Motherland: Fort Salem cast and creator tease 'dramatic' season 2 twists

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Published on July 26, 2020 02:17PM EDT

After all those jaw-dropping season 1 finale twists, where does Motherland: Fort Salem go next? Luckily the cast and creator were all on hand for the Freeform series' virtual Comic-Con panel on Sunday to tease what fans can expect from season 2.

The big finale reveal that Raelle's (Taylor Hickson) mother Willa (Diana Pavlovska) is actually alive and has been the one giving the orders to Scylla (Amalia Holm) the whole time is going to have a major impact on Raelle once she learns the truth about the two most important women in her life. But creator Eliot Laurence explained that ending the season on that twist was not always his plan. "We did not know in the writers' room," Laurence said. "It came out of one of those 'what if' moments and we ran with it."

Laurence noted that season 2 is going to begin "on the ground in a Spree cell. We're going to learn what that feels like, we're going to see how the Spree's changing. Both Scylla and Willa will be pulled towards Raelle. It's going to be very dramatic."

Hickson actually predicted that mother of all twists throughout season 1, but was still "completely mind blown" when she read the finale script. "We all had our suspicions but to have them all affirmed, we were all screaming," she said. "Raelle is going to be quite angry with her mother."

But Laurence added that "there's joy in it too and there's definitely a mother-shaped hole in her life that she longs for, so there's going to be many layers" as they unpack that twist in season 2.

As for Tally (Jessica Sutton) giving up her youth to become one of General Alder's (Lyne Renée) biddies, Sutton explained that Tally never thought twice about that sacrifice. "The moment itself on the battlefield, there was no way the unit was going to get out of there without Alder and her power," she said. "It was the impulse of the moment to do the right thing. As the last chapter of season 1, we've seen Tally's arc of her naiveté being chipped away. Lessons were bound to come her way and this beautiful arc that Eliot wrote, she's maturing. She's waking into a woman and waking into her power."

But will Tally eventually become "un-biddied" and ever get her youth back (allowing Sutton to not have to wear old woman makeup all the time)? "I don't want to give that away quite yet," Laurence said, before dropping a tease that got a major reaction from the cast: "But the connection of biddie-ship is so profoundly intimate... and deep. That will haunt Tally throughout the entire season because Tally will start to remember Alder's memories."

Something that will affect all the characters in season 2 is how the story explores the balance between "what is necessary force? What is justifiable?" Laurence added. "That's going to play through many of our characters' dynamics" as the ancient evil force, the Camarilla, returns in a major way.

"The Camarilla are genuinely horrible," Laurence said. "They were a witch-hunting organization that were alive and active back in early Alder days. They were the ones who were behind the Inquisition... using all that chaos to root out witch families. Their stated aim is to wipe the stain of witch blood from the world. They're openly genocidal. They're really, really bad."

But perhaps the Camarilla is not all bad because it might actually force the two warring magical factions of the witch army and the witchy terrorist group the Spree to come together, something that seems impossible given everything that's happened in season 1.

"What we're going to see in season 2 are these very different and very full of conflict organizations — the Spree and the witch army — realize we have the same enemy," Laurence teased. "We may want to help each other because if they win, we're all gone."

Something that excited Ashley Nicole Williams, who plays Abigail Bellweather, is the fact that there are going to be some new guy characters being introduced in season 2. "You're going to get some new male witches," Laurence revealed. "War College is the advanced training that we will be moving into and there are more men there than there were in season 1."

"Abigail! Abigail," she said while laughing and shaking her head. Expect to see some interesting new romantic story lines play out for, yes, Abigail, as well as the other witches. And on the opposite end of the spectrum, there will also be some more stories touching on the "witch hatred" that runs deep in the world of the series that is similar to white supremacy.

Check out the full panel below:

Motherland: Fort Salem will return for season 2 on Freeform.

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