyse was having a lot of fun talking to fans. Amalia just had a lot of autographs to sign. But, all of them were happy and professional, being warm and welcoming even after about 3 hours of autographs. For KTY this was her only autograph session.
The cast’s long day continued when they had to judge the cosplay competition in the evening. That took a lot of discussion. Then they were eventually able to disappear while we partied at the disco.
Sunday morning was more photoshoots and fan meets. Extra fan meets had needed to be scheduled as there was large demand and some of the original allocation sold out very quickly. The guest panels were rearranged on Sunday. Instead of 4 panels, each with 2 people, both the Motherland panels had 3 people. This meant that KTY could leave after her talk and the autograph session could start earlier, allowing Lyne to depart in time for her plane.
But it was the end of the Amalia / Lyne / Taylor panel that blew everything away. Amalia singing Redemption to Taylor is the best thing I have ever seen at a convention. By a very long way. That woman is a goddess, such an amazing gift to the fans. Taylor and Lyne did not know it was going to happen. It started with a showing of the video, which Amalia, Lyne and Taylor came down into the audience to watch. Then Flora Leo, the composer, brought her keyboard onto the stage and it got wild.
Redemption is a song that is meant to be sung, musical theatre style, by Scylla to Raelle. To actually see it happen was unbelievable. The room had spent the previous hour filling with love and emotional energy which Amalia was able to tap into and bring Taylor with her into that energy. To see her look into her eyes and sing and then take her hand and go round the room, was mind blowing. To say it was ‘Magical’ is almost an understatement. Nothing beats that. It left everyone emotionally exhausted, but incredibly happy to have witnessed something that special.
At the closing ceremony, the extended standing ovation that Amalia got actually moved her to tears. Starfury had lots of tissues available! She talked of having been very nervous about coming as she didn’t know what to expect. She had been worrying about it all week, but ‘now’ she couldn’t understand what she had worried about. She had been surrounded by love and affirmation for the whole weekend. She also paid tribute to some of the fans and what they had faced to come here, particularly mentioning one young fan with social anxiety who had flown all the way from Australia because she wanted to meet the cast.
There is no question that our cast had a great time. Taylor said at the closing ceremony that she will come back every year they will have her. So we await Witchbomb 2 next August.
I have been thinking about why this convention was so special and there are two standouts for me.
First the generosity of the fandom. Even Starfury staff said that the amount of gifts for the cast was far bigger at this convention than any other con they had even done. Some cons, there are none at all. At Witchbomb, there were crates and crates of gifts. Fans even brought things to give to other fans, sweets, balloons, name labels, pens, pronoun stickers, cards etc. That level of gift giving creates such a positive energy and atmosphere.
Secondly, the willingness of the cast to start a relationship with the fans. As was mentioned at the opening ceremony, this was the first time they really got to meet us. We came out from behind our screens and so did they. They put a lot of effort into getting to know us. On Sunday, I was in the foyer as one of the guests walked through and she greeted me by name. My first coherent thought was ‘how does she even know my name’? After a few moments thought I realised I had told her at the Friday night Meet and Greet. But then a second cast member greeted me by name later.
This was not just a paid gig for them, they showed that they want to connect with us. We are very fortunate in the cast we got. It reminded me very much of the Earper con the previous week and the way the WE cast relate to their fans. There is a relationship and a commitment there too. Right down to getting a police car for the photo shoots and Kat Burrell spending an hour in the Manchester rain dressed in her police uniform for fan photos.
Whether or not we even get Motherland back on our screens in one form or another, Witchbomb showed that this is a fandom with a lot of mileage in it and a cast that are prepared to travel with us too. Just witness the deluge of fanfic, fan art and new videos that have come out since the con. People are already planning their gifts for next year.
It is a stronger, more empowered fandom, that now goes to Paris at the end of September. It is Jess’s first in person con. Witchbomb had Raylla, Paris had Talder. Can’t wait.
A lot has been written about Raelle Collar as ‘Lesbian Jesus’, but I would like to redress the balance a little but examining Scylla Ramshorn as a St Paul like figure. Raelle is seen by many as a saviour figure, Scylla is the one who is initially the persecutor but who ends up as the one supporting and making sure that the Saviour’s message gets heard.
If anyone is not familiar with the story of St Paul, he was someone well educated and zealous for God, but initially he showed his zeal for God by persecuting members of the early Christian church. He was on his way to Damascus to try to arrest and kill members of the church there, when he had an encounter with God on the Damascus Road. God showed him that he was persecuting God’s people instead of serving them. He ended up in the hands of the leader of the local church.
