Do you really want to meet a creature like this? Imagine what that creature must be like."įather Paul (Hamish Linklater) explains the creature’s grotesqueness by pointing out that scripture often depicts angels as being pretty frickin' scary. "Whenever God needs to do something horrible to someone in the Bible, he sends an angel. In an interview, he explained the reasoning. What viewers will find equally horrifying is the series’ principle “monster,” which isn’t really a monster, but rather an interpretation of Catholic “angels,” beings who populate Christian theology and play the part of messengers and henchmen-and, in the Book of Revelations, straight-up genocidal killers.įlanagan’s semi-twist: the angels themselves are somewhat monstrous. C’mon, you get to drink wine in Church, kids-don't ya wanna sign up? For Netflix viewers likely unfamiliar with the Catholic mass, it’s a newly-horrifying discovery and one unlikely to convert (many) people.
In Midnight Mass, a horror master and kid who definitely didn’t want to be at Sunday School-writer/director Mike Flanagan-delivers a twisted vampiric take on Catholic scripture, replete with guilt, judgement, and creatures literally devouring the body and blood of the Holy.įor those of us forcefully versed in Catholic teachings, the scripture’s metaphoric (?) cannibalism is, by now, a well-trodden joke.