Vampires have been having a moment for about a decade, and zombies have been everywhere ever since The Walking Dead made the undead trendy. But, what about mermaids? The majestic mythical creatures have been popping up on our favorite coffee beverages since the ‘90s. Now, they’re all over everything from luxe makeup brushes and emoji updates to churros, of all things. It’s time everyone’s new favorite supernatural beings got their pop cultural debut without anyone having mention a certain beloved, finned redhead. Enter, Freeform’s upcoming series Siren.
Like Riverdale and the current Sabrina The Teenage Witch reboot kicking around the CW, Siren, premiering in 2018, will take its inspiration — mermaids, natch — and offer viewers a much darker take. The drama follows the fictional town of Bristol Cove, Washington, whose history is rooted in mermaid legends. The entire sleepy burg will be turned upside down when one of those famed mermaids (Eline Powell) makes it to land and is more Jaws-with-legs, than Ariel. If you’ve seen the trailer, you know what we’re talking about. In the video, a handsy creep ends up getting his just desserts. And by "just desserts" we mean the guy’s throat gets ripped out before he's tossed through a windshield. Siren doesn’t play.
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Ahead of the Freeform show’s upcoming 2017 New York City Comic-Con panel at the Javits Center on Saturday, October 7 — which this humble TV writer will be moderating — we have an exclusive clip of Siren’s premiere episode. The sneak peek shows how our mysterious mermaid is adjusting to life land-side. As you can guess, the top-level predator can get pretty fearsome when she’s hungry. At least she's noticeably docile when she meets an unexpected friendly face in the middle of the street.
While talking to Eline Powell about her character on Siren’s Vancouver, Canada, set, the British actress shed some very humanizing light on the mermaid's more violent tendencies. "I think we act very hostile when we’re scared. When we’re in new environments and primarily when we feel threatened," Powell said. "We’ve all been in those situations. I constantly just try to reverse it. Like if I went to an alien planet or if I went in the sea, how I would react?"
Siren, giving us the fearsome killer mermaids we can all empathize with.
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