WARNING: The following contains spoilers for The Craft: Legacy, now available on VOD.
The Craft: Legacy puts a modern spin on the '96 cult classic about witches in a Los Angeles high school. But this reboot/sequel has some plots holes that can't be magicked away.
The Girls Keep Using Their Powers In Public
When Lily (Cailee Spaeny) and her newly formed coven start realizing their powers are growing together, they become kids in a candy store. However, it's pretty dumb that they keep using these abilities in plain sight. They change homophobic bully Timmy's clothes to Pride colors in school. Frankie uses her telekinesis to snap a bully's neck against the wall at a party. And they keep freezing time in the cafeteria and messing with people.
It is as if cameras don't exist, whether it's school security cams or someone with a cellphone. As for Lily, she accidentally uses her telekinesis to throw Timmy several feet across the hallway and magically attacks her mother Helen (Michelle Monaghan) at a funeral in front of a congregation. This happens in full view of witnesses, yet no one ever questions why she's displaying Jedi-like abilities. Tabby even uses her fire-starting powers to burn graffiti off her locker, so one has to wonder why they think people wouldn't notice.
Helen Breaks a Solemn Pact
At the film's end, it is revealed that Lily's birth mom is Nancy, Fairuza Balk's character from the original film. The witch broke bad in the first film and was institutionalized during the intervening years, yet somehow she got pregnant, and Helen, a caregiver at the facility, agreed to take Lily (aka Lilith). However, the conditions were that Helen cannot reveal Nancy's identity and she must never bring Lily back to LA as some dark destiny awaits, possibly tied to the god Nancy worshipped, Manon.
That said, Helen literally does the opposite by coming back to the very place Nancy warned her against. Mind you, she thinks she's in love with her boyfriend Adam (David Duchovny), but it's really for drama and plot convenience as Nancy hinted only pain and suffering would follow. Also, Helen keeps the adoption papers in her office, despite the high risk that Lily might stumble upon them one day (which she does).
Adam and the Cult Let the Coven Power Up
Adam, who in truth is an evil misogynistic warlock who wants Lily's powers, has kept tabs on Nancy, and he knows Lily has powers from the start, so it would make sense to take her as soon as she arrived. Instead, he waits, thus giving Lily time to meet her fellow witches, hone her craft and grow stronger with her coven. His women-hating cult should have taken the girls out long before. Getting to a weaker Lily early on would have made it easier for him to steal her powers.
He basically lets his enemy level up, and oddly enough he doesn't place a tail on her. This allows Lily to discover the cult's lair, as well as interact with his sons Jacob, Isaiah and Abe. Abe comes close to spilling the secret, so it's questionable why Adam would let her roam free in a way that could have exposed the mission. This approach allows Lily to become a weapon and garner an army, so it's counterintuitive to his objectives as a disciple of Manon.
Starring Cailee Spaeny, Gideon Adlon, Lovie Simone, Zoey Luna, Nicholas Galitzine, Michelle Monaghan and David Duchovny, The Craft: Legacy is now available on VOD.