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In August of 2021, it was announced that Freeform had renewed the supernatural drama Motherland: Fort Salem for its third and final season. While a renewal may sound like good news to some, the decision to end the series after only three seasons came as a blow to many of the show’s dedicated fans, known in the community as “switches.” Following the announcement, fan efforts to save the show and preserve it for further seasons quickly commenced on social media.

Motherland: Fort Salem takes place in an alternate universe wherein witches avoided persecution at the Salem Witch Trials by making a deal with the United States government to fight on behalf of their country. The America depicted in the show is a matriarchal society, and the series follows three witches – Raelle Collar (Taylor Hickson), Abigail Bellweather (Ashley Nicole Williams), and Tally Craven (Jessica Sutton) – who have just begun their basic training with the Army. The new recruits are enlisted to help fight a powerful witch terrorist group known as the Spree. Of particular interest to many fans is the dynamic between Raelle and Scylla (Amalia Holm), who develop a romantic relationship in Season 1. 

Despite less than stellar ratings, a dedicated, international fan base has emerged around the show. In order to get a better sense of the fan activity surrounding Motherland, I spoke to a group of fans called the Morrigan Coven who are working to spread awareness about the show and save it from cancellation. One of the most tangible endeavors in this effort is the Change.org petition Save Motherland Fort Salem, which currently has more than 25,000 signatories. Other strategies have included buying billboards plastered with fan art and sending balloons to the lobby of the Hulu offices (where the show is currently streaming).

I asked the members of the Morrigan Coven about their dedication to the series and how their involvement in this fan campaign started. The Morrigan Coven was founded by a fan named Ames, a 32-year-old Army veteran living in the Southern United States. Ames wasn’t even on social media before they started watching the show but was inspired to get involved in fandom because they wanted to talk about the series with other people. After becoming more involved in the Motherland fandom, Ames decided to step it up a notch. “I thought we could do more. I wanted to connect with people. I wanted to make something that could keep the fandom engaged and keep the hashtag numbers up through the hiatus between seasons,” Ames said. None of the other members of the group had been involved in fan efforts to save a show before either but were similarly compelled to join the cause after watching Motherland. 

I asked the Morrigan Coven why it was this show specifically that inspired them to get involved in fandom more seriously. Ames noted that the chemistry and the dynamic between Raelle and Scylla is something that is especially compelling to them. Alex, a 28-year-old who lives in the UK, loves engaging with the alternative universe the show has created. “It makes you feel like you belong in the world and gives you hope that one day, our world as we know it now can be so accepting of everyone. That's part of the passion for wanting to save the show, because it makes you feel human. It makes you forget for that short time that the world sees you as someone who is different just because of who you love or because of the colour of your skin or your body shape and size.”

Alex went on to say that the show has “literally changed people’s lives,” and Ames concurred with that statement. Ames, who is non-binary, explained that they had never seen non-binary representation on screen before, and that watching the show actually inspired them to begin the process of getting top surgery. 

All the members concurred that one of the things that is so great about the show is how it treats the identities of its characters. As Amber, a 29-year-old who lives on the East Coast of the United States noted, “Raelle and Scylla are two very strong, very prominent leads in the show, and for once their conflicts and character arcs do not revolve at all around their sexuality. Their storyline is completely independent of their sexuality, aside from them being a couple, and it's what we all want and need.” Though the characters on the show deal with a lot of strife and conflict, none of these problems arise from their sexuality, gender, or race. 

Ames, Alex, and Amber all agreed that while the show itself is why they became involved in fandom, the community they have built as a result is an unexpected but cherished outcome. They all echoed one another in this regard, describing how the Motherland fandom has become like a family to them. As Alex put it, “It's a safety blanket I guess from the horrors of the real world. A place to escape and know that you're among like minded people who just like are you looking for a place to belong.” Amber had a similar response, explaining that she first discovered the show and its attendant fandom during a hard time and that it became a very comforting space for her. Ames recounted how the show has given them hope and a support system, something they had never experienced as the result of a television show before. 

Considering their love for the show, it’s not surprising that the members of the Morrigan Coven have been disappointed in how little attention Motherland has gotten within the media at large. All three members I spoke to were ardent in their belief that Freeform hasn’t done nearly enough to promote the show. Ames and Alex both maintained that the show could have been hugely popular had it aired on a network that actually put effort into promoting it. (This has been a common criticism from fans of shows that have been canceled too soon, something that has become increasingly prevalent with Netflix’s strategy of producing “diverse” shows only to cancel them after a season or two.) For these Motherland fans, it's frustrating to see a show as unique as this in terms of its take on representation not be better supported by the network on which it airs. 

While trying to save a show that has already been canceled by a network may seem like a hopeless cause, there is actually a lot of precedent for a situation just like this. Fan campaigns to save a series can be traced all the way back to the emergence of television fandom as a budding form of community. The earliest recorded instance of a fan campaign like this occurred in the late 1960s when fans successfully saved the original Star Trek series from cancellation through an extensive letter-writing campaign. 

In more recent – but still pre-social media – years, Joss Whedon’s beloved series Firefly was able to continue on in movie form primarily thanks to fan efforts. One of the most creative examples of this phenomenon occurred while the WB show Roswell was on air in the early 2000s. Fans of the show sent thousands of bottles of hot sauce – an important plot point on the show – to the WB in an effort to save the series, and it was eventually picked up by UPN for another season. Alex noted that fan efforts to save the series Lucifer – which resulted in the series being picked up by Netflix for its fourth season after it was canceled by Fox – was an inspiration for her in working on the Motherland campaign. 

These types of fan campaigns are especially important for fans when representation is involved. One of the most talked-about fan efforts to save a show in recent years was the controversy surrounding the cancellation of the Netflix series One Day at a Time. Yet another example of Netflix promoting “diversity” without actually making an effort to promote and preserve this content, the cancellation of the show was met by anger and indignation by the show’s fans and creators. The series was eventually picked up by Pop TV three months later after an extensive #SaveODAAT campaign. Similarly, the beloved fantasy series Wynona Earp – which includes a sapphic couple in its central storyline – was saved by fans after languishing in production purgatory for months. Fans were rewarded for their efforts when the series ended with a lesbian wedding. 

What examples like this reveal is how limited this investment in representation and diversity really is. While companies like Netflix and Freeform are often self-congratulatory about their efforts to bring diversity to the screen, there seems to be a lack of follow-through in many instances. In 2020, Aisha Dee, star of Freeform’s feminist Millenial drama The Bold Type, called out the show for its lack of diversity behind the camera, something that seemed to be in conflict with the series’ ethos of progressivism. Netflix recently fired a number of talented women of color from their short-lived editorial site Tudum after recruiting them only months earlier. And just a few days ago it was announced that the CW’s Batwoman, which features a black queer woman in the lead role, was canceled after three seasons. For these fans of Motherland: Fort Salem, there is a sense of disappointment in the lack of investment Freeform has put into the show, and as such, they have taken it upon themselves to make their voices heard. 

So is there hope, after all? The Morrigan Coven think so. Amber is “confident” that their efforts to save the show will have an effect, suggesting that it will be difficult for networks to ignore their passion for the series. But, even if the show doesn’t get picked up for another season, Ames, Alex, and Amber are grateful for the community they’ve built within this fandom. As Amber put it, “whether this is the last season or we get 10 more seasons, we live on through Motherland and Motherland lives on through us.”

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