Mrs Davies is a 8 episode teleseries Peacock (HBO in Spain), starring a nun at war against an Artificial Intelligencea story that mixes science fiction, comedy, drama (dramedia?) and intrigue in a risky but addictive way, and develops correct religious intuitions in an inspiring way, although it skids theologically in some solutions at the end.
It does not have woke scenes or gay quota and it has a single sex scene (interrupted and not explicit). Although It is a comedy, it does not attack the Church or make fun of it (the only ‘bad’ cleric is actually an outsider, from a sinister organization). Approaches the theme of the mystical or spousal relationship with Jesus in an attractive way… all that makes it a peculiar jewel.
It is a series that can be seen by people over 15 years of age, a lot less hooligan and funny than, for example, 30 Coinsby Alex de la Iglesia.
While 30 Coins paid tributes to horror and fantasy classics in each chapter, in Mrs Davies the game consists of the opposite: fight clichés, twist everything, surprise with the unexpected and that, however, in the end everything adds up. That is to say, to do what an AI, a ChatGPT cannot do, a script full of twists and at the same time closed and coherent (if one does not get very serious with theology). If you ask ChatGPT: “make me a soap opera script like Mrs Davies” the machine will explode.
Those responsible for this well woven chaff are Damon Lindelof (who changed soap operas forever with lost and its coups de effect, and spiritual end) and the Californian Tara Hernandez (scriptwriter of young Sheldon and big bang theory). They make everything fit: it seems that he brings the crazy twists and ambitious symbology, and she the dialogues, characters and humor.
No matter how absurd a chapter seems: two or three chapters later everything is justified and you enter into something even more unusual.
In her fight against Mrs Davies, Sister Simone is docile to the instructions she receives from on high, although by nature she is rebellious and distrustful…
“I know who I have trusted” (2 Tm 1,12)
Isaiah 31.1 warns: “Woe to those who trust cars because they are many, and in the horsemen because they are very strong, but they do not look at the Holy One of Israel, nor do they seek the Lord”.
In the 20th century, cars – the false confidence in power and technology, that lead to forgetting God – would be the State and ideologies, and perhaps not so much technology, since atomic power credibly threatened to destroy all of humanity. In the 21st century, the cars of idolatry are the Internet, Google searches, Alexas, ChatGPT, those artificial intelligences that promise to solve all your doubts, plan your vacations, do your homework, class work, even reaching the crazy promises of transhumanism.
The Serie denounce idolatry towards that technology. There is a commitment to spirituality and what is truein front of the mere technique and the virtual (which is fictitious and enslaves).
Mrs Davies is an algorithm, an Internet program, to which everyone connects through their mobile and their earpieces: she (it, that) distributes digital prizes (the long-awaited wings) to those who do what she asks. This AI tries to make humans happy and for that he will lie what is necessary. Who programmed it, how did it come to be? That is explained in the last chapter.
But already in the beginning we see how Sister Simone embarks on a double task: search for the holy grail (“the greatest of clichés, the Supreme McGuffin”, as they declare, because AIs love clichés, the series insists) and kill that AI who dominates the world.
The key is that Simone doesn’t trust the AI or almost anyone else. But she does trust Jesus. While everyone connects with Mrs. Davies, Simone connects with God through prayer. Really.
How much of what we see in this series full of surprising scenes is real and how much is fantasy? The viewer tends to suspect that “everything is a dream” or “an illusion” or “a matrix”. Well no, over and over again everything is justified. And nothing is what it seems, starting with the well-worn topic of the templars, with their grail and their warrior women: that’s not what it seems either. It pays to persevere in the series.
against deceit
Saint Thomas, the twin, wanted to touch the Risen Jesus, perhaps because he had experience playing substitutions with his twin since he was a child. He was suspicious. Simone is also, because of her past, which she reveals to us. He knows how to detect deception and traps. And all the AI is one big trap, a lie that enslaves
People want to be validated by AI, and AI wants to be validated by people (She will even ask Sister Simone to rate her, from one to five stars). But the human key to the series is that We all seek approval, especially from those we love, especially from our parents.. The relationships between fathers and mothers and children (with the interference of sinister organizations, convents and dishonest trades) are one of the strong points.
Also the relationship between equals is worked on, especially between the men of the resistance, machos and strong, committed to ending AI. Are they a fun walking topic? Yes, but the series shows us that they are sincere and generous, and that their friendship protects them from being manipulated by the AI. Non-toxic testosterone, another brave antiwoke line.
Another topic is that of Vatican conspiracies. Here it turns out that some clerics prefer AI to God, because she is always there, always responds, while God does what he wants… A cleric, after a lot of effort, managed to have a mystical experience, a contact with God, but he knew little about it and preferred to serve the algorithm, rather than God. The series criticizes it, but without making too much blood, because almost everyone has given in to AI. The alternative is Simone, the nun who doesn’t think of giving up.
