In 1307 Paris, the Knights Templar are burned at the stake, purportedly for heresy. A convent in Paris is attacked by knights looking for the Holy Grail; it's revealed that the nuns are also Templars, and after a violent melee, all are killed, except for one of the Templars; the sole surviving Templar nun escapes with the Holy Grail. In 2023, an artificial intelligence, Mrs. Davis, is used by almost everyone, which has prevented war and famine. Simone, a nun who debunks magicians, works in a convent. Simone is repeatedly contacted by Mrs. Davis, but she refuses to speak with her, claiming that Mrs. Davis killed her father. Her convent is sold and all of the nuns are relocated; Simone is captured by German henchmen claiming to be at the direction of Mrs. Davis, but escapes when an old acquaintance, Wiley, arrives. Simone decides to confront Mrs. Davis, and goes to an elementary school, where she meets with a teacher who speaks on behalf of Mrs. Davis. Mrs. Davis requests that Simone find the Holy Grail and destroy it; in exchange, Mrs. Davis will delete herself.
2
"Zwei Sie Piel mit Seitung Sie Wirtschaftung"
Owen Harris
Tara Hernandez & Jason Lew
April 20, 2023 (2023-04-20)
As a child, Simone, (born Elizabeth), served as an audience plant for her parents' magic show. At home, her mother has been working on a secret project that causes tension between her parents. Simone breaks into the office one day to see what’s inside, only to be shot by a crossbow and taken to the hospital, where she meets Wiley. Presently, Simone reunites with Wiley, who leads a group fighting against Mrs. Davis. They claim people do tasks for Mrs. Davis to earn "wings", which are visual awards for recipients, while some even volunteer to be killed at a certain date to earn wings. They encourage Simone to work with Mrs. Davis to find the Holy Grail to learn more about what she wants. They confront the German attackers who chased Simone, and apparently kill one of them when they throw him off a building. Simone meets with Jay, her husband, who reveals that he has the location of the last woman, Clara, who may have known where the Holy Grail is. Simone and Wiley prepare to try and find her in London. It is revealed that the fight between Wiley's team and the Germans was all staged.
3
"A Baby with Wings, a Sad Boy with Wings and a Great Helmet"
7 years ago, Wiley and Simone planned to give away their family fortune and move to Alaska. However, Wiley discovers his life-saving liver transplant was staged, prompting him to enter a rodeo to prove himself. Elizabeth (Simone) prays for his safety and meets Jay in a restaurant. Wiley backs out of the rodeo. In the present, Simone and Wiley follow a man they called on a train to Scotland. Mrs. Davis reveals that Celeste, Simone's mother, is on the train,she thinks Simone is helping her dad hide his death. In Scotland, Wiley joins a contest to hold a giant Excalibur prop. Simone follows a woman she believes to be Clara but accidentally knocks out a banker named Mathilde during a ritual. Simone discovers Wiley has wings, leading to a fight. Wiley reveals he got the wings in exchange for his life. During the fight, Wiley curses the Jesus Simone's lover, and lightning strikes the Excalibur, injuring him. The priest from the train kidnaps Wiley in an ambulance.
7 years ago, Elizabeth, now Sister Simone, married Jay in a convent and changed her name. Presently, Simone is interrupted by Jay's dove, who tasks her with delivering a cake to the Pope in Rome. At the Vatican, Wiley is imprisoned and questioned by priest Hans Ziegler about the sneakers Simone gave him. Wiley encounters a man claiming to be Pope Leo XI, who says he was jailed for interacting with Mrs. Davis, while an imposter assumes his role. JQ, having staged Simone's kidnapping, tries to rescue Wiley but finds only a room full of similar sneakers. Simone, assisted by Mrs. Davis, procures the cake for the Pope but doubts her relationship with Jay when the baker reveals that many before her made the same request. Upset, Simone eats the cake herself and chokes, leading to a confrontation with Jay in a "vision." She wakes in the hospital, reconciles with Wiley, and learns that Jay's cake was an apology to the Pope. The Pope reveals a tape from Mrs. Davis showing a 1307 ad for sneakers with Clara, who blackmailed Ziegler, and a scene of her cradling the Grail.
