"What in the Disney hell is this?"
— Sara Lance
Constantine and the Legends find themselves battling a Fairy Godmother during the Salem Witch Trials.
Tropes:
- An Aesop:
- The episode pulls no punches on the cruelties of tribalism and persecution.
- No good comes from becoming as bad as the people who hurt you.
- All Myths Are True: Turns out that in the Arrowverse, fairy tales are true. Or at least, Cinderella is.
- Arbitrary Skepticism: Nate's dad believes in time travel, metahumans, telepathic gorillas...but not in magic.
- Asshole Victim:
- The man who accused Jane of witchcraft, and who was heavily implied to have done it because she rejected his romantic advances, gets his eyes pecked out by crows. Zari and Sara have a hard time feeling sorry for him.
- Narrowly averted with the minister; while Prudence initially wants him to burn for his attempt at immolating Jane and Zari, Zari manages to talk her down and have his life be spared.
- Big Damn Heroes: Zari comes to Jane's rescue, then Sara comes to both of their rescues, and when Sara is subdued too, Prudence and the Godmother save them all.
- Burn the Witch!: Initially averted, as Jane was going to be hanged, but after Zari demonstrates her magic, both of them are about to be burned.
- Call-Back:
- Gary brings up his bitten-off nipple to try and prove that magical creatures exist.
- Nate is heard recapping his adventures to his father to convince him to renew funding for the Time Bureau.
- The Cameo: Beebo makes another appearance, this time in the form of an arcade game.
- Casting Gag: The Fairy Godmother is played by Jane Carr, who also voiced Mama Cosma in The Fairly OddParents! Both are Fairy Godparents with similar personalities.
- Connected All Along: Turns out, Nate's father is one of the political bigwigs who control the Time Bureau's budget.
- Continuity Nod:
- Sara mentions she's been to Salem before.
- Beebo is seen on a tablet game given to Prudence.
- The Corrupter: The Godmother constantly tempts Prudence to wish for destructive things.
- Creepy Children Singing: Prudence, when the Legends are following her.
- Deal with the Devil: John attempts to cut a deal with the Fairy Godmother, offering to be her host if she'll help him, but she flatly refuses because whatever's chasing him scares her as much as it does him.
- Didn't Think This Through: Zari, evidently, didn't consider the possible consequences of using magic in the middle of a Salem witch trial.
- Didn't See That Coming:
- Constantine is completely flabbergasted that he's dealing with a Fairy Godmother instead of his usual hell-spawn.
- Hank Heywood probably wasn't expecting any real proof of magic, much less a pig turning into a naked man in the arms of his son (who promptly turned into steel at the same time).
- Dragged Off to Hell: The Godmother's ultimate fate, after refusing to take John as her next host.
- The Dreaded: Whatever demon is after Constantine, the Godmother is more scared of him than of being sent to Hell.
- Eye Scream: The crows summoned by the Godmother peck out the eyes of the man who accused Jane of being a witch.
- Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: The Fairy Godmother looks as sweet and wholesome as the name implies. She's actually jaded, nasty, and more than a little sadistic. She's downright gleeful at the idea of feeding the Legends to hungry crows, and happily anticipates raining fire down on Salem before Prudence rejects her.
- Fairy Devilmother: The Legends face a fairy godmother that on the surface appears to be the sweet and kindly version, complete with singing and sparkly magic, but is actually a malevolent parasite that grants its host's wishes in order to feed off their life force. Fortunately, she can't use any magic without her host's consent, so her sadistic desires are stymied by trying to manipulate them into wanting it as well.
- Faux Affably Evil: The Fairy Godmother plays up her sweet reputation and maternal exterior to get on Prudence's good side, but her manipulative tendencies are well on display and any apparent sweetness hides an incredibly vicious and sadistic personality.
- Feathered Fiend: Appears to be preferred method of terror for the Fairy Godmother.
- Forced Transformation: The Godmother turns Mick and Ray into pigs.
- From Bad to Worse: Zari tries to appeal to the humanity of a god-fearing people raised to fear any hint of witchcraft. Since she makes this argument after using actual magic in front of them, Zari only manages to get herself accused of witchcraft as well and elevates her and Jane's punishment from hanging to being burned at the stake.
