Salem Saberhagen

Salem Saberhagen is a character from the American Archie Comics comic series Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Salem is an American Shorthair cat who lives with Sabrina Spellman, Hilda Spellman and Zelda Spellman in the fictional town of Greendale, located near Riverdale. A former witch, Salem was sentenced by the Witch's Council to spend an indefinite amount of time as a cat as punishment for trying to take over the world. Salem first appeared alongside Sabrina in Archie's Mad House #22 in 1962, and was created by George Gladir and Dan DeCarlo.

Earlier comics portray Salem as an ordinary orange-colored feline who doesn't speak. With the debut and success of the 1990s live-action Sabrina, the Teenage Witch sitcom, Salem's backstory and character underwent several retcons to bring it more in line with the sitcom's version. A late 1990s story initially revealed Salem was turned into a cat for standing up Enchantra, the Head Witch, at the altar. A similar version of events was presented in a 1990s live-action TV movie, where he was imprisoned in the form of a cat for attempting to use his magic to make a mortal love him. However, the comics eventually gave Salem a similar backstory to that shown in the sitcom and its spinoff, Sabrina, the Animated Series. Further details about Salem's past before his transformation into a cat were revealed in the 2000s manga-inspired version of the comic, written and drawn by Tania del Rio.

Personality
He has a barbed wit and is often the first character to come up with the one-liners or obvious puns in a scene. In addition to world domination, his ambitious plotting often includes attempts to make millions, become a famous celebrity, regain his magical powers, and become human again. He sometimes dispenses (bad) advice to Sabrina, often involving using magic to solve a problem, which usually ends up leaving Sabrina with even more problems than she began with. He is motivated mostly by his greed, hunger, and ambition. Salem is very proud of his singing voice, which he has shown off during the series. Some of his favorite pastimes include playing with yarn, lint spotting, surfing the internet, and reading Sabrina's diary. In the early part of the series, Salem is seen feuding with the neighbor's cat, Fluffy. He has a liking for Lizard Flakes, a snack for cats which is said to be fattening and full of cholesterol. In the show's pilot, he made the remark to Sabrina that he misses being able to dance. In some episodes, Salem acts more like a cat than a human, as if he was really one all along. Despite his mischief, greed, and egocentricity, he is shown in many episodes to genuinely love the Spellmans, especially Sabrina, and also is very fond of Harvey. Harvey learned Salem's true nature sometime around the end of high school. Salem is also known for his trade mark sobbing when distressed.

History
Salem was a witch, sentenced to spend 100 years as a cat with no magical powers (although in the comic [depending on the story], he retains limited powers via incantations, but requires Sabrina's magic finger to enact them) by the Witch's Council, as punishment for his attempt to take over the world. However, in the film, he was cursed to spend a century as a cat because he had kissed a mortal (due to the fact he had used his powers to impress them). At the beginning of the television series, he had already served 25 years. Salem generally serves as some of the show's comic relief, with his rapid fire jokes and deadpan manner. Despite his megalomaniacal desires for world domination, he is generally portrayed as having a good heart and being a loyal friend to Sabrina. In the series he would generally serve two roles: one as a mentor / "familiar" - commonly an animal that guides a young witch, for Sabrina, as she found it easier to go to him with her problems, or the trouble-maker in the episode, such as finding an illicit way to become human again without being punished convincing Sabrina to use magic to solve her problems, both of which generally ended up putting Sabrina in even more trouble than before. He has shown on multiple occasions to deeply care about Sabrina; in the fourth season, when Sabrina left to live with her father in Paris, Salem missed her terribly and went so far as to start a civil war on Pluto in order to get her back to Westbridge. Salem supposedly erased the holiday "Bobunk", as said in Christmas Amnesia

The leaders of his attempted revolution were also turned into house pets. Newt, the pet of Hilda and Zelda's cousin Monty, was heavily involved with the scheme, for the promised reward of Denmark. Another follower, Duke (played by Dick Van Dyke), had a reduced sentence and was set free during the series, though Salem tried to use him to take over the world again. A talking guinea pig named Stonehenge ("Stony" for short) was introduced in the first made-for-television film, but whether or not he was ever human is unknown. Hilda was also one of Salem's followers; her punishment was to keep Salem free of worms during his period as a feline although she was pardoned at the end of season five. During season one, Salem was visited by his parole officer, to whom he insisted that his reformation is under way, but he accidentally lets it slip that he still yearns for control of the planet.