The idea of a Damascus Road experience, is not a redemption story of someone turning from evil to good. Scylla was never an evil person. It is the story of a moral person realising that they are fighting for the wrong cause and changing their life. Scylla had always wanted to protect witches, that did not change. What changed was how she went about it.
How exactly Scylla came to join the Spree has never been fully explained. We know that the army killed her parents when she was 16. Alone, angry and in pain, young idealistic people like her are easy prey for grooming and radicalisation. Anyone recruiting for the Spree would have targeted her to join them, to give her the family she needed and somewhere to put her pain. But in doing that they gave her the wrong target.
The Spree attacked civilians, seeing them as the cause of witch conscription and so a major cause of the loss of lives of so many witches. Scylla believed that if she was to save witches, the way to do it was to kill civilians. We see her commit mass murder in the mall attack and kill more personally, when she kills Porter and Shane.
Scylla’s Damascus Road experience began when she got captured at the Bellweather wedding. She was strong, confident that she was right and that the army were fighting for the enemy. She was telling herself a simple story of good and evil. She had never listened to the other side of the story before.
Anacostia made her listen. And she made Scylla explain herself. Just as the head of the Damascus church had done for Paul, so Anacostia would forgive her, protect her and release her to continue her fight.
So, why did Scylla take Raelle as her moral compass and not Anacostia? Raelle had rejected her. Anacostia had taken the time to understand her and had shown her undeserved kindness, she was so much like Scylla herself. She made Scylla realise that even though her goal to protect witches was good, she herself was motivated by hate. The way out of that is to love. Raelle, and Scylla’s love for her, could reach parts of her soul that even Anacostia couldn’t touch.
After release, Scylla’s journey had many of the same highs and lows that Paul’s journey had. The highs of addressing councils and world leaders. The lows of further imprisonment and torture. The sacrifices to save others, such as when Scylla offers herself to save Tiffany or to save Edwin. Even a ship wreck (OK, a different kind of ‘ship’!)
If Scylla had delivered Raelle to the Spree or if Tally had not seen the balloon, then Scylla would not have had her values challenged. She would not have had to make the commitment to love above all else. She would have continued to fight the wrong battle. The Damascus Road experience that delivered her into the hands of those she thought of as the enemy, was the thing that made all her victories possible,
We first meet Edwin’s favourite café in the Cession in episode 2.6 My 3 Dads. Tally and Raelle are waiting outside the café and discussing the noticeboard while waiting for Edwin.
In the Cession, the café is called Nimaamaa’s kitchen. Nimaamaa is an Ojibwe word, meaning Mother or My Mother. Essentially it is Mother’s kitchen. The name both pays homage to the languages of the people of the Great River in the Cession and acknowledges that this is Motherland.
Once Tally, Raelle and Edwin are inside the café, we see them sitting at a booth by the window. There are no curtains in the café and the surveillance van with army personnel can be seen through the window.
Edwin visits this café again in episode 2.9 Mother of All, Mother of None. This time it is Scylla who is sat with him in the booth, while Quinn is also there with Tiffany. Quinn is introducing Tiffany to the dodger family who will take care of her. Edwin and Scylla are sitting in exactly the same booth that Raelle and Tally used earlier.
Although it is the same café, there is one significant difference now, there are curtains at the windows. If those curtains had been there 3 episodes earlier, we would not have been able to see the surveillance van parked outside. I can’t work out whether the curtains were removed for episode 2.6 or were added specially for episode 2.9.
In both episodes where this café was used as a filming location, they also filmed at City Hall, Port Coquitlam. Raelle and Tally walk through it in episode 2.6 and it is the site of the Morrigan’s Whisper dance in episode 2.9. So it was reasonable to assume that the two locations were very close together. In fact they are down the street and round the corner from each other.
Then I found a new Behind The Scenes photo of Edwin.
There are curtains in the windows here.
Once I had a name, I could find a better image of the real café online. This image gives a better view of the curtains.
The real café is Matteo’s Gelato. The address is 2615 Mary Hill Rd, Port Coquitlam, BC V3C 3A9. The street number 2615 can be seen to the right of the door in the second photo above.
On the map below, the City Hall location is marked in red. Matteo’s Gelato is round the corner on Mary Hill Road.
Having found these and other interesting locations, the next step is to plan the trip to Vancouver to visit these places for myself. I want an ice cream from this café and I want to eat it sitting in that same booth. Vancouver Pilgrimage!
We don’t actually see Scylla get arrested, we just meet the situation where she is being interrogated by Izadora and Anacostia.
