‘God’s Favorite Idiot’ is an American apocalyptic comedy about Clark Thompson, a middle-aged IT employee, who God chooses to supervise earth’s peace against the looming satanic takeover of it.
Story
Clark is an ordinary, middle-aged, simple tech guy who loves his pet cats and attends weekly sauna sessions with his dad. One day, he got struck by a bolt of magical lightning on his lawn. He ignores it and goes about his daily routine as usual.
Amily, his party-crazed colleague, observes his weird glow while working late in the office, and passes out on the spot. Clark asks her out for dinner, mistaking her strange behaviour for romantic desire. He goes viral on social media. Some say he’s a liar, while others say he’s connected to God’s prophecy.
Throp, a well-known pastor, condemns them, asking them to quit the bluff game. A winged ‘angel’ (Chamuel), asks them to spread God’s message.
Satan breaks through the scene and tries to convince him to join evil forces against God. She badly injures Clark’s father. He rushes onto the scene, ignoring Judy’s interview to promote his message.
God advises Clark and Amily to run away from the impending apocalypse. Satan arrives at the hospital to kill them. Clark and Amily are finally off to a mysterious location.
Performances
Melissa McCarthy as Amily Luck is the standout performer of the series. Her depiction of the party-obsessed, light-hearted, satirical, and determined character of Amily is engaging to watch.
Ben Falcone’s portrayal of Clark Thompson as a mundane, ordinary, middle-aged techie is authentic yet clichéd at times. Perhaps the writer aimed it to be clichéd to suit the narrative, yet, Ben looks effortless in his role.
Leslie Bibb as Satan adds the right flavour to a fairly predictable storyline. Her portrayal of the comedic-evil Satan feels original and frightening.
Other supporting cast members have done satisfactory work to build a salvageable story around the protagonists. Ana Scotney as Wendy, Steve Mallory as Frisbee, Usman Ally as Mohsin Raza, and Chris Sandiford as Tom are the performances worth mentioning.
Positives
Melissa McCarthy as Amily is impressive. She does an immense job in maintaining the genre relevancy of the series with her quick-witted satires.
The plot is fairly simple and light-hearted. Every character enjoys balanced screen timing, barring just one or two. Music references to Harry Styles and ‘Mamas and the Papas’ are impressively inserted to spark the chemistry between Clark and Amily.
Its theme is directed toward tackling the issue of Christian fundamentalism in the US by delivering an all-inclusive message of peace and empathy.
Negatives
The series does a massive injustice to its story. The screenplay is astonishingly unambitious, lazy, clichéd, and utterly predictable. It attempts to willingly bail out key satirical scenes.
The director’s lazy approach to depicting selected satires makes it look justifiably biased and incredulous. Dialogues aren’t great either, in fact, most are fillers to extend the story to eight episodes’ length.
The laggard pace of the series doesn’t know the right time to introduce its characters. Satan is not introduced till the fourth episode.
The quality of acting stinks of mediocrity, or perhaps, the sheer predictability of the series renders it ordinary.
Verdict
God’s Favorite Idiot is a creatively bland piece of satirical series, still oozing with endless potential. The series demands more courage, passion, and determination from the director. A good piece of a script with a lesser clichéd storytelling technique is the way to go forward.
Rating: 1.5/5
Also Read: The Wrath of God (2022) review: Intriguing thriller that ends on a damp squib