Netflix’s Messiah Asks Big Questions About Faith and Power — Then Shrugs

Netflix’s Messiah wants to be a tense, international conspiracy about a man claiming to be the returning Jesus. It mostly fails to deliver. The show, created by Michael Petroni, follows a CIA case officer named Eva Geller as she investigates al-Masih, a charismatic figure whose followers believe he is the long-awaited messiah. The series ran for one season of ten episodes, all released on January 1, 2020.

The premise is promising: a modern messiah figure emerging in the Middle East, performing miracles, gathering followers, and raising political tension across the world. The execution is not. Messiah is a slow, talky, and often baffling show that never commits to its own ideas about faith, politics, or the man at its center.

Trailer, via Netflix.

Eva Geller and al-Masih

Eva Geller is played by Michelle Monaghan as a sharp, cynical CIA officer who does not believe in messiahs or miracles. She treats al-Masih as a threat to global stability, a man who could start a war if his followers act on their beliefs. Her scenes with Mehdi Dehbi, who plays al-Masih, are the show’s best moments, because the chemistry between the two actors sells the tension.

But the show keeps pulling back. Every time it threatens to say something about al-Masih’s motives, it retreats into vague dialogue about fate and destiny. The audience is left wondering whether al-Masih is a prophet, a con artist, or a puppet of some unseen force. The show never answers. It just ends.

The Supporting Cast

The supporting cast is full of talented actors. John Ortiz plays Felix Iguero, a journalist who becomes obsessed with al-Masih’s story. Tomer Sisley plays Avrim Dahan, an intelligence officer tracking al-Masih through Israel. Stefania LaVie Owen plays Rebecca Iguero, Felix’s wife and a constant presence in the background of his investigations. The other actors — Wil Traval as Will Mathers, Jane Adams as Miriam Keneally, Sayyid El Alami as Jibril Hassan, Fares Landoulsi as Samer, and Melinda Page Hamilton as Anna Iguero — fill out the world of spies, followers, and skeptics.

None of them get enough to do. The show is so fixated on al-Masih that it forgets to give its other characters arcs. Felix Iguero spends the whole series asking the same questions about al-Masih’s legitimacy, and his wife Rebecca is mostly a plot device for pushing him forward. The intelligence officer Avrim Dahan is a shadowy presence who occasionally shows up to make speeches about security, but his scenes with al-Masih are the most interesting thing in the show, and even those are few.

The Plot That Never Arrives

The ten episodes of Messiah are structured as a slow build toward a climax that never comes. Each episode introduces a new follower, a new country, a new piece of evidence, and a new question about who al-Masih is. The show spends a lot of time on the logistics of global conspiracy — the CIA’s surveillance, the tracking, the religious movements that spring up around al-Masih.

But the show never answers the questions it sets up. Who is al-Masih? What does he want? Why does he show up now? The show’s final episodes hint at a larger conspiracy, but the answers are vague and unsatisfying. The show ends with Eva Geller chasing al-Masih into a desert, where he disappears into a crowd. It is a final scene that feels like a shrug.

The Messianic Problem

The show’s central problem is its unwillingness to commit to a point of view. Is al-Masih a genuine prophet, a modern Jesus? Or is he a shrewd political operator who understands the power of faith? The show hints at both. It shows him performing miracles that are real to his followers. It shows him manipulating the press and the CIA. It never decides.

This ambiguity is frustrating rather than clever. A show that is willing to say a man is a messiah and let that stand would be bold. A show that is willing to say a man is a liar and expose him would be satisfying. Messiah tries to have it both ways, and the result is a muddled middle ground where nothing is true and nothing is false.

Messiah is a slow, talky, and often baffling show that never commits to its own ideas about faith, politics, or the man at its center.

The show also fails to give the audience a clear sense of al-Masih’s beliefs. He speaks in vague, poetic terms about love and peace, but he never explains how his followers should behave or what a messianic age would look like. The show’s followers are defined by their devotion, not by any shared theology. This makes al-Masih a blank slate for the audience’s projections, but it also makes him a paper cutout rather than a real character.

The Style and the Weakness

Michael Petroni directs the series with a grim, handheld style that tries to evoke the street-level tension of a conspiracy thriller. The show uses a lot of close-ups, shaky camera work, and natural light to create a sense of immediacy. It occasionally works, especially in the scenes between Eva Geller and al-Masih. When the two actors are on screen together, the tension is real.

But the style is a crutch. The show relies on visual intensity to cover for its thin plotting. When the camera is not moving, the dialogue is forced to carry the weight of the story, and it fails. The show is also weighed down by its own ambitions. It wants to be a global conspiracy, a religious drama, and a character study all at once. It does not have enough runtime to do all three well.

The show’s pacing is also a problem. The first few episodes move slowly as the CIA and the tracking establish themselves. The middle episodes drag as the show repeats the same conversations about al-Masih’s identity. The final episodes rush to tie up the loose ends, which only makes the show feel unfinished.

A TV Series That Never Finds Its Voice

The show’s failure is not a lack of talent. The actors are good, the premise is interesting, and the direction is competent. The problem is that the show never finds its voice. It is not a thriller, because it never delivers a payoff. It is not a drama, because it never commits to a point of view. It is not a character study, because it never explains its central character.

The show’s best episodes are the ones that focus on the relationship between Eva Geller and al-Masih. Those are the scenes where the show has a clear direction and a clear tension. The worst episodes are the ones that try to explain the global conspiracy, because they are the ones that are most forced and most repetitive.

The show also fails to give the audience a clear sense of the stakes. The CIA and the tracking are worried about al-Masih because he is gathering followers, but the show never explains why that is a problem. The show also never explains why the followers believe in al-Masih. The show’s lack of answers makes it feel incoherent rather than mysterious.

1. The Eva Geller and al-Masih scenes are the best the show has to offer.
2. The Felix Iguero and Rebecca Iguero relationship is underwritten.
3. The global conspiracy plot is too vague to feel meaningful.
4. The final episodes rush to tie up loose ends without resolution.
5. The show never commits to a point of view about al-Masih.

The Verdict on Messiah

Messiah is a show that is smarter than its execution. It asks interesting questions about faith, politics, and the power of a charismatic leader. But it never answers those questions, and its failure to answer them makes the show feel hollow. The show is a missed opportunity. Its premise is compelling, its cast is talented, and its direction is competent, but it never becomes the show it could have been.

Messiah earns a score of 4.6 out of 10.

Messiah · Michelle Monaghan · mystery thriller · Netflix · Streaming · TV Review