It is only at the end of 1.6, Up in Down, that we see Izadora and Anacostia with Scylla. It seems clear that they are trying some sort of good cop / bad cop tactic with Scylla and it is not working. Izadora is not an obvious choice of an interrogation partner for Anacostia. But Scylla was her student, so she would have been one of the people who would know Scylla best.
Anacostia and Scylla clearly had an antagonistic history. We first see this in the opening episode 1.1 Say the Words, when Anacostia warns Scylla in the hospital to stay away from Raelle. At that point Scylla backs down and let’s things play out.
But the situation doesn’t stay there. As Scylla’s relationship with Raelle develops, Scylla becomes confident enough to stand her ground against Anacostia. Their altercation at the Bellweather wedding was classic.
When Anacostia reminds Scylla to stay away from Raelle, Scylla does not back down. The words are polite, but the body language oozes confidence. Even to the point where she tells Anacostia ‘don’t take this out on Raelle. I take full responsibility for disobeying your orders.’
She doesn’t say ‘I take full responsibility for my actions’ or ‘for our relationship’, she uses the one thing that Anacostia could pursue if she wanted to do so – disobeying orders. It is Scylla issuing a challenge – ‘If you want a piece of me, come and get me’.
This time it is Anacostia who backs off. Leaving Scylla with the last words ‘Yes Ma’am’. The raised chin, the smirk, this is Scylla’s way of showing that as long as she doesn’t cross the line, there is nothing that Anacostia can do about her.
This is personal. We never get to know the origin of their animosity. But Scylla has played a dangerous game, one that makes sense if she was intending to go away with Raelle. But by baiting Anacostia, she will just make Anacostia more determined to break her.
So, in the confusion of the balloon attack, she is arrested as a member of the Spree and set up for interrogation. Asking her about the planned attack on the Bellweather wedding was never going to get her to answer because she simply didn’t know. She will have seen the balloons, but would probably not know the attack on Charvel and Abigail had even happened. She can’t tell Anacostia what she doesn’t know.
But she doesn’t deny being part of the Spree. She even has the confidence of her convictions to berate Alder, who she sees as responsible for the ‘enslavement’ of witches into the army. She believes in the cause she is fighting for. It is her moral compass and her integrity.
Anacostia tries to link with her, to see her mind, but at this point Scylla is strong enough to block her out. Anacostia leaves her with one of the sound boxes, probably seed 14, the seed of interrogation. Clearly this is a distressing experience. No food, certainly no sleep, but when Anacostia tries again Scylla is still strong enough to resist, even trying to headbutt her. Now it is a clear battle of wills between the two of them.
Despite everything she has put Scylla through, Anacostia is not sure that she will win this battle. So she tries a different and less ethical strategy. She brings Raelle into this, without Raelle’s consent. This must be a gamble. If Scylla’s feelings for Raelle were genuine, this had a chance to work, but if Scylla was just using her then it was going to be a waste of time.
But we know that Scylla’s feelings were genuine and that when the soldiers removed Raelle from the room, Scylla’s distress finally allowed Anacostia to take advantage and join with her. Essentially this is mind rape. We see the memory of Baylord autos and Anacostia gets what she needs. Anacostia’s anger as she walks out is understandable, she knows Scylla is responsible for a major Spree attack with a lot of deaths. But what else did she see when she was in Scylla’s mind?
Anacostia did see more than the Baylord attack. There is no other plausible reason for her actions. Whatever Anacostia saw, makes her start to change her mind about Scylla. She makes the first approach to Alder to advocate for her, but Alder doesn’t want to know.
What happened to Scylla while Anacostia was on Citydrop? We know that Anacostia was responsible for leading her cadets into the execution (or murder) of Spree operatives and of their innocent civilian hostages. Anacostia killed people because of her orders, and her values, believing those people were the enemy and accepting the civilian casualties as collateral. Did she make the connection that what she had just done was exactly what Scylla had done? Just on a smaller scale.
I think she realised that a decision to kill is not a straightforward choice of good versus evil. Good people died at Citydrop. Good people killed them. Is Scylla’s integrity any different?
I think Anacostia questions her own moral actions and the actions of those giving her orders. Perhaps she has regrets about those deaths. But it means that she talks to Scylla, who might have some of the answers. She wants to know what it is like ending thousands of people.
Scylla has recovered some of her bravado, but now that the army have got what they wanted from her, her future is uncertain. Anacostia tells her that Alder to send her to a prison, which will be a death sentence. Why do such places exist in the Motherland Universe? Scylla knows that the only reason she is still there is because Anacostia still wants something from her. When she realises what it is, she has something to bargain with and asks to see Raelle again as her price for co-operation.