5
"A Great Place to Drink to Gain Control of Your Drink"
The search for Clara and the Grail leads Simone and Wiley to an island where they meet Arthur Schrodinger (who had been rescued in episode one but has since returned to the island). Arthur tells them Clara's story: Clara was Mathilde's daughter who was inducted into the Sisters of the Coin, a secret order responsible for caring for the Grail, which they call, "the asset." One of the Sisterhood's duties is to show the Grail to 1% of the world every year. Given the population boom, Mathilde suggest the best way to do this is under the guise of a Super Bowl commercial; the shoes. Mathilde is dismayed when the sisterhood says she's too old to star in the commercial, and Clara is given the role instead. Mathilde makes shooting difficult for Clara, giving her unreasonable demands and forcing her to shoot numerous re-shoot. When Clara finally snaps, Mathilde tells Clara she's dying, and wants to make sure the sisterhood is taken care of. The shoot goes off without a hitch. However, it's revealed that the commercial won't be aired, earning Mathilde the scorn of the sisterhood. Clara also learns Mathilde lied about her illness. Realizing her mother doesn't love her, Clara spitefully steals the Grail and goes to Schrodinger (her father and a scientist) to destroy it. The pair try for ten years to no success. One day, Clara gets an idea. Perhaps the way to destroy the Grail is by violating the sisterhood's most sacred rule, "thou shalt not sip from the Asset." Clara drinks from the Grail, but doing so kills her. After Clara's death, Schrodinger hid the Grail by feeding it to a sperm whale. He theorized that the Grail was coated in a toxin, and observed that when his cat ate a mouse that died from drinking from Grail, his cat was unharmed and immune to the Grail's effects. Simone realizes that the liver she and Wiley received from their transplants as children was Clara's liver. They are possibly immune to the Grail's effects, and if they drank from it, it could destroy the Grail for good.
Three years earlier, Montgomery tricked Celeste and Simone into meeting him. He claims to have perfected a trick known as the, "Lazarus Shroud." Montgomery believes the access to Mrs. Davis is killing magic by revealing the secrets of magicians, and that the Lazarus Shroud will save it. He asks Celeste and Simone to attend his debut of the trick. Celeste refuses, but Simone agrees. Back in the present, Simone and Wiley see Celeste for the Lazarus Shroud, which Simone needs to protect herself in the whale's stomach while she retrieves the Grail. Celeste replays the day Montgomery debuted the Lazarus Shroud, which resulted in his death. She then goes on to explain how he might have survived the trick, continuing to believe Simone helped him fake his death. When Simone insists he's dead, Celeste refuses to give her the Shroud. Knowing her mother wouldn't cooperate, the visit was a ruse by Simone and the Resistance to case Celeste's office so they could steal the Shroud. While being transported back to Celeste's office under sedation, Simone flashes back to the day of her father's funeral. Grieving, she tried to have sex with Wiley. She then found Celeste having a breakdown on stage, insisting Montgomery wasn't dead. When Simone and Wiley wake up, they put their plan into action, only to find Celeste has been one step ahead of them, staging a fake office for her real office when they exited the couch's interior. Angry, Celeste shows Simone ATM photos of Montgomery, days after his death. Despondent, Simone goes to a diner to talk to Mrs. Davis. Mrs. Davis reveals that Celeste came to her with the photos, asking if Simone helped Montgomery. Mrs. Davis says she lied to Celeste and told her Simone was Montgomery's accomplice because she refused to believe the truth (similar to how Mrs. Davis lied to Simone about being responsible for Montgomery's death) because of her own sense of guilt for her crossbow trap injuring Simone when she was a child. Simone asks where her father is, but Mrs. Davis's proxy, visibly disturbed, refuses to answer, making Simone put in the ear piece and communicate with her directly. Simone goes back to Celeste and perpetuates the lie, saying she did help Montgomery fake his death. Celeste agrees to give Simone the Lazarus Shroud, only if she goes with her and only if they find Montgomery after getting the Grail. Celeste then says what gave them away was a tracking device in Wiley's shoe; planted there by Hans Ziegler. Hans Ziegler is shown returning to Mathilde and the Sisters of the Coin, revealing that their Grail is fake and that he knows exactly where the real one is.
Simone, Wiley, Schrodinger, and Celeste prepare to set off after the whale that ate the Grail. Before they leave, Simone handcuffs Wiley to a bench, worried that he'd try to go into the whale in her place. In the Restaurant, Jay begs Simone to abandon the quest, going so far as to command her, which she ignores. Mrs. Davis releases Wiley, telling him she knows about the Resistance. Mrs. Davis tells Wiley to keep fighting her, to expand and "franchise" the Resistance, needing someone to fight against. Wiley returns to the Resistance base and tells them his plans to expand. He privately tells JQ that Mrs. Davis is in their servers, and this is ruse to evacuate so they can destroy the base. Back at sea, Ziegler and Mathilde are pursuing Simone, only for their ship to be destroyed by the whale. Mathilde survives. Simone dons the Lazarus Shroud and is lowered into the sea, where she's eaten by the whale. While in the whale's stomach, Simone finds herself in the Restaurant again. This time, the locked door where Jay's "Boss" presides is unlocked. Instead of God, Jay's boss is his mother and Simone's Mother-in-Law, Mary. Mary tells Simone the full story. When Jay was crucified, Mary took a part of him out of selfishness, so she'd have a piece of her son to remember him by; the Grail is made out of Jay's skull. But doing so made the Restaurant. It is a limbo in which Jay is imprisoned between life and death. Mary explains that it's not Clara's liver that will protect Simone, it's her love for Jay. As Mary says, "selfishness made the Grail, only selflessness can destroy it." Simone realizes that once she destroys the Grail, she'll never see Jay again. Still out of reach, Simone breaks the tether to the Lazarus Shroud. She washes ashore with the Grail only to be confronted by a crowd of Mrs. Davis's users. Meanwhile, after destroying the Resistance base, Wiley goes to Mrs. Davis. He tells her he destroyed the base to set them free, so they couldn't play her game anymore. Then, he turns himself in for his expiration date.
