CAN A NUN CONQUER AI?
‘Mrs. Davis’ blends faith, free will and wild action
What TV shows are dominating the conversation, capturing the zeitgeist, have something interesting to say or are hidden gems waiting to be uncovered? We take a look ahead of your weekend watch.
Someday down the road, when computers have completely taken over our lives, we might look back wistfully on “Mrs. Davis” — that’s assuming the algorithm hasn’t wiped the TV show from the record.
The series from “Lost” mastermind Damon Lindelof and Tara Hernandez, a writer on “The Big Bang Theory” and “Young Sheldon,” couldn’t have come at a more perfect time. Just a month ago, tech bigwigs including Steve Wozniak and Elon Musk released a letter calling for an immediate pause in the work of artificial intelligence labs lest humanity lose control of the machines. Now comes this Peacock show that features a nun on a quest to bring down a particularly ubiquitous form of AI called Mrs. Davis.
Just to be clear, Lindelof and Hernandez started working on the series in the early days of the pandemic, long before alarming news reports about rogue ChatGPT conversations, deep fake Drake songs and faux fashion models.
But even if they had been shockingly prescient, the timing wouldn’t be worth a fig if the show wasn’t worth watching. And it is. It is also bonkers, but in a fun and absorbing way.
The AI here isn’t so much “Open the pod bay doors, Hal” — the computer run amok in “2001: A Space Odyssey” — as Alexa on steroids, if Alexa didn’t just tell you the weather and cue up your music but was programmed to erase war, famine and other human ills.
But Sister Simone, played by Betty Gilpin (“GLOW,” “Nurse Jackie”), has a deeply personal reason for mistrusting Mrs. D. She’s on a mission to destroy her, er, it, aided by her ex-boyfriend, an erstwhile rodeo cowboy named Wiley, played by Jake McDorman (“Greek,” “What We Do in the Shadows,” “The Right Stuff”).
Gilpin is marvellous in the role, achingly human even in the midst of the absurdity and, trust me, there is plenty here that’s absurd, not least that Simone is on a quest to find and destroy the Holy Grail.
It’s a quest that takes her to places as diverse as an “Excalibattle” waged on a giant sword in Scotland, the Vatican, an otherworldly falafel restaurant; an island where a castaway named Schroedinger (Ben Chaplin) lives with his cat; and the belly of a whale.
There’s also a delightful supporting cast, including Margo Martindale (“The Americans”) as the mother superior of Simone’s convent; Tom Wlaschiha (“Game of Thrones,” “Stranger Things”) as a nefarious priest; Chris Diamantopoulos (“Silicon Valley”) as Wiley’s perennially bare-chested righthand man; Elizabeth Marvel (“Homeland”) as Simone’s cold fish of a mother; and Andy McQueen (“Station Eleven”) as, well, I’m not going to tell you who because it’s better if you figure that out on your own.
The series is in part a commentary on faith and free will, and it’s not hard to see that a seemingly allpowerful algorithm and a seemingly all-powerful deity to whom people entrust their lives are two sides of the same coin.
Motherhood is also a key theme throughout the series and it’s no accident that the AI, no matter where it’s used in the world, is perceived as female.
But you don’t have to think deep thoughts to appreciate “Mrs. Davis.” You can just take it as the wacky, globe-trotting adventure series it is. And the good news for anyone still scratching their heads over “Lost” is that “Mrs. Davis” neatly ties up its loose ends and does so in a redemptive, emotional gem of a finale.
THE FIRST FIVE EPISODES OF “MRS. DAVIS” ARE STREAMING ON CRAVE, WITH NEW EPISODES EVERY THURSDAY ON CRAVE AND CTV SCI-FI CHANNEL. “CITADEL” DEBUTED FRIDAY ON PRIME VIDEO, WITH NEW EPISODES AVAILABLE EVERY FRIDAY.