That meeting with Raelle does not go well, she feels betrayed by Scylla and the last thing Raelle says is that she wishes they had never met. As she never saw Scylla again, believing she never would, Raelle probably came to regret those last words.
Scylla’s defence was that ‘I chose you’. Powerful words, showing an even stronger decision. She had to make a choice – to deliver Raelle to the Spree or to defy her orders and to protect Raelle. She wanted to protect all witches and she decided that she wanted to do it with this woman by her side, whatever the consequences would be. She chose Raelle. In her mind this was not a betrayal of Raelle, but the choice of her over everything else.
Scylla is distraught. So is Raelle afterwards. Raelle advocates for Scylla as Anacostia had done with Alder, even asking her to get the prison to ‘go easy’ on Scylla, that ‘she’s not all bad’. All this adds to the unease that Anacostia is feeling, the idea of a simplistic good or evil just doesn’t work anymore.
Scylla and Anacostia finally have the talk with each other that they have probably never had with anyone else. Anacostia gives Scylla a picture of her dead parents and they trade stories of the death of their parents and how they both found family – Anacostia with the army and Scylla with the Spree. They see the humanity in each other and the way that each could so easily have stood in the other’s shoes.
The part that might have really gotten to Anacostia is when Scylla says that she had been kinder to her than she needed to be. Then she simply says ‘Thank you’. That level of maturity and forgiveness after everything she has been put through meant that Anacostia could no longer even pretend that she saw Scylla as evil and deserving to die. She had found an integrity and a goodness in her that could not be ignored. Perhaps Alder’s order to send Scylla to a death camp could be ignored or worked around.
Sometimes integrity means not carrying out orders that you know to be morally wrong. Sending Scylla to her death would have been one of those situations, so Anacostia helps Scylla to escape and return to the Spree. Had she gone to Petra to get the mission authorised? We don’t know.
We do know that after the hell they had both just been through, that they had turned their animosity into respect. They had set themselves on a path that would save both of them.
Motherland Fort Salem is set in an Alternate Universe (AU). In a version of contemporary America. General Alder’s conversations about how long the Salem Accords have been in place set the first season in 2019. So it is ‘now’ but different.
I have a bit of a weakness for AU fantasy books and movies / TV. They offer some of the sharpest contrasts to our contemporary world and so can ask some of the deepest questions about humanity and what it means to be human. Motherland asks some of the very deepest questions. None of us would be the same in this universe.
Scientifically there are different ideas about how Alternate Universes are created. Has a parallel universe always existed, perhaps in another phase or dimension. Does history branch and create a new AU after every decision and change? Lots of respectable science and even more maths – but nobody reads this blog for a physics lesson. I am going with the idea that ‘something changed’, creating a new AU. Before that their AU was the same as our universe. Even if that universe was a primordial swamp.
The timeline on the blackboard in Citydrop and the season 1 discussions give the idea that the worlds would have diverged in 1692 when Sarah Alder made her deal for witches to fight America’s wars.
This timeline does have some similarity with our universe, but subtly different in others.
One glaring omission here is anything that is not about war or fighting. Admittedly, this is a military training ground, but if another classroom can have chemistry on the blackboard, then why not other things? No Moon landings or California Gold Rush, or Great Depression or presidents getting assassinated. Did these things not happen or were they just not important enough to count?
Remember, the Moon landings took place using technology from the 1960s. The Motherland AU level of tech is behind our universe, but it is well beyond what would have been needed for a moon landing. Did it happen? What does that say about this universe if things like that didn’t happen?
But we must judge on the evidence before us. Comparing the dates of events with their real counterparts, some things are fiction, like a second Mexican war and the rise of the Spree. Some things are missing, like the second World War. Interestingly at the time, the ‘First World War’ was called the Great War, as it was believed it was so big that it would be the war to end all wars. The idea of it being a world war was too big to use. Interesting that the Motherland universe uses that name.
But what does it say about the War of Independence and the First Mexican wars that they were forty years earlier? Was that a sign of hostility or just a desire for independence of any influence with other countries. If so, why no wars with the French?
If there was a civil war, what were they fighting about? Was it still a war about the ‘right to own’ slaves? Or something very different indeed?
And what about the creation of the Cession? We know that is older than the United States itself, but when was it created and why? Does it predate the Salem events? There is so much history to learn, but history is not everything.
Until the start of season 3 I was working on the idea that the divergence of our two universes was recent, but the opening scene of Homo Cantus changed all that.