8
"The Final Intercut: So I'm Your Horse"
Owen Harris
Story by : Nadra Widatalla & Chikira Bennett Teleplay by : Tara Hernandez & Damon Lindelof
May 18, 2023 (2023-05-18)
Simone finds Mrs. Davis's creator, a programmer named Joy. Joy tells Simone Mrs. Davis began as an app that eventually spiraled out of control. Meanwhile, Wiley reports for his expiration. Simone returns to her old convent with her Mother Superior. She goes to the restaurant one last time where she says a final goodbye to Jay before drinking from the Grail, which successfully destroys it. Wiley learns that the expiration date is a ruse created by Mrs. Davis to help people find the worth in their lives. Simone takes Celeste to see Montgomery; when he realized Mrs. Davis would keep giving the secret away, he worked with her instead to fake his death. He was meant to pop out of the piano being played at his funeral, but backed out when he saw how hurt Simone and Celeste were. Monty ended up accidentally dying in the piano. Simone has Celeste proxy for Mrs. Davis, through which she and Celeste are finally able to reconcile. Mrs. Davis honors her agreement and shuts herself off. Simone and Celeste watch as the world erupts into chaos. Wiley meets up with Simone and the two ride off into the sunset.
Production
Mrs. Davis was created by Damon Lindelof and Tara Hernandez at Warner Bros. Television, and the show received a 10-episode series order for Peacock. The pair would both co-write and executive produce, with Hernandez acting as showrunner. Susan Rovner had been developing the series with them at Warner Bros., and as new chair for NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, she out-bid other broadcasters and streamers to buy the show.[8]Owen Harris and Alethea Jones are executive producers and each directed multiple episodes.[6]
Filming was in progress in August 2022,[11] shooting primarily on the Warner Bros. lot or in a remote desert location to maintain secrecy.[5]
The international scenes were filmed in Spain: Sa Boadella beach in Lloret de Mar (Arthur Schrodinger's island), Cathedral in Girona (the execution of the Templars), Figueres Fortress (sword contest), Valencia (Shrodinger's ship in Cadiz) and Sant Pau Hospital in Barcelona (Shrodinger's university).[12][13][14]
Writers used AI to come up with episode titles.[15]
Teller (half of the comedy magic duo Penn & Teller) was a magic consultant for the series.[16]
In May 2023, it was reported that there were no plans for a second season.[17]
Release
The series had its world premiere at South by Southwest (SXSW) on March 11, 2023.[18][19][20] The series premiered on April 20, 2023, with the first four episodes available immediately and the rest of the remaining four debuting on a weekly basis.[3]
The series premiered with the first four episodes on April 24, 2023, on HBO Max outside the US where available.
The series premiered on Prime Video in Germany on 10th November 2023.
Reception
Critical response
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported an approval rating of 92% based on 59 reviews, with an average rating of 8.1/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "Positively bonkers while undergirded by an intelligent design, Mrs. Davis makes Betty Gilpin a hero for modern times in a highly imaginative mixture of spirituality and technology."[21]Metacritic gave the first season a weighted average score of 78 out of 100 based on 23 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[22]
The series was included in several mid-year lists of the best TV shows of 2023, such as IndieWire, Rolling Stone, Variety, and TheWrap.[23][24][25][26] Ben Travers of IndieWire wrote, "Mrs. Davis is made to entertain, first and foremost, and it's a highly enjoyable experience whether you engage with its deeper issues or not. Betty Gilpin is delightful. The larger ensemble matches her irresistible energy. The visuals are colorful and vast. The scripts are tight, the momentum unwavering, and the sheer joy palpable."[23]Rolling Stone's Alan Sepinwall said, "Mrs. Davis featured some of the crazier plot twists you will ever see, yet managed to be genuinely moving and thoughtful even in the middle of all its ridiculousness."[24] Alison Herman of Variety noted that the series "has the confidence and humor . . . to help the audience adjust to all the show throws at them, helped by a grounding performance from [Gilpin]. Whether or not you laugh at the final joke... you have to admire the show for making it, or getting made at all.[25]
