In the new Netflix thriller Unchosen, a young mother in a religious cult meets an escaped convict after he saves her daughter, and she starts to rethink her place in the conservative, God-fearing congregation. It’s a bit like The Handmaid’s Tale, but without a whole lot of nuance.
UNCHOSEN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: Over pastoral scenes at sunrise, this text is shown. “Over two thousand cults exist in the United Kingdom. Some are closed communities, but others, like this fictional one, live in plain sight.”
The Gist: Fellowship Of The Divine is the kind of Christian cult where the men are the ones who set the agenda; the women are there to cook, keep the home and carry babies. As we see the congregation at an outdoor dinner, we see a sermon by the pastor, Mr. Phillips (Christopher Eccleston) say that the congregation is “a sanctuary safe from the temptations of the world outside and from the evil that lies within.”
As storm clouds rush in during the dinner, one of the wives in the congregation, Rosie (Molly Windsor), loses track of her daughter Grace (Olivia Pickering). While her husband Adam (Asa Butterfield) and Mr. Phillips insist that that it’s not a woman’s job to go out and search, Rosie does so anyway. She finds Grace floating in a pond in the woods, and is surprised when a strange man dives in to save her. Before she can thank him, though, he’s gone.
Adam arrives with his brother Isaac (Aston McAuley), and is puzzled when Isaac pulls out a cell phone to call 999 to get an ambulance. Phones are not allowed in the fellowship, and when he confronts Isaac about it later, he has to decide whether to report him to the elders or not.
Rosie leaves a necklace draped around a tree in order to see if the man returns. She’s already on thin ice, with the pastor’s wife, Mrs. Phillips (Siobhan Finneran), clocking Rosie’s sojourns away from the compound. When Rosie tells Mrs. Phillips that a random man saved Grace, Mrs. Phillips replies, “You should be thanking God, not some unchosen.”
Eventually the man, whose name is Sam (Fra Fee), comes to her for help with his injured hand. He surreptitiously stays in the house, and eventually tells Rosie he has nowhere to go. She finds him some hidden shelter in a chicken coop. In a flashback to the hospital, we hear through a news story that Sam killed someone while on work release at a fish factory and is a fugitive. But Rosie has no idea.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Created by Julie Gearey, Unchosen is a bit like a British take on The Handmaid’s Tale, though the cult that’s depicted in this series is inspired by a number of similar cults in the UK.
Our Take: By amalgamating various conservative religious cults in the UK, the writers of Unchosen have decided to cherry pick the worst aspects of all of them and exaggerate them. Yes, we’ve seen enough scripted series and docuseries to know that these cults are misogynistic and abusive. But in Unchosen, the stark contrast between this group that sees cell phones as a gateway to temptation and the escaped convict that will enter their midst doesn’t leave a lot of room for nuance.
This can be seen in how Adam rats out Isaac for using a phone and how Isaac is punished by being locked in a room in the cult’s residence, unable to interact with his wife and kids. Literal brotherhood doesn’t outweigh adhering to the rules and tenants of the fellowship, which were more or less set up by Mr. Phillips.
But we can already see cracks in Rosie’s loyalty, as she takes the risk to find Sam, takes another risk by questioning Adam about Isaac’s punishment and takes the biggest risk by hiding Sam on the compound. Something about Sam has shown Rosie she can have more than the mechanical, procreation sex Adam has with her, and her questioning is going to lead to something with Sam that’s going to go completely against what this cult is about.
The way the first episode has set things up, though, it doesn’t much matter that Sam is a fugitive who killed someone in self-defense. This show is positioning himself as a savior of sorts, and we get the feeling we’re going to see that positioning a whole lot in the full run of the season.
Performance Worth Watching: Molly Windsor’s character Rosie seems to be doing a mostly good job at being an obedient wife in this cult, but we can see in Windsor’s performances that she’s fine to lean into the various temptations that might come her way.
Sex And Skin: None in the first episode.
Parting Shot: We flash back to see just why Sam is on the run.
Sleeper Star: Christopher Eccleston is creepy as hell as the pastor/cult leader Mr. Phillips.
Most Pilot-y Line: There is an implication that Isaac is doing things outside the group that would get him disavowed. An affair, perhaps? It’s one of those plot points that’s being held back to build drama, but we’re not sure if it’s the best idea to do that or not. Isn’t it enough that Adan is holding back things he knows about Isaac?
Our Call: STREAM IT. As we said, subtlety isn’t really a strong suit of Unchosen, but what we hope is that the show’s rough edges in that category will be smoothed down as the psychological thriller at the core of the series develops.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