136,455 years ago six women came together and their song changed the world. It takes the helicopter scene from Revolution Pt 2 to tell us what happened, that the Mother merged with the six women and changed their voices and the way they hear. These descendants came to be known as witches and were feared for their gifts. This established the Matrilines that are such a feature of contemporary Motherland.
This was the origin of what happened in Salem. Sarah Alder had those gifts and was able to use them once she was able to speak to the people of Salem. They feared her voice and had kept her gagged, but when she was ungagged, she could sing the songs that would change history. But the universe had to change first, to make the songs possible.
But what about civilians? The Matrilines and the army show that they are a matriarchy, but wider civilian society doesn’t seem to show the same traits. Think of Shane and Bonnie of Not Our Daughters in early season 2. He is clearly the one who controls their relationship, in an unhealthy way. His hatred for witches infects his family. Would things have been different in a matriarchal society, where Bonnie had grown up enjoying the privileges of power and resect instead of him?
So many questions, so few answers. Unless Eliot Laurence writes the Motherland books, the only way we will find out for sure is if there are more seasons. So, #SaveMotherlandFortSalem
To be honest, a dramatic Raylla scene like that would usually have my mind elsewhere, but this was the image that just stopped me completely. There is a really clear image of this, but there is a second sticker underneath that reads LIGHT ‘EM UP.
It just stopped me in my tracks for two reasons, one was the subconscious resonance with bumper stickers from a previous era – the notorious Florida bumper stickers of ‘kill a queer for Christ’ (a toxic sentiment consigned to the dustbin of history and a stain both on Florida and on the Christian groups behind it). The other reason it stopped me is because I am Christian – I know this ‘theology’ exists, but it does not speak for me.
One good thing about having a theology degree is that I understand there is toxic material in the Bible if you simply take things out of context. With almost 35,000 verses you could probably find one verse that fitted most views, which is why you can’t just take a few words and justify killing a whole group of people.
The Camarilla do just that. They have taken Exodus 22.18 as a defining symbol of their movement. The Camarilla army have it on their jackets as we first see in 3.05
When the Camarilla army invade Fort Salem in 3.10 we see it on all their uniforms. They do not want justice, they want to use the Bible to justify their desire to kill witches.
We first see these specific references in the Not Our Daughters protests in 2.4.
The protestors are making it clear that they do not want their daughters tested, but they want witches executed in line with so called ‘biblical truth’. We see these ‘biblical truths’ used again and again by Alban Hearst and the Camarilla as they try to justify their actions.
We see this in 3.5 when Hearst has broken in to the hotel where Abigail, Tally, Scylla and Adil are being kept prisoner by the Marshall and the Council of the Great River. Hearst quotes Job 4.9, saying ‘By the blast of God, they perish. And by the breath of his nostrils are they consumed’ as he prepares to kill them. Hearst is even quoting from the Epistle to the Hebrews as he is at a drilling site to poison the Mycelium.
Use and misuse of the Bible run throughout Motherland Fort Salem. Interestingly, the only character who can be seen as actually using the Bible in a way that Jesus would recognise is Raelle. (That discussion is for another time.)
But let’s examine what Exodus 22.18 is actually all about.
16And if a man entice a maid that is not betrothed, and lie with her, he shall surely endow her to be his wife.
17If her father utterly refuse to give her unto him, he shall pay money according to the dowry of virgins.
18Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.
19Whosoever lieth with a beast shall surely be put to death.
20He that sacrificeth unto any god, save unto the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed.
21Thou shalt neither vex a stranger, nor oppress him: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.
This is one sentence, that even within its own context about restitution for actions, does not carry a lot of weight.
A big problem for the people of Israel was that they had to remain distinct from their neighbours, as a separate people of their God. That led to all sorts of dietary laws and worship codes. Many of the neighbouring cultures practised divination, seeking oracles of the future, communicating with the dead and casting spells. These things were seen as unacceptable to God’s people. Seeking to know the future by divination was seen as denying faith in God to control the future. Communication with the dead and casting spells were using a power other than God’s and would be understood as hostile to God. So the people of God were not to do such things because they denied God.
In the universe of Motherland Fort Salem, the irony is that this situation is reversed. Work is seen to come from the gift of the Goddess, the Mother Mycelium. The different larynx and ear structures are a direct gift from the Mother. Witches would understand that when they are doing work, that they are using the gifts of the Goddess, not rejecting them. Theirs is an act of faith, not an act of rebellion or heresy.
But, in the Motherland universe, there are changes and we cannot honestly say that the Bible of that universe is exactly the same as the Bible in our universe. Maybe it says more things about witches that might make the Camarilla feel their views are justified. But people will always find a way to use religion to ‘validate’ their own views and I am sure the Camarilla are no different.
