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The Chosen, Inc.

The Chosen

A multi-season drama about Jesus told mostly from the disciples' side, with each of them given a life, a temper and a backstory before they are called. Released free, and by a wide margin the most-watched thing in this section.

VerifiedFilm & seriesNon-denominational
Where to watchthechosen.tv ↗

Why this is listed

Listed because a reader is going to ask about it, and a directory that vets things should have a straight answer rather than a shrug. It is the only serious long-form Jesus drama that gives the disciples enough screen time to become people, and it is free. It also invents more than any other production here, which is the trade.

Before you press play

Most of the dialogue outside the quoted sayings is invented, and so is a great deal of backstory: Mary Magdalene's life before her deliverance, Simon Peter's marriage and debts, Matthew's social difficulty, an enlarged Nicodemus, and Roman characters such as Quintus and Gaius who are not in the gospels. The creator has said repeatedly that the show is not Scripture and has asked viewers to read the gospels alongside it; take that at face value. The controversy worth knowing: early seasons were filmed on a Jerusalem set in Utah owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the show's first distributor was founded by Latter-day Saints, and remarks by the creator about shared belief drew sustained criticism from evangelical and Reformed writers. The production later moved distributors. Content itself includes demon possession, a stoning, Roman brutality, and — in the later seasons — the crucifixion; roughly thirteen and up, and younger with a parent.

Suited to Adults. Age judgements are ours, not a rating board’s — you know your own family.

How to start

  1. Open thechosen.tv (opens an external site) and read what The Chosen, Inc. says about itself before you read anything else.
  2. Read the note above first. It is there so an evening does not go wrong twenty minutes in.
  3. Watch it yourself before you watch it with children, if there are children.
  4. Read the passage it dramatises alongside it. The point is to send you back to the text, not to replace it.
  5. Afterwards, ask what the story added and what it left out. That conversation is worth more than the film.

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