- Guest-Star Party Member: Constantine makes it clear he's only with the Legends to help them send the magical creatures back to Hell; after all is said and done, he'll be leaving.
- Headbutting Heroes: Mick and Constantine are constantly at each other's throats throughout the episode.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: While the Fairy Godmother is a threat, the real villains of the episode are the hate-filled humans trying to lynch an innocent woman. Zari lampshades this the first time she sees a "witch" getting accused.
- I Choose to Stay:
- Despite being innocent, Jane refuses to escape with Zari, as she doesn't want other people to suffer for her.
- Instead of coming back to the Waverider with Ray, Nate stays behind at the Time Bureau.
- Internal Reveal: Nate's father learns that his son has superpowers and has been involved in Time Travel for the past two years.
- Kangaroo Court: Prudence's mother is put on trial for witchcraft, with flimsy evidence like her birthmark brought up as "proof". Unfortunately, Truth in Television for the Salem Witch Trials.
- Leeroy Jenkins: Zari, in her unresolved grief over the death of her mother, attacks the minister and his toadies with her totem powers. All she does is scare the crap out of the town and get branded a witch as well.
- Motive Rant: The Godmother explains her hatred for humans to Constantine on the Waverider.
- My God, What Have I Done?: After she nearly kills the minister and several others with her powers, Zari is shocked by her own actions.
- Naked First Impression: Ray meets Hank Heywood after being turned back from a pig, leaving him naked in Nate's arms.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
- Zari, having grown up in a police state, has zero tolerance for Salem's bigotry. Unfortunately, she can't control her temper and uses her powers on the villagers, before she has a My God, What Have I Done?...which leads to her imprisonment and her totem confiscated. Luckily, Sara is very understanding.
- Constantine accidentally gives the Godmother the idea to unleash hellfire on Salem.
- Non-Residential Residence: Ava discovers during a late shift that Nate is staying at the Time Bureau since he can't afford a hotel. She encounters him walking around in a bathrobe, and in the process of brushing his teeth.
- Noodle Incident: Apparently, Gary has sleepwalked his way to the Time Bureau before.
- No Ontological Inertia: Prudence releasing the fairy godmother, thus removing herself as the Godmothers' host, instantly undoes all the things she wished for the godmother to do, like turning Mick and Ray into pigs and sealing Constantine's mouth.
- Post-Modern Magik: Ray wires Constantine's divining bones to the temporal detector to detect magical disturbances to the timeline.
- Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Zari refuses to let history take its course and goes to rescue Jane.
- Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: Ray loses his clothing after the Fairy Godmother converts him into a pig. After her spell is negated, he is naked.
- Shown Their Work: Both Constantine and Sara point out that there was never any magic in Salem, and they hanged people instead of burning them. Of course, due to timeline shenanigans, there is now magic and Zari manages to piss off the villagers enough that they decide to bring back burning.
- Shout-Out: The episode features a young woman related to witches named Prudence.
- Sinister Minister: Salem's resident minister is self-righteous, arrogant, and blatantly misogynist (though this being the 17th century, his views aren't exactly far from the norm).
- Skewed Priorities: Mick doesn't really seem to mind much about being turned into a pig, continuing to raid the ship's supplies as usual.
- So Proud of You: Nate's father has a change in opinion on him after learning what he's been up for the past two years.Hank Heywood: Wow, Nathaniel, you did it. You finally found a useful application for that history degree.
Nate Heywood: [exasperatedly] Still not letting it go.
Hank Heywood: Take the win, son. You've done good here. I look forward to working with you. - Stepford Snarker: Lampshaded by Zari, who admits that sarcasm is good for hiding deep-seated anger issues.
- Unwitting Pawn: The Fairy Godmother is using Prudence's wishes to take revenge on all humans who imprisoned her.
- Villain Has a Point: The Fairy Godmother sarcastically asks Zari if she can tell Prudence that people have stopped persecuting the different in the future, and Zari is forced to admit that they haven't.
- You Wanna Get Sued?:Fairy Godmother: I mean only to make dreams come true, because a dream is a wish your heart—
Sara: Don't say another word!
