Streaming on Freeform and Hulu
I love alternate-history sci-fi, and I’m pretty smitten with Freeform’s Motherland: Fort Salem— decadent feminist fun.
The basic premise is that (1) witches are real, and (2) back in American colonial days, a witch named Sarah Adler signed something called The Salem Accord, which decreed that witches would be given legal status in exchange for helping the burgeoning nation fight its battles. With witches so central to the country’s development, US politics and culture took a radically different direction—which is where the show gets even more fun, because the prime shift this caused was that America became a matriarchy.
The military is entirely female, there are women-only section of the country called Matrifocal Allotments, and bloodlines are matrilineal. Men are certainly treated as full equals, but male birthrates have steadily declined over the centuries so there just aren’t that many of them (though there are still male witches, led by a man known as the Witchfather). All the key players in keeping the country running, including the president, are women. This vision of American society is incredibly inclusive. To quote Popwire, it’s “a mainstream television series that readily prioritizes women empowerment, sisterhood, racial and ethnic diversity, and positive LGBTQIAN+ visibility.”
Fictional societies where the status quo is turned on its head aren’t anything new, but what’s impressive about the series is that it’s clearly designed to appeal to a young (mostly female) audience and empower them. Not cater to them, not just make money off them, but celebrate them. The writing, character development, plotlines, and conflicts are constructed around a world where women are central to the action and where diversity is honored. Instead of staging conversations about women in leadership roles, LGBTQ rights, or racial equality, “Motherland” shows us a world where these aren’t even things we need to discuss. The magic of this is that every episode does what science fiction can be so good at: it makes the disparities in our own world more glaringly obvious.
The show has a large and fierce fan following—known as “switches”—all over the world, despite having only aired for two seasons. It’s scheduled for a third season, which is supposed to be its last, but if the Switch Army have anything to say about it, that could change (see the aforementioned Popwire article, or #SaveMotherlandFortSalem on Twitter or IG). I love how engaged the switches are with the series, from watch parties to funding billboards in LA to support the show, and the fan art is incredible. I’ll share some below so you can see.
Even if this kind of show isn’t your usual thing, it’s worth checking out, if only as an antidote to (sigh) reality.
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