The Salem Seven

Agatha All Along has name dropped the Salem Seven and as your resident comic book expert I am here to answer all those burning comic book questions. I think context is really important for a lot of these Marvel shows. But more important than that, this is how I chronicle how comic book accurate these shows are. Not that they need to be, but the best MCU films and TV shows are truer to the source material. So whether or not you read or care about the comics it is in everyone's best interest if the creators care about them.

So here we go, the Salem Seven. The team first appeared in Fantastic Four issue #186 and were created by George Perez and my least favorite comic book creator to ever walk the planet earth Len Wien.

The Salem Seven hail from New Salem, a very small, hidden town that is purely populated by magic users. The Salem Seven were all fathered by Nicholas Scratch who some of you may remember as Agatha Harkness’ son. This is something that the show has not really acknowledged or set up. Though they did tell us that Nicholas is in fact Agatha’s son. However, we have no more information on that. In their first major storyline Scratch gets them to abduct Agatha for betraying the magic community and having the audacity to choose to live among humanity. They took Franklin Richards when they abducted her, incurring the wrath of the Fantastic Four and getting Scratch banished from the dimension.

Vertigo ends up as their new leader after the banishment of Scratch and they once again capture Agatha burning her at the stake. The magic that radiates from New Salem draws in Vision and the Scarlet Witch who are captured as well. Vision takes on Vertigo causing her to lose control, as Wanda siphons off some of her power the town kind of explodes. The explosion completely wipes out the town, and the Seven.

Like Agatha the Salem Seven are intertwined quite tightly with Wanda and the Scarlet Witch. They really don’t have any stories that are independent of her. In fact most of their existence in the comics directly depends on her. She even resurrects them at one point. Most of the magic that exists in the comics is tied back to the Scarlet Witch. She is one of the only beings in the Marvel universe that possesses every single type of magic that there is, it is one of the many reasons why she is so powerful.

In the New Warriors series, New Salem is back and the Salem Seven are its guardians. The town is now a safe haven for any person born of magic. The Salem Seven have the ability to change their form into animals. This would be why in episode 2 of Agatha All Along, Agatha was freaked out when met with the crow, the rat and the wolf. Those were all members of the Salem Seven watching her.

Brutacus transforms into a lion like creature that gives him enhances durability and strength. Gazelle has the ability to turn into a deer-like animal that grants her super speed and agility. Hydron turns into a fish man and can control streams of water. Reptilla has a very unsettling snake form that includes poisonous snakes coming out of her arms. Thornn can turn into a demon thing and can throw exploding or stunning thorns. Vakume turns into a mass of purple and he can fly and control air, winds and vacuums. And last but not least Vertigo, she is the oldest and has no other form. She does however possess the ability to affect someone’s sense of balance. As you can see the names are very on the nose with very little creativity involved.

How much of this we are going to see on screen I do not know. There is already a fair amount of tension between the Salem Seven and Agatha so at least that is being kept fairly accurate. Again I don’t need everything to be by the book, I understand if they did some of these 1 to 1 it would look campy and ridiculous, which is simply not the tone of the show. But I think that there is a way to do it without taking away from the darker and more serious tone that the show has set up.