Family
Members of Salem's blood family include his daughter, Annabelle, whom Salem loves dearly but doesn't interact with much due to his shame about being a cat. Salem managed to make it to her wedding and performed all the duties of father of the bride that he could in his furry state. His mother visited Salem and pampered him to the point Sabrina missed her own mother and went to visit her. It is revealed later in the episode that Salem's mother, ironically, is allergic to cats. Another member is Salem's grandfather, who is a hobo riding the rails of an Other Realm train. According to Salem, Salem's grandmother claims he (Salem's grandfather) was lost at sea. He also mentioned having an uncle Goliath and Morty. In one episode of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Salem mentions that his father's name was Gummo, implying that he died.

Salem often uses Yiddish words and mentioned his cousin's Cheryl's Bat Mitzvah in Sabrina in Wonderland [episode 154].

Relatives

 * Mrs. Saberhagen, Salem's mother. She was strict but well-meaning and didn't know that Salem was a cat until she came to visit him. She pampered him and he loved it. But she found out that she was allergic to cats and had to leave early.


 * Uncle Morty is Salem's uncle. He is rude and has no manners.


 * Gummo is Salem's father. Mentioned.


 * Annabelle is Salem's daughter.


 * Punit Mistry is Salem's first son, twice removed.


 * Uncle Goliath, Salem's uncle. Mentioned.


 * Grandpa, Salem's grandfather,works the trains as seen on 'Murder on the Halloween express'


 * Cheryl, Salem's cousin. Mentioned


 * Grandma, Salem's grandmother

The sitcom model
The sitcom's creators were very sensitive to the treatment of animals, so Salem was often played by an animatronic puppet rather than one of the 4 actual cats who are used for the non-dialogue scenes.The four trained cats portraying the character were named Elvis, Lucy, Salem and Witch. This part was performed by three puppeteers and two different animatronic puppets. The mechanical Salems were originally made by Animal Makers, but in early 1998 they were fired, and their puppets were replaced with ones made by Chiodo Brothers. The new mechanical Salem(s) were controlled by 3 puppeteers, who could manipulate Salem's body in more than 30 ways via rod, cables, and radio control. Animal Makers posted a video of some of the puppets highlights on its website.

In a few instances where his human form is shown in flashbacks, he is portrayed with his face in shadows, but with a body type and militaristic uniform similar to Fidel Castro (Castro himself is depicted as being a friend of Salem).

In the sitcom and Sabrina: The Animated Series, Salem was voiced by actor Nick Bakay In one sitcom episode Salem says he needs to make a phone call for Nick Bakay for Sports Section on TV, saying, "I need to call in to Nick Bakay's sports show on ESPN radio. All he ever talks about is the Buffalo Bills, and his voice? LORD, is it annoying!"

Other appearances
The sitcom version of Salem also made a guest appearance on the Disney-ABC owned shows Boy Meets World, You Wish, and Teen Angel during the fall of 1997 and Disney's One Saturday Morning on Friday Night with Valarie Rae Miller in 1998.

Filmation animated series
In the Filmation series, Salem (similar to the comics) was portrayed as an ordinary orange-colored cat who could only meow. Salem's meows were provided by Dallas McKennon. In these appearances, Salem possessed limited magical abilities, including the ability to teleport himself. A running gag in this series was Salem's recurring feud with Jughead's dog Hot Dog.

DIC animated series
Salem was a recurring character in Sabrina, the Animated Series and its followup series Sabrina: Friends Forever and Sabrina's Secret Life. Salem here retains his backstory from the live-action sitcom, including his last name being "Saberhagen," being black colored, and having been a former witch turned into a cat as punishment by the Witch's Council. Unlike the live-action sitcom, but similar to the previous Filmation series, Salem possesses a limited range of magical powers.

Louis Chirillo provided Salem's voice in Sabrina: Friends Forever, while Maurice LaMarche took over for Sabrina's Secret Life.

Sabrina the Teenage Witch (TV movie)
Salem appeared in the Sabrina the Teenage Witch live-action TV movie.

Sabrina: Secrets of a Teenage Witch
Salem will appear in the upcoming 2013 series Sabrina: Secrets of a Teenage Witch. Ian James Corlett will portray Salem.