I know that too many killings have happened in the name of religion and in the name of Christianity. Too much hate, when the message of Jesus was about loving neighbour. Will images like the one at the start of this blog continue to unsettle me – yes, and they should. Honestly Christians have to do better.
That is one of the things that I actually love about Motherland, that it does challenge me and makes me uncomfortable at times. We should never stay in our comfort zone too long, or we forget that we need to grow. So, I keep this image on my desktop to remind me of that.
We all know the one I mean. The final scene of 3.10, Revolution Pt 2.
Now, to be totally honest, I liked the finale up to this last scene. The death of Anacostia was a tragedy, but she was moving on to a new role on a new show and this honoured her contribution.
I know some people are not happy that Scylla and Adil were not in the helicopter scene. However, I don’t think they had a part to play in it. When the cataclysm happened it was Tally, Abigail and Raelle who played pivotal parts in it. Tally and Abigail as stewards, singing their part of the song and Raelle with the Witchbomb sending their message all round the world. Then Raelle healed Adil and Scylla. This storyline started with the unit and ended with the unit. Adil and Scylla would still be there when the Bat landed back at Fort Salem.
But, I don’t understand the helicopter scene. It almost screams deleted scene, or at least deleted lines. There have been a few bits previously that I wanted to rewrite, but this makes me just want to take that page from Eliot and totally rewrite it. Keep it open ended, but get it to make sense.
Here’s what they actually say:
Alder: You’re going to want to listen carefully. The Mother wants a word.
Echoing voice (Amanda Tapping’s voice overlaid on Lyne Renee’s): Long ago I merged with six women. I changed their voices and the way they hear. As my gifts travelled down their lines, descendants of the six came to be known as witches, and they came to be feared for their gifts. Now my gift is freely given, thanks to you three. They are awake, all of them singing one song.
Tally: And the Camarilla?
Alder / Mother: They are witches too, like everyone else. [Addressing Tally] You saw my plan. You saw how all the pieces work together. The parts you all played.
Tally: Will it be enough?
Alder / Mother: That is up to you. The world will need new stewards. They will need your vision [Tally], your care [Raelle] and your fury [Abigail]. Well done. They will call you goddesses.
Alder: Did you get all that?
Tally: It doesn’t mean what I think it means?
Raelle: We’re ancient.
Alder: Like an old friend once said, witch is just a word they call us. She has spoken. In fact she has just told me that my work is done. Thank you for changing the world my daughters.
[She kisses each of them].
Alder: When they call you goddesses, make sure you live up to it.
Tally, Raelle, Abigail: Let us begin – Khàsémé àvá.
One thing that seems glaringly absent from this scene is any Abigail dialogue. Abigail doesn’t get a line in this scene. Raelle may only have got two words, but Abigail deserved something. I just wonder what was filmed and not shown.
I can’t work out if the Mother is thanking them for what they have done or what they are going to do or both.
Alder / Mother’s first part does make sense, the idea of the six women we saw at the start of 3.1 Homo Cantus having their voices and hearing changed is what we have been shown through the seasons. That these changes were gifts and made people fear them is reasonable.
When the Mother says ‘Now my gift is freely given’ does this mean that everyone’s voices and hearing has been changed? As for the ‘They are awake, all of them singing one song’ part, here is where I start to lose it. Awake in what sense? All of them singing one song, is that some peculiar way of saying that harmony has been returned to the world? Is the Mother trying to say that it was a way of healing divisions between people and ending hatred and prejudice? Or is it more metaphysical, about all being children of the Mother? If that is the meaning then it has major implications for the world religions.
The idea of the Camarilla being witches too is unsettling. If they are committed enough to hating witches that they form an army and wear 22.18 on their jackets then the last thing they want to become are witches themselves. They would not want to become what they themselves hate. When you hate what you are and cannot change, then it is a bad place to be.
Then it gets weirder, with the idea that the world will need new stewards. Stewards of what? Stewards of the first song, version 2? Then we need Khalida and the others in that Bat too. What are these new stewards supposed to do? And as for them being called goddesses? Why? Honestly that was bizarre. Why would they be called goddesses? Perhaps Alder was talking about the long distant future, when stories of the origin of the new world order are told and the unit become almost mythological and achieve goddess like status in the retelling.
The only person who seems to understand what is going on is Tally. She asks ‘It doesn’t mean what I think it means?’. I am not sure if Raelle was serious or joking when she replies, ‘We’re ancient.’ Perhaps that is a question to ask Taylor at the London con in August.
