Every generation deserves an attempt to get its own Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I am not quite sure what generation we are up to now – I took my eye off the ball sometime around Z – but whatever it is, they should be glad they fall into the one that gets Domino Day as its submission. As supernaturally slanted stories of young women discovering their power and its temptations, the dark ways of the world, solidarity and sisterhood go, it is not half bad.
Domino (Siena Kelly) is a young Mancunian witch (and barista and part-time tattooist) who must feed off the energy of others to stay alive. She sources her meat from dating apps – I do not know how un-hot young witches manage – and rare is it that one of her hookups doesn’t prove himself worthy of being drained.
Things go awry in the first episode, however, when one dirtbag-cum-attempted-rapist secretly sets up a device to film them together. Thus he ends up with video evidence of her secret. Soon, Domino learns that her powers have a scorched-earth setting.
The local coven – which runs a plant shop that supplies other witches and ties them nicely to the wise woman and herbalism traditions – is aware that there is a new, unaffiliated witch in town. They are trying to track her down and get the measure of her abilities. If they don’t bring her into the fold and report their findings to the Elders, they – and she – will be punished. The Elders seem a lot tougher than Buffy’s Giles. The coven’s leader, Kat (Alisha Bailey), has enlisted the help of her ancient ancestors, practitioners of a form of magic long ago outlawed by the Elders, to help her understand how best to approach and deal with Domino.
There is also a love interest in the form of Leon (Percelle Ascott, wearing the burden of representing all good men lightly), a lurking unknown in the form of Silas (Sam Howard-Sneyd) – who is Domino’s ex and recently ghosted her (so far, only in the young people’s sense, but stay tuned) – and the untrustworthy owner of the local spells shop, Cal (Darren Tighe), to whom she takes Silas’s grimoire to see if its secrets can be unlocked.
In short, the setup is great. Fertile, fun and – as all supernaturally inflected tales need to be to work properly – grounded firmly in reality. The coven captures the feeling of being a really good group of girlfriends on your side; they just happen to be able to read your aura as well as pour you wine. Even as they are telling nightclub losers to bugger off, they are administering protective charms.
Domino’s growing powers and her concomitant unease stand in nicely for just about any awkwardness or learning curve you remember from your 20s; they also bring the notion of working out how much space you want to take up in the world, and how little the world wants you, to the fore. There is an African tribal aspect to Kat’s ancestors and their outlawed magic, while the Elders appear to be a white, western organisation, which brings ideas about colonialism, racial oppression and erasure into play.
It dances along lots of tightropes without falling off. It is incredibly stylish without being self-conscious and it has energy to burn without becoming frenetic. There is always plenty going on and the twists and revelations are nicely paced, if not particularly groundbreaking (so far – I have watched half of the series).
More ineffably, it feels like the woman-led production that it is. Created and written by Lauren Sequeira, directed by Eva Sigurdardottir and Nadira Amrani and with a cast dominated by female roles, the drama conjures a sense of sisterhood among the coven and perfectly evokes Domino’s own fear of her appetites, as well as the disbelief of others at how deep they run. It is one of a growing number of programmes that treats male violence as a background hum that escalates, rather than a sudden, inexplicable eruption from nowhere.
I can’t quite say it is a pleasure to watch, but it is good to see. It’s a real sign that things are changing – in television, at least; I don’t mean real life – and that what we really mean by telling women’s stories is starting to happen. Magic.
• Domino Day was on BBC Three and is available BBC iPlayer