Being a nun as a bride of Christ
The Serie beautifully explores the spousal dimension of consecrated life, the prayer like that “love treat with the Beloved” (that Saint Teresa said). That includes a dimension of obedience and loving trust: “I know who I have trusted“.
But the series doesn’t seriously explore almost any other dimension of religious life. The community of nuns that he shows us is nice, but hardly credible: They do not have a founding charism, a founding mother, a mission… Although their faith is sincere, we see them immediately change tasks, without further ado.
The nuns on the soap opera Mrs Davies are likeable and cheerful, but not very believable in that they have no charisma, no foundation, and no real sense of community in God.
Simone also does not seem to have much attachment to spiritual aspects of the Church or doctrine or liturgy, although we can justify it as she is a convert, quite new to the faith and almost self-taught.
We will also discover peculiar character of Jay, a cook-waiter who attends and listens in a peculiar falafel restaurant, with a beautiful symbology in the food. “What I like is serving people,” she says. That’s fine, but when the plot goes into supernatural-theological disquisitions in chapter 6 (Jay and his family’s relationship with the Grail) will lose much of the meaning.
The main theological complaint that can be made to him is that the scriptwriters have not taken the reflection on the Persons of the Trinity very seriously, nor between the Grail and the Body of Christ. But since the series arrives very late and is a crazy fantasy, it will not bother the viewer much, more interested in advancing the earthly plot.
Connect without belonging?
The leading actress, Betty Gilpin, explains that she is the daughter of an Episcopalian clergyman (Anglicans from the US) and who maintains a “complicated relationship” with the churches as an institution. In an interview in observer he declared that he saw faith as “a sensation, or a feeling, or a concept.” “I look at things like the Internet, the church and probably, Jesus – whether or not he was the Son of God, or a well-meaning carpenter – He wanted to connect people. She didn’t want to control people. Probably the Internet was also looking to connect. But we are good at misusing things that could save us.”
So, for the Catholic viewer who “connects” with the Church – the Church is just ordinary people trying to love Jesus and be like brothers in a family – You will like the “connecting” part with Jesus, but the lack of connection to the Christian community will seem strange (those nice nuns, but hardly credible).
The bottom line is that “connection” is offered without belonging: but God does not offer men mere connection, Rather, it asks for that spousal relationship that includes what the marriage vows say: “and I surrender to you“.
personal relationship
Christians often speak of the relationship with God as an interpersonal relationship, and the Bible compares it to the relationship between spouses. But there are Catholics who seem to have never heard of it. For example, in the Web reverse, write a review Dais Johnston, who explains that when she was young she was a very strict Catholic with her fasts, that she even wanted to be a Pauline religious, but in college she drifted away doing “Queer” studies and created her own cafeteria religion (I take and leave what I want).
after viewing Mrs Davies it states: “It never occurred to me before that a relationship with God could be as personal as a relationship with a friend, or, as in Simone’s case, with a husband.” Really? Didn’t you read the Bible? Didn’t they tell you as a child on your first day of catechesis: “Jesus is our friend”?
And then the columnist comments that burst into tears watching Episode 4, Simone’s vocation story, “a deeply personal faith, a faith that is not practiced to find belonging or feel good, but purpose and fulfillment, something I didn’t realize I craved.”
This example shows that It should not be underestimated that a series deals well with such a basic topic as the sincere relationship of love with God: showing that it is possible, it is already a conquest, something that many -even from a Catholic environment- seem to have not even thought about.
Stages in Barcelona and good actors
The Serie It will not be liked by those who do not like science fiction or fantasy, and who is not willing to see a story with humor and a thousand twists. But whoever wants to get into the game will offer a multitude of shocking scenes. Several take place in Spain!
The people of Barcelona will recognize the beautiful entrance of the Hospital de San Pablo, and areas of the Gothic Quarter and other Catalan towns are shown as if they were Rome. The heroes go to a Spanish ship to go hunting a whale.
Along with Betty Giplin, there are great actors like Margo Martindale (the communist spy chief of The Americanshere playing Mother Superior), Elizabeth Marvel (house of cardshere as the mother of the nun, not a believer) and Katja Herbers (the skeptical psychologist from another recommended series, Evil, which is involved in a sinister organization here). Jake McDorman (who we saw in the essential dopesick) is the ex-boyfriend of our nun, and Andy McQueen (Outer Banks) has the most special and spiritual role of the series, as Jay, responsible for the falafel.
It is a series to recommend to our friends, perhaps far from the Church, who They intuit that technology and screens enslave us and they suspect there must be a spiritual responsewhich involves God and others.
The nun in love with Jesus who faces Artificial Intelligence: total war on clichés