Somehow it is fitting that the last line of this scene is said in unison. Their Khàsémé àvá ‘Let us begin’, in Mothertongue both suggests an ancient past and the start of a new future.
Powerful, but I think something got lost along the way. Probably a few lines of dialogue to join the dots. I would love to see an original script for this scene, it might help me to understand. Failing that – Tally, have you got time for a couple of beers? I’ll buy.
Scylla and Anacostia are not hundreds of years old. They do not have a special connection with the Mother Mycelium or have special gifts of sight, they are not Stewards or among the most powerful witches that ever lived. Instead, they are the everywoman (every witch) characters. Neither of them would claim to be especially powerful or important witches. History will probably not remember them, but we certainly will.
What they are is knowledgeable, wise and very well trained. They are us in that alternate universe if things had worked out differently. More importantly they represent what each other could have become if our lives had taken other paths. They have a complicated relationship and recognise in each other that if their paths had turned out differently, they might be in each other’s shoes right now.
A key thing for both Scylla and Anacostia is that they both lost their parents when they were young. Both their parents died suddenly and together and left them alone in the world. Scylla and Anacostia both hold the army responsible for their parents’ deaths, but where Scylla blames the army for deliberately killing her parents, Anacostia does not blame the army. Her parents died by their choice in following the army rules about not using Work off base.
After suddenly becoming orphaned, Anacostia is immediately swept up into a new family as one of the Army Fosterling programme. She had a new family, people who loved her and raised her in the army values. They gave her a path and a set of values to make sense of her life. They made her who she is.
For Scylla, it was completely different. She was left alone in a dodger world, where there was no Fosterling programme. There was nobody to take her in, nobody to look out for her and raise her. Instead she was alone and vulnerable, which meant that she was easy prey for groups like the Spree, who would take her in and give her a sense of belonging and purpose. This is grooming and is how radicalisation starts. This radicalisation of young, isolated people is so common that it is something people are taught to look out for in things like the PREVENT anti-radicalisation strategy. She would have been taught off canon magic, taught who were the ‘real’ enemy and indoctrinated.
This difference in their paths shows up powerfully in their different reactions to General Alder. Anacostia sees Alder as a substitute mother figure, someone she looks up to and reveres. It is this reverence for Alder that makes her disillusionment at seeing things like Alder puppeting President Wade so difficult to handle. Her idol has feet of clay after all.
Scylla’s attitude and opinion of Alder are shown up when Alder comes to see her in the interrogation chamber. She blames Alder for the fact that witches have to surrender themselves to the military and fight wars whether they believe in them or not. She believes that she is fighting for the liberation of witches from some form of slavery. Despite everything she has gone through, she is strong enough and determined enough not to be cowed by Alder. All she has to fight back with are her words and beliefs, but fight back she does.
Anacostia recognises something of herself in Scylla. Their relationship prior to the Bellweather wedding had been a frosty, or even antagonistic one. She sees her own path so clearly, that whatever life journey Scylla had been on was something she did not understand, but wanted to. It was Anacostia’s unwillingness to give up on Scylla that eventually saved both their lives.
The relationship each of them had with Raelle complicated things. Now is not the place to think through all those strands. Anacostia knew that Raelle was Scylla’s weakness and she wanted to break her. She was willing to use Raelle as a tool to do that.
We don’t know the full extent of what Anacostia learned when she was able to probe Scylla’s mind. She clearly learned more than the flashback we saw because she knew Scylla had been responsible for the deaths at the mall.
After Scylla’s escape, the Anacostia – Scylla reunion at the Mall Memorial was where Anacostia pulled no punches in her condemnation of Scylla and her actions. Perhaps Anacostia thought she was trying to reach someone committed to the Spree cause. She had no idea at that point that things had changed. She didn’t know that Willa had changed the mission. As Scylla would say to Raelle after they had rescued her, that it was not about fighting conscription or liberation at any cost. It was about stopping the people who had hurt Raelle, ‘They are the only enemy that matters’. As they were about to part again, Scylla said she would ‘hunt down the Camarilla and make sure they don’t put any more of us in cages’.
They are both teachers. Anacostia has made that clear from the start that she is about getting the recruits to survive basic training. She trains them to be warriors. But we see Scylla sharing her Spree knowledge and teaching others some of the tricks and tactics she has learned. She taught Quinn when she was staying with Edwin in the Cession and clearly taught Anacostia things like how to take someone’s face and she, in turn, taught Sterling. Petra was very grateful for that bit of Spree magic when President Silver arrived unexpectedly.
