Fans thought that the tension between the original Charmed and the reboot's cast and crew would finally die down as the series came to an end recently, but the opposite happened! The season finale that aired on June 10 saw the charmed trio Mel, Maggie, and Kaela finding a portal to the original series’ Halliwell Manor, where Piper, Phoebe, Prue, and Paige lived, tying the two shows together. However, a writer of the original show wasn’t pleased!
One of the original series’ writers, Curtis Kheel, took to Twitter to slam the finale. He wrote, “As an original Charmed writer, I can tell [you] what happened next: Piper, Phoebe and Paige vanquished the [three] imposters right after they invaded Halliwell Manor.” Further adding, “Then [Holly Marie Combs] blew up the portal to that other universe [and] quipped: ‘We wish them well.'”
The reaction and mention do not come as a surprise as the cast and crew of the original show have been displeased ever since the reboot was announced. To Kheel’s tweet, the reboot Charmed writers who share a common Twitter account responded, “Unlike with the OG version of the franchise, we had a strict ‘no a–holes’ hiring policy in the writer’s room. We feel mostly sorry for these people, because unlike them we actually like each other and had the best time.”
Further adding in a follow-up tweet “And for the record, we love both versions, which is why we set out to create a cohesive universe. In our minds, there is zero competition in a long line of strong young witches tasked with repeatedly saving the world.” Their Twitter comment prompted Kheel to respond elaborating his point,
My problem with the Charmed reboot is that from Day One, it pretended like the original Charmed didn’t exist, yet it borrowed a ton of ideas from it. We worked very hard on the OG series for many years [and] to disregard that is offensive and disrespectful to us and our fans.
The executive producers of the reboot Jeffrey Lieber and Joey Falco previously told TVLine about their plans to add the original cast cameos for kick-starting Season 5. However, the show was canceled after Season 4. The duo said, “We wrote and shot this episode before we knew the show was going to end. We knew for months that there was a 50/50 chance of us getting canceled, so we wanted to end on something that could move forward but could also be a satisfying conclusion. We wanted to eventually tie these universes together.”
Charmed reboot saw Melonie Diaz as Mel, Sarah Jeffery as Maggie, and Lucy Barrett as Kaela. The original cast featured Combs as Piper, Alyssa Milano as Phoebe, and Shannen Doherty as Prue and, Rose McGowan as Paige.
Check out Kheel's Tweet and The Charmed writers' response below: