A billboard in San Antonio, Texas, promoting the critically acclaimed multi-season series about the life of Jesus Christ titled “The Chosen” appeared to have been defaced with a message of hate towards the show. However, it is a marketing scheme by its distributor, Angel Studios.
The billboard in San Antonio shows an image of the actor Jonathan Roumie, who portrays Jesus in the series, next to the words “ChosenSux.com. Binge Salad (eww).” The URL directs users to a website called “The Chosen Is Not Good.”
The website features a satirical video titled “Stop watching the Chosen…It’s not good.” The video depicts an actor playing Satan teaching a classroom of demons and saying, “Hello class. Wellcome to hell,” in front of the words “Intro to Damnation” written on the chalk board.
The video shows Satan teaching the class how to shut down what he calls the “high quality TV series about Jesus” by discrediting it. Satan admits that this is a challenge, given the how well-done the show is.
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Showing clips from “The Chosen,” Angel Studios promotes its free app where viewers can binge the first two seasons at no charge.
“This Jesus with an actual personality,” Satan says, “is a real pain in my Satanic butt. Here’s the plan. Convince the public that watching ‘The Chosen’ will feel more like a Sunday school video and less like the high-end epic it actually is.”
The demons can’t help but admit that “The Chosen” is good. While viewing a clip of Jesus interacting with the woman at the well, Satan starts to cry, and another demon says that the show makes her want to be more like Jesus. She then ascends from hell into what appears to be heaven.
The main purpose of the video appears to be promoting the Angel Studios app, so viewers will watch the first two seasons of the show before the third season releases later this year.
“The Chosen” tweeted images of other billboards that appeared to be defaced with the hashtag #ChosenFeedback. One billboard read, “ChosenSux.com; Come and see Poopy butts,” and another said “ChosenSux.com; The Chosen is boring.”
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The next day, the show tweeted, “As you may have heard, these billboards are one part of a larger marketing campaign that launched yesterday. At the beginning of our livestream tonight at 8:30 ET, Dallas will give you the scoop on what’s behind it (the devil, really???).”