As their paths grew together and intertwined, they influenced and changed each other. Their shared values grew and so did their respect for each other. Each sacrificed herself to save others, Anacostia died for others in the season 3 finale. Scylla sacrificed herself to save the councillors of the Great River by allowing herself to be captured so they had a chance to escape.
Two people, so different from each other at the start, found a path that allowed them to bring out the best in each other and to grow into their shared values. They each found a better path. A path that eventually allowed them to fight side by side to retake Fort Salem. One that we could all learn from and follow.
Therefore it is fitting that Scylla’s final words in season 3 were about Anacostia. She said ‘She saw the good in everyone.’
But Scylla’s final words were in a group tribute to Anacostia. A tribute that saw not just the respect for Anacostia and her path, but Scylla fully reintegrated as a member of the army and part of the unity. Paths that had started so far apart had come together and changed each other’s lives.
When most television shows come to an end, that is final. But that is not true for all shows. Some live on in future versions and forms.
At this point there have been three seasons of Motherland Fort Salem and the third season is supposedly the final season. However the fan campaign to get one of the big streaming platforms to commission a fourth season is very strong. There is a lot of activity, a lot of trending and season three spreading out round the world. The fan base is growing. Will it succeed? At this point it is hard to tell.
I do believe that at some point there will be a return to Fort Salem. Whether it will be another season, or a sequel or prequel or a spinoff or a TV movie(s) or theatrical film or even a reboot in the future, it is too early to predict. Maybe several of them. How long it will take, I have no idea.
When most TV shows finish they usually die, but some don’t. It tends to be the most original that don’t die, especially those who create their own universe. With a rich story telling potential there is so much more to explore. Motherland Fort Salem is definitely original – we have not seen anything like this before.
Fan campaigns have always been a big part of those shows that continue after first cancellation.
The first time that a fan campaign was successful in getting another season for a show was the original Star Trek series in the 1960s. That was originally cancelled after just two seasons, but the determined fan campaign got a third and final season. Then it just stopped until the Star Wars movie came along in 1977. Suddenly big sci-fi epics were back and every studio wanted their own big movie so the Star Trek revival happened. With nine further films and ten spin off series, five currently in production, Star Trek is still going strong.
Babylon 5’s planned five season story arc had to be cut short when they were renewed for a fourth and final season. Except that the show was picked up by another studio to make a TV movie and there was so much interest that they commissioned the fifth season to finish the story.
Firefly only lasted one season, but came back as the theatrical movie Serenity and even now is still alive with five tie-in novels published in the last year.
Battlestar Galactica was originally a one season wonder. But in 2004 it was rebooted. It lasted five seasons and led to TV movies as well. This reboot did make some significant changes from the original, most controversially was casting Starbuck as a woman. The reboot proved to be far more successful that the original.
Imagine a Motherland Fort Salem reboot, there would be changes to reflect the new times. One thing that reboots like to do is to use original cast members in the new reboot, playing other parts. I can just see Jessica Sutton in a reboot playing Sarah Alder or Ashley Nicole Williams playing Petra Bellweather. Taylor Hickson and Amalia Holm would have to be in there for at least an episode if a reboot stays true to form.
Where does that leave the fans now? One thing about the powerful shows is that they leave a legacy, which is part of why they are attractive to future studios. There will be a demand for convention appearances for a long time to come. One legacy of the pandemic is that few fans have actually met any of the cast, so there is a huge untapped market there. With that comes the relationships and friendships that form and last. I have friends form previous fandoms that I have known for twenty plus years. Shared experiences and shared values matter. When twitter and Instagram have stopped trending Motherland Fort Salem, the fans will still be there. New people will discover the show in years to come and one day the time will be right to come back.
For now, we want season 4, but we have to be realistic, shows saved by fan campaigns only get one more season. What do we want after that? Sequel? Prequel? Books? Webisodes? What do the cast want? What does Eliot Laurence want?
In the meantime we have the Starfury convention Witchbomb to look forward to. Details at Witchbomb – A Motherland: Fort Salem Convention – Starfury Conventions (seanharry.com) With Gold tickets selling out in about 9 days the demand to meet the cast and crew is strong. So is the desire for Switches to have the chance to meet each other, which the pandemic has largely denied us.
For the time being we have to create our own new content and demand. This blog site is offered in that spirit. We may not have new on screen content, but there is always fanfic to sustain the interest and explore some of the stories not told onscreen. The main site for Motherland Fort Salem fanfic is at www.archiveofourown.orgMotherland: Fort Salem (TV) – Works | Archive of Our Own
So, let’s enjoy what we have, fight for more and never shut up about our show. One day they will be back.
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