Sabrina Spellman should be a series regular in Riverdale’s final season

After the airing of Riverdale’s most recent episode, “The Witches of Riverdale,” it would be a missed opportunity to not bring Sabrina Spellman back to finally bring closure to her storyline and character during the final season of Riverdale. In fact, Kiernan Shipka should be promoted to full-on series regular, to help bring Riverdale through its final season in spectacular, and witchy, fashion.

It’s no secret that Riverdale has gotten crazier and crazier over the years, but the inclusion of the supernatural in the most recent season has finally allowed the series to reach new levels of insanity, making the sixth season the show’s best. Sure, Archie is invulnerable and Cheryl is a witch with the power to resurrect anyone she wants from the dead, but that’s what makes this newest season so good. Riverdale has finally, completely jumped the shark, and the evolution of the characters and story overall has done nothing but benefit from the madness.

The most recent episode featured a long-awaited guest appearance from Kiernan Shipka’s Sabrina Spellman, especially after her 11th hour-inclusion in the Rivervale event. After finally seeing her featured in an entire episode, it’s hard not to want more. Moreover, her series’ premature cancellation in 2020 still feels like an open wound, one that can be healed through a meaningful role on Riverdale.

Unfortunately for all involved in the show, this cancellation was completely out of left field, which ultimately resulted in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina ending with the untimely death of Sabrina herself. Chilling Adventures, in the state it ended in, became the sad tale of a single year in the life of a teenage witch doing the best she could, and ended up dying because of her heroism.

“The Witches of Riverdale,” rehabilitated that ending, establishing that the very final scene of the show was actually Nick (Gavin Leatherwood) sacrificing himself in order to trade his own life for Sabrina’s. Sabrina says that her Aunties resurrected her, and she became a Necromancer to honor Nick’s sacrifice and her own connection with death.

Despite this episode smoothing over the unfortunate end of the series, it’s clear that Sabrina’s story isn’t over, and this isn’t the last time the newly minted Witches of Riverdale will need her help. If the show keeps leaning into the supernatural after the upcoming season 6 finale, then there will be ample opportunity for Sabrina to act as a guide for Cheryl and the rest of the Riverdale-Avengers as they navigate their powers, and whatever fresh hell Percival’s infamous Ghost Train might bring.

Now that it’s also been established that the Greendale from CAOS is the same as the one mentioned in Riverdale, the connection between the two with both Heather and Sabrina could make for an interesting cross-town storyline in the coming season. Sabrina, Heather, and Cheryl spending an episode or two in Greendale with the Aunties, or simply bringing them from Greendale to Riverdale, would be like killing two birds with one stone.

For Sabrina and her Aunties, a storyline on Riverdale would allow closure beyond what happened off-screen after the finale for fans of Chilling Adventures. For our beloved Riverdale characters, it would provide another interesting storyline for Cheryl while tying her new girlfriend Heather even deeper into the main plot–especially since, at this point, it seems we might never get Choni back, much to our dismay.

Would making Sabrina a series regular for the final season of Riverdale feel like fan service? Maybe. Am I the fan being serviced? Absolutely, and I don’t think many Riverdale fans would object to a more prominent inclusion of the teenage witch either.

In whichever way scheduling allows, I truly hope “The Witches of Riverdale” wasn’t the last we will see of Kiernan Shipka’s Sabrina Spellman. Whether she returns as a guest star, or a full-fledged series regular, Sabrina has to appear again before the Archie-verse officially comes to a complete close.

Riverdale airs new episodes Sundays at 8/7c, only on The CW; streaming free next day on The CW App.