Unchosen Recap Episode 1: The Outsider

There was a scene in the first episode of Unchosen, a psychological thriller that started streaming on Netflix on April 21st, with Rosie and her young daughter Grace in a hospital room. Grace needed to be rushed to the hospital following a near drowning incident in the woods adjacent to the community of the Fellowship of the Divine. When Rosie asked Grace why she ran away, the kid explained that she was scared of the rapture. Rosie assured her daughter it was just a storm, not the rapture, and in any case, she ought not to worry about the rapture because they were the chosen ones. The nurse overheard all this, and hurriedly left the room. 

Unchosen indicated that there were over two thousand cults in the United Kingdom. The nurse’s reaction – mild curiosity, then a hurried not my problem exit – was probably how most people would react in a situation like that. At least outwardly, neither Rosie nor Grace were being abused. When the nurse called Rosie in to enter Grace’s room, she stopped Rosie’s husband Adam and the cult leader Mr. Phillips from entering as well. Giving mother and daughter time alone in the room was probably the best she could do. 

Within the community, however, the chains were more overt. Rosie was forbidden by Mr. Phillips from joining the search for the missing Grace because that was supposedly men’s work. Rosie disobeyed and went into the woods in the middle of the storm. It was she who found her daughter, though it was a stranger, a man we would later know to be Sam Devlin, who dove into the river and rescued Grace from drowning. 

Adam’s brother Isaac pulled out a cell phone to call an ambulance for Grace, a forbidden object in their closed community. Though Isaac handed Adam his phone to be destroyed, Adam still betrayed him and announced his sin to the whole community. Everyone turned their backs on him, except Rosie. Rosie later confronted Adam about his betrayal, and pointed out that Isaac used the cell phone to help their daughter. Adam snapped back that wives should submit to their husbands.

Rosie accepted Adam’s procreation focused advances, but she sneaked out early in the morning in search of the man who rescued her daughter. She left her necklace in the woods as a silent sign of her gratitude. When Sam showed up outside her house, asking for help, claiming he was in trouble and could not go to the hospital to get the wound on his hand patched up, a wound he claimed he got in the river, Rosie allowed him inside her house and treated him. When she later realised that Sam did not leave as she told him to, and refused to accept her offer of money, she hid him in a tiny barn in her backyard. She watched from her window as he cleaned up outside, shirtless. For a member of a cult intent on separating themselves from society, Rosie had her eyes on a stranger, an unchosen.

What Rosie did not know was that Sam was not exactly truthful to her. He was in trouble, that was true enough, because he escaped from prison whilst on day release at a local fish factory. The wound on his hand was not from rescuing Grace at the river. Another prisoner attacked him, and in the course of their violent fight, he was wounded, and he ended up killing his attacker. Sam’s escape from prison was in the local news; Rosie did not see because she was inside the room with Grace when the news report flashed in the hospital.

The first episode of Unchosen was more quiet than quietly compelling. I am encouraged to watch it because of the cast, especially Asa Butterfield whom I loved from the brilliant show Sex Education, and Molly Windsor, who is doing the heavy lifting as Rosie. Let’s see how the next episodes go. 

Rating: B

Strays

🏡Rosie was spotted by Mrs. Phillips returning to her house after her early morning trip to the woods. To demonstrate her repentance, Mrs. Phillips demanded the eggs Rosie and Grace gathered from their chickens.

🏡I remember watching Christopher Ecclestone as the Doctor in Doctor Who. I did not recognise him here as Mr. Phillips.

🏡As punishment, Isaac was locked in a room in his own house, with his family not permitted to speak to him. 

🏡Adam hinted that there were other transgressions, and if the community knew, Isaac would be disavowed.

Episode Writer: Julie Gearey

Episode Director: Jim Loach

Original Release Date: April 21, 2026

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