Satan is getting a bad rap in Hollywood.
At least that's one of the claims in an usual copyright infringement lawsuit that the Satanic Temple has brought against Netflix and Warner Bros.
The Satanic Temple this week sued the media companies in federal court over its portrayal of a goat-headed deity in the show "Chilling Adventures of Sabrina." The group is seeking at least $50 million in damages.
The way the show presents the deity Baphomet isn't accurate because it doesn't represent the temple's values, the Satanic Temple says in a lawsuit filed in New York on Thursday.
The Satanic Temple, a Salem, Mass., organization that describes itself as a political activism group that promotes certain beliefs like free will, argues in the complaint that Satan isn't an evil being, but rather "a literary figure symbolic of the eternal rebel in opposition" and "meant to be a rebel against God's authority."
In "Chilling Adventures of Sabrina," the show's main character is half-witch and half-human and is conflicted on whether to join the Church of Night and leave her human life behind.
"Defendants' prominent use of it as the central focal point of the school associated with evil, cannibalism and possibly murder is injurious to the Satanic Temple's business," the lawsuit says.
The Satanic Temple says it had spent $100,000 to commission a statue of Baphomet with children that it believes is misrepresented on the show. It is asking the court to bar the show from using similar images of the statue in the future.
Netflix referred a media request to Warner Bros., which produces the show. Warner Bros. declined to comment.
