A still from Good Omens. (Image courtesy: goodomensprime )
Highlights
- A Christian group petitioned Netflix to cancel Amazon Prime's Good Omens
- Prime offered to pull Netflix's Stranger Things in existential exchange
- 'Good Omens' released on Amazon Prime last month
Hilarity of an infernal kind is afoot. After thousands of offended but clearly clueless Christians petitioned Netflix to cancel Amazon Prime's new show Good Omens, Prime's verified Twitter account jokingly offered to pull Netflix's hit series Stranger Things in an existential exchange. "Hey Netflix, we'll cancel Stranger Things if you cancel Good Omens," read Amazon Prime's nice and accurate tweet, with Vanity Fair's piece on the subject attached. Netflix's response, hopefully equally awesome, is awaited - they did post a tweet replying to one by The Guardian promising 'not to make any more.' Good Omens, which released on Amazon Prime last month, is based on the book of the same name by authors Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman - more about the show later; here's Amazon's tweet:
Here's Netflix on the subject:
As the Vanity Fair article reports, the Christian group - called Return To Order - that is protesting Good Omens once opposed an ice cream franchise named 'Sweet Jesus,' calling it 'blasphemous.' Little wonder, then, that people who hate ice cream would object to a satirical show as "another step to make satanism appear normal, light and acceptable." Also, they are upset that God has been voiced by a woman, even though that woman be the redoubtable Frances McDormand. The petition is believed to have received at least 20,000 signatures but appears to have now been taken down - presumably a fresh one addressed correctly to Amazon Prime will surface soon.
This absolutely hilarious case of mistaken identity is made more delicious by the fact that Good Omens is predicated on a central theme of mistaken identities, albeit at a cosmic level. In short - an angel and a demon (the demon, in fact, the serpent that tempted Eve) have lived together on Earth for millennia and become unlikely friends, even if the angel is in total denial about this; so when it's time for the Antichrist - placed on Earth with help of an order of 'Satanic nuns' - to set the events of Armageddon in motion, angel and demon decide to join forces (secretly of course, without Heaven or Hell figuring it out) and thwart the Apocalypse. Only problem, the nuns mixed up two babies and the Antichrist, all of 11, isn't where he should be.
How utterly and delightfully apt that the Antichrist mix-up should be reflected in the Prime-Netflix mix-up - it's like the plot jumped from screen/page straight into real life, with screamingly funny consequences, exactly as things happen in Good Omens itself. It's almost as if it were, you know, ineffable. Welcome to the End Times.
Fans of the show and the Internet at large have been facepalming over the offended Christian group's petition addressed to Netflix asking them to take down a show they don't run. The absolute best response to the 'great pustulant mangled bollocks' as the demon Crowley would no doubt call the comically misdirected petition came from Good Omens' own Twitter account: a still of Jon Hamm, who plays the archangel Gabriel, saying "not my department," which is one of his actual lines from the show and which he says in response to being asked who summons the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (Death, War, Famine and Pollution, portrayed in Good Omens as riding bikes instead of horses, which has also annoyed the protestors).
Good Omens was written by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman in 1990 and various attempts have been made to film it ever since. Tragically, Terry Pratchett, who died in 2015, never lived to see the adaptation become reality. A seat was left empty for him at the star-studded premiere of the show last month; and several little nods to his legacy fill the show - for instance, his hat his hung up on the hat stand in the Soho bookshop run by the angel Aziraphale.
Speaking of, the cast of Good Omens reads like a who's who; Jon Hamm and Frances McDormand apart, the angel and demon are played by actors Michael Sheen and David Tennant, a pairing made in cinematic heaven (with apologies to hell). Benedict Cumberbatch has a tiny role as the voice of Satan.