They are pretty pathetic people. There's local doctor Nat Sharp (Jeremy Renner), who has fallen into despair with alcoholism since his wife left him, and Lee Ross (Andrew Scott), a best-selling author and self-proclaimed recovering liberal whose shift to the right has led him to write an unreadable book about Weeks' life. Somewhat more sympathetic are Simone Vivane (Cailee Spaeny), a gifted cellist sidelined by chronic pain whose generous donations keep the church running, and Vera Draven (Kerry Washington), a nervous lawyer. The script's most cynical creation is Vera's adopted son, Cy (Daryl McCormack), a soulless opportunist who, having failed in Republican politics, now seeks social media fame. Weeks' most loyal ally is Our Lady's assigned church woman Martha Delacroix (an amusing Glenn Close), who knows where the notorious bodies are buried. (By the way, not far from the church there is a huge crypt, which emphasizes the Lazarus title of the film.)
A genuine ray of light emerges from this group: Father Jude Dupletisi (Josh O'Connor), a junior priest – “young, dumb and full of Christ,” in his own words – who has been sent to serve at Weeks' church. Overflowing with grace and mercy, Jude longs to embrace his congregation in their human brokenness, without judgment. Naturally, the monsignor immediately sees him as a threat and begins a brutal campaign of psychological warfare, repeatedly forcing Jud to listen to his confessions – in which Weeks describes his masturbation habits in sickening detail – and undermining the young priest's authority at every opportunity. Jud, a former boxer with a checkered history, has vowed never to punch in anger (again), but Weeks' intimidation tactics force him to break his fist. They also make Jud the prime suspect when the monsignor is fatally stabbed in the church, immediately after delivering a Good Friday sermon, in an alcove located out of sight of the congregation. Blanc soon arrives on the scene, eager to find out how Weeks could have been killed during the service by an assassin who appears to have walked right through the walls of the church. Unfortunately, no one calls the incident a massacre.
When the first Knives Out movie came out in 2019, it felt like a Hollywood revival—and sophisticated reworking—of a lost art of storytelling. It was an original plan for a murder in a country house, constructed with great care and ingenuity. Johnson sharpened these throwback pleasures by pairing them with sharp progressive politics: The film was a kind of Cinderella story, in which the kind, unassuming heroine (Ana de Armas) teams up with Blanc to solve a crime, and ultimately triumphs over her racist, classist, and filthy rich former employers. Johnson maintained the story's structure in his next Knives Out mystery, Glass Bow (2022), again pairing Blanc with a larger-than-life figure (Janelle Monáe) and launching, this time, an attack on billionaires and tech bros around the world. However, the joke was at least partly related to the film: by then, the burgeoning Knives Out franchise had been acquired by Netflix, a move that put Johnson's culture-destroying satire in a completely different light. Like most Netflix films, Glass Onion received only a token theatrical release and never had the chance to become a major big-screen hit comparable to the original Knives Out, which grossed over three hundred million dollars worldwide. (If the laugh still hasn't died down in your throat, Netflix appears poised to acquire Warner Bros., calling into question the direction of one of Hollywood's last major studios and its future theatrical releases.)
Wake Dead, which hits Netflix this week, directs its political ire at the unholy alliance of Christianity and the political right; the intolerance, exclusion and rampant misogyny ingrained in the church; and the terrifying speed with which today's disaffected clerics can become tomorrow's YouTube demagogues. By abandoning this satirical burden, the film does confirm a structural weakness of the Knives Out series: a painful lack of individual development among its supporting characters. With one or two exceptions, Weeks' congregation feels like little more than decorative; there is no real sense that suspicions rise and fall on each of them in turn. Most of them are sarcastic and harsh, petty and self-serving, and their scandalous accusations become monotonous, which at times suggests a not-so-generous deity in the director's chair.
